Posts Tagged ‘new growth’
Clock’s Ticking
We are quickly running out of time to accomplish any of our goals that require an ability to see clearly into our woods. Leaves and flowers are about to burst forth like a volcanic eruption.
Grass is growing enough already that I did a little mowing with the push mower in front of Cyndie’s perennial garden and the sunny spot behind the barn that always grows faster than anywhere else on our property.
While I was tending to compost piles mid-morning, I looked up and found three of the horses on the ground napping with Light standing watch.
I finished the afternoon with a shift clearing out downed branches that have accumulated in the area where we recently pulled out a few miles of grape vines. All the time I spent in there battling vines revealed just how many branches were on the ground.
We keep going back and forth over wanting to pick up dead wood that falls or leaving it to decay. We soon discovered it’s a fool’s errand to think we could stay ahead of the number of branches that are constantly dropping. The problem is that ignoring the situation for very long gives the place a neglected look and makes the clean-up job much more work when we finally decide to do it.
I made piles that must now be hauled away from the lane around the back-pasture fence. Anything dry can be run through the chipper, but the rest will be tossed onto the natural fence wall where we just piled all the willow branches we cut down on Monday.
If we don’t move all these branches today, I worry we will get distracted by other projects. Suddenly, the piles will be swallowed by grasses and brambles, and we won’t see them again for a year.
We are on the verge of a green growth explosion. If we listen closely, I think we could hear leaves unfolding all around us.
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Giant Paradise
Back in June, Cyndie received a present from Elysa and Ande of a giant bird of paradise plant they were repotting. Elysa had rescued the root-bound plant from her workplace when it was about to get discarded. Ande worked determinedly to untangle the mass and turn one pot into several.
It was quite a challenge for Elysa and Ande to tip down and fit our new transplant into her car for the trip to our house. It was also a challenge for us to find a place where it would fit indoors and keep it standing without an established root structure yet.
After it continually leaned too much, we decided to tie a line to the wall to hold it up while hoping the roots would soon get a grip to stabilize the tall shoots. I don’t know if that stability is happening yet, but this weekend a new shoot burst up and began to unfurl to a surprising degree.
This is one vigorous tropical beauty.
We are thrilled to see this new evidence of that vigor and feel optimistic about the future of this beauty of an indoor plant in the corner where it now resides.
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Impressive Recovery
It’s hard to know for sure how long ago the top of this tree snapped off. One possibility that I find believable is a reported tornado that occurred in 2010, two years before we moved here. We could see plenty of evidence of severe chaotic tree damage when we arrived. In fact, there were so many large trees in various stages of fracture that their shattered remains grabbed attention much more than the wild sprouts of new growth that began to emerge in the aftermath.
The other day, while trying to keep up with Asher as he bushwhacked through our woods in pursuit of whatever critter scent he was detecting, one of those [no longer] new sprouts caught my attention.
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How did this growth succeed in getting that large at that remarkable dangling U-turn off the side of the original trunk? It has me wondering how much bigger it will be able to become.
There is a large opening at the bottom of the main trunk that reveals the center has been hollowed out by homesteading wildlife in the intervening years, as well as decay and fungal growth up above where the storm damage first occurred.
The odds of a long future for this tree don’t look all that promising, but the significance of that limb soaring straight up sure says something about resilience.
I love being able to witness this kind of resilience every time we wander through the woods. Now that I’ve spotted this tree clearly, I’ll be checking on it regularly through the seasons to keep track of its progress. Who knows which of us will outlast the other?
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Can You?
If you look closely, can you see how much growth has occurred on the spindly little fingerling of the volunteer oak tree to the right of my balancing stone since that first picture on the left was taken back in May? I’d love it if we could get that same amount of new growth every year. We’d have shade on that side of the house in a couple of years.
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Relative Something 