Tubed seedling in deep peat plough furrow
The photograph is courtesy of the family of George Dey. George took many forestry photographs in his forestry career and many are now shown on this web site. Check under ‘Groups’ and George Dey Collection.
This sequence of shots (some in the PDF) shows someone pulling out a planted tubed Lodgepole pine seedling. The seed was grown by the nursery in its little tube filled with growing mixture and when about 8 weeks old (perhaps more) the little trees, complete with tubes, were planted into the peat. The tubes made of plastic had a slit up the side which opened up as the tree grew.
It was a very convenient way of quickly growing trees for planting, planting could carried out in summer time when normal bare root planting had finished and the job could be accomplished quite quickly. Disadvantages included susceptibility to browsing damage (one bite and gone), in summer peat could dry out and leave the tubes open and trees very likely to die, sizable growth was slow to start and weed growth could overtake the small plants and it seemed the roots could be deformed a bit by the tubes but not as serious as the effect of single furrow ploughing.