landscaping

June-July 2009 is considerable landscaping. The final results will be visible next year or the following, once the new plantings grow some.

The first job was pull up the 85 ft Yew hedge.


Rented excavator, $700 for the weekend (United Rentals) including taxes, diesel fuel, pickup/delivery. The excavator was easy and fun to use. In photo below, half the hedge is removed.

Also with excavator I leveled some lumpy ground out by the shed. I discoverd that one of the lumps was a rotted wood pile with a hugs bees nest in it.

Here the yews are almost gone. A couple buddies came and helped out. It wasnt hard to get friends to come over when you have an excavator to play with.

Not shown, the yews ended up in a HUGE pile in the cul de sac. My neighbors helped me drag the yews into the woods the day after my friends and I dug them up.

I aligned shrubs at different angles because the house is at an angle to the street.

Trucks make a fine planter but I need this one for other purposes. I am looking for an old wood cart to just leave somewhere on the lawn and grow plants in and around.

Here is digging up the asphalt walkway. The walkway was too narrow and too close to house. I am replacing it with a grass walkway that will be defined by plantings on either side.

I will seed over the old walkway. The new walkway to front door will be just grass, which won't wear because the kitchen door gets all the use.

I will train this climbing rose to climb up the burkwood, at the entrance to grass walkway. Nothing like climbing roses to give a house a cottage-y feel.

Partway done with planting, below. The Andromeda is the only thing I kept from the original landscaping. Everything else was yew or hosta and pulled out.

View looking from driveway in photo below. I got the wild mountain laurels from nearby woods a couple miles away. The wild mountain laurel flower white in spring. The kaliedescope laurel is white/pink/purlple in spring.

Below, area of yew hedge, and where laurels will extend on opposite side of driveway:

The four sugar maples block late afternoon light to garden:

I had an arborist friend prune them to let more light through. The trees ended up looking more stately, and everyone was impressed with the work.

Below, late afternoon sun lighting garden (lower right):

The garden this mid-July is a big green tangle:

All tomato plants except one (bigboy in picture below) are doing terribly because of all the rain. They've hardly grown. The bigboy I had bought as a large greenouse plant, so it is less affected.

Pole bean plants wrap around posts like vines. I just hooked up netting along the posts to create a fence. The hope is that the beans spread along the net.