Late last year, an arborist gestured toward the lush little grove in the middle of our yard and said, with something between concern and glee: “That’s Japanese knotweed.”
The same plant that popped up mid-summer in the future garden space.
“Ya gotta dig it up,” he said with a gleam in his eyes. “REALLY get in there.”
At the time, we nodded and filed it away in the part of the brain reserved for things we weren’t ready to deal with. Then we started digging garden paths. That’s when we noticed big tangled masses of bright orange rhizomes.
“I wonder…” I thought, and did a little online searching. It was like those middle-of-the-night health searches that always indicate either cancer or a stroke.
Of course it’s cancer.
Enter: the mini excavator.
If it’s cancer, well, let’s get it done. We figured the mini excavator could do what the tractor did, but more precisely, and it could squeeze into the middle paths where the tractor couldn’t fit. If anything could rip out that knotweed…
And let’s be honest. Excavators are fun.
We got the rest of the garden paths dug. We raked the beds smooth. And for the first time, looked at the layout and thought:
We’re actually ready for a garden.
To garden: as a verb.
Of course, that doesn’t mean we waited. My impatience is legendary.
First Things Planted
I’m trying to practice succession planting this year – spacing things out, planting in waves, resisting the urge to put everything in the ground on the first sunny day.
I’m trying. Really.
But some things couldn’t wait:
- One full row of Quinault strawberries (which are freakishly good)
- Three Caroline raspberry plants
- Twenty Asparabest asparagus crowns. It’s my first time planting asparagus, which feels weirdly sentimental
- A block of peas: Super Sugar Snap, Purple Podded, and Melting Sugar
- A small mix of radishes
- One strip each of broccoli, romanesco, orange and purple cauliflower, and kale
It’s not the plan. But it’s a start. And it feels good.
Bedrock Chronicles
Because yes, we found more rocks. Of course we did.
- Quantity: high
- Size: strawberry to cataloupe
- Shape: mostly stubborn
- Reproduction rate: alarmingly high
- Potential reuse: maybe a garden border… maybe a shrine to our own persistence
What’s Next
- Practice succession planting like a patient person
- Yell at the the pepper seedlings I planted in February that still don’t have true leaves
- Wait for the next chip drop
- Try not to plant fifteen things on the next sunny day
The garden is waking up. So are we.
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