Why I Oughta...

The story of our contorted tree starts with a trip to Phantom Manor in Disneyland Paris back in the Summer of 2019 .  Nat and I spent a day there during our visit and we were both struck by the trees and foliage that the Imagineers planted and nurtured around their Haunted Mansion.  The queue is outdoor like at WDW, but it winds through a garden full of weeping and contorted trees and shrubs.  It gives off quite a look - one of decay, dying and ill-looking horticulture.  Based on that trip, I included the idea of buying a 'contorted tree' on my 2020 to-do list .  #13 on the list was to buy a weeping or contorted tree .  I suppose that I could have crossed that off my list when I bought the tiniest of tiny contorted trees online this Spring with my small Cortorted Hortsmann Recursive Larch .  But, I couldn't stop at one contorted tree.  So, when we were doing a "drive through" nursery run to the Growing Place during the early stages of Covid quarantine and s

I recently picked up this fern at Home Depot on a whim.  Had no intention of buying a fern, but as I was looking at the hostas, I saw it and thought....hmmm...that green fern is calling to me.  If you've been reading along over the years, you'll know two things: 1.  I'm a shade gardener. 2.  I love ferns. I have a few kinds, but it seems that the two that are consistently successful for me are:  Ostrich Ferns.  And I have one, ignored, but thriving Japanese Painted Fern .  I just recently transplanted ten (10) Ostrich Ferns that I've been calling "Survivor Ferns" from our fenceline to a spot on the plan that called for ferns.  I also have this other fern - that I call our " Teardown Fern " - which came from my sister-in-laws lot before she built her house.  I stuck it in the far back of our lot and it has been doing really quite well .  Ignored for the most part, too. This new fern - pictured above - kinda resembles that "Teardown Fer

We have two large Oak trees in our backyard.  One has a tree swing on it.  The other is located a little further back in the yard and is along the south property line.  That second one is the tree that I documented last Fall/Winter when it lost a good-sized limb in an ice storm .  I've just been referring to the trees as "Oak Trees", but since our visit to Waterfall Glen where we came across an Oak Tree identification sign , I wanted to see if I could get clarity on the actual varieties. First up is the south-side tree.  That photo at the top is a close-up of one of the leaves.  Note it has pointed lobes at the tips and the recesses that appear between each lobe aren't SUPER deep - like on the Hill's Oak.  And, looking at the sign, I think we can rule out the Shingle Oak for sure.  This *could* be a Black Oak, but I'm leaning toward calling it:  Northern Red Oak.   Next up - is the larger Oak with our tree swing.  Those leaves are quite a bit highe

I was at Home Depot a week or so back and and came across the tree above that stopped me in my tracks.  It is a beauty.  I looked a little closer and realized that what I was looking at was a Weeping Alaskan Cedar Tree.  The one I dreamed about in 2017 here on the blog .  And something that looks VERY different than the tree that I planted in 2018 and called a weeping cedar:  the Emerald Falls Himalayan Weeping Cedar .  That tree didn't make it through the first Winter , but that hasn't stopped me from thinking about it since then.  This past Winter, I posted another weeping cedar - a columnar variety called the Van Den Aker Narrow - and talked about how I'm drawn to this tree in both forms. The tag on the tree at Home Depot looks like this below.  It lists the tree as: Chamaecyparis - Weeping Alaskan Cedar and is listed at $99.  I'd say it is about six feet tall from the rootflare to the top tip.  The $99 price had me think twice about it - because I'

Number eight on my 2020 to-do list for the yard was to buy some fruit trees and plant them to start a Belgian Fence espalier.  Why a Belgian Fence?  Well, we already have a pair of Cordon'd Linen Trees in our yard, so I wanted to try a different form.  And, on our trips to Disneyland, I noticed that they have a number of Belgian Fences that served as inspiration .  And, on our trip to Luxembourg Gardens in Paris last Summer, we walked by their espalier garden a number of times and was struck by how they've worked their fruit trees a number of ways.  So, earlier this Winter/Spring, I identified the place that we'd plant them and then in April, I pulled the trigger and bought eight Apple trees .  By May, I had planted them 16" apart and lop'd off their heads .  Then I held my breath and hoped that we'd see some growth.  Turns out, the garden gods smiled on us and there was enough energy stored up in the rootballs and all of the trees have thrown off so

I have been busy digging up, moving, dividing and transplanting hostas around the backyard.  Started with the Teardown Hostas around the hose bib in back .  Then moved a series of variegated hostas around the Oak tree.  And transplanted three back by the other Oak tree .  Here, in the photo above, you can see two more.  These are two parts of a divided hosta that are now planted at the base of the espalier'd Greenspire Lindens on the southside of our backyard.    These two - the larger one is on the left ) are currently located in between the two trunks - and to the East of the first set of Summer Beauty Allium that I planted this year .  The hostas don't look like much right now, but history tells me that if I keep them happy and wet this year, they'll come back in a more traditional form next year when they emerge from the mulch.   

I've posted a number of times - across houses, towns, years - about Ostrich ferns .  We had them back in Elmhurst at our old house .  And when we moved, we transplanted a few clumps of them over at Nat's Mom's house in Naperville .  When we bought our lot in Downers Grove, we inherited some of what I've been calling " Survivor Ferns " that lived through the construction and re-grading of our lot. As part of my 2020 to-do landscape list, I identified area #2 that includes the planting of a series of Ostrich Ferns - along with other items.  One of those 'other items' is the planting of hostas around a large Oak tree - in an area adjacent to where these Ostrich Ferns are supposed to be planted.  I posted about those variegated hostas yesterday .  The plan calls for Hadspens, but I decided to go with Variegated hostas because I had quite a few of them on hand. In that Priority Area #2 post, I mentioned that the plan called for 12 Ostrich Ferns in t