February 16

          Today I'm dealing with the bareroot plants from the YCSWCD.  Lots and lots of potting - I want them to be okay - not drying out, if bareroot - for awhile, until I can get wire to build cages to protect them from the deer.
           But it's a nice sunny day, and Rose and I planted five items.  We put two Oregon grape plants (Mahonia aquifolium) east of our house.  One is between two rhodies right beside the house, and one is in the bed just inside our fence and boxwoods by Hebo Lane.  There are two more Oregon grapes in that bed, and one or 2 in the bed below the redwood tree, also in our yard.
          Later we took 2 alders (from High School weeds) and an alder and hemlock (from the Association of University Women's tree sale two or three years ago) that were growing - thriving! - in one pot.  We planted these straight below the house and very close to the river.  This sounds easy, but isn't.  First I had to cut lots of blackberry vines, and while I was at it, cut ones around already-planted small trees. I made little "rooms" in amongst blackberries and willows and flood damage and fallen limbs partially covered in flood-brought sand.  Hard work.
          The soil IS sandy and easy to dig.  One "room" I was cutting blackberries on my way towards, turns out to already house a 10-foot tall (wild?) alder.  The tree's buds weren't as swollen as my container-grown trees, but I'm pretty sure it is an alder.  It's maybe cooler down there amongst the shade from willows and vines.  
          I flagged these plantings with red surveyors' tape;  some are very small and I don't want them mowed or weed-whacked.  Deer love hemlock, so I'll have to get a cage around that tree as soon as I can.  The above photo is Western hemlock, Tsuga heterophylla, the species we're planting.  Kruckberg says "heterophylla" means 'leaves of different shapes', but to me, it refers to the different sizes of the hemlock's needles, this seeming randomness giving the hemlock leaved branches their delicate, lacy look.  It is a beautiful, graceful tree, of a lighter green color, usually, than the spruce.  Both are very common around here.
          I am at 38 trees out of 47 days - starting to get seriously behind.  Sigh.