On Thursday morning around 11 am, two very nice workers unloaded nine new trees off of the back of their truck, straight from the wholesale nursery. They proceeded to plant them in locations I designated, along with planting three trees I had previously purchased. That makes twelve trees newly in the ground. Wow!!!
Each and every one of the new trees was very beautiful. That is probably the benefit of dealing with professionals who obtain their trees from a wholesale nursery which actually grows trees on their various local farms, as compared with a retailer who gets new trees from the same nursery, or one like it, and then has them sitting around in their side lot Garden Store for a few months and watered, or not, by store staff. Ironically on Thursday night when I dropped into Home Depot to get more topsoil, I saw a dead looking tree that must have been beautiful once at 12 feet high. The recent hundred degree heat is surely no help in keeping such trees alive, especially when they are parked in an asphalt lot.
I hope that irony doesn't come back to bite me. Ever since I agreed to have trees planted and irrigation installed simultaneously for lowest cost and practicality and promised planting despite my wire loaded yard, about a month ago, I've been very worried about how this was going to turn out. The need to get irrigation done NOW (really should have been done 15 years ago) itself was mainly driven by concern about my home foundation, which is now facing intense summer heat and dryness now that we're no longer getting tropical storm rainfall several times a week as we were (very unusually) in early summer. I hope I am not sacrificing poor little living trees for vanity and concern about my mostly inert foundation. I would feel bad about that, but then just get more trees to replace them come October. I believe the main thing here is that after many years of procrastination, I am finally doing something about my back yard. My lady friend is very happy about this.
Most of the new trees were in 15 gallon pots, but the two Vitex were in 5 gallon pots. I had specifically chosen the smaller size to make them easier to plant in my backyard full of telecom wires. I would have chosen to get many if not most of the other trees in a smaller size also, had it been available from the nursery.
As it turned out, wires were not a problem except for the four trees planted along the south side of my back yard where all telecom and electrical service wires run to my house panels. That area of the yard is riddled with cable TV cables, probably many of which are no longer in use, but who knows which is which, and they all got marked. And it wasn't just the markings. A snarl of wires was quickly exposed at the southwest corner of my lot, and the planters balked at planting the 15 gallon Viburnum. Leaving that spot open for awhile, they just barely managed to get my existing Crepe Myrtle into the ground nearby, and then the Wild Olive, by pushing wires far enough apart to squeeze them in. Then they found that at the spot closest to the house, they could simply pull the wires from the ground and lay to one side...making for the largest ground opening on the south side. So then I had to make a hard decision quickly, and I agreed that they would put the Viburnum there rather than where originally intended, and the little 5 gallon Vitex I had chosen for that spot should go back near the southwest corner. I am very ambivalent about that decision. The Viburnum is rather big for a shrub nearest the house (I paced exactly 5 feet from the SW corner of my house). I have half a mind to pull the Viburnum come October and plant something smaller there. But then what would I do with the Viburnum?
Each and every one of the new trees was very beautiful. That is probably the benefit of dealing with professionals who obtain their trees from a wholesale nursery which actually grows trees on their various local farms, as compared with a retailer who gets new trees from the same nursery, or one like it, and then has them sitting around in their side lot Garden Store for a few months and watered, or not, by store staff. Ironically on Thursday night when I dropped into Home Depot to get more topsoil, I saw a dead looking tree that must have been beautiful once at 12 feet high. The recent hundred degree heat is surely no help in keeping such trees alive, especially when they are parked in an asphalt lot.
I hope that irony doesn't come back to bite me. Ever since I agreed to have trees planted and irrigation installed simultaneously for lowest cost and practicality and promised planting despite my wire loaded yard, about a month ago, I've been very worried about how this was going to turn out. The need to get irrigation done NOW (really should have been done 15 years ago) itself was mainly driven by concern about my home foundation, which is now facing intense summer heat and dryness now that we're no longer getting tropical storm rainfall several times a week as we were (very unusually) in early summer. I hope I am not sacrificing poor little living trees for vanity and concern about my mostly inert foundation. I would feel bad about that, but then just get more trees to replace them come October. I believe the main thing here is that after many years of procrastination, I am finally doing something about my back yard. My lady friend is very happy about this.
Most of the new trees were in 15 gallon pots, but the two Vitex were in 5 gallon pots. I had specifically chosen the smaller size to make them easier to plant in my backyard full of telecom wires. I would have chosen to get many if not most of the other trees in a smaller size also, had it been available from the nursery.
As it turned out, wires were not a problem except for the four trees planted along the south side of my back yard where all telecom and electrical service wires run to my house panels. That area of the yard is riddled with cable TV cables, probably many of which are no longer in use, but who knows which is which, and they all got marked. And it wasn't just the markings. A snarl of wires was quickly exposed at the southwest corner of my lot, and the planters balked at planting the 15 gallon Viburnum. Leaving that spot open for awhile, they just barely managed to get my existing Crepe Myrtle into the ground nearby, and then the Wild Olive, by pushing wires far enough apart to squeeze them in. Then they found that at the spot closest to the house, they could simply pull the wires from the ground and lay to one side...making for the largest ground opening on the south side. So then I had to make a hard decision quickly, and I agreed that they would put the Viburnum there rather than where originally intended, and the little 5 gallon Vitex I had chosen for that spot should go back near the southwest corner. I am very ambivalent about that decision. The Viburnum is rather big for a shrub nearest the house (I paced exactly 5 feet from the SW corner of my house). I have half a mind to pull the Viburnum come October and plant something smaller there. But then what would I do with the Viburnum?
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