Looking Ahead Week: The Wildflower Area

In the back right corner of the yard sits an area of random wildflowers.  I don't know the names of all of them, but there are purplish flowers and goldenrod, among others, scattered in with black raspberry plants and other thorny plants that I don't know the name of.  It's kind of a random mess right now, and I'd like to add some order to this part of the yard, but I have to be careful, because the deer pass right through here all the time, as evidenced by the deer trail in the photo below.

I already cleared out some of the raspberry plants in the fall, such as the ones below.  (They're the ones with the purple stems, or canes.)

Though parts of the wildflower patch - especially those with the raspberries - can be pretty densely vegetated, other parts of it are somewhat sparse and open to planting:

Farther back, the raspberries and other thorny plants dominate the growth.  The wood log in the photo below marks a short path through the wildflowers; beyond it, I'm thinking of clearing out the other thorny plants and letting the raspberries just grow and see how that pans out.

But in other places, like here in front of the tree, I plan to clear out all of the thorny plants (raspberries included).  In their place, I hope to plant some grasses, wildflowers, maybe a few shrubs or smaller bushes, and probably a few sunflowers.  I'm not sure exactly what the mix will be or how it will be laid out - I'm waiting for the snow to thaw to get a good look at the yard again - but that's the working idea.

The first phase of the project was covered on Tuesday...clearing out the old to make room for the new.

Of course, this isn't the only wildflower patch in the yard.  There's also a relatively large area of wildflowers in the back center of the yard.  In summer and through much of the fall, I found it to be healthily full of a variety of wildflowers.

It's not all flowers, though.  There's a small fallen tree (as well as some tree stumps and logs) that I have to decide whether to keep or not.  An advantage is that the birds can sit on the branches and have their pick of whatever food the flowers provide.  And I suppose it looks somewhat natural this way...but if I get the fallen tree out of the way, there will be room for more wildflowers.

But it's not all wildflowers and fallen trees, either.  Raspberry plants, aggressive as they are, have put down roots here as well (see the purple cane shooting straight up in the photo below).  Early in the spring, before the other vegetation sprouts up, I'm hoping to pull out many of the raspberries to make room for more wildflowers.  

The plan for this wildflower patch for this year is to remove some raspberries and other thorny plants, but to otherwise let things grow naturally.  I have enough other stuff to attend to around the yard.  After a full year of seeing this area in action, I can better decide if I like it the way it is.  In the fall, the wildflowers died off to make way for this year's batch. Next year, they may be making way for a new and improved wildflower patch...or maybe just more of the same. 

To close the post, here's a look at the whole backyard.  The wildflower patch that I'm planning to re-do this year is in front of and mostly behind the pine tree at the right of the photo below.  The other wildflower patch, which I'm not planning to do too much with this year, sits at the back center of the photo.  Beyond it, of course, are the creek and the dock.

Tomorrow, Looking Ahead Week continues...

Looking Ahead Week: Clean-up

Now that we've taken a look at March weather in Freeville, Looking Ahead Week moves on with the first tasks of spring.  Since I'll have to wait until April at the earliest (probably more like May) to begin planting new things, the first task of the spring will be yard clean-up.  And yes, there's plenty to clean up.  I don't know where the clean-up will start, but this post starts with the various piles of fallen branches around the yard.  They'll have to be chopped up and taken to the recycling center, which accepts branches up to 4" in diameter.  I'll also have to collect the fallen branches from around the yard and add them to the pile.

There's also plenty of dead wood hanging out around the yard, waiting to be cleaned up. 
For example, there are dead branches and vines still leaning up against this maple tree.

And in the photo below are actually two plants: a live maple tree and what looks to be a dead vine of some kind.  All of that dead wood should be cleared away.

The back end of the yard is congested with thorny plants...both black raspberries and the other thorny plant with small red berries that I haven't identified yet.  I'm not entirely sure what I'll do with this area of the yard, but I'm thinking of turning it into a raspberry patch.  Either way, I'm pretty sure that I'll be clearing out the other thorny plants to make way for something else that might attract more birds and wildlife to the yard.

I'm also not sure what I'll do with the wildflower patch at the back of the yard - my vision is for it to eventually be teeming with wildflowers throughout the whole warm season - but I do know that I want to clear the raspberry plants (and other thorny plants) out of here.  It's possible that I'll transplant them to my new raspberry patch in the back corner of the yard.

Not sure if I'll be able to pry this branch down, but it would certainly make the tree look nicer!

And then there's the thorny plant patch at the side of the yard.  I don't plan to tackle this area until next year, but I would like to clear out the pieces of wood and other junk that's stuck in there before the plants expand with the warmer temperatures and increased sunlight.

So that's a quick look at my clean-up projects, which should take up most of March and might even bring me into April.  I haven't mentioned anything about the pieces of human eyesore - bricks, cinder blocks, chains, trash, and other junk that is scattered across the yard - but I hope to begin cleaning that up, too, before the vegetation gets thicker.  That's where tomorrow's piece of Looking Ahead Week will pick up.

Transparency in the Wildflower Patches

Now that winter is here, the wildflowers have died off (except for the thorny plants), and I can see what they've been hiding all this time.  I'll have to decide how to manage these areas, and whether I want to replace the wildflowers with something else.

Can you see the path towards the left in the above photo?

There's a big pile of accumulated branches that I'll have to get rid of.

There's a whole bunch of thorny plants in this patch; I have to decide whether to keep them or not.  There are also a couple of random piece of wood that were tossed in there that I should extract before the vegetation grows back in the spring.

Here's that same patch from a different angle....the growth looks a little fuller from this view.