nasty thorns part two

This season's formal farming footwear is best displayed in pin-stripe or chevron.  Ad-hoc, I love my new socks!  We are ready to get to work.

Wheelbarrow tires are pumped and so are we.

Now that those nasty brambles have been run through the chipper, we have ourselves some fabulous mulch.  The city's newsletter arrived today and water restrictions have come into place.  Mulch helps keep the soil shaded, allowing it to retain moisture.  The living micro-organisms in the soil rely on moisture to stay alive.  

Making your own mulch saves you money and gives you the opportunity to get rid of yard waste at the same time.  It saves on the energy required to truck your store bought mulch in and haul your yard waste away on garbage day.  Mulch makes the garden beds look neat and tidy.  I love my chipper!

nasty thorns

In the spring I pruned the blackberry bush which had come back to life on our second year here.  It had recovered from being cut down to a stump (and sprayed with RoundUp) by the property manager before we moved in.  I wish that she would have pulled out the stumps from the fruit trees she had chopped down (or better yet, left the trees).  It makes for tricky mowing.  Most of the trees have come back to life, spitting out shoots everywhere.  We wonder if it is the rootstock itself that is growing back.  After three years we still haven't gotten fruit from the apples.

Finally I got around to picking up those hazardous thorns which had been left laying where they fell.  "Chop and drop" is a method for dealing with weeds in which they can be left to break down and contribute to the life of the micro-organisms in the soil.  It's all biomass!  Chop and drop mimics a forest where plants are constantly in all stages of life.  It doesn't always look pretty.

Some plants don't break down as easily and that's where the chipper comes in.  Kitson managed to get the thorns through our electric chipper without ripping an arm off (I had refused to try).  Thorns aside, chipping is very satisfying.  I prefer the chopping and styling elements of gardening to planting, maybe for the same reasons I enjoy working as a hairdresser.

I was about to show you the after picture but it looks like the camera has gone fishing!

the canoe

My husband told me a few years ago that he wanted a boat.  I told him it wasn't in the budget.
"But it's only $300!"  I decided that wasn't too bad and he got his boat.

People ask what kind of canoe we have.  I always tell them the kind that has a regatta '78 sticker on it.

The other sticker is in memory of my husband's cousin Neil, who is best know for being glad.

The wood trim around the fibreglass had cracked and Kitson replaced it with new wood.  We polished it up with our home made all purpose polish (half beeswax dissolved into half olive oil) which aids in waterproofing.

More recently Kitson decided the boat needed some handles.  He used some scrap rope and threaded it through some irrigation tubing that was laying in the backyard in a sorry heap.  Ta-da!