Friday, May 08, 2009

What's buried in YOUR yard?

I've recently been doing A LOT of digging in the yard. With all the trees/shrubs I got at the auction, plus some more taking advantage of a Lowes coupon mom and dad sent (thanks mom and dad!), PLUS taking advantage of some specials at Donzells, I've really had a lot to plant! I'm SERIOUSLY looking forward to seeing how all the trees (more info later) mature, and hope all will survive.

I'm wrapping up planting the big stuff, and after work the other day I had just finished planting the pink-blooming dogwood, and decided I still had time before dinner to slightly extend the corner of the bed off the front of the garage to plant the Cherokee Pride hydrangea from the auction... There's multiple reasons for this particular project/location - it's the north-east corner of the house - it'll get sun til about noon, but shade the rest of the day, and both the hydrangea and the dogwood prefer some shade. This area of the landscaping is really blah. The bed I put in with hostas, ivy and yarrows has a bunch of grass growing in it (so I've been thinking of redoing the bed, and mulching with newspaper under wood mulch). Annnnd I've realized that there's an awkward corner of the lawn when it comes to mowing, so I'm going to follow what the neighbors did and bring the flower bed around the corner to meet the driveway a little - which means no awkward corner of grass to mow up agains the house!

One small problem.

I was digging where I wanted to put the hydrangea, with the neighbor kids announcing all the play-by-play bits ("Ooh, look at that worm!" "Yeah, this'll make your mowing easier..." "I think you're hitting a rock with the shovel").

That last bit was the issue. I knew I was hitting something - and it wasn't a rock. It didn't sound right, and it didn't feel right.

After some more digging I came up with the piece of wood you see behind me here - the one propped up against the garden cart.


Oh yeah, I ALSO dug out the piece of wood you see me holding, AND this other piece of wood in the following picture! It's quite possible there's more wood buried by the builders under there, but I haven't found it, and I give up. If there's more it's not interfering with any of my planned landscaping, and isn't so close to the surface that it's killing off the grass.


Well, I guess it's time to get back to work.... I pulled out the rest of the wood - Sharon had the great suggestion of using it in the in-ground garden bed for a walking path!


Now I've got a huuuge long strip about a foot deep where I've dug up the grass and some of the landscaping. Gee - I might as well go ahead and re-do the bed afterall, hunh? I think I'll save it for later...maybe this weekend if the weather cooperates. By the time I got all that out of there, I was tired and it was time to think about dinner...

9 comments:

Sherry said...

Geez, Jeph. . . you make me tired just thinking of all the work you do around the yard. Post pictures when everything is in bloom!

Jeph said...

Oh you know I will! ;-)

Sharon Andy Holderman said...

I know what to do with Jeph's wood. I rock ;)

Jeph said...

Um, that sounded dirty.

FinnyKnits said...

To answer your question: half a buried swimming pool, a 100 year old defunct water line, a Happy Meal Chicken McNugget toy from 1978, half of GI Joe's army, half a plastic crocodile head, half a plastic pony toy, a dozen marbles, most of the larger species from the Jurassic period in toy form and a million other little mysteries yet to be discovered.

Your find, however, looked like a LOT more work to unearth

Jeph said...

LOL What's with all the halves? Are the rest on your neighbor's property? Or did you bite off a piece of each and spit it back?

Those marbles would NOT be fun when hit with the lawn mower!

Wow, imagine if it was an in-ground pool buried back there - I bet you could modify it into some sort of rain-catching well!

Sara said...

I don't know what's buried in my yard, hopefully nothing bad! Thanks for the tips on the roux, what a great idea.

Kris said...

Look like railbed ties to me. Guess you dug up part of the fabled "underground railroad". (Who knew it was literally under the ground?) You can now start your own museum! LOL

Jeph said...

Turns out they were more planks than rail-road ties... They did have that dark look, but I think it's because they're water-logged and dirty.