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We're in the sweet spot!
Schedule your fall planting today!
By Chris Leinster - September 23, 2025
It was a brutally hot summer with wildfire smoke blanketing the Front Range for much of July and August. While Happy Trees planted nearly every day with extraordinary success, cooler temperatures and natural precipitation provide better conditions for planting trees. If you were waiting for Fall to get trees in the ground, Fall has arrived and now is a great time to plant!
Trees can only be successfully harvested while the trees are dormant, usually in February and March, and again in September, October, and November. Every tree that was sold over the summer months was dug in late winter/ early spring. True, supplies for many trees are somewhat or totally depleted by this time of year, but most wholesalers anticipate this and order quantities of the most popular trees sufficient to meet fall demand.
If you’re looking for Maple, Autumn Blaze remains one of the best sellers around the region. While Autumn Blaze is a perfectly acceptable tree for Colorado, they are exhibiting summer stress from sitting in the nursery through the heat of summer. This manifests by turning early fall color, and sun-scorched leaf margins. The trees will recover beautifully if planted in your yard, but more resilient varieties of maple with very similar characteristics are coming online in recent years. It should be noted that Autumn Blaze is the only variety that is seedless, so I still recommend them if this is important to you.
Consider Redpointe Maple, virtually the same as Autumn Blaze, but with a more uniform branch structure, a dominant central leader, and better adapted to deal with our drought and alkaline soil. While I do observe some summer stress, they are faring much better than their AB cousins at the end of the season. Also noteworthy, Fall Fiesta Maple is a magnificent choice for our harsh environment. Still a quick maturing overstory shade tree, Fall Fiesta exhibits a diverse display of Red-Orange-Yellow fall foliage. If you need a more bomb proof plant for exposed sites or urban areas, State Street Maple is tough to beat. These are stout trees that are quite adaptable to our alkaline soils, they withstand our dramatic temperature swings, and are resistant to frost cracking. These stalwart trees are showing no signs of summer distress and are among the best looking trees in the nursery at this time. Brilliant Gold fall color, a great addition to any yard.
If you don’t mind acorns, I’ve still got plenty of Oak from which to choose. Northern Red, Shumard, and Texas Red are abundant in both 2” and 2-1/2” caliper sizes. If the beans don’t bother you, I’ve got some of the best Western Catalpa I’ve ever seen on the lot! One of my vendors has Redmond Linden newly arrived in 2-1/2” that I could probably sell as 3”, an exceptional value! Skyline Honeylocust are plentiful in all sizes, one of our cleaner trees for shading decks and patios.
Fall harvested trees are beginning to arrive from our northern states and Canada. Spruce, Austrian Pine, and Pinion Pine are now arriving daily. The pickings were getting pretty slim on these popular evergreens, but if you act now you’ll get the pick of the litter!
It’s been another sensational year for Happy Trees, with hundreds of newly planted trees now gracing the homes and yards of Coloradoans! If you’re considering a fall planting, it’s time to pick up the phone. Remember, it may take a few weeks for HOA approval if necessary, and a week for utility locates. We generally plant straight through October, although last year temperatures remained favorable for the better part of November which extended our planting season. The cover photo was taken 9/30 in the Mt. Evans wilderness. Aspen are displaying peak fall color, so hurry up and get scheduled today!
Trees can only be successfully harvested while the trees are dormant, usually in February and March, and again in September, October, and November. Every tree that was sold over the summer months was dug in late winter/ early spring. True, supplies for many trees are somewhat or totally depleted by this time of year, but most wholesalers anticipate this and order quantities of the most popular trees sufficient to meet fall demand.
If you’re looking for Maple, Autumn Blaze remains one of the best sellers around the region. While Autumn Blaze is a perfectly acceptable tree for Colorado, they are exhibiting summer stress from sitting in the nursery through the heat of summer. This manifests by turning early fall color, and sun-scorched leaf margins. The trees will recover beautifully if planted in your yard, but more resilient varieties of maple with very similar characteristics are coming online in recent years. It should be noted that Autumn Blaze is the only variety that is seedless, so I still recommend them if this is important to you.
Consider Redpointe Maple, virtually the same as Autumn Blaze, but with a more uniform branch structure, a dominant central leader, and better adapted to deal with our drought and alkaline soil. While I do observe some summer stress, they are faring much better than their AB cousins at the end of the season. Also noteworthy, Fall Fiesta Maple is a magnificent choice for our harsh environment. Still a quick maturing overstory shade tree, Fall Fiesta exhibits a diverse display of Red-Orange-Yellow fall foliage. If you need a more bomb proof plant for exposed sites or urban areas, State Street Maple is tough to beat. These are stout trees that are quite adaptable to our alkaline soils, they withstand our dramatic temperature swings, and are resistant to frost cracking. These stalwart trees are showing no signs of summer distress and are among the best looking trees in the nursery at this time. Brilliant Gold fall color, a great addition to any yard.
If you don’t mind acorns, I’ve still got plenty of Oak from which to choose. Northern Red, Shumard, and Texas Red are abundant in both 2” and 2-1/2” caliper sizes. If the beans don’t bother you, I’ve got some of the best Western Catalpa I’ve ever seen on the lot! One of my vendors has Redmond Linden newly arrived in 2-1/2” that I could probably sell as 3”, an exceptional value! Skyline Honeylocust are plentiful in all sizes, one of our cleaner trees for shading decks and patios.
Fall harvested trees are beginning to arrive from our northern states and Canada. Spruce, Austrian Pine, and Pinion Pine are now arriving daily. The pickings were getting pretty slim on these popular evergreens, but if you act now you’ll get the pick of the litter!
It’s been another sensational year for Happy Trees, with hundreds of newly planted trees now gracing the homes and yards of Coloradoans! If you’re considering a fall planting, it’s time to pick up the phone. Remember, it may take a few weeks for HOA approval if necessary, and a week for utility locates. We generally plant straight through October, although last year temperatures remained favorable for the better part of November which extended our planting season. The cover photo was taken 9/30 in the Mt. Evans wilderness. Aspen are displaying peak fall color, so hurry up and get scheduled today!