Monday 4 June 2012

Dig, Dig, Dig, Mutter.

I've been out transplanting this morning.

Yeah, I thought I was done too. But yesterday my landlord took advantage of the one dry bit of the morning to do the lawn-mowing and the weed-whacking. And whether it was carelessness, botanical ignorance, or simply a guy-getting-carried-away-with-power-tools thing, he cut down a whole bunch of stuff that wasn't weeds. Most of the annuals I planted last week to replace the weeds near the compost pile were toast - I salvaged a few annual rudbeckia, a couple trailing things, and an ivy. Sadly, the coleus and tradescantia had little more than stubs left. The woodruff, which was in flower, got  chopped, but will survive. And I doubt the phlox and the soapwort from the back corner will flower this year, but they're perennials, so they'll live.

I had to find places for all these things, though. Ended up taking out three or four buckets-worth of groundcovers I had been allowing to flourish, and a daylily which was starting to overshadow a bunch of other things. The daylily was a little recalcitrant. Halfway through the digging around it with a shovel to loosen it, it proved too tough for my shovel. Snap went the handle, right above the metal shaft holding the blade on (I knew it was getting weak, but no, I had to push it), and backwards went I, collecting a scrape on my hand where I collided with the concrete behind me. Fortunately, there was an extra shovel available, so I finished the job. It's supposed to rain today, and the ground is still damp from yesterday's rain, so I didn't bother watering things in. I'll do it this evening if the rain doesn't turn up.

And Wednesday when he comes to put out the garbage, I think I'm going to try to have a chat with the landlord. And just to be sure, I may fence the edge to show what's lawn and what's not. I want to make sure I'm not going to lose any vegetables to the weed-whacker.

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