Hello,

I decided to plant new trees a few weeks ago and probably couldn't have chosen the worse time now that heat is picking up here in the Antelope Valley High Desert area - California.

One tree is not looking so good, maybe I didn't plant it correctly and when I cut the sides of root ball to promote them to stop growing in container I may have been too rough.

The bottom portion of the trunk is not looking so good, I don't know if normal. I'm a total noob to planting trees and just saw a few youtube videos and took a shot.

Please see pictures below:

Hi and welcome. Yes, it's possibly the worst time to plant especially with your current heat wave.

About the only thing you can do is rig some shade for the trees - a piece of shade cloth supported on a PVC frame or something like that? Then go out at least twice a day and mist the trees, plus you should be watering deeply every day anyway. Keep this up until you see the needles perking up, and then gradually phase out the misting but keep up the watering daily until you see active new growth. This will mean that the tree is growing new roots as well.

Whoever sold you those plants should have advised you to wait on planting them until fall.

Good luck, and here's hoping the hot, hot weather will abate soon!