Dear Yonny Stanly what do you mean with pitting? Of course is the right planting hole very important for the success. Size and depth depends on the roots of the specific plants, the age and whether you will plant naked roots or container plants. Best Joerg

thank you very much for the positive respond. regarding the tools used for pitting activity, excavator seems need a lot of cost , is there any recommendation for low cost tools for pitting. and how it suit the topography (hilly ). thank you very much!

thank you Dr. Jose for the positive respond. yes, pitting is not the only thing in planting and not the most important part as well  and i just want to emphasize that without one of this part of planting, there are circumstances that the plantation will facing. hoping that i will understand every part of planting involved. thank you everyone for your support.

Hi dear Yonny:

For planting the first thing you should consider is what species to use. Depending on future use as timber or non extractive use, soil type and conditions and precipitation regimes of your plantation area. After that evaluate the plants you have available in local nurseries and depending on the size of the pots you can choose a device for pitting. 

Dear Yonny,  The size of pits and distance between them are of course important and will depend on many factors - for pit size -  the size of sapling (and particularly the roots), species, soil type etc all matter.  In poor soils sometimes one mixes some fertilisers (compost) etc and this may lead to a desire for larger pits.   Larger pits are often preferred but there is a cost to that.  Often pits at least 12-15 inches deep and 9-12 inches across are used - so about a cubic foot - but this size will vary a lot depending on what you are planting.

For tools - of course more mechanized - excavators etc can be useful.  However if the terrain is very hilly as you indicate it may not be possible to get any heavy equipment.  Also,, if number of pits is small (few hundred) it may not be worth it.  Hand tools are typically used in the Himalaya - these are very cost effective and easily moved across difficult terrain. a heavy iron rod (locally called a sabbal) and spades are typically used in the Himalaya for pit making.   All the best

Dear Yonny  I will talk about our conditions in a semi-arid zoes ,where water harvesting is a big deal to have success afforestation. we are planting seedlings  in abig halls with 30*40*30 cm diameters in gradonies on hilly areas where soil depths not exeeds 30 cm where soil pockets are there this technics allow to collect soil in order to open these pits in other hand these gradonies alow water harvestngs in these pits, gradonies and pits always done by  labours. Where soil depth are deep enough these can done by exacavotors such as also here or in cyprus therefore pits are very important to get better survival rates even in humid areas.

best rgards