Sunday, February 3, 2019

New plant from John!

Yesterday after the volunteer day Matt and I sped off to John's house, where he needed to find a new home for a LARGE Agave attenuata in his front garden. Luckily it's a very soft and toothless kind, because this specimen is huge. Like, "is it even going to fit in the car?" huge. Like "It probably weighs more than me" huge. And if it had teeth, someone would have been hurt.

Using ropes, a reciprocating saw, two wheelie bins and a piece of wood we managed to lower the Agave onto the ground and nobody got killed. Then it got into our car - just.

Today Matt and I took it to PRG and planted it - with the help of a random passer by - and it looks amazing.

Hope you enjoy it! And thanks John for always thinking of us :)

Saturday, February 2, 2019

Slightly cloudy with a chance of Agaves

Matt
Today's volunteer day was happily mostly rain-free, and we had a great group out to help weed and plant, and as a result much was accomplished.

John, Josh, Amanda, Aditi, and Hilary joined Matt, my parents (on a visit from Wales) and I at PRG and we all got stuck in weeding, weeding, and a bit more weeding.

Aditi
First order of business, with rain in the forecast to help them settle in, was planting the two Acaia steonphylla trees that Jamie gave us recently. Matt accomplished that, and staked them in well too, so they should take off quickly. What a lovely tree they are: extremely drought tolerant and very graceful to boot. They're one of my favorites.

My parents picked up all the trash on the street, and weeded too. A whole new area was cleared of weeds and 5 Euphorbia wulfenii and 3 Artemisia “Powis Castle” were planted as ground cover in two separate areas.

John and my parents
Josh and Aditi took on another area, moving an Agave weberi "Reiner's Selection" away from the path. Then they replanted a piece of columnar cactus that I found in the bushes, and rearranged a large group of Nassella tenuissima nearby - they also planted 7 of the same grass to make a nice design.

Josh
2 Salvia canariensis went in along the fence lines courtesy of Matt, and they were staked up as they are quite small still. Hope they grow really quickly.

These are ones we started 6 months ago from cuttings and I'm very pleased to have more of them to plant because they are incredibly tough and xeric.


Hilary
Amanda took on a section of the path to weed thoroughly, and John delved in with his usual fervor to help me weed in the rain garden at the bottom of the garden. We even had a visit from Kunaal and Coco the puppy - always good!

The garden is starting to really look good after all the winter work that has gone into it - thank you all for making it happen.
 
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