Saturday, March 9, 2013

Truth In Gardening

From year to year my enthusiasm varies for getting back into the garden after a long winter nap.  This year I have lots I want to accomplish and I'm excited about the changes I plan to make.  When it comes to the garden, historically I bite off more than I can chew, but at this juncture I'm confident that 2013 may be one of my best garden years yet! 

Last Saturday I got outside for the first garden work day of the season.  Most of the garden areas were either snow covered or too wet to work, so I decided to tackle the much neglected dry in the winter, even drier in the summer weed pit behind my garage.





As my grandfather would have said, "Criminentlies!"

For the past few years I have largely ignored this area.  Given the conditions, I'm amazed that anything grows here on what appears to be an artificially raised patch of land in the dry shade of locusts and white pines.  A thicket of pricker bushes, a tangle of poison ivy and lack of time has kept me at bay.  Oh and the snakes.  Have I mentioned that I hate dislike snakes?  One of the benefits to working in early March is the creepy little buggers are usually still sleeping.

In my defense, this is not my property and by the time I finish maintaining the gardens I do have on my property I don't usually have any time left.  However, since this patch of land is only accessible from my property, if I don't maintain it, nobody will.





Standing in the work area you get a direct view of the back of my garage.  To a certain extent this location falls into the category of "out of sight, out of mind".  But it shouldn't.





Take a gander to the right and the shed garden is in full view.




My goal for the day was to get rid of the thorn bushes, which I believe are some sort of wild raspberry, although I don't ever recall seeing fruit.  The arching canes root at every spot where they touch ground.  To get them out I had to section back each stem until I got to the root then either gently pull them out or use the shovel to dig them out.  Progress was slower than I expected.  After a few hours I had infiltrated the tangled mess and was able to walk through the two Locust tree trunks for the first time in years.





But I still had a long way to go.





Criminentlies!

Buried beneath the weedy mess is a tarp covered pile of topsoil.  My goal is to extricate the tarp, level out the soil, plant a row of Thuja plicata 'Green Giant' and attempt to manage the potential for weed regrowth with heavy mulch.  Most likely additional top soil will have to be brought in to create a berm of sorts because less than a foot below the surface is what appears to be a base of trap rock.

By late afternoon I had removed the thicket along with some Rosa multiflora and tons of Bittersweet.  I was able to walk back by the fence and pull out most of the dead branches that have collected over two hurricanes and a fall snow storm.  Poison ivy is a problem in this area and I am very allergic.  By some stroke of luck, I managed to avoid contact but I may have to wait for things to leaf out before attempting to remove more of the ground weeds.





As I widen out the view you can see why I'm so eager to manage this area and create a solid screen.  I mentioned before that I live behind a small shopping plaza. 

When I bought this house in 1995 the plaza was completely screened by a 30-40 foot tall hedge of hemlocks (Tsuga canadensis).  Unfortunately before I even knew it existed, wooly adelgid killed those trees and they had to be removed.  When the deciduous trees leaf out the view fades somewhat but last summer the plaza removed most of the small saplings on the other side of the fence and opened up the view beyond my tolerance level.

Despite the view, for the most part, the plaza isn't a bad neighbor to have.  In my town the alternative would most likely be the backyard decks of two or three homes peering right on to my patio.  As it stands right now, I enjoy almost complete privacy.  The area I'm attempting to maintain is located on a 25 foot strip of zoned buffer property.  Not a bad deal really-I can use it and someone else pays the taxes.

Below is a view from my shed garden back to the area I just cleared.  Years ago the wood fence sections were attached to an existing chain link fence to stop the dogs from barking at anything that moved and to create privacy at the ground level. 


   


Up until the spring of 2009, this area was heavily shaded by a huge Sycamore tree.  Growing evergreens was virtually impossible.  In the spring of 2010 I planted a trio of Thuja plicata 'Green Giant' on five foot centers mostly to see how they would perform.  Conditions that year were extremely dry and despite regular watering, I lost one of them before the end of the summer.  The remaining two have grown a respectable couple of feet since.

In 2004 I planted eight of these along my driveway and some of them are close to 20 feet tall now and doing well.  I would be thrilled to get that kind of growth from the trees behind the shed and garage but the conditions are drier and shadier.  Even so I still believe the Green Giants are my best choice for a solid evergreen screen.   



