Thursday, June 28, 2012

JUNIPER REMOVAL


The next morning I woke and found myself praying for the sound of soft and soaking rain. The kind of rain that prevents any gardening projects from being undertaken or at least completed. Hearing none, I resigned myself to another day of back breaking labor and rolled out of bed. Completely without warning I collapsed into a heap on the bedroom floor. Apparently my body had its own ideas about avoiding garden work for today. I slowly assessed the damage, probing and prodding my tender flesh as I winced in pain. I felt as if I had just survived several rounds with a group of pro wrestlers, each armed with a baseball bat. My back was still reluctant to straighten out, my arms ached and as an unexpected bonus my left knee would not bear my weight without protests in the form of a searing pain just behind and slightly to the right of my kneecap.

I proclaimed a day of rest, most of which I spent psyching myself up to the ‘battle of the stumps’
Looking back I find it quite amazing that what I had originally supposed to be multiple small plants were in fact only three, probably placed into the earth a long, long time ago. They had stood the test of time, avoiding being consumed by dinosaurs and remaining steadfast while the first inhabitants of this land battled the elements to carve out an existence for themselves. And all the while they grew, spreading out to claim new territory. They had survived war and strife and trial by fire as General Sherman’s troops invaded this fair land, and they had become stronger from the ordeal, thicker and more determined. They had even prevailed against the ongoing progress of the twentieth century, avoiding the bulldozers and earth movers which are the henchmen of urban development, such a long history they had endured only to die at the determined hands of a would be landscaper, Sentenced to death by finger crusher for the heinous crime of being "too green."

But the project was now beyond the point of no return and the stumps had to be removed. I was pretty sure that I would be violating numerous local ordinances as well as sections of the homeland security act if I was to employ dynamite or some other high explosive substance to eradicate the stubborn stumps, and so with a great lack of enthusiasm I set to work with conventional methods

The first one only took two hours. Two sweaty painful hours of digging and tugging, straining and grunting as I attempted to wrestle it from the ground. The second one was more difficult and left me spent. It also claimed my shovel as a victim, as I tried to get some leverage by sliding the shovel blade under one of the larger roots. My expectation was that the force would cause the stump to surrender its grip on the dense clay and be wrenched from the ground. But it was the shovel that was to admit defeat and with a staccato crack the wooden handle snapped, but in relinquishing it life the digging implement had loosened the stump enough that I was able to remove it after just three short hours.

The third one was the worst. I had deliberately left it for last in the hope that a miracle would occur. I considered that it was possible that a kindly farmer would happen by and offer me the use of his tractor, or a bus load of Olympic weight lifters, lost in suburban Atlanta would, pause their journey long enough to volunteer their assistance. I even considered the possibility that a herd of deer would happen by and devour it, perhaps as compensation for the consumption of the cherry trees. But needless to say none of these things happened. .

For the rest of the day armed with only a hand trowel and a crow bar I loosened and removed as much of the surrounding soil as I possibly could and then I grappled with the root and pulled. And pulled, And twisted and tugged, and then pulled again. I was definitely moving but not coming out. I couldn’t tell what caused it to remain planted to the earth, but I carried on. I dug my heals into the dirt, bent over, grabbed the resilient wooden mass and attempted to straighten up my body. I feel sure that a chiropractor or a spinal surgeon would have advised me against such a strategy, but neither was present. I took a deep breath and strained a mighty strain, and for a moment I seamed that I felt some movement, but it was difficult to know for sure because just about then I began to lose consciousness. As the lightheadedness and delirium overtook me I experienced a fleeting vision of the roots extending down all the way thought he earth to emerge as another juniper plant somewhere just outside of a small Chinese village with an unpronounceable name. There an entire Chinese family would be gathered round their Juniper bush holding onto it for dear life as it descended into the earth.

