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How to Plant a Dogwood Tree on the Corner to Make Your House Look Wider

Landscaping around your house can make it look more attractive, and trees are among the most impressive and useful landscape elements. If you’d like your house to appear wider, plant a tree near its corner, then choosing a variety that is not overly tall but has a broad canopy. A dogwood (Cornus spp.) Is a great illustration of the type of tree, with a mature height of 15 to 30 feet and a spreading form that can reach 30 feet wide. Spending a while selecting the website and giving the tree some extra care following planting can help ensure a fantastic result.

Choose the Best Spot

Two kinds of dogwoods work especially well as landscape trees: the common flowering dogwood (Cornus florida), which has white flowers in early spring before leaves appear, and also the Korean or kousa dogwood (Cornus kousa), which flowers later in spring, following leaves are about the tree. These trees grow in U.S. Department of Agriculture plant hardiness zones 5 through 9 and 5 through 8, respectively. Both do best in a place that gets partial shade — they require sunlight to promote flowering, but also much sunlight creates a more upright, less spreading tree. Depending on how your house is situated, pick a corner that gets morning sun and afternoon shade, including a corner with an eastern or northeastern exposure. If that is not an option, a south- or west-facing site that is shaded in the day by larger trees or another building can also work.

Give It Enough Space

When choosing the exact website for a dogwood, take a careful measurement in your house to give the tree enough space to spread. A well-developed, adult dogwood tree includes a vaselike type, with branches that spread out gracefully from the middle of the tree. Whether you choose a common dogwood or a kousa dogwood, dig the planting hole at least 15 feet away in the house, so the tree can finally reach its full width, then maximizing its ability to make your house look wider. When there’s already a boundary around the corner of your residence, extend it out to surround the new planting area, because this helps visually integrate the tree to the landscape surrounding your house.

Plant It Always

If your dogwood is balled, dig a hole twice as wide as the root ball; to get a bare root tree, then make the hole twice as wide as the cluster of roots. Set the tree approximately 2 inches higher in the hole than it had been formerly, to allow for a small amount of settling following planting. Place the tree in the hole, then untie and fold back any burlap that is on it, and backfill the hole with topsoil, tamping the dirt as you go. Water the tree when the hole is one-half full and when it’s been filled. Once the water drains off, tamp the dirt well and add more, if needed. If the website is sloped, it’s a fantastic idea to use additional dirt to construct a level “saucer” around the disturbed region, to slow runoff of mud under the tree, giving it time to soak in.

Give It Unique Care

Once the dogwood is implanted, keep it well watered to minimize transplant shock. During dry spells, water the tree, aiming to get approximately 1 inch of water per week, including rain. It is best to water gradually to minimize runoff and allow water to penetrate the dirt — with a soaker hose or drip irrigation can help achieve this. Insert a 3- to 4-inch thick layer of organic mulch to the soil below the tree’s canopy to help conserve soil moisture and suppress weeds, but keep it at least 6 inches away from the back of the tree to stop fungal problems. The new tree needs no added fertilizer.

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