 
 
 
 
So there you have it.  Up until now I've only shown my garden from the best possible angles.  Every property has positives and negatives.  All things considered I'm happy with the location of my house and garden but I consider this view a big negative.
 
In the next few weeks I plan to start preparing the planting site and purchasing the trees I need.  If anyone has suggestions on screening a large ugly view like this I'd love to hear them.
 
Sue~
 
 
 
 
 

30 comments:

  1. I had a young tree specialist come and plant 14 five year old spruce trees to block the view of a "neighbor" gravel pit. That was over 15 years ago and they are now HUGE. In fact, we may have to thin things out at some point! I loved the former view of farmland, but gravel extraction is ugly, noisy and dusty. He also planted a few cedars and two tamaracks. All in all, it was a success. We didn't lose a single tree even though there were plenty of droughts. I watered like a maniac for the first two summers.
    I think your project is most worthwhile and I know you'll make it very neat and attractive.

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    1. Everything I plant back there struggles. But I know if I can get those Thujas established they'll give me the height I need quicker than anything else.

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    2. You might want to add pipes next to each Thuja at planting time for easier watering of roots down below. This worked for me at times...but the pipes also got plugged up in some cases, even though I had covers for them. Watering is so time consuming!

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  2. You are one heck of a worker.

    Rhododendrons and mountain laurel.

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    1. They don't get tall enough, Jack. I need 20-30 feet. The Thujas I plan to use can easily get to 40-60 feet in ideal conditions. Half that height would be fine.

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  3. My hat's off to you Sue! That's a lot of work! Although I've got lots of projects planned, I'm just not motivated this year. I go out and work but it just seems like work and not like it has any purpose.

    Leyland Cypress grows very quickly and is more tolerant of shade than thuja. It's unpopular because it's been overused in some areas. Zone 6

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    1. For some reason you just don't see Leyland Cypress for sale in the nurseries around here. I suspect it may be marginally hardy or disease prone but I've never asked. I'll have to poke around a bit and find the reasson.

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  4. That is a very daunting task, you are to be commended for taking it on. I also am extremely sensitive to poison ivy. Sounds like you are on the right track.

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    1. Poison Ivy is one of the only plants I will attack with chemicals. Every so often one escapes my radar, gets too large for me to safely pull so I have to resort to a spray.

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  5. The patch you're cleaning up...looks like my ENTIRE back yard right now! I think I still have most of last year's leaves still waiting to be raked!

    Love your garden shed and especially its window box!

    PS: met the team from Creative Contours at the CT Home & Remodeling Show who told me the orbs above their tablescape at the Garden Show came from Spruce Home and Garden in West Hartford...and that they are actually called Butterfly Balls. It looks like a trip out to Spruce is in store! Have you ever been there? It looks a little pricey for my modest wallet...but I may be able to DIY some inspiration items!

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    1. I've never been but my friends were so intrigued by Spruce Home and Garden that they took a business card at the show. West Hartford center is filled with great eateries so I suspect a visit may be in the immediate future :).

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  6. You're doing an amazing job, and I am glad you are showing us your challenges in such detail. Gardening is solving problems, not just looking at pretty flowers in close-ups. Your thuja trees will get you the screening you need -- I like that you have total privacy from that blank wall, and you just need to soften the view of it. But I don't know that you need to completely blot it out.

    One thought is to mix the row of evergreens with a variety of trees so it is not a solid wall of one kind of plant (which is exchanging your view of a solid white wall for a solid green wall). You already have the privacy, you just need the view to be less uniform and blank.

    Instead, stagger a row of trees, using several thuja mixed with some deciduous trees too, maybe tree sized American hollies, or witch hazels (but those are slow growers). Cornus alternifolia likes shade and gets 20 feet tall. Sweetbay magnolia gets 25 feet tall, grows fast, likes shade and is evergreen (but not densely so like the thujas).

    Make the screening grove complex & varied and zig zaggy, and then add a lower level of laurels in front of it. The idea is to create a place for the eye to go that distracts from the plaza wall even if it doesn't completely hide it in winter. The eye will see only the rich complex woodland planting with varied levels, tightly planted, and just a hint of blank wall behind. Just a thought!

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    1. Thanks for giving me points to ponder, Laurrie especially looking at ways to distract the eye when the view can't be totally screened. To a certain extent I have taken a layered approach. I already have an established shrub form Chionanthus and a struggling weeping purple beech back there as well as a shrub border of sorts along the back of my shed garden. After allowing a 6-8 foot footprint for the Thujas, I won't have alot of room. One solution is to move the Thujas back closer to the fence but I fear that may place them in too much shade.

