A Dry August

We are at the end of August and it is sprinkling as I write. But it's been mostly dry all month and we have been concerned about drought stress. We also tend to hover over our plantings to make sure they'll succeed. This post summarizes our outings on the four Sundays of this month.

On August 8, we watered our plantings. Jim said he had 70 gallons. More branches off of the dead birch fell in the area and Gary decided to chop enough of it for easier access to remove blackberry sprouts and new bindweed. Directly in front of him is our bad luck vine maple--that poor thing has suffered multiple direct hits from falling branches. It has been topped at least once. We then staked it and another falling branch took down the stake. However, you can see green in the photo so it is, remarkably, still living.

We then walked over to arboretum. The soccer field was all torn up, due to the turf replacement project. When we got next to the Community Garden, Gary and I got distracted by the ripe blackberry west of the bridge (see below) and stopped to pick and eat. We then followed Jim into the Arboretum Annex and discussed whether trees are drought stressed, yanking morning glory off while we looked. Is this tree drying out or is it normal shedding of leaves? As for the soil, we noted some areas were still wet; but a few yards away, the soil was bone dry as I dug in and kicked it loose with my shoe. It's a strange area. It's all wetland or wetland buffer but some of the buffer area is elevated and the soil appears to dry out.

We went back to the Arboretum Annex on August 13th. It rained! On the other hand, the area was a mess. Lots of bindweed on blackberry. We basically focused on removing bindweed off of trees. Gary also cut back the knotweed. No one has worked on the knotweed since John.

On August 20th, Jim brought more water in his truck and we watered along the Trail of Cedars. We dashed through the Southern Forest and I had Gary stand by the cottonwood shoots--they are getting super high! We also went to the Arboretum to water there, stringing the hoses Kirk gave us way back when, from the garden faucets. I don't know how or when it happened but there is now a dead Douglas fir (or I think that was a Doug fir), clearly visible from the lawn in front of the Arboretum. Jim also helped me water the WNPS project site (Zone 6-2), where the willow and pine had been drying out. We put down 120 gallons of water there.

This last Sunday (August 27), we watered again down the trail and for good measure, in the Arboretum, too. We also found what appeared to us as a rabbit cage. Jim sent an email to Tony about it.

Jim also met with Tony last week. Parks has something that holds 200 gallons of water that could be placed in Jim's pickup. We would like to test drive this (so to speak) some time in September. If it works well (or is easier than the present system of Jim bringing water in tubs and garbage cans), we could then use it in future dry summers.

July Outings

I was out on the Meridian side on July 2nd, 9th, 23rd and 30th. Jim and Gary were there on those days, too, and also on the 16th.

On the 2nd, we noted signs of human activity near the Southern Forest. Whether it was "camping" or not was hard to tell. Really, not much to do about it but toss out the stuff.

Just litter, if you ask me!

More litter...

Jim started to worry that we'd have a repeat of the 2015 drought so we wheelbarrowed water down to the Southern Forest. Also, he knew someone digging oxalis out of their yard so he brought that with him and we planted most of it in the Southern Forest and a bit below the fence by our most recent planting. I'm a little worried that it's the wrong season to be doing this but given that it was free and it would have been thrown away anyway, it seemed worth the gamble.

On the 9th, after more watering, we worked along the trail and near our Jobox, pulling morning glory off of natives. Here's one Indian plum that was a little taller by the time I yanked off most of the bindweed.

My mind wanders off sometimes. I had just freed a vine maple of some morning glory and started to remove bindweed off of what I thought was a bracken fern. The fronds of bracken fern are easily knocked down so I was careful to snip off some of the bindweed and unwind others off the frond. I was doing this mindlessly when all of the sudden I realized I was removing bindweed not off of a bracken fern but poison hemlock. Oops. This is in the area close to Meridian and our Jobox. I didn't realize the hemlock was in that spot and with so much overgrowth I had only seen a frond sticking out. Too much stuff all around it so I didn't bother digging it out.

On the 23rd, we watered a few things on the north side of the main trail. We also took a good look at the area. I was not happy to see that a western hemlock very near the main trail entrance had been pruned. Also, there was a mangled salmonberry. A cedar on the other side of the trail was also pruned and the branches tossed aside. I emailed Kirk about this.

North of the trail, there is a five-needle pine that appeared to have the rust disease.

I spotted a young horse chestnut in the area and got Gary to saw it down. I also talked Gary into yanking out a small English hawthorne. That took longer since we hadn't brought a shovel or even a trowel. But we got rid of two invasive trees that day.

The 30th was a short work day for me. Discovered another large branch had fallen off of the dead birch tree, smashing into an ocean spray we had planted and the already damaged vine maple, which we had staked. It's as if we planted the vine maple in a bad luck spot since it had suffered previously from a branch falling on it. After staking, it had produced a new leader but the latest blow was another setback. Ideally, all the branches on the birch that will fall on it have done so. The culprit is on the right below.

Later in the day, I was on the 1st NE side. Someone bent back a branch on a witch hazel in the Arboretum. Perhaps it annoyed someone because the branch stuck out too much over the lawn.