Hive account@rawutah, I will gracefully disagree. Yes, a bare root is so much better then a potted tree. You are 100% correct but there is another option that is so much better. Let me explain. I planted 12 fruit trees all bare root of which in 5 years 5 have been replaced and the other 5 are diseased. I have been working hard to save them. Where I live there are tons of orchards. I recently discovered that the trees that grow disease free(more or less) are trees from long ago that started from seed. I found out that trees planted bare root or not will not develope a tap root. Also trees over the last 30 plus years are grafted on a rootstock of a supposedly hardy tree and is not always the same that is grafted too. Before grafting and selling trees like this trees survived so much better then today. Today at least where I live there are so many health issues with trees. So this fall, I planted several seeds in one spot so it can pop up in the spring and then choose the strongest one to allow to grow. The benefit of buying a 2-year-old grafted bare root tree is of no good if after 1-3 years the tree dies. So why not start from seed and have a tree that could last 100 years? Maybe not all areas have the issues we ahve but I still found it surprising how these 80 year old trees produce so well with no care yet trees of today do so poorly.