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  7. I live in a very different climate but here bamboo is frequently used as a quick, low maintenance screen. I checked my go-to garden guide and there are a few that are hardy to -20 degrees (e.g. Fargesia murielae and F. nitada) but I have no idea how readily available they may be in your area.

    Like the other commentators, I'm impressed by the effort you're putting into the project. Good luck.

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    1. I do grow Fargesia rufa 'Green Panda' as a screen for my utility meters. Although it is a clumping bamboo, the clump has expanded more rapidly than I expected. Based on that variety I wouldn't get the height I need to screen the plaza but since I do need to divide it, tossing a clump in back wouldn't hurt just to see how it would do.

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  8. I admire your energy! I tend to default to "out of sight out of mind," especially when I have more visible eyesores. Loblolly pine is hardy to zone 6, I think, and is (theoretically) suitable for dry soil. It grows fast down here!

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    1. Another plant I don't recall seeing for sale in this area. Even though I did find references to zone 6 hardiness, UCONN does not list it in their plant database. All the maps show Delaware as the northern end of it's hardiness zone so I suspect it's marginal here.

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  9. You're a helluva woman, Sue. And an amazing planner. I'm with Kris on bamboo. I have a huge screen of it, including yellow groove, black, and golden. It makes *anything* disappear, and you could keep it in check, as you're a vigilant gardener.

    On what may be wild raspberries: Maybe deer like them as substitutes for your cultivated plants.

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    1. Have you ever seen the huge grove of bamboo at Avant Gardens in Dartmouth, MA? It's beautiful and effective as a screen but running bamboo, even with vigilant maintenance gives me pause on a small suburban lot like mine. I have been thinking about growing some in a galvanized stock tank that I could wheel around the patio as a movable screen. How cool would that be?

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    2. That rolling tank would be very cool. But, warning: Don't let the roots bust through the bottom and touch the ground.

      If you ever change your mind and join me on the wild side of bamboo, think of the tales we can swap. Like how the canes in my grove start shooting each spring, recalling the Kurosawa movie, Throne of Blood, forcing me to go out with pruners and snip each new shoot – before the grove reaches my castle.

      OK, OK, do the tank.

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    3. Worrying about advancing bamboo groves would keep me awake at night. No running bamboo for Sue.

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  10. Sue, You've done a wonderful job clearing this area. Just be sure to revisit it regularly to keep the brambles and the bittersweet in check - with gloves on, of course, to protect you from dreaded poison ivy (I share your allergy).
    Laurrie has great suggestions. Add in a few ground cover plants that tolerate dry shade and some bulbs for spring interest (and cutting for indoor enjoyment) and no one will ever know there is a shopping center beyond.

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    1. I've still got alot of weeding work left to do in that area. None of the usual weedy suspects have started growing yet. Once that happens I'm going to need to schedule a few hours out there every week.

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  11. I bet it feels great to tackle this neglected area. I am guessing that the thorny brambles are blackberries. I have had to contend with them in my own garden.
    I see you have lots of suggestions to hide the shopping mall. I like Laurrie's idea of mixing it up and not just using a single tree or shrub. I am not so sure about the bamboo idea. Some bamboos are invasive.

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    1. As far as bamboo goes, I think the only kind that would get tall enough would be the running varieties and I'm definitely not going there.

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  12. what big work! yes I like the fast growing evergreen idea....and one thought would be to try some cultivated raspberries in the sunny area...because i love them!!

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    1. One of my garden friends has a patch of cultivated raspberries in her garden. When I go there in the summer, a popular activity is to grab a glass of wine and graze the bushes. If I had the sun (and the room) I would plant a raspberry patch in a heartbeat.

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  13. I'm not sure what plants to advise you to use but would be cautious of bamboo. I had it in my garden in upstate NY and couldn't get rid of it. It even laughed at Round Up. But I also like Laurrie's idea of using more than one type of shrub for visual interest.

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  14. I'm not sure what shrubs to recommend you plant but would be cautious of bamboo. It's so invasive. I like Laurrie's idea to mix in different types of shrubs for visual interest. Would a Goshiki osmanthus or Five Leaf aralaia work there? The Goshiki is evergreen and has beautiful variegation.

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  15. A lot of work ahead for you!

    Here, we're still buried in snow.

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