There was a loud crack. Not unlike the sound of the shovel’s demise, but in this case it wasn’t the shovel. It was my back

By the afternoon of the forth day the stump was removed. I stood trembling before a pile of ruined tools, a feeble shell of a man, broken and bent, bloody but victorious. I surveyed the terrain before me. The juniper was at last gone. In its place was an expanse of brown uneven rock filled clay and at the location from which the resilient and overgrown juniper bushes had sprang forth, three large irregular shaped craters stood testament to a once proud shrub. All that remained was to convert this barren surface into something more beautiful involving the colorful plants. This would be no trifling accomplishment considering that current view looked more like a missile test range than a garden        

Receive this news update in your mailbox by clicking the follow link at the top of this page. 

Stephen R. Drage
Author: MUD LANE            

 


Tuesday, June 12, 2012

JUNIPER


  “I don’t think that look very good”
This is how it always starts, with a casual comment from my loved one, suggesting that a landscape change be implemented. In this case the subject of her casual comments was about 200 square feet of Juniper plants. The principle objection expressed was that the garden appears too green, I pointed out that the brown spots of dead grass on the front lawn afforded some nice contrast but this comment was not well received.
It was pointed out to me that if the juniper was removed we might install some colorful plants in their place. I suggested that we should leave a border of the hardy shrubbery to provide a decorative band between the azaleas and the colorful plants, the species of which had yet to be decided. After a microseconds consideration this idea was also rejected. All of the juniper had to go.  
At first I didn’t much like the idea of digging up what must be upwards of one hundred and fifty plants, after all my mission of late was to get things to grow not tear perfectly good plants out of the ground. But then an idea struck me. I could transplant them onto the bank where the dead hydrangeas lived, to replace the loriope that I would remove to create a lawn border; this would have the added advantage of supplying so much ground cover there.
So the very next morning at first light, before I had an opportunity to change my mind I stepped outside to begin.
It was now the end of August, and the temperature was a refreshing eighty five degrees so I prepared my customary gallon of iced lemonade picked up a small hand trowel and set forth. I stood a few yards distant and visualized the finished project. I find that this helps tremendously. Not only does it provide the necessary encouragement to continue, but it allows you to form a ‘plan of attack.” In this case, contrary to my wife’s drastic strategy, I would remove most of the Juniper but still leave my decorative border. I felt sure that I would be able to convince her that this was the right approach.      
I approached the edge of the planting and lifted a tendril to find the root but alas no root was visible. I lifted higher but still could not ascertain the point at which the course shrub sprang from the earth. I next grabbed the branch with both hands and raised it as high as I comfortable could. It was heavier than I expected, and seamed only to be connected to other juniper branches. This mystified me and gave cause to reformulate my plan. I would take the finger crushers and chop away some of the larger parts until the root became visible. With each passing hour the branches became thicker and more resilient to the finger crushers efforts, but my trustee tool and I battled on, cutting our way through the offending tangled growth. And still no roots visible.
It was about one thirty in the afternoon when exhausted and drenched in sweat I collapsed next to my empty lemonade jug. My muscles ached, my hands were sore and in many places skinless, my head ached and my back seemed to be telling me that we would never walk upright again.
I have often found that when life has delivered all of the hardship and frustration that it seems the human spirit can endure, it is only then that a glimmer of hope is revealed, not to torment you with the idea that you will live on to continue cutting Juniper, but to give support and hope and just enough positive fortification to make you feel some sense of achievement, so that renewed with energy you are driven on to complete the task. In this case as I lay face down on the dirt sucking huge quantities of air into my burning lungs, the glimmer of hope came in the form of a ground level view of the juniper plantation’s underside, and there in the shaded gloom I could just make out the shape of a root. Energy rushed back into my lifeless form and I dragged myself up to carry on.            
By the time the sun set, I had made significant progress, and stepped back to admire my accomplishment. I was standing on the very spot that I had occupied that same morning while performing my visualization exercise. Then the sight before me was of a sprawling field of Juniper, now the juniper leaves and branches were gone, and all that remained were three massive trunk like root systems protruding from the uneven dirt. Each trunk was a tangled and twisted conglomeration of roots with some pieces as thick as my weak and trembling legs.
I stumbled into the house and collapsed into a deep sleep, the last thing I remember thinking before I drifted into a deep and peaceful sleep was “thank goodness the difficult part is over.”

Stephen R. Drage
Author: MUD LANE