This morning I found another sign of the approach of spring. Opening the chicken house to top up their food, I discovered two eggs in the nesting box. Nice fat dark brown ones, slightly speckled. The chickens have looked distinctly bouncier in recent days, more active and alert, and have started taking an interest again in the world outside their run. In the shortest, darkest days they just stood hunched in the corner, looking as if they were waiting for winter to be over. It'll be time to start letting them out for an afternoon constitutional soon.
I got another three rhododendron stumps out of the wood. That was cheating slightly, as I picked on the ones that looked least likely to offer resistance (two were completely dead). The three left to go still have some leaves, and may have more of a root system to contend with. Still, I feel I'm approaching the home straight in the end of the wood. I filled up the trailer with another load of brambles and ivy, and managed not to poke myself in the eye on the brambles during the course of the day. The Systems Administrator obligingly got out the electric chainsaw, and removed a branch of a coppiced hazel that was growing into the airspace of Magnolia campbellii 'Charles Raffill'. It's all beginning to come together. I should be safe buying a Eucryphia x nymansay, when I see a good one at work, as I now have the space cleared to put it. (Finally. I identified the spot where I wanted to put it back in 2009, which shows the speed at which things sometimes progress in this garden).
There was one solitary snowdrop in bloom. There are the first leaves of a few bluebells showing, but in general the bulbs in the wood haven't yet started coming through. I remember panicking about this in past years, thinking that by mid January there ought to be more growth visible, and that something must have happened to them (I don't know what. The biggest vole invasion in the history of gardening). They have always turned up in the end, so I expect they will this year. It's a mystery why this one lone snowdrop is so early.
I finally ticked the Italian garden off my list of things to do. That has shrunk since I set it up, but is still far too long to finish by the end of February (or probably before the end of 2012). There are some jobs on it that I haven't touched at all. Mind you, there are some that are to all intents and purposes finished that I haven't crossed off. It seems I have a neurotic reluctance to declare any gardening task actually finished.
The black cat was in the wars again, this time with a septic eyelid, but his shot of antibiotics last Monday seems to have been sufficient to nip trouble in the bud, as it looks better than it did. He is now famous at the vets, following his cruciate ligament operation. Although they have not explicitly said so, we are more and more certain that he was the first ever cat (as distinct from dog) they'd tried the operation on. Well done that cat, for being a medical pathfinder.
Showing posts with label stumps. Show all posts
Showing posts with label stumps. Show all posts
Friday, 13 January 2012
Thursday, 3 March 2011
a long deferred job finally accomplished
Today I finished digging out the rootball of a defunct Hebe salicifolia. That one sentence describes how I spent an entire day of my life. It was a large shrub, that must have grown to reach 3m high and wide over the years. I was beginning to think that it was not looking so comely as it had, and that it was time to start thinking about a replacement, when the 2009-10 winter killed a lot of the branches without killing the entire plant outright. I lopped most of them off, but in the mass of clearing up required after that winter never got round to tackling the roots (about my least favourite gardening task). Last winter damaged it some more, but still without killing it. Yesterday and today I ceased to put off the dread deed any longer. The hebe was in an open border with nothing large or precious too close to it, and room to swing a pickaxe, but even so after the first hour I thought the job was going to take the rest of the season. When I finally chopped through the bottom of the rootball I was left with a lump of soil and roots approximately 1m by 60cm by 40cm, and had to summon help to heave it out of the hole. It took the rest of the afternoon to chisel soil off the rootball, so that I wouldn't be left with a hole in the ground 1m by 60cm by 40cm, and so that the great ball of roots had some hope of burning on the bonfire.
