The Envelope, Please
This year, my big seed order goes to Pinetree Garden Seeds. They have the most complete selection of my favorite seeds, low prices and reasonable shipping. I know I'll have good results with the vegetables, but it's going to be a war with the grasses to succeed with the flowers. I need to bust some sod first.
Diamonds Are Not Forever
It got down to twenty-four degrees last night. The morning sun showed the brown grass wearing diamonds in its hair. Sparkles of reds, blues, greens and gold winked at me. It was beautiful, but rather like a tiarra on a wild hog.
It's the look of the brown grass that spurs me on to think I will be able to get past it to the dirt to plant the flowers. The grass isn't dead, it's dormant, biding its time like the Wicked Witch. When warmer days arrive, it will choke out everything but dandilions and chicory.
Fescue-Wrestling
In my book of weeds, fescue is the biggest thug of all. It's a non-native grass started by cattlemen. The cows across the road love it. I hate it. Fescue actually favors clay soil. It survives our cold winters and hot, humid summers. Cows, those big lardos, can walk all over it and it cares not.
A recurring daydream I have is me using a giant flame thrower to prepare the soil for the flower beds. It's a very theraputic image, until I remember that fescue comes back even better after a fire.
Fescue and other grasses do serve a useful purpose in controlling erosion. But to the gardener wanting to plant anything on its turf, it is The Enemy.
Fescue forms an impenetrable carpet of thick clumps. Even jumping on the shovel, I can barely slice into it. It can be mowed down to the ground, but then tillers buck at the thick roots and clay combo.
Battle Strategies
Since I'm an organic gardener, toxic herbicides are out of the question. The only thing that has worked for me has been smothering it. Even so, it's so tough that it took most of the growing season without light to kill it. I've had good results with a tarp in the garden and bits of plywood elsewhere.
Last year, I created a cottage garden in one corner of the vegetable plot, the low end with all the topsoil. Even though the dirt has been tilled repeatedly, bits of grass roots are still in the soil. They are always ready to lurch to life like an almost-dead villian in a scary movie.
I Will Never Be Defeated
Glancing up from my nearly-completed seed order, I see the grass out there, lying low. I believe it is saying, "Sure, you can plant all those seeds, over my dead body." It is sullen and intractable. "Just you try and get rid of me, you fool," it snarls.
However, I will be victorious. In last summer's skirmishes, I gained valuable ground, over twelve square feet, at least.
