Yardis Catharsis

What do you on a long holiday weekend? At our house - prune some more! After completing 2.7 Apple trees and a very small cherry tree our brush pile is the size of a Chevy Van. In spite of sore muscles, the work is cathartic and everything looks so much tidier and brighter you start to wonder why you didn't do it in the fall (you mean besides the fact that it was dark and raining?...ok true...).

Did I mention you can do cool stuff with the branches? You can force blossoms indoors and have a lovely indoor bouquet. Chunks of thicker apple and cherry branches are amazing in the bbq after they've been dried for a year. We keep our dried wood stash in the Dogloo on the right of this pic. The dog never really took to it, anyway!

This tree is a late apple of dubious origins. Perhaps a King?They're a lot smaller without all the water sprouts!
(I did mention we're hacks, right?)

You'd be amazed at the moss and other lil things you'd see....While perched on a precarious ladder in an old tree...

Fungus among us

Here's hoping you and yours enjoyed each other, as for us, we'll be sleeping well!

Sweet Dreams,

Amanda

Chorez!

Today we took advantage of the relatively warm and dry afternoon and did a wee bit o' pruning! We're no pruning experts but every spring we make an attempt to prune our 5 apple trees, 4 Cherries, 2 plums, as well as the other general spring cleanup required by the herbs and flowers. It is a lot of work!

As a teenager I asked my Dad why he spent so much time pruning them every spring. Wouldn't it be better to leave them au naturale? Apparently not! He explained fruit trees are dependent on humans and need pruning or they'll just grow themselves to death! Or something like that? (Hey, I wasn't the greatest listener at that age!) Pruning is also good because it helps you and the sun to be able to reach the fruit.

Hacker's toolkit! Dexter eat your heart out.

Today we pruned one of the two Gravenstein trees on the property. Gravensteins are delicious apples that make amazing pies! If you are looking for a good heirloom apple, they may be for you! This tree had huge water sprouts (good pruning guide) and needed shape improvement so we did a heavy pruning on it. At our house, a light pruning involves taking off the water sprouts and cleaning off dead branches. Heavy pruning more seriously altering the shape. A heavy pruning sometimes leaves you wondering if you went too far but then the leaves come out and the blossoms burst open and all is right with the world again. While we were at it we trimmed the crazy lilac (behind apple on right) behind it and the removed blown over blue spruce(? behind apple on left) that was growing up in its business.

Gravenstein Before

After - hey air and sunshine!

Afterwards it was amazing how much more light was in the yard (from the removed spruce). The greenhouse (out of view, stage right) will benefit from the additional lighting as well, I suspect.

And as if rewarding us for all the hard work, Mother Nature outdid Santa Claus and left us a little present under the apple tree. A little clump of snowdrops just breaking through the soil! Oh green, we've missed you!

Sweet Dreams,

Amanda