when i moved....and it was to a WAY different location: from utah to the
willamette valley in oregon, i hired one of those small U-HAUL trailers and
hitched it to my station wagon (one of those queen elizabeth II ships). it
wasn't so much the move as the new owner of the house informing me she was
going to have EVERYTHING i'd lovingly planted and replaced with grass (i
wish i could have seen her face when the drought hit utah for 7 years!!!) i
dug up almost everything and put them in those cheap black pots you get from
nurseries....i even dug up my spearmint and a 5 yr. old Fagus sylvatica
'tricolour'---EVERYTHING survived their trip beautifully...but then again, i
moved during a warm season so they wouldn't be damaged in trips over the
mountains.
i checked on them each night when i stopped and talked to them and made sure
they were feeling okay and not traumatised.

and, when, finally, we pulled up to our new home in the armpit of central
oregon (philomath-no evil letters, please...it REALLY IS the armpit of
central oregon!!!!!!), everybody was happy but more than ready to be
planted, which i did, even before checking out the house or moving my own
stuff in. the plants, after all, were more important than my own stuff,
IMHO.

one thing, callen, you MUST check before planting your babies.....is the
WATER SUPPLY!! the person who sold me that little piece of hell on earth
sold me a property with water which had such a HIGH content of sodium, it
killed EVERYTHING i'd brought with me, inside AND outside the house. it's
not good to be a gullible and trusting person (such as i); when i had seen
the house on my "scouting trip," the water had been mysteriously turned off
because, i was told by the owner, "my son turned it off to fix the plumbing
under the kitchen sink and the toilet in the master bathroom, both of which
were leaking."
stupid me!!! i believed it.

so, PLEASE...check out EVERY ASPECT of your plants' new home....make sure
EVERY LITTLE THING is in its place and will be good for the
babies.....otherwise, you could end up like me---5 acres of DEAD PLANTS.

and YES!!! i DID knock my head against the walls for MONTHS AFTERWARD!! i,
personally, was responsible for killing all my babies. (VERY BIG SNIFF)
--
With Malus toward none, and Cherry-Trees toward all.


From: "Callen Molenda"
Organization: University of Virginia
Newsgroups: rec.gardens
Date: Wed, 15 Mar 2006 14:50:31 -0500
Subject: I have to move! :-(

Well, my stepfather just informed me that he is selling the family farm,
where we've lived for years. Forget figuring how I'm going to deal with all
the four-legged beasties, what am I going to do with my PLANTS????

I refuse to leave all my beautiful acquisitions, many with personal memories
of the long-gone friends who gave them to me, to the attentions of a new
owner. I don't know when I am going to move, and I'm concerned about doing
it in a way that will least traumatize my plants. My gardens are huge so
there is no way I intend to move everything, but some of everything is what
I'm aiming for.

Can anyone recommend a comprehensive site for determining the best way to
approach moving my stuff? I have everything from grasses to small trees to
rosebushes to euphorbias, and I need to get some sense of how to handle
their respective moves, depending on what time of year this occurs. Does
this make sense?

Oh, and I'll remain in the same zone.

Any input would be appreciated.

Callen in VA