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Garden journal entry

 

May 31, 2020. As I've stated a few times in these pages, my primary goal in developing the backyard garden was to eliminate the bare-fence view out the back windows and from our back patio. So my earliest gardening efforts focused on building a border spanning the length of the back fence. Since our cul-de-sac lot is wedge-shaped, that makes for the single longest stretch of garden you can create around our house. Serious work started in spring of 2017, spurred by the construction of our waterfall pond; three years later, I feel I have mostly achieved my objective: the view from the patio reveals barely any of the cedar slats that used to dominate the picture. Of course a stroll down the border will still show plenty of fence in between the larger plantings, but the overall look is that of a shrub border. Now, if anything, I have to contend with the enthusiastic growth habits of many of its inhabitants, but I think I can deal with that. In the picture here, the tallest trees (mid-left and right corner) are on the other side of the fence: the builder-planted live oaks that live in all the neighbors' backyards (our own is out of view, further to the right). All the other plants are in front of the fence; counting the bigger blobs starting from the left, there's a couple of fig trees in the left corner, followed by a pomegranate, an olive, a Key lime, a huge Cape honeysuckle that is intent on conquering our yard and the neighbors' too, purple-flowering duranta, yellow-flowering thryallis, and one of our two satsuma oranges. The border continues along the back of the pond, where several vines (climbing aster, Carolina jasmine, Mexican butterly vine, and Mexican flame vine) combine with the other satsuma, a silver dollar tree, an Arizona cypress, and aforementioned live oak to complete the picture. The only part where significant fence shows is above our rock garden, where plantings are naturally lower, but even there some horizontally extending jasmine vines soften the picture. In all, I'm pleased with the progress over the past couple of years. On to the next challenge!


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