First Project: De-Landscaping, Part 2

Following the success of shrub removal from the front of the garage, I moved on to the other garden bed.  This was going to be a bigger challenge.  In all, there were two dozen plants in this bed that needed to be dug up and some had roots going down 8 inches or more with a diameter of over an inch.  It took more than just a few days, it was a week-long project and it wiped me out.

The project took my entire arsenal of tools: the sharpened shovel, the digging bar, the hatchet, the bow rake, and even a new tool, a combination hoe and cultivator – “the hoevator” – were used at various points.

The shrub removal was made exponentially more difficult by the vine that had consumed the entire bed.  For as bad as it was in the previous bed, this was at least ten times worse.  It was like a ground of its own.  The cultivator tore that up with ease, although it resulted in mounds of vine carcasses.

The garden was walled off by those generic stone wall pieces that never stand up to time.  The retaining walls had sunk into the ground, or fallen over, or got pushed out of symmetry.  Yet another thing that needs to be removed.

This is how it started:

This angle really shows how badly the vine had taken over the shrubs.

On the first day, I brought my assistant.  She wasn’t of much help.  That humungous palm tree in the background?  That’s a topic for a future post.  Yes, It’s coming out, too.

After the first day, I got the bulk of the shrubs removed.  Because of the masses of vines, it doesn’t look like much has been done at all.  Also, I have well over a dozen baby palm trees growing in the bed.  That’s not something I want to deal with.

A couple of days and a little more progress.  You can see how badly the house was stained from these shrubs.  Terrible.

The next day, I removed the last of the stumps.  I broke out the hoevator and ripped up a ton of roots and vines.  Unbelievable how the shrub roots snaked all around the bed.  Now it actually looks a little smoother.  A tiller would be awesome right now, but that’s not in the plans.

Finally, I bleached the walls.  I still have another few shots to do on it, too.  But this project is more or less complete.