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Although this could very well be a picture of me finding a new treasure at a favorite nursery, it's actually an illustration by David Catrow for a children's book called Plantzilla.

Tuesday, June 20, 2017

Confessions of a Lazy Gardener # 768 Making a Garden in a Day

Out in front of our house between the intersection of two streets and the intersections of the two sidewalks, there is a roughly 8 foot by 12 foot space where an inherited classic Pacific Northwest lawn (green in the winter, brown in the summer except the vibrant green dandelions)  There is a fire hydrant close to the sidewalks so I'd never though much of doing anything in that space other than keeping the weeds mowed and averting my eyes.

This year, I decided that I'd replace the weed bed  with Acaena inermis 'Purpurea.'  a sweet little plant that does well in my parking strips with practically no summer water.  It doesn't look like much in the little pots or when it's first in the ground but once it becomes established, it's lovely.

Back in my misspent youth, when I wanted to create a garden bed, I marked off the space, cut out sod, shaking out as much soil as possible, amended the soil, raked it all level then planted.  Now that I'm old and lazy and inspired by  "lasagna gardening," I use a less labor-intensive method that gives much quicker results.

1) Cut the sod from the outer perimeter of the bed.
2) Scavenge through the house for cardboard. (A saved collection of nursery boxes works well.)             Decide that you need more  and go scavenging through your neighbors' recycling bins.
3) Cut the sod away from where you'll place the new plants.
4) Cover the rest of the sod with cardboard, plant the plants sticking out of the soil a bit.
5) Cover the cardboard with whatever you have on hand like compost or manure.
6) Water everything well.

A friend calls this technique "Garden in A Day" and it's been used to create lots of areas in my garden.  The upside is that it's fast; the downside is that you have to have pretty good existing soil for plants to be really happy.  

But wait, what if you decide that it would look really sweet to have a bit of Acaena saccaticupula 'Blue Haze' for contrast?  Simply use your shovel to remove some cardboard, cut out the sod below, plant and fill.

But then, you're at a nursery and see this adorable and drought tolerant Tanacetum haradjanii whose little fern-like foliage would be charming with the others.

Oh yeah, there are those three Carex testacea sitting in pots in the ghetto from the fall sale at Watson's a couple of years ago. Orange and purple with touches of gray - pretty.

Also hanging around were several pots of Ophiopogon planiscapus 'Nigrescens.'  The pots at nurseries are usually very crowded and expensive so I always divide them and make several out of each one and have divided my own that are growing in the ground.

So, there you have it, the uneven garden in a day. It looks hideous now but once it fills in, I think it'll make me much happier than the former brown lawn.  Most of these plants can take foot traffic once established so hydrant access won't be an issue.

Best part?  No mowing!  
One does enjoy being lazy!

15 comments:

  1. I can't believe you held out so long before planting it up!

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    1. For some reason I thought that I couldn't because of the fire hydrant but if it's okay to have grass and weeds, it surely must be acceptable to have more interesting ground covers.

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  2. Love those plants most of which I don't know. Do post an end of summer pix so we can see how it is doing. Very interesting fire hydrant. First that it is not a bright color. Second that it has that visible dial etc. on the front. Must be the latest technology. Looks nothing like the hydrant in front of my house.

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  3. Oh, my, that is looking great and it's only going to get better! I use the lasagna method all the time--even when I was young (and even then, lazyish). Our soil is very good here (good Midwest, prairie/farming soil), so that helps. But my understanding is that this method is actually better at retaining soil nutrients and avoiding weed seed dispersal. So, you're using the best method! Can't wait to see the new garden over time. :)

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  4. As many times as I've been there, I've never noticed that this area wasn't planted up. Well done! I have both of those Acaena in my garden, and they do spread nicely, so this area will look great once they are established. I love the lasagna method.

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  5. I'm sure it's going to look great when it's all grown up.

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  6. I can hardly wait to see how this all fills in.

    FlowerLady

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  7. We should all be this lazy :-D
    I never heard this method of planting being called "lasagna method"; love the name. The corner is looking really nice; I expect it will fill up in no time.

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    1. This isn't the true lasagna method which basically starts with newspaper or cardboard followed by various layers of grass clippings, manure, leaves and whatever else one can scrounge up to a height of a foot or more. The whole thing is left for at least a season to make sure that whatever was growing below is good and gone and then plants or seeds are planted in what's become compost.

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  8. We have never tried this method of creating new garden beds. I will be very interested to see how this matures.

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  9. It's going to look great. I'm a lazy gardener too. I have got rid of all the lawn including the verge of the street. I think your method is a pretty good way of getting rid of most of the weeds.

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  10. Well done Peter. Now you have room for more plants.

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  11. Looks good! Remember to show pictures of how it looks in the fall.

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  12. I'm also a little surprised it took so long to plant this up!
    I'm all for the lazy method. Sometimes all I do is dig a hole and fill in around the new plant with upside down sod and then hope the mulch that I eventually spread around will be enough to kill the rest of the lawn.
    Sometimes it works other times I end up with a sad plant in the middle of out-of-control lawn!

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Thanks so much for taking the time to comment! I love to hear your thoughts.