Clematis Vitalba: Traveler's Joy; Old Man's Beard

Yesterday, John Dixon instigated the removal of traveler's joy on a pine John planted in the arboretum.

What happened was that last month, I got John to give a tour of the arboretum to my fellow team members in the project sponsored by the Washington Native Plant Society. He noticed that traveler's joy was growing on the eastern white pine (Pinus strobus "Winter Gold"). John decided this had to be tackled. By the time he had dug out the roots earlier this week, the plant had already flowered in the tree and was starting to go to seed. So, he enlisted my help and Jim's in an effort to contain the flowering plant and seeds.

King County has a pretty good website on clematis vitalba. John's primary aim in getting rid of the plant off the pine was to stop, to the extent possible, the seeds from getting dispersed by the wind. Here are the photos I took:

The first tactic was to try to yank the vines off the tree from the ground. Note the knotweed behind the guys. Said John: "Don't get distracted."

Next tactic: John climbed into the tree and then tried yanking on the vines.

Here's an image of the flowers and a bit of the younger vines, which eventually become quite woody.

Jim managed to climb higher into the pine.

John with a load of clematis vines, leaves and flowers. My job was to get all this off site.

Hard to see, but there is a pole in this photo, parallel to the  second large branch from the top. Jim had taped a gardening fork on the end of it and he was grabbing the vines and twisting the vines around the fork like spaghetti. He would then drop bundles of the stuff to the ground.

The end. 

In a little over three hours, most of the clematis was off the pine. I would estimate Jim got 95% or more, with a few young vines still visible from the ground at the end. Of course, some of the seeds were raining down as the guys tried to get it off the pine and some of that will surely germinate so John said the matter needs to be monitored. I will also return to dig out the the small patches of knotweed in this area. John pulled out one at the end to show me what the root looks like. They are not particularly deep in the ground.

June: Maintenance Month

Gary, Jim and I were at the park on all four Sundays this month. We were joined by Robby on the 11th. All this month, we have basically looked after our planting. In particular, to make sure the bindweed is kept at bay from our plants. We've also pulled up young blackberry shoots along with lots of Herb Robert.

It is impossible to remove all the morning glory so we've not done much outside our planting areas. Below on the left, you can see it climbing around the columbine. On the right, note the blooming honeysuckle in the back along with one ripening salmonberry. These were taken on June 4, as was the photo of the mock orange that we just planted in April. We were happy to see it bloom already!

On June 11, I dug out quite a root so I had to take a photo it. This goes to show you why bindweed is everywhere--the roots are going in all directions!

We took a break from this to walk to the main trail where the leaning Norway spruce finally fell. This is right by Meridian Creek and the South Pond. I couldn't resist taking a photo of the babies in the pond, too. The last photo was taken from the other end of the fall. Since it was obstructing the trail, I emailed Parks with couple of photos. When I got home, I learned from neighbors the tree had fallen on Thursday, June 8. I don't know if it had already been reported. The path was cleared couple of days later.

On June 18, I noticed the ocean spray we planted in the fall of 2015 had begun to flower:

On June 18, Jim figured out that the seeds on our clothes are aven seeds, I broke open a head (ovary?) and all these little seeds fell out. Since I've been picking off these sticky little seeds as much as I could off of my clothing, I guess I've been spreading avens here and there.

 Parks (most likely Tony) did a nice job clearing the downed tree. Also, there's now a log across the creek.

Today was hot, 90 by late afternoon perhaps. I think we only picked one bag of morning glory between us since Jim spent most of the time tackling black locust shoots. I took a photo of the cottonwood shoots in the Southern Forest. They are starting to crowd into the path but we decided we liked their shade value.

Memorial Day Weekend

Yesterday, Jim, Gary and I continued to work along the trail to the Southern Forest. Gary complained that the weather pattern this year--a very long period of rain followed by sunny days--made everything grow like crazy. The groundcover is shrub height, great if we're looking at avens but unfortunate in the case of creeping buttercup.

Most of our attention continues to be trying to contain the bindweed in our planting areas. Taking out bindweed is not really practical in the fireweed field so we made a note to dig out bindweed roots there in the winter.

The big English hawthorn is in bloom, towering over the fireweed field. I've always been partial to this particular tree because I find it attractive. But lots of little seedlings beneath. I pulled out dozens. The tree has a death sentence if the VMP ever get fully implemented--Nelson noted that English hawthorns in the park need to come down, using herbicide. I see where he's coming from because I've noted quite a few in the park and it really does meet the definition of invasive species. Yet I'm sad to think that this tree will need to die. I'm contemplating deliberately targeting small trees and a concerted effort of pulling out seedlings as a strategy to decrease the population of English hawthorn in the park. I'm putting this on my mental "to do" list. Along with everything else.

In the Southern Forest, we noted the sun was everywhere. I wound up under the bigger spruce to pull out herb Robert in order to work in a shade. My guess is that the loss of trees in recent years due to their falls have made this area much more sunny than it has been in my memory.

Looking toward the east, there are three dead trees: two Lombardy poplars on the left and right, and a deciduous tree in the middle (behind the alder). They, too, will eventually fall.

The Merry Month of May (and the last day in April)

Finally, today, we had a sunny morning for our weekly work session. I haven't posted since our spring planting party so I need to back track. Essentially, Jim, Gary and I have continued our maintenance work, making sure our plantings succeed. Our invasive plant of the month has been field bindweed, AKA morning glory.

On April 30, a week after the planting, we brought in more chip to create a deeper mulch in this extended restoration area. It may have been our imagination but we thought the new plants actually grew in one week! For the record, here are couple of photos:

The only other thing to note from this last day of April was that earlier in the week, Gary had found jugs of motor oil and some sludgy stuff in a plastic bag in a bucket. Later in the day when I was doing errands, I took this refuse to the north parking lot, left it by the trash can, and emailed Kirk and Tony H to ask them to pick it up for proper disposal. Why people use a park as a dump is beyond me.

