Today was a great day to plant trees. Jesse the cat supervised.
The weather and timing couldn't have been better. It's supposed to rain tonight and tomorrow. I'm a happy tree planter. Sorry about the pictures being a quarter turn off.

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	Redbud 1.jpg (199.7 KB, 42 views)
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	Jesse the cat..jpg (184.4 KB, 39 views)

Typical supervisor. Resting in the shade nowhere near the work!

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The best I can with what I got

The wife made me help her put in the tomato plants tonight, does that count ?

Going to hit 90* on thursday, they say.

Hope they get rooted.

Do I detect just a whiff of jealousy? Cats rule

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Jesse supervising..jpg (101.5 KB, 81 views)

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"I drank WHAT?" (Socrates)

No jealousy. And one of them rules me, that's for sure.

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The best I can with what I got

Yup. They know their place. And ours

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"I drank WHAT?" (Socrates)

I plant a bunch of trees every year about this time. I'm re-foresting some of my farm land. Once heard a joke(?) that there are only two good times to plant a tree: 20 years ago or right now!

That's always nice to plant some trees; they're nice to look at, attract some really cool birds & little furry animals. Also, they make oxygen. We (Dad) bought a camp up in Crawford County in '63. The first few years Dad got a bunch of evergreen saplings to plant out back where it was farmland many years before. Of course, I had to water them. One whole bucket of water per tree. It was only an 80 yard round trip from our little backyard stream to the tree row!
I'm curious: do the deer mess with them? I live in the city. PGH. IN the city, and the damned deer eat everything I try to grow! Good luck there, and thanks for making us some oxygen!

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There's a Monster on the loose

This ^^^ My gardening-mad gf in Bellingham WA has absolutely transformed the garden of the place she bought in 2009. The main garden is only about 80' x 80' but it is choc-a-bloc with trees and shrubs. Plus she put a small greenhouse outside the kitchen, visible at upper right in the pic. Standing in most places you can't see the edges so it could be enormous. It probably makes enough oxygen to be a fire hazard. The wire-fenced dog run the previous owner had at the bottom of the garden she has put several beds in for vegetables. The birds and bees (and her cats) love the place. She lost lot of plants last winter, though, as it went down to 3ºF (!) In the summer she can sit out and watch the hummingbirds flit through the sprinklers. It's a great mental health resource

She bought a small drone a few years ago and got some pics from about 100' up but has been banjaxed by the FAA as she is within a mile of the airport and now they want her to pre-book a flight time, whereas initially she could just log in and get clearance This pic is from 2021.



No real problem with critters getting in as it is well fenced, but she does have a mother skunk that creates a home under her ground-level deck each spring, so she usully gets little skunklets. She is awaiting their arrival any day. Fortunately they don't create any problem as the cats ignore them.

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Sandra drone pic.jpg (189.2 KB, 56 views)

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"I drank WHAT?" (Socrates)

Yes, the deer can be a problem: more for the deciduous than the evergreens. I place little wire cages over them when they are seedlings and increase the cage size as they grow. Once they get really big (taller than me!), I usually replace the cages on deciduous trees with something to protect the trunk from the bucks damaging the bark when rubbing the velvet off their antlers. Up to a certain size, the tree also needs protection from our numerous local beavers. Evergreens are pretty safe from the animals once they're waist-high or so. Several kinds of deciduous are also in danger from Yellow-Bellied Sap-Suckers, but we're fortunate to also have a large number of Blue Jays who intimidate them and even actively chase them away.

We bought our camp in 1987. Each of the first 3 years we planted 100 pine and spruce tree seedlings that we bought for pennies apiece thru the DEC. They are now 30-40 feet tall. Since we are 100% wooded now, no more room to plant.

The deer did not bother any of them.

About 20 years ago I got involved in a program to plant American Chestnut trees that came from a disease free plot. They only allowed 5 trees per customer. I planted them all in good spots and flagged them because they looked so similar to native trees.

The deer ate all but 4. The fifth survived, but as it turned out it was in a bad location and I had to cut it down.

My trees are too close to the house for the deer to be a problem, but the bunnies munched on two of my young peach trees this winter. I thought I had them protected, but I was mistaken. The bunnies never touched any of my young maple trees.

Wow, that’s too bad about the Chestnut trees.
I failed to mention all the trees Dad got were spruce in one area and Scotch pine in another. Seriously, I believe there were at least 50 trees. 50 round trips! What else did I have to do? Of course, watering time was late afternoon. I miss that place!

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There's a Monster on the loose

I bought a potted Norway spruce tree for my second Christmas in this house. After Christmas I planted it in the center of my back yard. That tree is two stories tall now.