The space vacated by the hebe will provide a new home for a replacement Prunus x subhirtella 'Autumnalis'. Then I've got plans for a burnt orange colour scheme. Burnt orange doesn't especially go with palest pink cherry flowers, but that's fine because they'll happen in different seasons. There is a berberis called 'Orange Rocket' that has completely fabulous dark orange new leaves, which I fell for as soon as I saw it, and think will go very well next to the purple leaved cotinus that is finally starting to make some size, after a painfully slow start. Then there is a modern rose called 'Hot Chocolate', with burnt orange flowers which I find completely delightful. The name is a pity, and it was declared novelty rose of the year a while back, which is a bit embarassing. The soil in that bed is so light and sandy and lacking in structure that I feel a bit optimistic asking the poor rose to grow in it, but I can apply loads of organic material. Every year, for the rest of our mutual existence. A rose grower at the Hampton Court Flower Show last year told me that 'Hot Chocolate' was a good doer, which may be the case, or he may have been hoping to sell me some. Then there are some Alchemilla mollis to come out, which I feel sad about as I originally raised them from seed, but I have seen how they look when they are growing well and mine don't look like that. It really is too dry for them. Also some Lychnis coronaria, which has committed the opposite crime of doing too well. It seeds like the devil in that bed, and forms choking mats of leaf and root that seem to starve and suffocate all neighbouring plants. Truly gardeners are never satisfied.
The space vacated by the hebe will provide a new home for a replacement Prunus x subhirtella 'Autumnalis'. Then I've got plans for a burnt orange colour scheme. Burnt orange doesn't especially go with palest pink cherry flowers, but that's fine because they'll happen in different seasons. There is a berberis called 'Orange Rocket' that has completely fabulous dark orange new leaves, which I fell for as soon as I saw it, and think will go very well next to the purple leaved cotinus that is finally starting to make some size, after a painfully slow start. Then there is a modern rose called 'Hot Chocolate', with burnt orange flowers which I find completely delightful. The name is a pity, and it was declared novelty rose of the year a while back, which is a bit embarassing. The soil in that bed is so light and sandy and lacking in structure that I feel a bit optimistic asking the poor rose to grow in it, but I can apply loads of organic material. Every year, for the rest of our mutual existence. A rose grower at the Hampton Court Flower Show last year told me that 'Hot Chocolate' was a good doer, which may be the case, or he may have been hoping to sell me some. Then there are some Alchemilla mollis to come out, which I feel sad about as I originally raised them from seed, but I have seen how they look when they are growing well and mine don't look like that. It really is too dry for them. Also some Lychnis coronaria, which has committed the opposite crime of doing too well. It seeds like the devil in that bed, and forms choking mats of leaf and root that seem to starve and suffocate all neighbouring plants. Truly gardeners are never satisfied.
Friday, 21 January 2011
the mysterious death of 'Paul's Scarlet'
I have finally finished removing the stump of the dead Crataegus laevigata 'Paul's Scarlet'. It took all of this afternoon and half of yesterday, and was one of those unappealing jobs I should have done last year, when it died. I am gently baffled that even after exhuming the remains I can't really say what it died of.
It was planted in February 2001, after I'd spent several years admiring specimens at The Chelsea Flower Show. Hilliers and Notcutts both used to be very keen on them. The flowers are red, and double so you don't get any fruit. Our tastes sometimes change in gardening, and if I were choosing a tree now it wouldn't be that one, so I should be grateful that mine has saved me from my previous error of judgement by quitting the scene. It was planted as a relatively young thing, only about 1.2m high, and until last year grew vigorously. It did turn out not to be at all root-firm, and leant out into the drive where I park my car, and required a prop, and once tempted a dreadful man who was supposed to be looking after the house while we were on holiday to prune it hideously, but apart from that it did very well. I have read that 'Paul's Scarlet is often not root-firm when young. Last summer, in the space of a few days, the leaves began to curl inwards, then went brown at the edges, then brown all over and remained on the tree, which is generally a bad sign. We cut the top growth off leaving a bit at the base to act as a lever for getting the stump out.
I should have got the stump out at once, especially as honey fungus had to be considered as a possible cause of death. When an established woody plant dies that suddenly catastrophic root failure is highly likely to be involved. The garden doesn't show any definite signs of virulent honey fungus infestation, but you never know. I didn't tackle it at once, because it was very dry at the time and the ground was too hard, and then I had lots of other urgent things to do, and it is human nature to postpone your least favourite tasks, and I wasn't convinced it was honey fungus. It was growing close (too close) to a Mahonia x media, a Chaenomeles and a cut-leafed elder which all looked absolutely fine. A colleague suggested that maybe the graft had failed.
