MI has a soil conservation program ... with their own district offices .. and wind breaks are soil conservation ...

have you contacted your local district office???

contact your Ag or extension office to see if you have said resource .. wherever you may be ... you note z5 ... but that covers about half the US ...

many states also sell the plants... rather cheap.. at the appropriate planting time ..

ken

duh ... as to your question ... windbreak trees are usually planted so they DO interweave ... so i dont understand your premise ...

that said ... straight lines do not occur in nature... and are rather boring ... visually ... you seem to have the space... snake your line around ... be creative ...

also .. number one rule.. NEVER PLANT ALL OF ONE THING.. you would be much better off planting a variety of plants ... just in case that once in a life time plague rolls thru ....

ken

Nebraska. I already have 30 trees for this year to start with. Ordered some 2-3' B.R..

I am likely going to plant 30 Auss Willows on my easement and then remove those 10 years from now after the Spruce are taller. (Or before if the easement is ever needed....only house out here) I will have American Cranberry (viburnum) closer to my house along with Vine Maples to make a more appealing windbreak that serves for the green season and then those will just be branches in the winter.

Pines are having a hard time in this area. Lot of blight and winter die back from dryness. I was considering planting the Spruce as my primary row next to my easement (Not on it) and then Austrian Pine for the second row closer to the house area. For my original question, does 18' seem fine then for the total permanent spacing? Norway Spruce are supposed to be a hardy and fairly resistant to disease (knock on wood) as opposed to other evergreen that grow at similar rates (2-3' a year)

I agree a row may be boring, but I do find a perfect row of trees to look tidy. I will have plenty of deciduous trees, and shrubs to break up the area. At least a straight row of Spruce will look better than a straight row of cedar or arborvitae ;)

Actually, a row or windbreak of just one (good) species does not look boring, it looks impressive. Ken is warning against failure of that one tree type, not expressing an aesthetic judgment. For my part, diversity is a community-wide issue, not one which comes into play within the confines of a single windbreak.

+oM

actually .. all i was doing.. was trying to get him to think outside the box he is in ... and he has .. now ...

whatever.. and however he ends up doing it.. makes no difference to me ...

i just dont want him tracking me down in 20 years and saying.. why didnt you mention.. such and such ...

ken

I understand to diversify. Would you agree pine is a good secondary break? And is my 18' spacing decent for the Norway?

you already know pines are a problem in your area ... where you going with that???

i answered your spacing issue in my second reply ... first sentence ...

but i will try again ... these are hardcoe telephone pole trees.. given decades.. unless you put them 100 feet apart .. they will grow together ... see this link

https://www.google.com/search?q=norway+spruce+forest&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=wyVOVaS2MomXsAWA2YDACQ&ved=0CAcQ_AUoAQ&biw=898&bih=745&dpr=0.9

after understand that ... there is an usual annual growth rate ... and you can easily mutliply years with that .. they will never stop growing ...

and when all is said and done.. its up to your vision.. your aesthetic.. as to how far apart to plant them ... to perfect your vision ...


take a look at the link below .. all kinds of variations on a theme ... besides Picea .. and pine.. there would be concolor ... abies ... etc [though i dont know which are suited to NE] ... it might help your searches.. if you started using latin names ...

ken

https://www.musserforests.com/

ps: take a look at some of the links here.. and see what nebraska might suggest for options ...

https://www.google.com/search?q=nebraska+soil+conservation&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8


and at this link..scroll down to NE ... i did find they had plant sales.. which you missed for this spring ... but i couldnt find a list of what they sell .. as i would presume they sell things that will grow well in NE ...

http://www.nrcs.usda.gov/wps/portal/nrcs/detail/national/people/?cid=nrcs143_022002

I decided to go with 20' spacing since I hope to own this property for a long time. My plan is to plant them every 10' and then take every other out either by cutting them down or transplanting. Probably easier to just cut them down since transplanting would cost money and may be tough to get into them. I will then have another row on the inside. Say maybe 14-16' back that will form a zig-zag pattern. So technically each tree will have 20' all around diameter.