Large Scale Central

Alberta Spruces- HARD to find?

I’ve always found Alberta Spruces at Walmart, Menards, Home Depot, etc…BUT NOT this year. Zero! Anyone finding that in their area? I lost 4-5 over the winter and was looking for replacements, although I do find I like the open look also.

All of my local DIY centers have sold out.
They all had racks of them for one-week, everything sold, I managed to buy (4) for my own layout.
Everyone had them priced from $8-10 each on the small pot sizes and they just vanished!
We seen them on a Sunday, I waited until the next Friday (5-freaking days) to grab some when I got paid, all I found was the (4).
With them so cheap I think all of the local landscape companies and nurseries grabbed them all.

I don’t visit the garden centers often because the plants have a habit of reaching out and grabbing my credit card. That wouldn’t be so bad if I had any place left to plant that got reasonable sun.

When I have gone I’ve looked, but not seen any. Arborvitaes still seem to be in good supply, I like them as well as the Spruces. When trimmed up from the bottom, thinned and rounded a bit at the top they make a good stand in for a deciduous tree - especially in the background of photos.

Yeah, I like the Arbovitae also, have several. Had good luck trimming down boxwood and junipers. Just have to look for the ones with thicker trunk stems.

Jerry and all,

Found mine at Lowes for $7.00. Small size but great for my needs. They still have a good supply as of yesterday.This is in Eastern Maryland. I lost some English Ivy and minor damage to my Holly trees this winter. Lucky I guess.

Noel

I think this is a regional thing. They are probably around but are popular and sell out quick.

I thought I lost all of my Boxwoods this winter due to burn. Some I cut back and others I never got to. Last week I noticed they all had new growth on almost all of the branches - I just have to clip off the dead leaves. I’ve never really been happy with the Boxwoods - I guess I just don’t know how to keep them pruned. They look spindly to me - so I stopped buying them.

Jon and all,
I am finding Alberta Spruce everywhere in S. Illinois, no problem, and they are still running about $7.00. We am trimming ours down by 6-12 inches in many cases this year, so we’ll see how that goes. Come out in the fall and you can see if any survive - see, you are needed!

We found more-than-usual damage to the boxwoods this winter too, aa we trim the layout getting ready for the second ops session. Looks like freezer-burn, with light yellow leaves. We am able to cut out the damage ok. Jan Golding’s trick on the boxwood is to take the powered hedge trimmer to get a nice ball shape, then trim up the stem as needed with clippers. I’ve asked Andy to get me one of those since I am looking at over 60 boxwoods on the layout now.

We believe we lost the crepe myrtle shrubs that we trim into trees. At least we have shoots coming from a good root to start them over.

Jane

I keep my boxwoods trimmed the same way. I also trim my spirea and the weeds with the lectric hedge trimmer. My Dwarf Alberta are doing fine, in fact they are doing a bit too well. I need to figure out how to thin them out a bit.

My neighbor has an Alberta Spruce. It is now around 8 feet tall and still growing ! I like the “Jeans Dilly”. Mine are about 13" tall and around 9" in diameter after 15 years on the railroad without any trimming … ever.

Del Tapparo said:

My neighbor has an Alberta Spruce. It is now around 8 feet tall and still growing ! I like the “Jeans Dilly”. Mine are about 13" tall and around 9" in diameter after 15 years on the railroad without any trimming … ever.

The “Jeans Dilly” variety are a lot harder to find and are a slower growing sub species of Alberta Spruce. and not many garden centers carry it. If I find one I usually grab it. I have a couple, 2 are about 8" tall and one that the rabbits got too, about 3" tall. But it has new growth on it, so it looks like it’ll make it.

I have found a garden center down in Delaware that usually carries them for the Bonsai crowd, plus a lot of other “Dwarf” stock, but getting there while they still have them is the trick.

Some finally showed up at home depot in GI the end of July. I picked some up when I was in Grand Island for a VA appt.

Our local Lowes also just received a bunch in, this time I bought most of them!
Picked up 30 of them!

Our local Lowes has been getting them in often. bought about 20 this year.

Vincent D’Agostino said:
Our local Lowes also just received a bunch in, this time I bought most of them! Picked up 30 of them!

Now I know which Lowes Not to go to. :slight_smile:
Dennis

I grabbed all of mine at the one on Rt5 Dennis, have not checked te Rt2 location.
But I bought all I could afford for this planting season!

Dwarf spruces and boxwoods have been very rare at the stores I’ve been to this year. When I did see the spruces, they wanted twice what they’ve wanted for them in previous years for the same size plant. The boxwoods–on the rare occasion I saw them–were the same price ($7), but the size of a softball, not volleyball sized as I’ve gotten in years past. Fortunately I didn’t need to replace many plants this year, so the lack of product didn’t affect me much. I’m also trying some yews as they tend to be a bit more shade-tolerant.

Later,

K

I’ve had reasonable success at growing cuttings from the Alberta Spruce, which is how the nursery does it.

Steve Featherkile said:

I’ve had reasonable success at growing cuttings from the Alberta Spruce, which is how the nursery does it.

How about an article with pics??

OK, I’ll work on it. Be patient.

Yea Steve, that could save us a lot of money. Especially since many of us prune our spruces anyway. It would be nice to do something useful with the cuttings.