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gardening2024-05-24 08:45 pm
littlewolfteeth) wrote in gardening2024-05-24 08:45 pm
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I've been rather busy lately. My neighbors drove me to this. Remember how they said to do everything out of spite? Well, I got angry and started clearing out all the brush and wilderness on my property. I wanted to keep it so I had a natural privacy fence but I don't get those nice options anymore because I have neighbors that like to loiter near my property that are up to no good. So... uh... I'm going to have to cut down everything except the shade-giving trees. :( In that process, there is a light. I'm going to start laying down my square foot gardening using concrete blocks. :)
Here is before I finished my progress for the day. You can see in this photo that some of it is cut down but not all of it. It's just me, my chainsaw, machete, and shears! Mostly manual labor with the machete and shears because my chainsaw is cheap and doesn't want to chainsaw anymore.
I went ahead and bought an orange tree. They are so expensive but if they really yield as much fruit as the internet tells me then I'll be set with just this one tree? Plus, I can make more copies from a branch from what I can gather. One should be good enough, right? For just two people. I realize I don't have a lot of pure sun spots in my acreage but I don't want to cut the bigger trees down because that means my house will heat up way too much. So it's going in that left hand corner in the picture that gets a lot of sun. I'm going to do everything in my power to keep this little dude from dying because it was So. Expensive. Please don't die on me little tree!
I'm not putting this one in a raised bed since apparently these guys like the awful soil in Florida. I'm going to dig a big hole and still lay some pre-mixed garden dirt in there so at least it will have some nutrients starting out. I still don't like the idea of just sticking it down in the sand. Which I'll do tomorrow since I broke my shovel trying to dig a stump out of the ground.
Anyways, here are the after picture from me quitting not too long ago.
I did all of that by myself with just my muscles and a sharp blade. I can't afford to buy not even a push mower right now but I can dig up the dirt with my shovel and use sharp things to cut into roots and small, skinny trees. I am proof that a single lady can do the really, really hard things. This was hard! I can't afford the nice tools that let me skip corners even though I wish I could. It's hard to do this in our heat. I was dumb and should have started in October instead but well, when I get mad I don't think that far ahead... XD
Once I can start pulling those palms out of the ground - it takes a god awful long time for them to get weak enough from me keeping the green cut off - I'm going to start laying my concrete blocks down. I'm going to do 4'x8' in this particular area. I'm thinking I'm going to establish my flowers here first. I want to attract and keep pollinators so this will eventually be nothing but flowers. I know it says direct sun for most of them but the only ones I'm going to worry about lining up in full sun are my sun flowers. I know they can take our heat, even the worst of it. These other ones need to be happy about being in the shade. Our average during the summer is starting to hover around 98 degrees. I think I'll plant the mammoth varieties along my border where it they can track the sun without much in the way. I'm going to eventually take the plunge in beekeeping too but that will be much farther in the future. Probably once I have most things growing that I want to grow.
This state does not have a lot of good native flowers that don't require being in a swamp so I'm just going to grow a bunch of different flowers and go from there. I already have an area picked out for my poisons - pretty flowers too that also attract pollinators like foxglove and the like - but it won't be worked on until later.
Either way I'm going to get the flowers and herbs started once I can finally get rid of that palm bushes and really annoying wood vines that I have to chainsaw through.
There's my pile of trees. I didn't realize oak trees were bad about sending up little suckers but my gods, they are awful at that. Like I said, I love but also hate the jungle growth like woods all around but it's becoming problematic because people are creeping around in them at night so... sigh... I have to do what I have to do to be safe.
I really don't know why our governor doesn't believe in climate change but after starting this project I'm realizing why watermelon (which is my favorite fruit and I plan on growing that soon too) and the like are so expensive and hard to find. Have you all noticed the prices and how bad the fresh produce looks lately? The heat on this planet is literally killing our crops. I don't know if I should try and grow my watermelons in winter now instead. I can't keep them watered all day long since I work. :/ I don't even know how to go about planting the little guys that need full sun but also keeping them from scorching. Does mulching help any? Should I start putting them in shade regardless? I don't know. I guess I'll find out.
Here is before I finished my progress for the day. You can see in this photo that some of it is cut down but not all of it. It's just me, my chainsaw, machete, and shears! Mostly manual labor with the machete and shears because my chainsaw is cheap and doesn't want to chainsaw anymore.
I went ahead and bought an orange tree. They are so expensive but if they really yield as much fruit as the internet tells me then I'll be set with just this one tree? Plus, I can make more copies from a branch from what I can gather. One should be good enough, right? For just two people. I realize I don't have a lot of pure sun spots in my acreage but I don't want to cut the bigger trees down because that means my house will heat up way too much. So it's going in that left hand corner in the picture that gets a lot of sun. I'm going to do everything in my power to keep this little dude from dying because it was So. Expensive. Please don't die on me little tree!
I'm not putting this one in a raised bed since apparently these guys like the awful soil in Florida. I'm going to dig a big hole and still lay some pre-mixed garden dirt in there so at least it will have some nutrients starting out. I still don't like the idea of just sticking it down in the sand. Which I'll do tomorrow since I broke my shovel trying to dig a stump out of the ground.
Anyways, here are the after picture from me quitting not too long ago.
I did all of that by myself with just my muscles and a sharp blade. I can't afford to buy not even a push mower right now but I can dig up the dirt with my shovel and use sharp things to cut into roots and small, skinny trees. I am proof that a single lady can do the really, really hard things. This was hard! I can't afford the nice tools that let me skip corners even though I wish I could. It's hard to do this in our heat. I was dumb and should have started in October instead but well, when I get mad I don't think that far ahead... XD
Once I can start pulling those palms out of the ground - it takes a god awful long time for them to get weak enough from me keeping the green cut off - I'm going to start laying my concrete blocks down. I'm going to do 4'x8' in this particular area. I'm thinking I'm going to establish my flowers here first. I want to attract and keep pollinators so this will eventually be nothing but flowers. I know it says direct sun for most of them but the only ones I'm going to worry about lining up in full sun are my sun flowers. I know they can take our heat, even the worst of it. These other ones need to be happy about being in the shade. Our average during the summer is starting to hover around 98 degrees. I think I'll plant the mammoth varieties along my border where it they can track the sun without much in the way. I'm going to eventually take the plunge in beekeeping too but that will be much farther in the future. Probably once I have most things growing that I want to grow.
This state does not have a lot of good native flowers that don't require being in a swamp so I'm just going to grow a bunch of different flowers and go from there. I already have an area picked out for my poisons - pretty flowers too that also attract pollinators like foxglove and the like - but it won't be worked on until later.
Either way I'm going to get the flowers and herbs started once I can finally get rid of that palm bushes and really annoying wood vines that I have to chainsaw through.
There's my pile of trees. I didn't realize oak trees were bad about sending up little suckers but my gods, they are awful at that. Like I said, I love but also hate the jungle growth like woods all around but it's becoming problematic because people are creeping around in them at night so... sigh... I have to do what I have to do to be safe.
I really don't know why our governor doesn't believe in climate change but after starting this project I'm realizing why watermelon (which is my favorite fruit and I plan on growing that soon too) and the like are so expensive and hard to find. Have you all noticed the prices and how bad the fresh produce looks lately? The heat on this planet is literally killing our crops. I don't know if I should try and grow my watermelons in winter now instead. I can't keep them watered all day long since I work. :/ I don't even know how to go about planting the little guys that need full sun but also keeping them from scorching. Does mulching help any? Should I start putting them in shade regardless? I don't know. I guess I'll find out.