GROUND CONTROL TO MAJOR TOM

You can’t make an omelette without cracking eggs. Likewise you can’t create a tropical garden without some casualties.

I’m talking trees and weeds.

Firstly trees. They can pose big problems.

Sure, there’s nothing like the sound of a majestic gum rustling its leaves in the spring breeze. It’s almost spiritual...

Not so enlightening, however, when the core has been devoured by a colony of chomping termites and the trunk is leaning over the house at a perilous angle. 

Or when a tree decides to spontaneously separate and, while one half stands firm in the garden, the other half falls over the driveway and blocks all incoming traffic through the cul-de-sac.

 

Then there’s only one thing to do. 

We call the tree loppers. Bryan and his team at ‘Too Easy Trees’ being our loppers of choice.

I take my hat off to these guys. Swaying precariously 10 meters above the ground on a branch designed to carry a few dozen leaves is a crazy gig in my book.

 

And when a tree looks like this on the inside who knows which way it might decide to fall.

 

But Bryan and the team do a mighty job and, after taking out some potential roof hazards not to mention a couple of potential people hazards, we are left with a safer haven.

 

 

Plus we score two lovely big piles of tree mulch.  Something Ian is looking forward to shovelling at a later date.

Now all we are left with are the weeds!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

To my dismay, I have been assigned the unenviable job of weed killing.  I don’t recall putting my hand up for this, but Ian insists I agreed when we were at the jewellers choosing an engagement ring.  I was in a La la land so I think he must have swayed me by dangling a carat.

I really hate using chemicals in the garden but when even the dog refuses to venture beyond the patio wall, it’s time for desperate measures.

So I kit up.

 

Looking like a cross between Darth Vader and Louis the fly, I get to work.

It takes about two hours of actual spraying, plus another six hours of praying it won’t rain, but finally it’s done.

Never thought I’d say this about my garden but I hope things start dying real soon. I'll keep you posted.

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