pal·i·sade
/ˌpaləˈsād/
noun
- a fence of wooden stakes or iron railings fixed in the ground, forming an enclosure or defense.
We spent all of March clearing the dead and dangerous trees out of the thicket along our west side beyond the garden. This past week we created some separation between the native shrubs and the landscaped area at the end of the lawn.
This area has changed a lot in the past ten years.
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| 2012 |
We started with a simple walkway across the lawn to the neighbor's driveway.
There were some sizeable trees along the edge.
We cut the grass very short and laid down mulch.
We added Myrtle as groundcover.
The mulched area butted up to "the Poop Deck" where I keep my compost.
Over the years we removed trees and added grasses and divisions of daylilies. The deer use this as a thoroughfare to get to the thicket area. There are always fresh hoofprints. So the deer go in and the roots come out. That is the problem with natural areas. When they butt up to landscaped areas you have a constant battle on your hands to keep the weeds out of the loose and fertile soil. I've blogged about this problem before. Sometimes the area needs a complete reset.
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| The Deer Route |
The Viburnum bushes spread by roots. They are invasive and insidious. The Buttercup are almost as bad forming a strong net of crisscrossing roots. Pulling one plant is no improvement. There is always a root left to pickup where it left off. Below is an example of how far one root can travel.
I hooked one sizeable Viburnum root that was coming out of the thicket, and by the time I got done pulling I had about thirty feet of root. All branching from one source.
Along the roots there were nodes that were sending up shoots. The baby bushes were easy to pull out, but there were always a dozen more sprouts below the surface waiting their turn. Spraying did nothing. Pulling was futile.
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| Six weeks of reweeding just waiting for their turn |
When we were brainstorming the neighbor's retaining wall and found a source for used power poles, I told my husband that I had a spot where I could sure use a wall of power poles to hold something back. After the retaining wall was finished we turned our attention to the problems at hand. My husband's number one priority was to get rid of 18 feet of edging. Step #1: dig a trench.
Step #2: Cut up a pole.
By the end of day one we had a little wall between the landscape bed and the lawn. We can mulch right up to one side, and use the string trimmer on the lawn side. Day two would be heading across the back. The backhoe made short work of it.
It was easy digging since the bed was constructed of deep, screened topsoil and has been heavily mulched for several years. Few serious roots has crossed over. Mostly Poison Ivy which we had to spray weekly during the summer. Beneath those Viburnum bushes is a thick carpet of poison ivy, and a lot of wild strawberry and Virginia Creeper. All of those things are invasive and difficult to control.
When I proposed this project, my thought was to swoop the wall around...
"Around what?" my husband asked. "Is there anything worth saving in there?"
No, not really. Just a big Oak stump, a clump of Viburnum, and a crap-ton of Golden Rod, Aster, Buttercup and... you guessed it... Poison Ivy. The Myrtle was doing its best to choke it out but it was fighting a loosing battle.
We spent the afternoon of Day #3 lopping, weeding, digging out Myrtle and assessing the problem.
Day #4 pulling stumps
lopping roots, bringing in fill for the holes and leveling
Day #5 was back to trenching and chain sawing
You couldn't plan it out this accurately. The last pole dropped in with only a smidge to spare. We'd rather be lucky than good. We brought in "crusher run" gravel and tamped in each side. That oughta keep the roots from invading!
And finally we added a layer of old shredded mulch. This will keep things tidy until the weather is better for transplanting. Then we will put down a final layer of mulch,
My plan is to divide up that large clump of Miscanthus Flame Grass that now looks out of place in the front. First I'll continue the row of tall grass divisions along the back, alternating with lower Hameln Fountain Grass divisions and perhaps a few other varieties I have around.
There is enough depth to have a garden path down the center if I want. I would like to have billowy grass contrasted with upright purple Sage and Salvia. Perhaps a dash of yellow like Coreopsis or Rudbeckia. Anything that goes into this bed will have to be deer resistant and cut short in the fall so we can mulch and blow leaves across the bed into the thicket. I dug and set aside several wheelbarrows full of the Myrtle. It is in the shade and can be transplanted back in when we get some cloudy days. Whew! That was a week's work!
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