Forsooth, Forsythia

I came, I saw, I pruned. Have I mentioned how overgrown our landscaping is? How, once upon a time, there was a green thumb who cared tenderly for the plants and shrubs around our house? And how the place has been neglected for years? Do you KNOW what happens to forsythia if you don't prune it (properly) for, say... at least 5 years?

Well, a couple of weeks ago I learned a few things about forsythia.

• The best time to prune it is spring, after the blossoms fall off.


• Prune it by cutting off branches at the base of the plant.


• Branches that grow long enough to touch the ground will grow INTO the ground and take ROOT.


• If you only trim the exterior branches (like shaving or giving it a 'haircut') - all you get is a lot of dead wood in the interior of the plant because sunlight can't get in.


• Trimming 4 overgrown forsythia does not take "just a few minutes." It is a 6 hour job that involves gloves, pruning shears, a ladder, big hedge clippers, at least 6 enormous yard waste bags and a bow saw. Oh, and a big bottle of Tecnu.


• It's best to bag the trimmings as you go, unless you want to face a mountain of branches 5 feet tall at the end of the operation, when really all you want to do is shake the dead bugs out of your hair and shower. And drink a very cold, very large beer.


• At the end of it all, you won't be sure if you like the results or if you should have just left the d*mn things alone for yet another year.
  

In the end, though, I reclaimed a strip of valuable gardening space about 4 feet wide and 15 feet long! Now I just have to dig up all the weeds growing there and figure out what to plant!

I do have before/after pictures.... but as this post has been sitting in the drafts folder for a couple of weeks, I'll publish it now and get the pictures later. (Yeah, right.) ** ok, so the picture above is 'before'!

Iris

Iris
Originally uploaded by littlepinksocks.

Blue.

A nice big patch of these in the back yard.

We've been in this house a little under a year now. Once upon a time someone lived here who really loved to garden. The folks who lived here before us didn't. Everything is completely overgrown and a total mess back there. But you can tell there was once a plan. My task is to figure out what to keep and what to chop down. But I need to wait til things bloom so I can figure out what everything is first. (see post on Poppies. Lesson learned!)

Poppy

Poppy
Originally uploaded by littlepinksocks.

Red.

When these showed up in the back yard I thought they were funky weeds. Spiky-fuzzy pod things.

Then they bloomed.

POW!

Too bad I mowed a bunch of them down prior to the fireworks. *sigh* I'm learning.

With all my free time

still life with doodle in motion
Originally uploaded by littlepinksocks.

When people ask me about hobbies, it's really hard for me to think of one. I generally think of 'official activities' like scrapbooking, quilting, fishing, etc. as 'hobbies.' I feel pretty lame calling 'surfing the internet' and 'playing with my dog' or 'baking cookies' bona fide hobbies (maybe more on this later). HOWEVER, this spring I think I might have stumbled upon a hobby that satisfies my rather stringent definition. Gardening.

Well, at least I like the IDEA of gardening as a hobby. All I've managed to do so far is plant some bulbs and plants and watch them come up. I've also purchased a book. Does that make it an official hobby?