How to Plant a Tree: The Hole You Dig Decides the Next 50 Years
Wide and shallow, never deep. Find the root flare. Backfill native soil only. Water like you mean it. The five things planting wrong gets right.
Dig the hole two to three times wider than the root ball and no deeper. Find the root flare (the woody trunk-meets-root point) and set it at or just above soil level. Backfill with the native soil you dug out — no compost, no peat, no fertilizer. Water deeply (15–25 gallons) at planting and weekly through the first three growing seasons. Mulch a ring; never volcano the trunk.
Why most tree plantings fail at year five
The two leading causes of tree death in the first decade are planting too deep and never watering past the second summer. Both look fine at year one. A tree planted with its root flare buried decays slowly at the buried bark; a tree never watered after the planting year stops expanding its root system and is unable to draw water during the first drought of year three or four.