Growing close to so many neighbours and next to the oil tank meant that swinging the axe and the pickaxe at the remains wasn't an option. I dug round the stump, sawed through the roots, traced each back as far as possible and wrenched it out, and by heaving the stump back and forth (this is why you must not cut the trunk off at ground level) eventually got that out too. Sawing at roots in the bottom of a hole is hard on the back, and the cats had been using the bed as a handy latrine (maybe 'Paul's Scarlet' died of cat crap poisoning?). Even Pollyanna could not have convinced herself that it was a fun gardening job.
The smaller roots had all vanished, so something bad had gone on down there. There was some white mycelium between bark and wood on the remaining roots, which the RHS would say was conclusive proof of honey fungus, though it wasn't as thick as a mushroom skin. I didn't find any bootlaces, or any mycelium on the trunk. But honey fungus varies a lot in its ability to kill. Some strains are virulently pathogenic, some only attack dead or dying plants. I still don't know whether what I found was the cause of death, or arrived after something else had delivered the coup de grace. I've found it in the past sometimes, but only on things that I was fairly sure had died of other causes, either drought or cold. I could send some roots for analysis to the RHS, but I think I'll just take them to the tip. I'm not sure I want the garden to be screened for something for which there is no cure. Better to go on in ignorance and hope.
It was planted in February 2001, after I'd spent several years admiring specimens at The Chelsea Flower Show. Hilliers and Notcutts both used to be very keen on them. The flowers are red, and double so you don't get any fruit. Our tastes sometimes change in gardening, and if I were choosing a tree now it wouldn't be that one, so I should be grateful that mine has saved me from my previous error of judgement by quitting the scene. It was planted as a relatively young thing, only about 1.2m high, and until last year grew vigorously. It did turn out not to be at all root-firm, and leant out into the drive where I park my car, and required a prop, and once tempted a dreadful man who was supposed to be looking after the house while we were on holiday to prune it hideously, but apart from that it did very well. I have read that 'Paul's Scarlet is often not root-firm when young. Last summer, in the space of a few days, the leaves began to curl inwards, then went brown at the edges, then brown all over and remained on the tree, which is generally a bad sign. We cut the top growth off leaving a bit at the base to act as a lever for getting the stump out.
I should have got the stump out at once, especially as honey fungus had to be considered as a possible cause of death. When an established woody plant dies that suddenly catastrophic root failure is highly likely to be involved. The garden doesn't show any definite signs of virulent honey fungus infestation, but you never know. I didn't tackle it at once, because it was very dry at the time and the ground was too hard, and then I had lots of other urgent things to do, and it is human nature to postpone your least favourite tasks, and I wasn't convinced it was honey fungus. It was growing close (too close) to a Mahonia x media, a Chaenomeles and a cut-leafed elder which all looked absolutely fine. A colleague suggested that maybe the graft had failed.
Growing close to so many neighbours and next to the oil tank meant that swinging the axe and the pickaxe at the remains wasn't an option. I dug round the stump, sawed through the roots, traced each back as far as possible and wrenched it out, and by heaving the stump back and forth (this is why you must not cut the trunk off at ground level) eventually got that out too. Sawing at roots in the bottom of a hole is hard on the back, and the cats had been using the bed as a handy latrine (maybe 'Paul's Scarlet' died of cat crap poisoning?). Even Pollyanna could not have convinced herself that it was a fun gardening job.
The smaller roots had all vanished, so something bad had gone on down there. There was some white mycelium between bark and wood on the remaining roots, which the RHS would say was conclusive proof of honey fungus, though it wasn't as thick as a mushroom skin. I didn't find any bootlaces, or any mycelium on the trunk. But honey fungus varies a lot in its ability to kill. Some strains are virulently pathogenic, some only attack dead or dying plants. I still don't know whether what I found was the cause of death, or arrived after something else had delivered the coup de grace. I've found it in the past sometimes, but only on things that I was fairly sure had died of other causes, either drought or cold. I could send some roots for analysis to the RHS, but I think I'll just take them to the tip. I'm not sure I want the garden to be screened for something for which there is no cure. Better to go on in ignorance and hope.
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