wishing for summer

Ben hiding in the garden, September 2007

The garden, late summer 2007

In the dark days of winter, I wish for summer to return. I've been looking over photos of the garden and making plans for next summer. We moved into our house a couple of years ago. and our yard was lacking everything but trees. We assessed the yard and got to work.

There were many tress in the yard; two American Elms, three maples, four Blue Spruce, three White Pines, one Mountain Ash, one White Cedar, two Red Pine, and my favorite a rare Jack Pine. Apparently we have one of a few Jack Pine trees in Minneapolis. The lawn looked spotty at best and everything was overgrown. The woman who lived there years before us had a thing for planting trees from her cabin up north. She was a bit of a recluse and liked to plant in the middle of the night.

We began with removing a diseased Norway Maple, which was the perfect spot for a flower garden. To save money we had Rainbow Tree cut the tree down. (This was no job for us amateurs) They removed all but the tree trunk. We gave the trunk to Xtian's dad Chuck to use. Chuck is a wood turner and used the wood to make a beautiful bowl for us. So I will always have a part of the tree. After the tree was cut down, the tree trimmers laid the trunk on a tree limb so as to not make an impression on the ground. I love trees and this was a sign of respect to me. I knelt down as thanked the tree for its life.

We couldn't afford to have the tree stump ground up so we decided to plant around it and let nature take its course. We plotted an area for a perennial garden. We discovered there were three stumps cut close to the ground. The cost for stump grinding was around $300 to $400 (ouch). We decided for the sweat equity solution and dig up the roots. We worked bit by bit and dug out a huge root ball. At the end of the struggle to dig out the root, it was like a loose tooth that was ready to come out. I stood on the stump, while talking to our neighbor Bob, and tried to get it loose. Bob volunteered to get the rest of the stump out with an ax. Success at last -- The root was freed from the land.

Root ball we dug out of the yard
(it's about a foot and a half across at the thickest part)

This was a small start on the way to building the garden. Next we hand tilled the land removing old dead roots along the way. We amended the soil with peat moss, compost, leaves, gypsum, and lime. We worked the soil to get it ready for planting and used what was available. Native vegetation stayed planted. We shopped at the Vagary at the St. Paul Farmer's Market for Minnesota native plants. We also added some interesting non-native non-invasive perennials. My goal was, and is still, to grow only Midwest (North American) native plants. But I accept that not all plants available or affordable are native plants. We planted White Sage, Echinacia, Cosmos, blanket flower, White Swan (white Echinacia), Big Blue Stem, Corral Bells, Spider Flower, Prairie Drop-seed, Giant Hyssop, Goldenrod, False Sunflower, Blue Gamma, and Black Eyed Susan.

planting the first native grasses and prairie flowers.

The beginning of the garden 2006

Native plants

We made a wood chip trail to cut down on weeds. I new that we needed some sort of edge for the garden. We used tree branches at first and then integrated rocks. I get a inspiration from nature. I thought of how rocks occur in nature and how they fit in with plant life. The picture below is from Wild River State Park in MN.

Wild River State Park, MN

We created a rock edge by using found rocks in the yard, from family land up north, large rocks from family in Colorado, liberated rocks from construction, and some were purchased.

Native grape vine

Sage and native grasses

Ben enjoying the garden, September 2007

Late summer 2007

The first year was really hard back breaking work. Tilling the soil, moving land, and lugging large rocks around is exhausting. It took two years to turn the land around to a beautiful perennial garden. This year I'm planning on growing more edible plants.