Mini Gardening

Today was a very nice day here, sunny and warmish for this time of year. We celebrated with a short burst of gardening. (We rarely do long bursts; life keeps being busy and our backs get sore too quickly.)

We did a little bit yesterday, in fact, making a symbolic start on our new daylily bed. That project has been underway for awhile actually, as I decided where to put all the plants, put in some bushes not in the bed, killed what passed for grass in that spot. A few weeks ago a friend (that would be Elizabeth, who gave us the Spiraea x vanhouttei earlier in the year (see this posting)), which we planted just at the edge of the daylily bed. For those familiar with our yard, the new bed is at the far corner of the east lawn.

Anyway, yesterday we finally lifted a few plants from their "temporary" spot (of about 8 years) in front of the house, divided them, and replanted them in the new bed. It felt like progress!

While we were doing this we noticed that there were a number of seedlings of Cercis canadensis, the Eastern redbud tree (article with photos, or something more botanical), progeny of our mature redbud tree in front of the house. They were mostly growing in the yellow garden, among the prospering Mahonia that we planted last December.

Now, at the foot of the west lawn, I've imagined for several years a gently curving row of some sort of ornamental tree, originally laid out for four specimens. A few years ago a friend gave us some chaste tree seedlings, but they succumbed in the winter. For awhile I was promised some Carolina silverbell seedlings, but they never materialized.

Yesterday, then, we saw these seedlings and thought they would make a good line of specimens on the east lawn; I've become a fan of the redbud as our current one has matured (and after I pruned it a few years ago). It has turned out to be a very attractive and well-mannered tree, and surely it would like some companions.

So, today, we extracted the seedlings (not so simple, since they seemed to like growing amidst rocks) and moved them to that spot on the east lawn. Now they are visible mostly thanks to tall stakes, but experience shows that they will put on some height next season if they don't succumb to the winter. I hope not. I like that they're all children of the tree across the driveway from them, so I'll hope for their hearty best.

Posted on November 8, 2009 at 18.55 by jns · Permalink
In: All, Personal Notebook

2 Responses

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  1. Written by rightsaidfred
    on Monday, 9 November 2009 at 02.48
    Permalink

    Are your plants hetero, or are they gay?

  2. Written by jns
    on Monday, 9 November 2009 at 16.34
    Permalink

    Bisexual, I suspect. Or something else altogether. It's difficult to tell for sure, but one does note that most of the plants can reproduce by having sex, but also that most of them reproduce without having sex at all — not that reproduction should be the sole determiner, of course.

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