Sandy Beotches wrote:
off the $%#&* paper mulberries, if I can 'cheat' and get 'new' mature
trees a few years earlier, it's worth the extra bux. Our acre doesn't

You might consider that more often than not, you really don't get those
"few years" if you buy a larger tree. Large trees tend to suffer a worse
transplant shock and take a year or two to recover. Whereas smaller trees
get going right away.
Two years ago (or was it three?) we planted one 5 gallon lacey oak and one
1 gallon at the same time. The 1 gallon went from being a rather puny 3' twig
to being a beautiful young tree about 6 feet tall. The 5 gallon hasn't grown
more than a few inches and is now shorter than the other tree.

As usual, YMMV.

--
Victor M. Martinez

http://www.che.utexas.edu/~martiv