My new toy and 2/3 done

Here is my new electric chipper/shreader. It is not an expensive model or super powerful, but it will help get rid of all the sticks and turn them into mulch rather than trying to burn them. I tried burning last year and I had a hard time just keeping the fire burning. For my purposes, I think this will work find.

So here is my first pile of mulch! That is one pile of sticks gone and a lot more to go!

I plan on using the mulch I make under the deck to keep the weeds down. I don't want to plant anything here because as soon as I save enough money the deck will be replaced.

I started working in this area last evening.


Here is the current after. I have a lot more work to do in this area. I need to weed wack it, rake, and dig out the roots of the wild rasberries. Those wild rasberries are a pain! They send shoots up everywhere and will be challenge to get under control. I am not keeping them, because the fruit production is very small and the deer and other animals eat them all anyway. I will probably spray this area with some weed killer just to knock back the undergrowth a bit and then replant the area after it dies back and I am sure the weed killer has been washed away with some rain.

Here are all the sticks that I cleaned out of this area and need to be run thru my new chipper. There is some thicker branches I won't be able to chip so I will get out my little electric chainsaw and cut them up into pieces that will fit in my fire pit.

So I looked around the yard for plants to put in this area. I have some ferns that wandered under the neighbor's fence. I have never transplanted a fern, but I assume it is just like any other plant. I also have a bucket of daffodil bulbs that I will plant here.

Here are some lillies of the valley that would be perfect ground cover for this area. They have gone wild in my flower bed and need to be removed anyway.

I have these two hostas - the green one I did not plant this so it is a volunteer. If I plant them mixed with the other plants deer don't like, maybe they won't eat them. I will definitly split them into smaller pieces when I go to replant them. I noticed that the deer don't eat the hostas in the woods, only the ones in the garden!

And some lenten roses would look good too. I have five or six plants in the front garden and they look great right now, but they do not like all the direct southern sunshine in the summer. This will be a great place to plant them. I didn't measure this area, but a guess would be 20' x 30'. Next spring this area ought to look great with all these new plants!

So after more than 2 hours of yard work I came inside and sewed together the bottom two rows of the gray and yellow quilt. The plan is to finish the last two rows tonight!