On May 7, it seemed spring was finally emerging. Avens along the trail, right before you get to our planting areas, had grown vigorously. They were much taller than what I recall from a year ago. Also, in the next photo, the columbine was about to bloom.

The columbine was blooming a week later, on May 14. We were basically removing as much morning glory as we could, particularly around our plantings.

Gary found this interesting specimen: a morning glory had grown through a hollowed out twig.

Today, we were in the Southern Forest to keep the morning glory off the plants from the fall, 2015 planting. It was super sunny and the twinberry had produced twin flowers. Robby showed up and worked with us for couple of hours.

Later, Gary, Jim and I walked over to the arboretum. The oxalis beneath the redwoods have gotten huge! Here's Gary's gloved hand in the mat of oxalis.

Day After Earth Day Planting Party

We held our spring planting party today. As with our past planting parties, we publicized through Shoreline Area News and the Parkwood Neighborhood Association, along with our email list. For whatever reason, we had our smallest turnout yet with just my next door neighbors--Katie, Ben, Julia and Will--coming out to help. 

The kids came with their own shovels and I discovered that with an appropriately sized shovel and a little instruction, young kids can also grub out blackberry roots. Here's Will with a root:

Photo by Katie!

We did manage to acquire plenty of cardboard for today, with multiple donations. So, I've concluded that the emailing was great this time around for getting cardboard but not volunteers.

Below, both Gary and Julia were intent on saving a spider from getting buried in a planting hole.

And, here is Julia next to the mock orange she planted!

Below are two views of the finished area: One looking from the west and the other from the east.

With this planting, we extended this particular restoration site, We planted last fall in the area photographed above with the sign. I was surprised with the amount of chip we used today--at least a third of the giant load Parks delivered few weeks ago. Really appreciate Parks also buying us plants! Today, we received mock orange, ocean spray and nutka rose. Last fall, they bought us serviceberry, vine maple and snowberry. There's also salal from my yard in this area and today, I brought three sword ferns that should be happier here than on my property.

Robby had also donated several potted spruces but this area is too dry for them. So after we were done with the planting and mulching with our tools back in the Jobox, we walked around to discuss where the spruces could go. We passed by this camas, just starting to bloom. 

April 2017

I noticed I haven't posted all month. 

On April 2, Jim and I worked in the area we want to plant for our planting party on the 23rd. It is adjacent to our fall planting area--we want to broaden the area that is sheet mulched and planted with native plants. (The photo below is not really very good but it appears to be the only one I took.)

On April 9, Jim, Gary and I worked along the Trail of Cedars. There's nice mat of oxalis that is doing quite well that we walked past.

We focused our attention on a cedar that was weighted down by some nearby holly. Here's what it looked like in the beginning:

The cedar is a little clearer below:

And a closeup, after we finished.

Today (April 16), Robby joined us for couple of hours. We looked primarily for emerging morning glory in the Southern Forest. I did get Robby to dig out couple of small English hawthorns while Jim worked on blackberry toward the wetland and Gary being Gary, disappeared to work elsewhere in the park.

Below, you can see morning glory shooting up, with native plants nearby. We planted the fringe cup on the upper right in fall of 2015; not sure if the sword fern was already there.

In the photo below, there's a mix of invasives and natives so a little tricky weeding!

Ideally, in due time, more of the ground would look like below, which has a very nice mat of false lily of the valley (maianthemum dilatatum). I believe the cedar is one we rescued once upon a time when a nearby lombardy poplar fell and pinned it.

More Along the Trail

Two weeks ago, we widened the sheet mulched area next to the injured cedar. By falling, the poplar injured but did not completely demolish the cedar. But as far as I can tell, it took down a hazel. Where that hazel once grew, I have no idea but there were broken limbs with catkins scattered all around this area. Anyway, we finished freeing the lower branches of the cedar on the west side.

Unfortunately, there wasn't anything we could do about the branches on the east side due to the poplar logs that were too big for us to move or saw with our hand saws so we called an end to the project for the morning. Walking out of the park, I noted that leaves had emerged on all the Indian plums along the trail--a sure sign of spring.

Today, Jim and I returned to the same spot. I had asked Tony H. (Parks Department) if he could chainsaw the large logs and he did. This allowed us to finally free the branches on this side. The before and after photos are below. I should also have taken a photo of the sheet mulched area since that is now piled high with broken cedar limbs, the hazelnut tree in various pieces and pieces of poplar. Some of the branches on the cedar look quite questionable but we are not trained arborists so we left them as is and I'll mention it to Tony.

Also, this morning before we worked along the trail, we took a quick walk to the Southern Forest. We noticed someone had built a bridge with branches over the water-filled gully. We dismantled the bridge. (There also seemed more downed limbs piled in the area but we didn't stick around to think that through.) The plants from the 2015 fall planting in the Southern Forest were doing quite well as well as the plants from a year ago. Also, the Indian plum is flowering.

We were at the Jobox when Cameron, who works for Parks, appeared. He is in the Master Native Plant Stewardship Training Program with Chie and me. He works with Tony H. and helped chainsaw the poplar logs and was part of the delivery team that brought us more chips. So our chip stock is now fully replenished--hooray!

I think we've done what can be done with the injured cedar. But we might take another look later. On our way out of the park, we walked through the area north of the trail. We plucked laurel and holly seedlings. Here's a small bouquet with holly, laurel and herb Robert. Over the years, we took out a lot of blackberry in this area. The last thing we did today was to clip some blackberry canes along Meridian. Our plan with that for now is for the canes to dry out in place,