The Weed Eater

I hate using the weed eater....weedeating...is that a proper verb? I don't actually eat the weeds, well, except for the bits that fly at my face and arms and the rocks that smack me in the face and the sap and bugs and other detritus that fly into my mouth when I forget to keep it closed. Yuck.

So anyway, with all the visitors we have had, we haven't gotten around to clearing the brush along the drive. And while I hate the doing of it, I like the way it looks. Almost like it is mowed grass. Of course, a close up look will tell you that is is weeds and grass, but from a distance it looks great.

When we first moved in it took weeks to get it cleared. You couldn't just use a weed eater. You had to get in there with loppers and clippers and hand saws. I didn't want it to get to the point it was when we got here, so I had to get out. Yesterday was quite a bit cooler than it has been. Today is going to be a scorcher. So we worked about 2 hours yesterday and a little less today. I forgot to take my camera yesterday morning to show the area around the stream bed, but here is a before and after of the work we did today. Doesn't it look better? Please say yes.




One thing we started way back when we moved in, is clear around any trees we think are in a good location...not too close to the drive..and of a variety we want to encourage...pine, poplar and basically anything that is not a locust (HUGE thorns) or a cedar. Sometimes you get in such a zone of moving the weed eater in a swaying motion, side to side, that you can hit a young tree that you intended to save. I feel bad, but then there are lots of trees and another one will pop up soon.




So we have cleared out and encouraged the trees in order to get a pleasing entrance to our house. I love the look of tree lined drives, but we did not want to buy a bunch of trees and then hand water them until they grew...plus, the drive it about 1/3 of a mile. That is a LOT of trees. So we encourage the ones we want and chop down ruthlessly (yes, we do it without any ruth at all) the ones that don't fit our criteria! I think it is starting to look great and we have a few pines on the left side coming up that I think will be great someday. One more advantage of tree lined drives, especially pine, is they drop leaves or needles and limit the whole weed eating nonsense in the first place. You see? A method to our madness.




And look what I found hiding! Time to start making jam!