Garden Journal 2019: It's May!

May 06, 2019

Garden Journal 2019: It's May!

[Editor's note: Blogger is the worst when it comes to formatting. Apologies for all the inconsistent spacing issues.]

Well, how did we get here?

It's been raining and raining and raining (and raining), so the opportunities for planting have been slim here. On the other hand, the rain-softened earth makes for easier digging up of rocks and digging of bed borders, so those have been the major activities going on the last few weeks. Even with before-and-after pics, this doesn't really look very impressive unless you are intimately acquainted with our yard. You'll just have to trust me that this is SO IMPRESSIVE.

Garage-Side Bed

This bed is on the side of the garage in the backyard. I don't have an original pic from when we first moved in--then it was just the rocks and mulch and a giant pile of random bricks. But this was an early-ish one in which I'd only added a tiny Knockout rose and two little hydrangeas, all of whom barely survived the winter. The other greens were volunteers of some sort.

Before

The roses and hydrangeas have ended up flourishing pretty well, and last year I added some tickweed and coneflower, all of which seem to have survived this past winter. However, as much as I loved the giant rocks that formed this bed's border, they were a nuisance AS a border, making it difficult to mow around and requiring extensive weed-whacking. And so this spring's project has been to dig out and repurpose the rocks (some in the bed itself) and dig a new border trench. Since this particular bed turns out to already be secretly bordered by a buried brick walkway (!), I just dug the ditch in front of that, then filled it up with gravel. I also directed the rainspout into the trench and covered the spout with rocks, and now instead of flooding the yard, the rainwater is directed into my border trench. Neat!

Where's the water spout? It's a mystery!

OH, and also after three years of hating the pile of bricks, I sorted through them all, used some to build the wall for Muriel's herb garden, and built a tidy wall here to hide the dog-poop-collecting implements. I call it Poop Corner, and I further moved the now-sizable Knockout rose to the corner to continue growing and camouflaging Poop Corner from the scrutiny of visitors.

Poop? What poop?

Backyard Corner Bed

Directly across from the Garage-Side Bed is this little corner. Again, this is not a move-in picture, as when we first moved in, there was no bed at all. In this first photo, I believe I had just built the bed and installed the Henry Lauder Walking Stick that you can barely see in the center. It doesn't help that this is the worst part of the lawn.

Before

Today, it... isn't a whole lot improved, honestly. BUT the Henry Lauder Walking Stick is thriving and growing, and I just moved in some rocks to add some interest and discourage dogs from tearing up the bed.

Look, they're not all winners, okay?

Big Back Bed

Now this is the big ambitious project this year. When we moved it, this little bed on the left existed with the big round planter. The birdbath and the turtle were our additions. In keeping with the trenched borders I've created in the other beds, I decided to do the same thing here, albeit while still retaining a few of the rocks.

Before

After

The yard that extended behind this bed was shady lawn that mostly became dirt where the shade was too deep. In short, it was ugly, and I decided to make it into another bed because OF COURSE I DID. It was... not very successful. Totally my bad because I did not edge it deep enough or maintain it properly.

First attempt at this one. EH.

This past Saturday, I renewed my efforts here, digging most of the border with a hand trowel on my hands and knees because guess what? Under two inches of soil, there are endless inches of gravel. Naturally! After hours of digging, I finally had a nice solid edge that reached from hither to yon!