Saturday, November 03, 2012

SPRUCE AND MOSS GARDEN - part 1

At the Manitoba cottage there has been a space between the screened porch and the road that has been empty of trees ever since a very large evergreen died a few years ago.  

Empty space?
An invitation!


 Over the years Spruce have sprouted up too close to the cottage to let them grow to any significant height.
So once again here I am doing what served me so well landscaping the Ontario cottage                                   - moving around existing plants.

Is it a conundrum that I want my natural looking yard to be "perfect"?  Not at all, I want each tree to have a good chance to grow and be healthy so when they are not growing in an optimal spot and an optimal spot is empty...well, wouldn't you do the same?

Step one was to prune the dead lower branches getting rid of the 'scraggly' look on the surrounding trees.
 I just love pruning; removing  the dead stuff leaves it looking that much cleaner. And by cleaner, I mean I got rid of that pile later that same day.

I often forget to take 'before" pictures before I start working, and this was once again the case here, so I have highlighted the trees I added before taking the shot to illustrate how barren it was to begin with.
Seedlings at the front, saplings further on and the biggest trees I can reasonably transplant with my own 2 hands and a spade (about 4 feet tall), at the back toward the road.  A nice steady progression which should look natural to the untrained eye but in fact would be a grand coincidence were it to happen naturally.


While 8 trees was not a lot for one day considering their size, I was just getting warmed up with what I actually wanted the spot to look like. 

With the season coming to a close I targeted the area above to be included and filled with trees this year.  And the area highlighted below to follow next year.


How far did I get before the end of year?

Stay tuned.

***

Sharing with Fertilizer Friday



4 comments:

  1. Oh yes, we gardeners love to do that! And shade gardening is a bit difficult here in the tropics.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I'm not clear on what all you did. Did you actually replant all the trees you took out? If it was me, I wouldn't replant them. If there were too many trees in an area, I would just remove them and plant other things. That's me, though, because I am not a tree person. At this point, we don't even have any trees in our small corner yard, except for the locust trees that pop up in the vegetable garden from the neighbors' yard, and take nutrients away from the vegetables.

    Thanks for stopping by and leaving a comment. I am kind of enjoying the fall colors of the foliage and grasses now that the flowers are almost finished blooming.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yes, I replanted all of the trees I dug up. I wanted to fill in the empty space at the front and the first place I looked for material to fill it in was on my own property.

      While I am creating a few gardens at the cottage there is also a need to infill with trees for privacy. Rather than just plant trees though I want a more lush look, so I am incorporating moss and old moss covered tree stumps as well.

      Delete