Garden is sleeping now with the exception of my arugula that is doing very well in my cold frame. We have made some late season changes on flower island and also the evergreen island. In both cases the changes had to be made because plants there grew way too big. We have removed the decorative grasses and moved Corkscrew Hazel together with some short grasses in their place. The root system balls of the grasses were so heavy that I just couldn’t lift them, I had to wrap a sling around them and drag them out on a piece of lumber and then I had to split each ball with an axe in order to handle them.
On Evergreen Island we had 3 species of junipers and they too were getting way too big. They were very easy to remove and now we have a small Alpine garden in their place. Both areas look much better. All the containers and planters have been emptied and their good potting soil was dumped on top of my raised veggie bed, but first I laid down weed barrier cloth to make it easier for me to remove the potting soil next spring.
Garlic is planted for a month now and spring bulbs are in the ground on both islands. Actually, they were never removed this spring. The dinner plate dahlias were removed 2 weeks ago and I stored each tuber in paper bag filled with peat moss. It will be interesting to see if they will grow next spring, I have never tried to save them before. Before I know it I’ll be growing flowers from seeds just like I did last few years. For now I have a two months of rest. Next garden post will be in February, I guess, even though I still have to spray our peach tree. As you can see on picture at top there are still lot of leaves and it is windy every day so I do have to postpone the spraying every day. But, it must be done.
In three years these grasses tripled in size...
...so they were replaced. It does look better.
The junipers on left side of island were removed...
...and replaced with small Alpine garden.
Again, it does look much cleaner.
My veggie bed serves as a temporary storage for container soil.
