New Yardstuff, Part 1

I am thrilled with the warm November weather here.  It is unusually nice.   It has been in the low to  mid 70s for days again, dry, and sunny.  Perfect for outdoor work.  

I roto-tilled the areas in the front yard where the tree stumps and roots were grinded out  a few days ago so that I could add topsoil, level the area and replant grass.  I filled fourteen 35#  kitty litter tubs (about 5 gallons each) twice and 4 more to complete the raking.

Those were about 1/2 stump mulch and 1/2 dirt.  I used it to completely fill one 4'x4'x4' compost bin in alternating layers with shredded mowed and bagged fallen leaves, and grass and kitchen waste from the old bin.  I was worried there wasn't enough "green" stuff to feed the worms and microbes, but it seems to have been enough.

I stuck in a kitchen thermometer probe (can't find my long compost bin thermometer at the moment) and left it there for an hour.  It went up from 70F outside temperature to 114F in the bin, so it is heating up well by microbial decomposition.  I did not expect it to start to heat up so soon!  😀. In a few weeks, it may get up to  140F and that it perfect.  

Thinking that it could use more greens for long-tern heating, I cast my eye on the wild english ivy growing in the far back yard.  Well, I had the collection bag on the self-propelled battery-powered mower, so off I went at it.  

I should mention that the ivy (English and Poison) are invaders from my backyard neighbor who simply ignores the back 10' of his yard.  I fight them (the plants) constantly.  Also, a previous side neighbor planted Some Damn Invasive Vine (which I keep forgetting the name of) which has gotten into my flowerbeds and raised garden paths.

So, it occurs to me I have a self-perpetuating source of green material for the compost bins!  If I have a fast-growing weed I want to eliminate, I might as well get some benefit from it.  I emptied a few trash barrels of old dried grass and leaves, so I can refill them until I have enough to fill the 1st bin with.  If life gives you lemons...

Having the mower in the far back, I also mowed around my 2 year-old specimen trees.  I want to build 4'x4' frames around them from old pallet wood, cover the inside with packing paper from Amazon shipments and fill it with mulch.  That should stop the underbrush vines from growing up the saplings until they get large enough to shade them out on their own.  

And by that time, the pallet frames and mulch should rot away. leaving the trees to grow naturally.  As the leader of the 'A Team' TV show used to say, "I love it when a plan comes together".

The next project is to get the DR brush mower working again.  I have a backyard of wild blackberries and undergrowth to remove.  But I left old gas in it for 2 years and it won't start now.  

The good neighbor guy across the street looked at it and suggested where I could spray "starter fluid" into the gas injector system.  I'll get at that soon.  And if I can't fix it, there are local mechanics who can.

But that's a future post...

Catching Up With The Yard, Part 1

I got some stuff done in the yard in June and July (which got undone as weeds regrew in August) but at least it isn't as bad as before.  Young new weeds are better that old tough ones. 

August was odd.  Too much rain.  I never thought I would complain about THAT!  My 1st 25 years here, the soil would get so dry that it would crack open like a lesser version of parched mudflats.

When some rain DID fall, it would immediately be sucked into the depths.  OK, unlike the above picture, I DID have lawn grass, but dry and brown.  Things have changed.  Partly, by my own efforts to leave grass clippings on the lawn which gradually improved the soil.  And NO, grass-clippings do not cause "thatch". Frequent but only surface watering causes the grass roots to spread on the top inch or so (where the water is), and THAT causes thatch.  And that leaves the grass roots subject to drying and death.

I have a healthy lawn almost year-round these days, and I seldom water it.  But when I do, it is a long deep watering.  Healthy grass can send roots down a foot or more if that is where the water is, and deeper water doesn't evaporate away as fast as surface water.

And I'll mention the clover is good for your lawn.  Clover sends roots down several feet and brings nutrients back up to the surface as the leaves die.  But bees like clover, and I sure don't mind helping the bees.  

As far as the lawn goes my rule is pretty much "If it is green, it is OK".  I don't even mind a few dandelions.  I don't have many because the grass is healthy and I cut it at 3" which is enough to smother/shadeout most weeds.  

I have neighbors who cut their grass to 1" and are constantly fighting with weak grass and happy weeds.  I'm pretty sure all the dandelions I DO have come from them.  Well, you know, most people don't exactly study about lawns.  They just do their best in their busy days.  I've always been interested in growing things though, and a lawn is like a garden.  

