The reason many people have failures when planting trees on their property is that they don't know how to plant a tree. Forests are a fungal soil type, lawns are a bacterial soil type. Trees will not grow well on a bacterial soil type and lawns won't grow well on a fungal soil type.
People will buy a tree from the store, dig a hole and pop it in and water it and expect it to grow. Generally those trees fail. A tree has to have fungal soil types around their roots to feed them with the fungal organisms that they require for healthy growth. Even worse is if you get a bare root tree that doesn't even have any good soil around it at all when you buy it, then you stick it in the ground with grass around it. Not good
The planting of a tree is a lawn is not impossible but really does require some help for the poor thing at planting time. First you must remove the grass and weeds from the entire root area of the tree. But even more important than that is to go somewhere where trees and shrubs grow and gather a few handfuls of soil and forest duff and maybe some sticks and twigs that are around the forest floor and bring them to the hole before you put in the tree. The more the better. If you do not have access to forest areas even a few sticks and leaves from a local park will help, but soil is much better. The last resort would be to find some fallen branches or sticks from a tree that have laid on the ground for a while and begun to deteriorate, you can pound them in the ground around the tree or break them up into the hole. You are trying to get fungal spores from the forest into the soil.
If you can't get good forest soil or branches or twigs or leaves or something at least make some compost from the parings and food scraps (non meat/fat) that you have in your home and add those to the hole before planting the tree, it will give the worms something to eat and maybe they'll haul in some fungal spores??
When you dig the hole for the tree make sure you take a tool of some kind and poke holes in the sides and bottom of the hole to give the roots somewhere to go,and make sure that there are no air pockets in the hole after you plant the tree, water and firm the soil down well and water again.
Leave a small saucer type of indention around the tree so it will hold water when it rains rather than all the rain running off away from the tree and always add some mulch of some type to the top of the soil to keep the water in the soil. Mulch is best if it is organic like leaves, twigs, wood chips, bark, compost, hay, etc. Keep the mulch an inch or so away from the trunk of the tree and make sure it is also well watered so it doesn't shed the rain.
Now water that baby tree whenever the soil gets dry, generally 1 inch of water a week minimum. If you get a good rain that will help a lot.
Remember you want your tree to have companions so look to the post I'll put on later on GUILDS.
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