Puddock Hill Journal #14: Multiple Invaders Challenge the Backyard Steward
Yesterday evening I went out with the string trimmer and found discouragement.
There are so many ways to look at nature. We can take in the lay of the land to understand its underlying geological formations, for example, or we can dig a small hole and appreciate the different layers of soil (called horizons). We can stand back and examine the growth habits of trees and shrubs or study the bark of their trunks in deep woods. We can ignore the most common greenery around us and home in on the unusual fish or fowl, the herbaceous plant, or the shy amphibian.
In my daily morning walks, I tend to look for nice little surprises, such as a blooming wildflower, but I also keep an eye out, pruner in hand, for the single invasive sprig growing in a sea of beneficial plants at the edge of the meadow or in the woods.
From my outdoor “office” on the porch off the library, by contrast, I see only the more prominent players: Spanish fir, Cutleaf maple, Atlas cedar (none of them native but all beautiful), the nearby new native planting bed of Oakleaf hydrangea, Witch alder, and Chokeberry that disrupts the lawn, and the sweep of the hill down to the big pond.