In fact, it is time to spread corn gluten meal on the lawn.  It inhibits seeds from developing and Fall is when the dandelion and most lawn weeds germinate.  And since it is also mostly nitrogen, the grass loves it.  Turf grasses in temperate zones grow roots best in Fall/Winter (which admittedly does seem odd for most plants) and good roots make healthy lawns.  But Spring bulbs are like that too, so they aren't unique.

But the corn gluten that prevents weed seeds from developing also affects grass seed.  So I generally cycle the  Fall treatments.  Two Septembers, the corn gluten, and the 3rd, new grass seed.  My preferred lawn grass is tall fescue and they are not spreaders.  So new seed has to be spread "sometimes".  

Every few years, I get a trailerful of free compost from the County and spread it around on the lawn.  It's really kind of a cool system.  You have yard debris like fallen branches and even Christmas trees and bring it to the Mulching Center.  

They pile it up into huge mounds for a couple years while it heats up and breaks down.  Then they move it to a 2nd spot for a final "churn" where it heats up again.  The result is something between mulch and compost.  It's not like finely-sifted compost of course, but it is ready for lawn and garden use.  

I like it for several reasons.  It's free to dump the raw stuff at the start and free to pick the finished product.  And if you go on Saturdays 8am-Noon, they use a bucket-loader to fill the trailer for free.  I LOVE "free".

The commercial nursery near the County mulch center probably hates that.  They get $40 per bucketload (my trailer holds 3).  But they offer sifted compost and a 50/50 blend of topsoil at the same price and sometimes I buy some of that.  And I only know of them because I have stooped there on my way to the County mulch center, so they get some business from me for that and sometimes I buy plants.

But back to the lawn.  I spread the compost over the lawn thinly most Springs.  Every little amount helps.  An 1/8" of compost helps the grass quite a lot (they are good at living on very little help (consider that most grasses worldwide live without human assistance)...

But all that is about the lawn.  I have problems with TOO much grass in other places.  More about that tomorrow... 

Near Dead Trees and Shrubs

Last year was really hard on the trees and shrubs in the yard.  I have 2 Golden Rain Trees on either side of the front driveway, for example.  In spite of frequent drip watering (obviously insufficient), they both nearly perished.  But there are some branches still alive on both, and both are sending out shoots from the main trunk.  I'm not experienced enough to know if that is really good or not, but growth is surely better than dead.

The 3 Burning Bushes sufferred various degrees of stress.  The first one by the drainage easement is fine but is overgrown with some thorny vine.  That needs to be cut and pulled out.

The second seemed OK, but suddenly had dead branches this Spring.  And they stuck out far.  Mowing was always a threat of poking out an eye.  I finally attacked all the dead branches a couple days ago with a lopper and the "saws-all".  I gained 3' all around the shrub.  And there were some junk saplings growing up through it.  I got them cut to ground level.  I hope they die as a result.

The third one was in better shape.  I don't know why; I didn't water it any more than the second one.  But sometimes, you take good news and just accept it.  It needed minor pruning.

My 5"x8" utility trailer is filled with pruning debris.  Even after I tie it all down, i will barely be able to see out the back of the Forester.  Barely is sufficient.  And on a Saturday, I will be able to return from the yard-debris drop-off County site with a trailerful of loaded mulch.

I have enough prunings for 2 more trailerloads and mulch in return.  I can use all the mulch.  It is nearly compost.  Some of it will go onto the long brown paper strips (that shipping companies use for shock-absorbtion) that I will put down between my garden beds.  More will go onto places in my flowerbeds where only weeds are growing to smother them for next year's plantings.  And any extra will just get added to the compost bins.  They have too much rich kitchen "green" waste and not enough "brown" bulk.  I'll turn the kitchen waste into the second bin and layer it with mulch.

This will be the first expedition with the new Subaru Forester hauling anything.  The trailer hitch was a real adventure.  The factory-installed tow hitch insert is a 1 1/4" x 1 1/4".  It takes a 1/2" pin which they did not supply.  The 1st hitch pin I bought was too short.  The 2nd one was also too short, but I was able to drill the hole slightly larger and hammer it into place.  That thing is NEVER coming off again, LOL!

So great, I will be hauling back a 5'x8'x18" trailerload of mulch and sholveling it into buckets to carry to the garden in effectively 100F heat for a few days!

Well, I do 45 minutes outside and 45 minutes inside to rest.  I'm not gonna kill myself moving mulch!

Yard Work

This will be a busy week (by my standards).  I'm completely taking apart my existing aquarium and cleaning it to start new after giving away my 10" plecostomus catfish (see yesterday's post).

Tuesday, a tree removal company (that I have good past experience with) is coming to remove the huge fallen tree in the backyard and 7 others that are starting to shade my garden.  I spent hours Sunday preparing a corner of the backyard and 2 other area to receive all the ground-up tree chips.  It will take several years for them to decompose, but I will have year's worth of great compost after that.

