Mulch to help keep the weeds down.

I build chicken wire fences to keep the critters away.

Neat project. Post some pics.

Last spring I planted a small red maple in the back yard. It was about 6" tall. I read about using Grow Tubes for seedlings and thought it sounded like a good idea, but for one tree, I didn't want to spend time & money ordering one online. So I made one from some 2 liter bottles and a short ventilated tree protector.

I had a different maple seedling, even larger, that was eaten off by a rabbit the year before so I knew it would be fruitless to plant this one 'naked' out in the yard.

This is what the tree looked like last fall. I'd say it grew a good 4 feet in one summer. Nothing but rain water from the barrel, mulched around it and a nice warm summer. :)

The tree grew as a single leader until it exited the tube and I was going to extend the tube but the tree got ahead of me so I just trained it as a single leader for the time being.

It's best if the plastic is translucent and imperative that it is well ventilated and it needs to be staked in for stability. I added some hardware mesh last fall to protect the top from the occasional deer we get passing through in the winter/spring.

In suburbia, I use a tomato cage just to help with lanmowing. In larger area where you'd have deer, rabbits, etc- as was suggested with a wire circle.

Dollar Tree waste baskets.

3 inches is rather small to set out. Another year in a pot might have been a good idea.

i would have probably left a 3 inches.. in the pot.. until fall .. when it hopefully would have been a foot tall ... then i would have gone towards bills method ...

i think you should probably repot it .... and plant a few more this spring ...

ken

Pots are difficult to deal with. They heat up, freeze, drain, retain water and generally require my attention.

There is a whole forest across the street where seeds grew in the ground.

he already made it thru winter toro ... i was talking about for this summer ... ken

Pots are hard to manage. They warm up, stop, deplete, hold water and by and large require my consideration.

There is an entire backwoods over the road where seeds developed in the ground.

I use tree tubes, but I just don"t plant one tree. IMO, they work great. Planted a seedling sawtooth oak last winter, put 4ft tree tube over it, this past fall it was two inches from the top. 1 of 10. Very thin, but tall. I keep tubes on for as long as I feel deer wont kill them by their rubbing.

'There is a whole forest across the street where seeds grew in the ground.'

Just to add: The tree in my picture wasn't a "first year" from seed, it was a woods dug, about a foot tall, from the fall before. I potted it for the winter, then last spring, noticed that the top half had froze off. So it probably was a little ahead of the OP's 3 incher.

But, with a good Tube set up, the little tree will be well protected, getting only indirect sun through the plastic. Which is plenty for a tiny tree. So if you keep it evenly moist (not drowned but not drought stressed) you may be surprise how well it does.

'IMO, they work great' Ditto. :-)

I've occasionally had insects snip off small plants so nothing is guaranteed but with a whole summer ahead of me, I'd go for a ground planting as opposed to a pot any day. Just make sure you are past last frost or at least protect the plant if it does freeze hard, yet this spring.

Maples produce a lot of seed and In the wild 'a whole forest' of seedlings may well occur. But most of them will not survive to maturity. The OP only has a single seedling so it needs much closer protection than a mass of wild seedlings.

As floral mentioned above, I use an old wire cage type of hanging basket upside down to protect small seedlings or rooted cuttings. If they are rusted, all the better as they disappear to the eye. Pin them down with two stakes and Bob's your uncle.

tj

Chicken wire (hardware cloth, etc), one or more stakes, and a pair of snips can provide some pretty flexible solutions where the temporary appearance is not a concern. Cut it to the desired circumference, lace a stake through the overlapped ends, and bend any sharp ends towards the inside. Lace additional stakes through the mesh as needed for greater stability. You can add a lid where needed for short plants. Here's what we've done to prevent damage from the chewing of an omnivore puppy and impact from rambunctious dog visitors: