Tree finder

How the matching works

• Zone. A tree or shrub is listed when your zone is inside its hardiness range.
• Mature size. The type the catalog gives each one, as in the shop's size boxes.
• Height limit. Those whose typical mature height tops out at or under the limit, or at 60 ft or more for its last step. The article on small trees for a small yard says how far each goes from a house or a line.
• Sun and soil. What each one is known to tolerate, counting the labels for shade, wet ground and drought.
• Must have. Every trait you tick, all at once.
• Counts. The number beside each box and each choice is how many would remain if you chose it too.
• Best fit first. Trees and shrubs that list your sun and soil outright come before those that only tolerate them. Within that, those with your zone in the middle of their range come before those at its edge.
• Ties. Those that can be ordered now come first, then those with a photo, then the rest by name.
• ZIP code. It sets the zone from the same listing as the ZIP code tool, and the code itself is not kept.
• Hedge spacing. On a Hedge or screen list each card gives the spacing its own page sets. A hedge length gives how many to set in one straight row, with one at each end. The article on hedges, screens and windbreaks covers staggered rows.

The address carries every choice, so a copied link opens the same list. These are its keys:

• zone: 2 to 10.
• size: shrub, small-tree, medium-tree or large-tree.
• height: 15, 20, 35, 40 or 60 for a top height at or under that many feet, or 60-plus.
• sun: full, part or shade. moisture: dry, average or wet.
• want: one or more traits joined by commas, such as want=evergreen,screening. The boxes are flowers, fall-color, winter-interest, wildlife, honey, edible, evergreen, rare, early-bearing, screening, nitrogen-fixing, salt, street-tree and erosion-control. The address also takes drought, wet-tolerant and shade.
• hedge: a hedge length in feet, read when screening is wanted. sort: name, height, hardy or fast, or the price orders once prices are set.

Each tree's facts come from its own page: its zones, mature height, sun, soil, labels and hedge spacing. The 20 and 40 ft height steps are the International Society of Arboriculture's zones by overhead wires (Avoiding Tree & Utility Conflicts, 2021). Within 15 feet of distribution wires, the species chosen "should have a mature height of 20 feet (6 meters) or lower". From 15 to 50 feet out, it should have "a potential mature height of 40 feet (12 meters) or lower". The planting-site check follows the same zones. Virginia Cooperative Extension draws the low zone wider, to 20 feet from the line, where "trees in the low zone should not exceed 25 feet at maturity" (Selecting and Managing Trees to Avoid Conflicts with Overhead Utility Lines, 2024). Under the line itself it suggests large shrubs with "a mature height of less than 15 feet", the limit's first step. A ZIP code's zone is the 2023 USDA Plant Hardiness Zone Map's ZIP code listing, prepared by the PRISM Climate Group at Oregon State University.

When nothing fits, the site is usually the problem rather than the catalog: tell us the zone, soil, sun and what the tree needs to do, and we will suggest something.