buds and branches

Buds are everywhere. Leaf buds, flower buds, new growth on old stems, new growth from dormant roots, bulbs, corms, tubers.

As anyone with one or two functioning sense organs can tell, the weather has turned a corner, and the flora and fauna are responding as if they knew something we don't know. In my microcosm on Summit Street, the iris, daylilies, daffodils, hosta, and tulips are appearing. Lamium, lambs ear, and yarrow are sprouting. Honeysuckle, apple, pear, maple, and forsythia are poking out, as well as a lot of things I can't name. It's all good.

Yet soon it's going to be out of control. (Shadow-Sven responds: MUST CONTROL!) The cleanup tasks that have been waiting for the weather to break can't wait any longer. The garden will either evolve with the gardener's firm direction or devolve randomly into some entropic mess. (Shadow-Sven answers: MUST CONTROL!)

So I took the window of opportunity last weekend - 60 degrees, clear sky, minimal wind - to cut down half of a big diseased maple tree in the back yard - the one beside the patio, close to the side gate, the one with several dead or broken limbs, the one that's just a matter of time before the whole thing is a goner.

It was a bit of a challenge, and it took all afternoon, but it worked out well. After multiple turns with the chainsaw - cut, take a look, cut some more, take a look, remove the wedge, cut in from the opposite side, take a look, etc. - I heard a faint cracking sound, got down off the step ladder, waited a couple of minutes, heard another louder crack, and that sucker came down by itself right where I wanted it.

Laugh out loud. It was definitely worth all the deliberating. Cut up the trunk into pieces I can carry, and there's a start on next winter's firewood.