Private Plantation Techniques

Omer Lutfu ^orbaci1 and Murat Ertekin2

1Ankara University, Faculty of Agriculture 2Bartin University, Faculty of Forestry

Turkey

1. Introduction

The visual value of a town increases directly proportional to the density of her open and green spaces. Vertically and horizontally formed greenery is an indispensable part of urban design. However, with the advanced technology during the 20 th century, wide construction areas, highways, agricultural and industrial zones have developed in an unplanned manner, and natural resources were abused in an unsystematic way. Unfortunately, the number of natural elements in towns has decreased rapidly in recent years, and with the help of uncoordinated urbanization, the situation has turned for the worse for green areas. If we were to analyze this fact with figures, the example of Ankara, Turkey would prove to be more than enough. In physiological terms, according to oxygen exchange and leaf surface calculation, there is a theoretical need of 25-40 m2 green area per person in an urban area. But in Ankara, this figure was 5.1 m2 in 1950, 2.8 m2 in 1965, and 1.8 m2 in 1979. However, the urgency of the matter has been realized during recent years, and inner urban greenery works have been started.

Improving the environmental conditions of the indoor and outdoor places where humans live, and also to arrange them to become suitable for living, has become a foremost priority. Today, extreme urbanization has become ever fast growing, and inner urban tree planting techniques are changing and improving accordingly too. Nowadays, it is necessary to make use of all new developments in technology and find ways to meet the ever increasing demands of modern life.

The first time when large plants were uprooted and transferred to somewhere else was during the Munich Olympic games in Germany. Back then, a whole new Olympic village was created with immense greenery. At that time, this transplantation process was realized with much more labour force and time, also simpler techniques were used. However, the same could be done today with much time effort and time spent, through the use of modern techniques. A very important aspect of landscaping works is the time needed until it reaches an effective power, or in other words, the dimension of time. Trees and landscaping elements need on average 30-40 years to reach an effective power in terms of physics, visual, climactic etc. aspects. Therefore, it is very important to foresee the needs of the future, and do the landscaping planning accordingly. This is a difficult and compulsory responsibility to do. However when a planning is done, people of today believe that reaching a necessary green area needs to be done as rapidly as other advancements.

Through the transplantation works done with this purpose, the inner urban areas to be planted become green very rapidly, compared to the years spent on planting seeds.

Due to industrialization and domestic immigration during the last thirty five years, Turkey has entered a fast urbanization phase and as a result of this, modern people have lost their opportunity to live in a natural environment. Therefore, they try to fill this gap by planting within as much as possible. Tree planting in urban areas is a very new application in Turkey. As well as transplantation works with simple tools, a machine for tree planting and uprooting is also used for the last few years.

Giving a short explanation on the meaning of the term "transplantation" would be useful in preventing any confusion on the meaning. The term transplantation is used in some departments of science in such a degree that it has become a cliche. For example, the term "transplantation" in medical literature means the transplantation of any organ from a person to another person, where all physical, biological and technical conditions are suitable. When an organ transplantation is to be carried out, high importance is paid for the organ of the donor to be transplanted to match certain criteria of the receiver, such as biological structure, physical conditions etc, which is important for the receiver to maintain his life healthily. And the term "transplantation” used in landscaping architecture means the re­planting of a plant from one place to another. However, it would not be right to use the term "transplantation" for all types of plants. Just like in medical terminology, the term "transplantation" in landscaping architecture does not mean the transfers of plants at an early age, but at their more mature periods. Again similar to other branches of science, transplantation process here; is a process which is realized in line with certain steps and in consideration of some basic principles, and in line with the necessary technical conditions.

Just like in all other landscaping applications, tree transplantation works also require a controlled monitoring during all phases and meticulous and well arranged implementation principles. In generally, trees and shrubs are transplanted when purchased or planted. These plants often grown in the field, and harvested in the form of bare-root, balled and burlapped (ball of soil and roots wrapped in burlap), or containerized. In nursery, trees and shrubs are often grown using cultural practices, such as root pruning, to prepare them for harvesting and transporting to the sales area. Nursery plants may have 75% of their root system intact after they are dug, nevertheless wild plants may only have 25% or less of their root system intact. When woody plants in the landscape are transplanting, they are exposed to stress because of any of the special procedures used in nurseries before the transplanting day. The increased stress on plants can make the difference between an attractive or healthy. Nursery stock grown in containers is often much more tolerant to transplanting than field – grown or wild grown plants (Anonymous, 2012 a).

Updated: October 17, 2015 — 12:03 pm