Yes, the tree company would haul the tree-chips away for free to the landfill (or maybe for sale somewhere, but I hate to waste organic material.  Eight trees will make several impressive piles and I expect that they will start to steam in the winter as they begin to break down.  And, for sure, I won't have to buy any mulch for the flowerbeds for many years!

I sure got plenty of winter exercise!  The corner of the backyard where most of the chips will go  used to be where I stored firewood.  It was so long ago that I had to push over old rotten wood and pry out cinder blocks buried in the ground from where I had upright P-T 2x4s to hold the firewood in place.  Carrying 10 cinder blocks 50' each is serious exercise when you are 62.  And then there were all the 12' 2x4s that supported the firewood across the cinder blocks

Plus, I moved stored hoses, removed hose supports, moved various planting buckets that have been sitting around for years, put boards over the pond runway so they wont puncture holes in it by walking on it or dropping tree parts on it (that liner is expensive), marked out areas where the tree removal crew shouldn't drag logs through (where plants were still underground but labels were above).  LOL, I even found my old compost sifter box and pried it out of the vines.

You never realize how much clutter you have around the yard until someone else is coming over to do something in it...

Three hours of heavy work!  I need them to move one bench that is too heavy for me to move alone, but other than that, I'm ready for them to arrive Tuesday at 7:30 am!  I can hardly wait.

It will be worth it for the greater sunlight when it is done!

Doing Useful Stuff, 5

The trees drop branches, I cut down weedy saplings, I trim desirable trees, some shrubs need severe pruning each year.  It adds up to a large brushpile.  

So I finally piled all the debris into the hauling trailer and brought it to the County landfill.  It was 8 feet high in the trailer.  After tying it down tight with ropes, I crushed it down to 6' high.  And delivered it.  Not as trash, but as compostable material.  You see, the County here has a huge composting area.  They pile all the organic debris into rows 20 feet high and a football field long.

In return, County residents can obtain "mulch" (more like halfway between shredded bark and compost) for free).  They will even use a bucketloader to fill trailers or pickup trucks for residents for free on Saturdays.  Its not quite either, but it IS free. 

I usually shovel it out of the trailer into a pile, use a mulch-fork to take out the large parts to use as real mulch, then let the smaller stuff compost (covered by a tarp) to become soil amendment.  Between moisture, time, ants, worms, heat, and microbes, it is really good stuff after a full year.

So it is really a "give raw material this year" and "get back a useful product the next".  And free, did I mention that?  LOL!  Free is good...

Free Mulch Again!

For years, the County collected lawn and tree debris, shredded it, and aged it.  Then gave it back to county residents for free.  On Saturdays, they would even load it in trailers or pickups for free.  It wasn't big pieces like commercial mulch, nor aged enough to be compost.  I used to get 2 trailer loads each Spring.  One to use for mulch and the other to set aside to compost further.

Then they stopped for 2 (3?) years.  I kept checking their website only to see "No Mulch Available".  I figured they were either using it for county maintenance, or lacked the funds to keep processing the raw debris.

So when I had a landfill load of trash, I asked about it.  I was told the mulch had become available again all this year.  I would swear the website said "No Mulch Available" just last month.  But the imporatant thing was that the mulch was available again!

There used to be hour-long lines to get the Saturday free loading, but yesterday, I was the only customer.  I drove up, put a tarp on the bottom of the trailer (it has gaps between the floorboards) and set the edge of a larger tarp in the front so the mulch would hold it in place.  ONE big bucket load later, the trailer was filled to overflowing!  I folded the top tarp back over the pile and attached it down with bungee cords.

I drove it into the back yard, where I will scoop it out onto this beat up old tarp where the last of the compost mulch was used up this Spring.  Unfortunately, the top tarp did not reach all the way to the back end, and with 3" of rain falling on it, the exposed mulch got so heavy it tipped the trailer back.

Now there is too much weight against the removable back  upright, I can't remove it.  So I'll have to shovel a foot or so clear before I can slide the mulch out.

This is how tipped it is.  I removed the top tarp, in hopes that the rain forecast for tonight will even out the weight and let it sit level again so that I can remove the back.

I shot this picture crooked so that it would LOOK level.  LOL!  That's 2.75 cubic yards of free mulch!  I hate to think what it would cost to buy it by the bag!

As soon as I get this unloaded and spread around the flower/garden beds, I'll go back and get more to leave aside to compost, then whatever more I can get, I'll use to cover my daffodil and hosta beds!