In The Middle Of Before

I really should not be gardening at this time of year. There are so many other things that need doing. It is long past time for me to paint the front and back porches. It was a lovely fall day though, perfect for gardening......and painting. I thought I'll just transplant this volunteer Smooth Sumac, Rhus glabra before I dig up some Stella D' Boros for sister #2. Then things got out of hand.

I have long thought of planting some sumac on the slope below the scenic byway. The seed heads and fall color are quite showy and the pinnately compound leaves will add another texture in the summer greenery. It is a suckering, colony forming shrub so I will have to watch that. I see all kinds of height ranges online from 5 to 15 feet. I am hoping it will stay on the shorter end like most of the ones I see along the roadsides.

You can't really tell, but the newly planted sumac twig is just above that log. It is also hard to tell that the slope below the scenic byway is going to be a major privacy enhancing shrubbery one day.

All I intended to do was plant the sumac. Then I started digging up blackberries and the hated Clematis virginiana by the roots. This part of the slope is choke full of blackberries and clematis. I spent a good deal of time working at that.

The entire slope was once covered with blackberries, clematis, elderberry and sapling trees. Every time I plant a baby shrubbery the unwanted get eliminated.

It took quite a bit of clearing just to be able to get to the slope below the scenic byway so that it could be planted with what I wanted. You certainly can't tell now, but there are already a lot of shrubberies planted on this slope. The list: 2 Mugo Pine, 2 Calycanthus, 4 bamboo, 4 Oakleaf Hydrangea, 3 rhododendron, 5 Doublefile Viburnum, 3 spirea, 1 evergreen Dogwood, a Silverbell tree and now one new sumac. I left all the native Hydrangea arborescens. There are about a dozen of those. The slope has also been seeded with ramps and False Solomon's Seal, Maianthemum racemosum.

One day it will be a major privacy enhancing shrubbery with a path directly below the slope and above the two baby pines.

It would be nice if the shrubberies grew as fast as the Miscanthus. I can't see the rubberneckers when they slip behind the grass.

All that grass started with a single one gallon pot. I am a cheap and persistent peasant gardener. Most of the baby shrubberies are starting off as rooted stem cuttings or volunteers that I find in my travels. Lucky my travels land me in some nice gardens that need weeding.

There has to be a before first. That is where I'm at in a garden becoming.

After I was all done transplanting my single volunteer Smooth Sumac and ready to call it quits - It was hard work - I remembered what I had really meant to do, dig up the Stella D' Boros for sister #2.