Hose vs Shoot
I toggled between assassin and attendant this month. I spent equal time delicately weaving the wayward clematis shoots back onto the trellis, gently trimming the dead foliage off the saliva, and in the rocks on my knees violently stabbing and swearing at the rogue weeds bursting through the landscape fabric and rocks. While the perennials are coming back to life in their manicured spaces, every weed imaginable seems to be revolting against the oppressing factors put in place to suppress them. I am impressed by their refusal to die while I hate their tenacity. They seem to sprout overnight.
I still question the logic of “controlling” a natural space. Why can’t I just let it be? The exacting task of weed control seems so futile. After all, are they not plants too (and hardy, resistant ones at that)? Am I making excuses to stop weeding (lazy) or trying to let go of my need to dominate a natural space (honorable)?
April has been a busy month of planting vegetables and flowers for the season and watching the weather very carefully. We saw a few inches of snow fall in the first week of the month. The neighborhood was beset by 80-mile an hour winds, which whipped up and dumped inches of loose soil on the tender radish and onion seedlings. Broken branches, collapsed fences and felled trees littered Longmont.
At the start of the month I nudged the hay mulch away from the new peony shoots. Planted last spring, we have yet to see any blooms, and I am concerned these plants may be in the wrong location in our garden (either not enough or too much drainage, light, or both). We may have a casualty from an ill-advised relocation of a peony into the bulb garden last Fall – I knew it was dicey considering that they don’t like their roots disturbed, and there are no new shoots on that one.
I finally purchased a new hose after an unfortunate accident involving our old, rubber, heavy 50-footer and a fragile new peony shot. I’ve been dragging that monster around the yard, stretching it taut, trying to reach the recesses of the backyard. A single impatient tug pulled the hose across the cutting garden, scraping and damaging the young shoot. In any battle of hose vs shoot, there can only be one loser. I purchased a lightweight 100′ hose, and knocked a bamboo cane into the ground as a hose guide and peony protector. I will still be impatient and move too fast – so I need to create ways to protect the garden from me (and the hose).
The hardening off of vegetables has begun, with a forecasted planting date of May 9th. It seems a bit early (before Mother’s Day), so I am nervous all this prep work will be for naught. Once plants are in the ground, you can’t very well dig them all up to save them from the weather.