CONTROLLING EROSION

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If the ground is rocky, however, you might strip the bark too badly by pounding, so you must first prepare a hole — much the same idea as drilling a pilot hole for a screw. For smaller stakes, you can pound a digging bar or even a crowbar into the ground, wiggle it around a bit, pull it out, and insert the cutting. For really big cuttings, you may have to start the hole with a shovel or a posthole digger (if you've got one), then use the digging bar after you're a foot or so down.

The ground at the bottom of the hole should be moist, wet, or even flooded. If you are planting in winter or spring, remember that the water table is probably much higher than it will be later in the year, so dig deeper than you think is necessary.

Pounding the cutting in. This step is a mind-boggier. l would definitely recommend it as therapy to those "nature lovers" who tippy-toe across lawns, who cannot bear to see a tree pruned, and who otherwise insist that plants are very fragile, delicate pieces of creation. You take your carefully shaped cutting, insert its pointed end into your carefully made hole, and just pound the hell out of it. A heavy wooden mallet is the best tool. Or have someone hold a piece of wood on the flat head of the stake while you pound away with a sledgehammer. The idea is to knock the stake deeply into the ground without splitting the top too much. Split stakes grow, but they tend to dry fast, rot, or (if they live very long) develop badly.

The cutting should have at least half its length under ground, and even two-thirds or more of its length can be buried. If you don't plant it deep enough, there will be too much leaf and too little root.

Browsing. Cattle are notorious for browsing young willows. They'll desert a pile of hay, a bed of straw, the shade of an oak tree, or a field of alfalfa and come running whenever they see a young willow. If there are cattle present, you'll have to fence off the planting.

Wildlife browsing should not be too severe, unless you happen to have an overabundance of hungry deer at the end of a long, hard winter. If this is the case, you'd be best off planting bigger, taller, thicker cuttings, which are less tasty and which can withstand browsing somewhat better.

Have faith. The first time I planted willows, I felt unutterably depressed. After a full, hard day's work, I stood there with a group of kids looking at what we had done. It was a weird, desolate scene. Everywhere around us we saw dead-looking sticks pounded into the ground. It reminded me of an empty drive-in theater, or a municipal parking lot with hundreds of parking meters all over the place. We were all very tired, cold, and discouraged. The kids kept asking me if I thought these stakes would grow, and I said, "Of course" — but only because that was what I was expected to say.

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