Trees failing to grow

[JDgreen]

About 30 years ago when my dad was living on our place, he dug up and transplanted many trees from the woods a half mile back. Most of them are sugar maples or sycamores, and all but two failed to gain in size. One of the sugar maples he transplanted was about the diameter of a soup can when he transplanted it, and today, 30 years later, the fattest part of the trunk is not much larger than a 2-liter soda bottle, and the height has gone from 6 feet to maybe 15. Several other trees of the same size and type planted at the same time have trunks the thickness of a telephone pole and have grown to 25-28 feet or more.

It baffles me why there is so much disparity, because the soil and growing conditions are basically identical for the trees. My dad did buy one mountain ash from a gardening supply center, but it too failed to grow worth a darn. When that one was about 7 feet tall, I dug up part of the root ball. Learned that when my dad planted it, he left the burlap and the wire caging tightly wrapped around the root ball, and although I removed those in the hope of helping the tree send out roots, it never grew much afterwards.

Does anyone have any input on this? Thanks.

 

[RobertBrown]

Good move on your dad's part, planting native trees, makes a lot of sense....
That is puzzeling. I really have no idea but I might speculate.....
Are you sure that the land surrounding your house was wooded and cleared before the house was built, perhaps there was never trees in that soil.
Perhaps because you don't have near the organic matter that is surrounding the trees in the wooded area that provides nutrients.
Perhaps there is a soil deposit that restricts moisture or nutrients to the roots, that does not occur in the wooded area(hard pan).
I'm 2000 miles away in completely different growing zone, so take it for what it's worth JD.

 

[mystreba]

Are you fertilizing your lawn (or other neighboring plants/beds)? Grass and trees have VERY different needs, and I've often heard it said "beautiful lawn, or trees - pick one". Meaning that if you fertilize for a beautiful lawn, your trees will not do well.

Also, what does the ground-contact look like? Is the earth mounded around the trunk? This could be suffocating the tree or draining moisture away from it. Are the roots visible on the surface of the lawn? This would indicate there isn't enough water retention in the ground for healthy root growth.