Sisyphean Struggle

Spring weeds and not using weed killer is killing me. I should have put down my mulch before the season was over last year....but did I? No. I did put in the dry creek bed through the garden, so I wasn't sitting on my laurels all winter. 

This was the garden last May -

It was full and lush, visited by many pollinators. I resisted cutting back spent foliage over the winter as the stems and seed heads are beneficial to birds and insects for food and habitat.

Here is was blooming in June last year- 

I was very happy with how the garden filled out, looking forward to this year's growth. We visited our each of our grandchildren since we have been vaccinated. With one visit in mid-March and the other in early April I tried to attack the winter weeds in between trips. Ha! 

You can see in the photo below an abundance of winter Poa anna winter grass- all going to seed. I really thought I had knocked it back a good bit before we left for our second trip. Between the bird bath and the Magnolia you can see light green seed heads. 

For the last few days I have been pulling weeds. In the center of this garden are seedlings of last years blooms, none of which I want to disturb. Yikes.  In the photos below you see a sea of weeds. The first photo I marked the edge of the garden. Boy do I need to get busy. Seems like each night the weeds grow by leaps and bounds, my Sisyphean struggle, starting over again each day. 

In the middle of this mess is a tiny Oakleaf hydrangea, Little Honey. Hydrangea quercifolia 'Little Honey'

My success yesterday was that I finished getting all the weeds (well mostly, am sure some will reappear this morning) out of the center of the garden where most of the blooming plants are. I had gone to a plant sale on Saturday and had some Salvia x superba 'Merleau', Echinacea purpurea 'Magnus Superior' and two different varieties of Asclepias tuberosa, the standard and 'Hello Yellow' to plant. I did have two Asclepias tuberosa in the garden but they have disappeared, late in emerging?

You can't see a small fence around this center area, it was put up to keep the dog from walking through the herbaceous plants and hopefully keep the rabbits out. The bamboo stakes in the photo above are marking some Amaryllis bulbs outside the fenced area. I stepped on them one time too many, so they needed to be marked. 

Today's job? I think this area-

Oh, did I mention that the place I get the pine straw to mulch my garden doesn't have any? Crossing my fingers for it to be in by the end of the week. My resolution is to keep a good thick bed of pine straw to retard germination of the weeds for next winter. Wish me luck!

p.s.- tick bite yesterday, yay.

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