Trees

[redtailgal]

Just make sure whatever you plant is NOT an invasive.
I do like cottonwoods over oaks and maples. It will be years before most oaks ar big enough to provide either shade or windbreak.
Conifers grow fairly fast after the first couple of years.

Someone will probably be along before too long saying how toxic White Oak, Red Oak and Burr Oak acorns are to cattle. The consensus among most cattlemen tho, is that the cows can eat a lot of them as long as they have other forage to eat as well, and many of us have never had a bit of problem with acorn ingestion at all--mine eat them every fall with out ever getting ill.
YRMV.

oops! I'd better go tell that to the cattle here. They have been eating acorns for years!

 

[secuono]

I'm in Northern Iowa and need some wind breaks and shade. I was told that Maples break to easily in windy situations.

For Oaks would Acorns be bad for the Cows and Horses?

Acorns are eagerly saught out by turkeys, deer, horses and cattle, etc. . American Indians gathered them in the fall and had great meals of them. I have about a 300 year old and about 90 feet tall with a 50 ft spread Valley Oak in my pasture as well as 4 others on or just over the property line,so about half of the acorns fall into my pastures. My herd of 9 mares + their foals seak out the acorns on the ground with great gusto and get fat on them.

That sounds like you should post a picture of this cool tree!



I would stay away from Sycamore trees, none of the ones I've seen anywhere in VA were very strong. There are plenty of those gold Maples and I rarely see any of them with damage or fallen.
Google for safe trees for cows and horses, then avoid those.
Willows are great trees, but they are 'high maintenance', they never stop dropping twigs.

 

[SheepGirl]

I think maples or oaks would be good. We've planted willow trees and we haven't touched them since we planted them and they thrive in really wet conditions (ie the bottom of our hill), where evergreens died.

 

[eweinHiscare]

Another tree that is useful is the American Persimmon tree.

It can get quite tall and is a nice tree.

My horses and goats have never bothered to chew on the bark of the wild Persimmon trees that are on my property.

They would eat the leaves if they could get to them probably, so if you plant one you would need to protect it until it grew tall enough.

The Persimmon fruit is delicious if you collect the fallen ones off the ground. If picked from the tree they will not be ripe enough and be very bitter.

All my livestock, including ducks, love to eat the fallen fruit.

Also I have noticed that my goats do not like the taste of the pear tree that is in their pasture, although the horse used to chew the bark when he could get to it.

 

[Symphony]

Thanks all, I ended up getting a variety of Trees. White Ash, Northern Oaks, Blue Spruce and Cottonwood were the most abundant of my purchase. I got mostly yearling trees but some saplings from Arbor Day. They have so far survived the winter and hopefully will have long lives to come.

Some crazy trees I bought were Northern Catalpa, Sweet Bay Magnolia, Royal Empress and Japanese Cherry tree.

 

[EllieMay]

You will LOVE your Royal Empress tree!
We have one that came with the property.
It's the only one we have, and it's about 4 years old.
HUGE tree and the leaves are an excellent source of protein for your livestock.
I just placed an order for four trees to go in four pastures where we have no natural shelter.
My sheep love to munch on the huge leaves that fall and I try to save some leaves for the compost pile.
The fragrance from the blossoms in the Spring is amazing.
I have a couple of pics of my tree.

 

[sankalp]

Trees are required for good nature and good life.

 

[norseofcourse]

I'm also in zone 5, tulip trees are nice (some call them tulip poplar).

 

[nelson castro]

You can get softwood maples grow quickly and give good shade. Cottonwoods are fast growing too

Couldn't agree more.