How the Earth Recycles Itself:

It all starts with dirt. A plant grows there. The plant gets big, and turns into a tree. The tree's leaves fall off, onto the dirt. The leaves sit there for years and years, docomposing. Eventually, the leaves decompose to the point that they do not look like leaves anymore. They are, in fact, dirt again. This dirt does not go away. It just piles up.

This is literally what happened in our yard. At the side of our driveway there is a retaining wall, next to which is a gigantic oak tree. The tree loses fifteen-thousand-bajillion leaves per day in the fall. A large percentage of these leaves get trapped next to the retaining wall, which also happens to be a plant bed. Our very first landscaping project this fall was to clear out the eight tons of rotting leaves from this bed in order to finally free the plants that were suffocating below them. First layer was dry leaves. Second layer, wet leaves. The third layer was a thicker paste of wet, matted leaves. The fourth layer was a smelly, rotted, black mush. Then the fifth layer: dirt. A huge mound of dirt. We have recently taken three wheel-barrels full of dirt away from this area, which only just barely uncovered the two feet of driveway where the dirt spilled over onto the concrete. The dirt is still probably another six inches above the level it should be in the actual bed. This is the "problem area" I noted in my last post.

Last night we did a little more work outside. We dug a few wheel-barrel loads of dirt out from around the air conditioner unit and leveled the area, prepping it to bring some of the front rock to the back. After this work was done, we grilled some hot dogs and discussed the "problem area."

We've decided to dig out the salvagable plants (there are some spectacular hostas growing there, presumably because they have been fertilized so well over the past twenty years of leaves - there are also a few tulips). We'll use the existing soil and a little fertilzer to put them in outdoor pots. We will remove the remaining soil to a few inches below the level of the driveway, then cover the area with rock fromt the front yard and put the new pots on top of the rock bed.

We're still not sure what to do about the area above the retaining wall, but I think we are going to try sodding the area. It may do okay, but we're worried that it won't get enough water, as the sprinkler system is not set up for coverage over there. We'll see, I guess. It will only be a couple of pieces of sod, so not too much wasted if it doesn't work. Another idea would be to plant some shrubs there for privacy (and to cover up the nieghbor's ugly fence), but then there is still the question of what to do for ground cover. Most important to me is that it not have the opportunity to get severely overgrown like it did before I pulled everything out.

So those are my thoughts for today. I'll try to get pictures of this stuff up at some point, but it takes some effort as my computer won't allow me to add pics when I post. I'll figure it out though.