March 5

       

          First thing this morning, Gordon and I went recycling at the dump - no fencing wire but lots of wood that G can use.  From there to hardware store, where fencing is even more expensive than at farm store.  From their ACE catalog, I can order a hand (human powered) lawn mower - anywhere from $80 to $230.  I'll hold out for a used one.  G ordered concrete mix and some NEW lumber - unusual for him as he's found most of what he's used to build house attachments (like our deck), garage additions, and outbuildings (tractor shed, chicken house) used, many times for free.
          Then to Habitat for Humanity office to give them our deposit cans and bottles, and home.
           Rose and I went up the hill after lunch and planted two cascara trees.  I potted these the spring before last from numerous seedlings here - maybe it was a bad year for cascaras? it was a dry year - and they were desperate to reproduce?  Or maybe it was a good one for them?  The seedlings were all over!  We also planted a native hazel.  Gordon and I can't remember where we got the hazels - but as I write that I think probably from J, Gordon's brother in Portland.  We have 2 in pots - they are very cute little guys only 12 inches tall, with multiple trunks and strong leaf emergence.
          I planted the hazel up by the goat pens, near the snowberry bushes I planted last month.  I put it in an old cage where something (a big leaf maple?) has died.  No sign of old plant.
          I put one cascara close to that.  Many native plants enjoy growing on the edges of forests and woods.  The other cascara I put at the edge of the mink bench, at the cusp of the bank of the tiny creek (dry in summer) that empties the small pond.  I'm taking a chance not caging the cascaras, but maybe the deer will learn to steer clear of them after they get diarrhea a few times.
          The photo above is of cascara leaves.  It is Rhamnus purshiana.  Hitchcock considers its foliage its strong point, the leaves being more leathery and shiny than the alder leaves they somewhat resemble in size and shape - but cascara leaves have a smooth edge, not serrated.  Hitchcock says they are deciduous trees, up to 30 feet tall, but we find they are somewhat evergreen here.  The bark is used as a laxative.

Then I dug two deer ferns (Blechum spicant) out of the middle of the tractor road by the pond, and planted them in my east-of-the-huge-rhodie flower bed, in the yard.  I love the graceful symmetry of  deer ferns.  They are smaller and more delicate looking than sword fern.
          Then I drilled holes in bottoms of vitamin supplement (for dairy cows) plastic tubs (2 feet tall, 3 feet across? large!!) that our neighbors gave me, put a course of up-ended gallon pots in each, filled around those with old soil from potted plants killed in our freezes early in winter.  I lost all my geraniums, fuchsias, and houseplant succulents - and my Brugmansia - in the early December cold spell.  I topped that with nice fresh potting soil.  These 2 are for the couple who live on the corner of Hebo Lane and Highway 101 and make their yard so pretty with flowers each year.  
          I plan to put the 2 Coral Bark maples I got from a local grower out Highway 22 last spring in two of those tubs.  I want to plant these out front when we take down the huge (and ruined because 'topped' at one point) Oregon big leaf maple.  But we won't be taking out that tree for awhile.  It is, for one thing, a major landmark in the neighborhood.  And beautiful.  It causes damage to our roof, and could blow over into our house or lose a huge limb onto the house, in a wind storm (as the Redwood out back lost one of its three leaders a few years ago).  We have a 15-foot baby from it coming along further away from the house, and this we'll keep.
          I'm at 57 out of 64.