My Shade Garden Tragedy and Revival

Summer 2013: Soon after the garden tour in which my garden was featured, something happened that changed my mood from cheerful and optimistic to gloomy and depressed.
Returning from somewhere and approaching my house, I noticed something strange and different on the south side of it.
It didn't look the same way it used to look.
Sky! I saw sky where a huge alder tree's crown  used to be.

This is the spring picture. In summer, when leaves are opened, 

this huge piece of sky was barely seen through the alder's foliage.

I went that direction and stopped in shock. The tree was gone.
I remembered that my neighbor told me about the tree removal. It spread its branches toward their house and instead of trimming, the tree company suggested cutting it down. This is what happened.

Notice the difference.

Left: multiple alder's trunks can be seen. Right: the trunks are gone

Then, I saw my shade garden. It wasn't shady anymore. The shade was gone. Bright afternoon sun, now unblocked, had changed everything. The plants, which were never exposed to the direct sun and which enjoyed dappled shade for several years, were in shock just like me.
It looked like a battle scene. I couldn't believe my eyes. Where there was formerly shady coziness, now bright light and heat invaded the area.

Rhododendron, hydrangea, Fuchsia magellanica, epimedium, tetrapanax, helleborus, corydalis, groundcovers.... everything looked hurt, miserable and pitiful.

Tetrapanax

Hydrangea

The suffering of plants was bad enough for me to see. However, the worst was the feeling of loss that donned on me: I lost my shady refuge.
This corner of the garden was always cool and shady, even in the hottest days. The alder's crown created a huge canopy. Every time, when I entered it, I felt like I was stepping into my private cozy and a bit mysterious world.
After several minutes of absolute disbelief and astonishment, I started to run back and forth bringing whatever I could find to protect the plants. Umbrellas, towels... It was like trying to help something that was already dead.

Before and After. The Worst of 2011 For Me

As I remember, the last time I felt awfully bad about dying plants was three years ago. Then, my Privet (Ligustrum japonicum) was hit by falling snow and my Cordyline froze (I Am Not Crying, Am I? ). While the Cordyline was gone for good, the Privet was given a second chance. It hasn't recovered 100% yet, but it survived, gave new growth and looks very promising now. I didn't know then how much worse the pain of losing plants can be even when those plants are not technically yours. Without further deliberations, let me show you what I mean.

A forest is also a garden, isn't it? Nature garden.

Before (Dec. 2008, snowy pictures) and After (Fall 2011)

Now, I know what sound I hate the most. It's the sound of a logging saw and the loud noise of falling trees crushing other trees on their way down. There is an agony of living things dying in that sound.

***

This summer, we hired a tree service company to trim several tall fir trees around our house. We also got permission from our Home Owners Association to remove one tree. The roots of that tree could harm our driveway. It wasn't an easy decision. It took our family several days to discuss if that tree needed to be cut down. Before the tree cutters came, I told my boys to go and say Good Bye to that fir and thank it for the beauty it gave us as well as for the shade it provided.

A bit later, I happened to look out of the window. One of the boys was standing at the tree and touching its trunk. I watched him. He stayed there for several long minutes! He was talking to the tree!

We never took that tree down. It is still there.

I can't tell you how many times I thought about that after the whole forest was gone in October.

I don't know what my kids will do when they grow up. They say 'never say never'. But, I hope they will never buy a piece of land near their own neighborhood with one specific purpose - to harvest all the trees and sell them to China. I hope they will never destroy such beauty for financial purposes. I hope they will never be disliked (softly saying) by all the people who used to come to the forest to feel themselves as part of nature, to enjoy its greatness and beauty and to stay sane in the whirlpool of stressful life.

How can we, people, come to believing that we can do with nature what we want and what we need? How can a person sleep after destroying not one, not ten, but hundreds of trees? How can people believe that their rights are more superior than the Earth and what belongs to it?

 How can something that is legally right be so ugly and morally wrong?

***Copyright 2011 TatyanaS

Accidental Flowerbed - Before and After

 Last October, I wrote about my so called  'Accidental' Flowerbed. It's time to show its progress since that time.
For starters, a couple of pictures from September 2009, when I finally decided to turn a pile of dirt into a plant bed.

September 2009:

Marking location for Ligularia and grasses:

Next picture, six months later, April 2010:

Plants are limited by grasses, Ligularias, Alliums and Heucheras 

 May 2010:

Blooming Bowles' Golden grass (Milium effusum 'Aureum') and Heucheras took  center stage

 Angelina Stonecrop starts to cover the soil

June 2010:

 

July 2010:

Alliums and more Heucheras opened their buds

One year later, May 2011 

June 2011:

Japanese maple and ferns were added in fall 2010. Groundcovers and mosses are spreading. Volunteer Foxglove has grown huge in the middle of Hakonechloa macra 'Aureola'.

July 2011

 A view from above:

Hostas with their variegated leaves really add nice accents to the bed. Among the varieties is Hosta undulata 'Albo marginata'

Blooming grass is Bowles' Golden grass (Milium effusum 'Aureum')

White-flowering Tradescantia loves this place

August 2011:

Ligularia and Echinacea 'Milkshake' are both long bloomers

Current look, September 2011:

Knock Out rose on the right and zonal geranium on the left brighten the bed with their last blooms

The bed is filled with plants. Not shown here, but present are: Brunnera Jack Frost, Euphorbia and several tiny shrubs of Hydrangea and Euonymus 'Canadale Gold'. I use this bed for hosting plants and their divisions taken from other parts of my garden. The last addition is a little purple Cotinus, Smoke bush

All in all, I am pleased with this accidental bed. The only frustration is the roots of the trees growing nearby on the border with neighbors. Whenever I dig a  new planting hole, I encounter not only a thick mat of feeder roots but also long thick woody roots. I believe that is why the plants in this bed dodn't grow as well as they could. Some of them are slow growers.

***Copyright 2011 TatyanaS

All Hail Wednesday

It felt suspiciously cold Wednesday morning. But, the day was not bad. The sun showed up, and I ran to the garden to do some replanting, replacing and refreshing.
A new Japanese maple was planted:

Two Japanese plum yews replaced two old azalea trees in blue belly pots. The azaleas were bought 5 or 6 years ago to decorate the house in December and were successfully moved outside after the holidays.  Trained into trees, with braided stems, they stood on our back porch:

By now, the azaleas lost their attractiveness and needed to go. At least, to go somewhere in a less prominent spot in the garden. I'll give them another chance, trim them and we'll see if they like it. Here is the old and new back porch. Before - on the left, after - on the right.

I bought the Japanese plum yews (Cephalotaxus H. 'fastigiata') at this year's Northwest Flower and Garden Show. It's an evergreen, slow growing, upright vase-shaped plant with large green needles. It grows 6-10 feet tall and 4 feet wide. I plan to prune it to keep it suitable for the pots' size. So far, the plants look a bit small for these wide pots, so I plan to underplant them with annuals.
Meanwhile, the weather changed, and after 6 p.m. we had pea-sized hail bombing our spring garden. It was not a usual hail storm of one-two minutes. The Wednesday hail storm lasted 30 minutes! It was very dense and furious. We couldn't believe our eyes. Hail was falling and falling and falling. It turned to snow after a half an hour, and everything around got white. Hello, April!
 I am sure that my pansies will survive:
   The tulips look bad. They were hit by snow in March, never recuperated after it, and now they have been bitten again.

The daffodils look good, at least now:

It's still cold on Thursday morning. Nothing melted at night.
 
I was right - there was something suspicious in the air Wednesday morning.
 ***Copyright 2011 TatyanaS