Elizabeth Barrette (ysabetwordsmith) wrote,
Elizabeth Barrette
ysabetwordsmith
  • Mood: busy

Monday Yardening

First round: Planted and mulched two sweetbush seedlings in the forest garden.  I am slowly trying to replace the mess of brittle trees and honeysuckle with something better.

Second round: Planted and mulched three sassafras and one bald cypress.

I also added a couple handfuls of worms to the barrel garden, and have started putting individual worms into flowerpots.

EDIT:
Third round: Planted three prairie plants (purple joe-pye weed, rattlesnake master, and one other) plus one red willow bush. This concludes the batch of tree and shrub seedlings I was working through.  All that remains of the native plants are the six pots of prairie grasses.

Raspberries and blackberries are blooming.  Wild strawberries have been blooming for a while.  :D


Tags: gardening, illinois, nature, personal
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  • 2 comments
rix_scaedu

rix_scaedu

May 11 2016, 06:49:32 UTC 5 years ago

I have what may be a silly question - is "brittle tree" a description or a name?

In my defence we have a whole family of trees, shrubs and bushes commonly known as "wattle" because the early colonists found them useful for making wattle and daub buildings.
ysabetwordsmith

Well...

ysabetwordsmith

May 11 2016, 07:03:01 UTC 5 years ago

"Brittle" means trees prone to ice/wind damage. These include hackberry and mulberry. I don't really want them where they are, but neither do I want to cut down the forest garden. So I am trying to replace them with better things. The sweet shrubs, small trees like the redbud I just planted, and something taller but sturdy like a linden (which I had but I think the rabbits have eaten it). This article has a chart of brittle and tough trees.