My daughter was given an elm sapling, it’s very special to her.
Unfortunately elm trees can get very large, and the only suitable place to plant it is close to a concrete path. Internet advice™ was twofold:
- Put in a root barrier, and
- Water the plant from the other side, with subsurface irrigation.
DripWorks make some great-looking watering stakes – the idea is you put water in the top, and it sends it directly to the the roots.
Unfortunately, they don’t seem to be available in Europe.
My plumber had left behind a piece of heavy-duty plastic/aluminium pipe. Perfect… oh wait, the blunt end won’t go into the ground so easily.
One cartoonish 3d-printed screw tip, and some work on the drill press, voila!
It won’t win any beauty contests, but it looks viable.
And here it is, installed:
The section without holes will provide some extra head pressure, to help push the water into the ground.
We’ll see how well it works!