I started working on the fallen tree this morning. The first step was to trim as much of the ivy off as I could. Here’s a good starting shot:

The only real damage sustained by the back yard (at least until I can get the trunks cut up and see what the grass under them looks like) is the bamboo at the men’s loo:

That of course should recover very quickly. Truly, though, take a look at this:

Not even the cheap plastic table took a hit. I was able to extract the table and both chairs from under the limb with no visible damage to any of them.

The ivy apparently had been holding this whole thing together. As I trimmed away from this limb, it completely broke apart from its upper half. You can see that other half still on the bamboo.

During all of this, Salem, our wacko kitty, began rearranging the universe to suit herself. Here she is in one of her favorite poses, “Cat Among Platonic Solids.”

And then she decided a better place was amidst the destruction. The dogwood tree took a serious hit, and I dragged that limb out into the labyrinth. Salem decided to pose as Shiva, Destroyer of Worlds.

I’m having to borrow a chainsaw from Craig, since I don’t own one, that’s a whole post by itself, so while I’m was waiting for it to return from its ride in Craig’s van, I went ahead and cleaned up all the ivy I’d trimmed. Alas, my wheelbarrow had self-destructed back when I installed the bowl in the center of the labyrinth. I had left all the dirt in the barrow, and then it rained, and then when I tried to get the wheelbarrow up the ramp and over to where the side area of the dance floor patio will be, the whole thing fell over from its weight and tore the barrow part right off. (It was plastic.)

So I put “barrow” on my shopping list, only to discover that although you can buy new wheels for your wheelbarrow, you cannot buy a new barrow. Stores are forbidden by the manufacturer from selling the parts separately.

This seems unreasonable to me. Surely it is my right to be a thrifty conservative if I choose, yes? (The right wing will now explain to me why my right to conserve is outweighed by the corporation’s right to make money off of me. Why this is different from taxes is beyond me, but I’ll bet the teabaggers would say it is.)

Therefore, since I had time to spare while waiting for the chainsaw, it occurred to me that I could do the whole Great Depression thing and just construct something out of scrap lumber I had lying around.

Behold:

Thus I have stuck it to The Man.

Here is how I have left it for lunch:

It’s a panorama shot done with the iPhone but without my glasses, so there are some fuzzy bits. Click on it to see it full size.

The chainsaw is on its way, so off I go to do the manly man thing.

Doesn’t this look cozy?

It’s not, of course: it’s a tree that fell this morning. Those who are familiar with the space will remember the ivy-covered trunk standing right behind the copper-mesh lighting fixture. It and the large branch arching over to the pecan tree came crashing down. I wish I had seen it.

Miraculously, it doesn’t seem to have hurt anything. Even the copper mesh is intact.

It has probably done a number on the grass, but meh.

I thought it was just the branch at first, but it’s the whole trunk.

The trunks literally missed everything of importance. I had moved the firepit up to the underdeck to keep the firewood dry on Sunday, but even if it had been in place, it would have been unscathed.

That’s how precise the fall was. I had a shot of the copper mesh sculpture, but it was all fuzzy. I’ll try to get one tomorrow afternoon.

At any rate, I’ll start removing it all Saturday morning. My goal this weekend was to move the remaining paving stones out of their current position by the entrance steps, back to the driveway area, mostly so I can begin envisioning how the eventual “dance floor” patio will tie in with the labyrinth below. Maybe I can get that done on Sunday as per my original plan.

I bought a book on ferns last fall and uncovered it during a recent spate of cleaning. I got serious about looking for some new kinds of ferns for the back yard and actually found a nursery in Virginia, the Crownsville Nursery, that carries a great variety of them. Yesterday, a box arrived with my new babies:

The packaging was quite clever: the packing straw is held in place with rubber bands, which keeps the potting soil from coming loose. Each pot has that stick in it, which kept the top of the box from crushing down or the pots from flying up. All of this actually allowed the larger ferns to travel free and unbroken. I was impressed.

This is the Dixie Wood Fern, Dryopteris x australis, and I got three of them. They’re supposed to grow up to five feet in lenght/height, so I’m thinking of putting them in corners somewhere. I had planted some Ostrich Ferns in such places, but those died off over the summer and don’t seem to be reviving like some of the others that suffered similar setbacks.

This is a Peacock Fern, Selaginella uncinata, and I got ten of these. They’re supposed to be a good ground cover and actually be an iridescent blue at some angles. I plan to cover the northern bank of the labyrinth with these, and if they do well there, and the Irish Moss fails to thrive in the middle plot, I may use them in the middle as well.

As I mentioned above, many of the ferns I planted last spring died back during the summer heat, but most of them are now putting forth new growth. The most hardy seem to be the Autumn Ferns; they didn’t even flinch at the heat. The Mexican Male Ferns that I planted at the entrance to the men’s loo seem to have perished altogether, although they shouldn’t have. The place I put them is usually moist. Perhaps this summer it wasn’t, however.

I need to go back and catalog the others I planted. I know some were Japanese Painted Ferns, and there was at least one other variety.

I love ferns. I think they’re beautiful in ways that flowering plants aren’t. I agree with the Japanese that flowers in a garden make it “hot,” and that a green garden is a calming one. So far, my semi-wilderness of ivy and ferns is fitting that description admirably.

Anyway, I was going to plant them this afternoon, but the rain has prevented me. Yes, I know I could go ahead and play in the rain, but I don’t wanna. Another task for later.

I was out on the Art Walk downtown last night, bought a new piece, and came across these at one of the antique places:

These look like pieces of old wall dividers, maybe like from between booths at a pub or something. The upper panel has been replaced with a mirror. (Yes, that’s Herman Fletcher in the first one. I’m in the other one.)

I’m thinking it would be interesting to have something like this, a tall one and a short one, installed together somewhere outside the labyrinth, so that as one walks it, one occasionally is confronted with one’s own image.

Reactions, anyone?

The grass springeth.

It’s still a little thin, so I’ll wait until next week to mow. I’ll wait for it to stop raining, too.