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Naturalization of my Property |
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Spring 2005
(Page 2)
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Back Yard
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| Julie has been doing some very nice and much-needed work
in both the back and front yards this spring. Here's some views of what
she has done so far (I have helped of course). |
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We placed a bench by the pond, so we (and visitors) could sit and
look out over the pond. |
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The side elevated area on the east side of the property had been
getting rather unruly, and needed some balancing. So Julie cleaned
out most of the foreign plants and we transplanted three Eastern Red
Cedar shrubs from the front yard (where I had "parked" them until I
could decide where they should really go). These are just barely
visible in this photo, near the end. |
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Similarly, the fern garden that lies along the rear of the house had
been getting very unruly as well. Julie cleaned it up, removed most
of the non-fern species, and expanded the stone boundaries a bit.
If you're new to naturalization, this will still look unruly and
unkempt to you! Imagine what it looked like before getting cleaned
up! What you see here are various fern species, plus a number of
Jewelweed sprouts, which we leave until later in the season when we
thin them out. |
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Gradually over the years the
prairie has crept out into the grass. Now, that's fine, except
eventually the end result is all prairie and no grass. So we
decided to delineate the prairie edges this year. Note the two
stumps. The prairie used to end at an imaginary straight line
drawn between these two stumps. The grass that you see here (not
the lawn) is sweetgrass. It will eventually spread like crazy if
you let it.
So Julie dug a small ditch along the edge to mark the
boundary of the prairie. |
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An integral part of any
naturalization project is usually to reduce the amount of lawn
on a property. I chose to leave some lawn, but I'm not very good
at taking care of it!
So Julie has been seeding certain areas of the remaining
lawn, in order to enhance it and bring it back to a healthy
state.
This photos shows where she has cordoned off a section of
recently seeded grass, along the edge of the prairie area, where
we have delineated it with a small ditch (as described above).
We are now at the end of May. |
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There has been this small "island"
down near the pond ever since I first naturalized the property.
Julie has delineated it better, mulched it, and cleaned out the
weeds. Looks much nicer now! The pond is in the background. |
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One thing we do to make the yard
inviting to animals and birds is to place shallow bowls out with
fresh water. The chipmunks and squirrels frequently drink from
them. The birds love these too, and we often see them drinking
from them. Once in a while a bird has a bath in one. We refresh
the water every day. |
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This is not meant to illustrate
anything, just to show a lovely view of the pond at the back
through the trees. |
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This is a closeup view of a nice
patch of Canada Anemone in the backyard (a native plant). |
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