Amending the Soil

Our Serenity Garden is filling out with lush greens, but it took a lot of work to get to this point.

When we moved in and began digging, we soon determined that the old, tired garden soil was not only sandy, but in many areas, hydro-phobic (wouldn’t absorb water). Add to that some areas of compacted gravel atop glacial till and I had my work cut out for me. Even though I dug out as much as I could, the there were also bits of blackberry, ivy, salal roots scattered throughout. Apparently, the only plants able to survive and thrive. But worse than all of this…

There were NO worms!

And so, before we could go any further, we had to amend the soil. Unfortunately, our own compost wasn’t ready so we brought in 3 dump trucks (72 yards total) of compost/cow poop!

Let the shoveling begin

As the compost is spread, the garden starts to take shape. A small hollow surrounded by boulders becomes a ‘pond’ area. A little mound becomes a planting berm. A gorgeous Japanese maple sets the tone for an oriental influence. And the old sidewalks, unearthed from the overgrown shrubs become the outline for future garden rooms.

Read about how this became our ‘Serenity Garden’ with a water feature

The Orchard comes to life

While I hauled and spread compost, and massaged the designs of the gardens, Jerry was busy at work in the orchard. Apple, pear, cherry, plum trees, some of which are nearly 100 years old were woefully neglected, poorly pruned (if at all in the last 20 years) and didn’t bear fruit last year. So he pruned hard to reshape, retrain and hopefully bring back the plentiful produce from my childhood.

Bountiful Harvest

Fast forward to Autumn - the pruning did it’s magic and the trees produced enough apples, pears and plums to make all sorts of goodies, include cider and mead (my son and his hubby are mead makers).

Here we are setting up the old cider press:

The gardens are still young… and I hope you will walk along with me through their evolution.

Come tour my Garden