I’m talking about the front yard. Progress has been rather slow for a while. Steve injured himself pulling out rosemary and really had to take things easy for about two weekends, so not a lot got done. Plus, we didn’t do a whole lot on the long 4th of July weekend because we were, you know, having fun. Not that toiling in the yard under the hot summer sun isn’t super fun . . .
We have actually accomplished quite a bit, though, thanks to the Mantis tiller we borrowed from Steve’s parents and my parents’ offer to help us dig out a large shrub. Specifically, this large shrub:
Its roots looked significantly more daunting than the rosemary we had spent all that time digging out. Plus, there was a sprinkler right underneath it we would have to be careful not to damage. It started to make me think of the monolith from 2001: A Space Odyssey.
We started out on our own by just slowing soaking the ground around it and digging in. It seemed like we didn’t do much but create a moat around it.
My dad has some experience with stump removal, so when he offered to help us get this one out, we jumped at the chance. He brought a special tool:
That metal thing with the red handle is a fancy ratcheting thingy. And yes, that is a technical term of art. Essentially he wrapped a chain around the based of the roots to the ratchet, then a rope from the other end of the ratchet to a stationary object (we used the trailer hitch on Steve’s car). Pull the ratchet a few time, and the stump comes right out. Well, maybe it’s not quite that easy, but I decided I wanted to take a picture of the process and when I got back with my camera this is what I saw.
It was that quick. What we were thinking digging out the rosemary without this handy helper?!? To be sure, we put it to use on the rest of the rosemary in the front. Here’s my dad, and Steve’s car, working on that.
So we are pretty much done removing stuff and have a clean slate to start laying out the new yard and planting stuff.
Ok, ok, we have actually started planting a little bit, and it looks pretty good. But that’s for another post, so stay tuned!
See our yard progress from the beginning here and here.
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That metal thing with the red handle,that fancy ratcheting thingy, is called a come-along. I have one and used it to stretch the wire fences around our property. No home owner should be without one, as you are discovering.