A little update on what’s happenin’ around here. If I was Southern I might say h’yere 🙂 It has been cool enough to work easily outside, and yet here I am on the computer…but I slip out, grab the kids, and work a bit on the yard. The grass has needed more than the usual mowing with the cool summer, I give that job to my son… anything with a machine limits the grousing. Yesterday we pruned out some trees a little. Just cleaning up their shape, no real cutbacks (I sound like a CEO here). Anyway, some lower branches an a few strong growing vertical shoots came away from the crabapples… and since the weeping willow is nearby that got a bit of a haircut,too.
I had my son help me on that, too, since my hip is giving me trouble lately. Usually I do most of the light pruning, but I turned it into a lesson on how to prune properly, and told him the story of how his dad earned college money pruning trees, and he seemed to like it and have a bit of a knack for it. The trees look so much better. The willow is so big now that it was a two person job anyway… I held the branch into trimming position and told him where to cut. That tree can make things look a bit overgrown and “Addam’s Family” around here…until pruned and trimmed , and then it looks “picturesque”.
I’ve also worked on getting some of the weeding done.The girls help me with that… I learned they are more thorough and with less passive-aggressive dawdling than the boys manage to always produce. Pulled out lots of poison ivy. I’m the only one for that job, since everyone else is highly allergic to it. Cut back some perennials. Especially the newer Shasta daisies, I didn’t realize they would get so large. Now they will have to be relocated: they totally overshadow some choice little campanulas that don’t like it one bit!
It’s been a trying year for the crabapples with all the damp, coolness, and cloudiness. They get fungal diseases that empty the tree of all its foliage very early in the season. It’s called “Apple Scab”. Lovely name. Anyway, I had planted the Prairiefire variety specifically to avoid this problem, but this years climate conditions ganged up on it. I highly recommend this tree if you like deep pink spring flowers and dusky purple leaves.
johanna_lea says
August 8, 2009 at 1:29 pmthat’s “hyah” sugerpie. and hair
is “hay-uh”. trust me, i know.
i have a hole in middle of the side yard that has been waiting for a bush or tree for two years now. took out an ancient plum that lingered for years close to
dead. do the prairiefire get tall– easy enough to mow underneath? that is where evil privet often lives, so mowing close a necessity.
i have a double flowering peach that produces seedtype fruit. its
sole purpose is beauty, first long
branchtips of round,clear white opening buds.(nicely forceable if
a late cold snap) against the almost-darkness it is beautiful, in full flower also.
mature size is large peachtree…
maybe 15′. but not to be
regularly pruned, as they do to
peach orchards down here.
years ago,i sent one home with mom, and it is very happy and hardy and blooms regular in her neighbor’s yard, despite ohio winters.
i’ll try and find a few fallen fruit and send you some pits.
they are easy sprouters, with many small plants around underneath the
tree. or perhaps a few semi bare-root?
it is really a superior early- spring tree. like the surprise white of early blooms of the star magnolia (stellata?)
like you need another tree! %] J.
Ilona says
August 8, 2009 at 4:19 pmActually I do need more trees- might purchase some this fall. I’ll be traveling through GA in September sometime- maybe we can work out something. Crabapples sucker, so I might have a start for you,too.
If I lived in the South (or a more southern region) I would plant ornamental cherries rather than the crabapple. Mt Fuji or Okame. I don’t know if there would be a problem planting it on ground that formerly grew the prunus genus or not.
Ilona says
August 8, 2009 at 4:39 pmI’ll have to practice my “Southern-alities” in writing, if never in speech. You did have a very sweet drawl until my Yankee accents inflected you 😉 Then you spoke as a true Yankee, again …shhh, I won’t tell your neighbors (but I guess it is out if any of them read the blog)
And you never know… you never know who will read your stuff eventuall 🙂 We write for posterity!
oops. got carried away.
johanna_lea says
August 9, 2009 at 1:45 pmcant help it, i’m a chameleon!!
30 years transplanted just does that to you…protective
coloration!
let’s do Botanical gardens this time around, unless you arrive on
another Atlanta traffic-packed holiday weekend!
have found any cherries-ornamental
as well- are not suited for heat/humidity of our climate,
not enough cold winter,either.
our flowering peaches are great substitute—i have seen a deep rose one also.
what do you mean no feedback?
i write copious commentary %]
come see us now, you hear?
Ilona says
August 10, 2009 at 4:42 amLOL! Lord, spare me from floods,whirlwinds, and Atlanta’s holiday traffic! I’ll see how I can work things during that trip and give you a heads up so you can plan, if need be.
Well, maybe a crabapple would be worth a try. I kept finding a certain cultivar that gets recommended for the South, but I think Prairierfire would be worth the experiment.
Just trying out this new comment app. {{hug}} you one of the very best commenters
Benjamin (http://deepmiddle.blogspot.com) says
August 16, 2009 at 4:56 pmI just planted this crabapple in March–VERY excited to see what it does. It only gave me about three berries this firs year, but at 8′ tall I expect it’ll give me much more next spring as it settle into my evil alkaline clay soil too. I ahve hope, since yours doing well!!