An interesting long weekend has been had. I had a couple of days off at the end of the week as the tree surgeons were coming to tackle the vast weeping willow at the end of the garden. I really should have tackled sorting out the tree when we moved in some nine years ago but given the lack of access from the front and the slope I have put the problem off. On top of that the tree is situated in the far corner of the garden and its roots disappear off across my neighbours gardens. To remove the tree completely would result in considerable upheaval not just in my garden but in three others.
You can see how the tree dominates the top of the garden and completely swamps the cherry next to it. The tree was approximately 40 foot tall and the branches twisted and contorted causing the tree to be incredibly top-heavy. Earlier this summer, in the high winds we had, one of the top most branches snapped leaving the branch hanging over the neighbour’s garden. Luckily the neighbour to the left isn’t very interested in her garden and the top of her garden is quite overgrown so she wasn’t bothered with the branch hanging down into it.
The chaps, four of them, had a tough job working out how to deal with the tangled mess. Luckily the non-gardening neighbour had agreed to them accessing the tree through her garden and this proved to be a huge bonus as all the whippy branches were taken out this way instead of the guys having to negotiate my busy garden. It was quite mesmerizing to watch the tree surgeon up the tree. I was stunned at how they move around without seemingly any thought slowly but surely reducing the tree. We spent some time considering the cherry tree which had grown mainly to the right due to the willow engulfing it on the left. It looks terribly sparse but with some consultation it was trimmed and shaped to try to give it a better appearance and hopefully with the better light it might re-shoot and grow better.
You can see that we have kept the logs. Some my eldest is going to keep for wood turning but the very big logs are going to go to his scout group for them to use to sit on round the camp fire and also to use when they train the scouts to use axes – a vast improvement on the pallets they currently use. I am sure some will also disappear off to various friends’ wood burning stoves. The willow was reduced to 4m and I have to admit that for 24 hours I was wondering what had possessed me as it looks so stark. However, being willow, I know it will bounce back next spring and in no time at all the compost bins will disappear from view under its cascading branches.
After all the excitement of the tree surgery my efforts the following day seem paltry but I succeeded in sorting out the front border in the front garden which has been irritating me for ages. As long-term readers will know I featured the front garden on the End of Month View last year and it perplexed me all year. I removed a line of deschampsia which edged the lawn as I felt they were a barrier to the rest of the border. When I first cut the lawn into a rectangle I had a notion to edge the borders with alchemilla mollis to provide a lime green cohesive edging. I did this along the two long sides and it looks quite good. I then added alchemilla mollis along the bottom edge when I removed the grasses but they haven’t done well at all; probably due to the border being in full sun which becomes quite baked in the summer. So the Alchemilla was ripped out. I then dug up the various plants in the border apart from the shrubs as well as some bergenias in the side border and also some libertia that was disappearing under the laurel hedge These, along with the two shrubby salvias, some francoa and a bronze leaved libertia which I divided, were replanted in the border. I know all these plants do well in the conditions as they are the plants that have been thriving here for the last few years. I tried very hard to avoid planting in straight lines and create a more random flowing effect but I don’t think I have quite achieved it. However, I am really thrilled with the effect I have managed to achieve especially as it has been done with existing plants. Hopefully the plants will now settle in, bulk up and spread and give me all year round interest with little maintenance. The intention was to use a limited plant palette which picks up on the red of the grevillea and shrubby salvias.
