Several weeks after picking up some city compost, the tree I was going to amend seems to have a smaller drip line radius. Is it fine to add the compost, although it will probably be clumpy from sitting in bags in an unheated garage? Apologies for not providing a photo, but I couldn’t compress it beneath the 2.1 mb size. Thank you.
Thank you for contacting the Toronto Master gardeners concerning your European Beech Tree.
The upcoming week of warm weather is a perfect time to add compost to your garden. Spread a good layer (10 to 15 cm if you haven’t done this for some years or 5-10 cm if you spread compost last year or this spring) all over the garden, not just around your beech tree. When adding your compost make sure not to bury the tree’s root flare by keeping the compost at least 6 inches (15 cm) away from the tree trunk. You can add a layer of mulch on top of the compost, once the ground has frozen.
Landscape Ontario has an excellent Tree Planting Guide which has a chapter on Soil Assessment which might be of interest.