It's important to keep the roots moist at all times. You can plant a plant with wet roots in dry soil, but you need to be focused on what you're doing and water as soon as the soil is settled around the roots. It's very simple with small trees. If you're working with larger root masses, you can use a chopstick to help settle the soil around the roots and work it into nooks/crannies as you add it. If this gets to be too time consuming and you think there's danger of roots drying out, use a spritzer to prevent that from happening. That's about it. Wait 1-2 weeks & then start fertilizing with a fertilizer with a 3:1:2 NPK RATIO (ratio is different from NPK %s - ask if you don't understand).

Al

Thanks! That's just what I needed to know.