A flowering venus flytrap plant is a rare event, at least to me. So when I encountered one in my kitchen window, images of Rick Moranis feeding his blood-eating plant in Little Shop of Horrors flashed before my eyes.
A flowering venus flytrap plant is a rare event, at least to me. So when I encountered one in my kitchen window, images of Rick Moranis feeding his blood-eating plant in Little Shop of Horrors flashed before my eyes.
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Digging up the hard packed clay-ish soil sucked. But as I keep telling my boys when they complain about any task... "if it was easy, everyone would be good at it" But then again, most people are good with a shovel. You just step on it and push. Maybe I need a new saying.
They all can deal with shade and they all look to be ground hugging. I like the Irish Moss and the Dwarf Mondo Grass because they function and look like normal grass more than the others.
My plan is to set up a few chairs and a small table and throw down a row or two of stepping stones. The ground cover won't be trampled but there could be light foot traffic. Since my handyman skills are on par with my singing skills, I do not look at putting in a sprinkler system with excitement. Dad to the rescue again: Buried drip lines. Both HomeDepot and Lowes have drip system packages. Throw the drip line down and cover it with a little soil/dirt. Now we are talking my complexity level. I mean, how can I mess up covering something with a little dirt? My cat does this a few times a day. Before reality set in... After reality reached up and smacked my face...and yes, reality is a short dude with anger management issues. It will still be nice, just not as nice.
My backyard project is moving along. Slow, but forward. My original, pie-in-the-sky, plan is shown below. Notice the built-in BBQ with island seating under a large umbrella. The wooden bridge traversing a babbling brook and Koi pond. The large jacuzzi against a rock wall backdrop. New and crack-free cement. Beautiful? Of course. Realistic? Hardly. [side note - I did the above plan in Excel. Its probably pushing the boundaries of a spreadsheet but you work with what you know, yes?] [side note #2 - the house portion of the design went off well - the great room (right side of the house) consists of the kitchen, dinning room, and living room, and was a considerable redesign. Three walls were removed in that portion of the project. The backyard was left for last and it is what currently consumes my time.] As a result, the plan for the backyard has changed a few times over the months/years. The budget demon has a way of scaling back most plans and my was no exception. The current plan consists of... 1) Garden a few raised garden beds for vegetables a handful of oak barrels for fruit trees a few upside down tomato plant holders for, err, tomatoes 2) Free standing BBQ 3) Table and chairs under an umbrella 4) Shaded area with grass and a few chase lounges 5) Possibly a free standing fire pit with a few chairs The first phase of the backyard project - the raised garden beds - is finished and awaiting soil and plants. I stopped at 10 rows per box/bed. I also stopped at two boxes. I originally planned four, but ran out of bricks. I was scrounging CraigList for bricks as I thought I was a row short on the second box but a last ditch scavenger hunt in the less traveled areas on my backyard found a gold mine of buried bricks. Good thing too, as all the bricks for sale and free on CraigList (yes, there were a few "free if you dig them out" posts) were the standard 8 inch long variety and what I was using was 12 inches. I used masonry glue to hold the bricks together. Initially, I was thinking of laying the bricks without mortar or glue but a talk with my dad convinced me to use some sort of adhesive. Looking and feeling the solidness the finished boxes, I am glad I took his advise. A simple Google search for "building garden beds" will pull back a long list of DYI sites. What I gleaned from reading a few was I only needed between 12 and 24 inches of soil for normal garden vegetables. Which worked out as my lack of bricks stopped me at 16.5 inches (10 rows). With a planned one inch of pebbles/coconut liner for good drainage, that will leave the beds with 15 inches or so of growing soil.
Up next - laying out the grass area, sprinklers, and the sod vs seed discussion. I also need to plumb the water line to the above boxes. I did get smart and plan ahead - I added some space for piping into the boxes. |
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