Why I Oughta...

Five and a half years.  That's how long the three posts have been installed in our backyard as a training device for the pair of Greenspire Linden trees that have been pruned in an horizontal cordon espalier.  This past weekend, I disconnected all of the wire and pulled the three posts down.  I put the posts in the ground in September of 2017 - look how NEW everything looks here .   Over the years, I've worked these trees to be a four-level espalier and it had matured (enough) to no-longer require the heavy-hand of a post and wire system.  See below for the pre-removal state:  And....below...are the trees with the posts and wires removed.  Feels VERY DIFFERENT over there (to me, at least) now. The top row of the cordon is thick and strong and vibrant.  Each layer down gets thinner, but the bottom layer has finally reached the fully-mature length.  I'll work to keep that bottom row horizontal with a bamboo pole.   #9 on my 2023 to-do list was to 'keep working the espalie

Over the past few posts about our fence , I showed the posts being installed and talked about what the fence was going to do in terms of framing up our backyard .  Unlike our first fence in Elmhurst , the crew putting our fence in this time dug each of the posts by hand.  I'm not sure if that is just how they roll or if it had something to do with the posts we selected? Because we're planning on staying in our #NewOldFarmhouse for quite some time, after talking with the team at Classic Fence, we decided to upgrade to steel posts instead of the traditional 4x4 cedar posts.  The steel posts we selected are called Postmaster posts from Master Halco . They're specifically designed for wood fences and allow for the attachment of cedar rails on the sides and accept planks on the outside and inside to basically 'cover' or mask the steel post in it's entirety. Here's a look at a few of the posts that were installed in our #newoldbackyard.  The one on the le