Category: Landscaping

Ah, spring.

Spring, that time to get out and do some yard work.

And, of course, that yard work has an eye towards Halloween as well.

I managed to dig up and split that wonderful grass from Michigan. I’m still a little unsure if the stuff we bought last year is the same grass or not…Same NAME, and there’s promising signs, but it just did not grow with the same aggression as our 10ft tall grass last year. We’ll give it another year then dig up if no improvement and replace by splitting more of my proven stock.

From 2010 Buildup

In a couple years, both sides on the path will be bordered by the 10ft tall grass, which will be fun to play with.

And, I just had to buy this…thing…when I saw it.

From 2010 Buildup

Technically a shrub, it can be trained to be a tree. I’m looking forward to this thing growing into it’s potential.

Progress so far.

Ah, nice, quiet Sunday morning…

From Halloween buildup 09
From Halloween buildup 09

By Monday’s end…

From Halloween buildup 09

Kyle’s responsible for the scarecrows this year. The last two years, they have gone rather unnoticed along the side of the house. It makes me happy to see them getting center stage again.

From Halloween buildup 09
From Halloween buildup 09
From Halloween buildup 09

Of course, Fred is always anxious to get into the role.

From Halloween buildup 09

Teusday morning saw snow. There is something eerily macabre about it…

From Halloween buildup 09
From Halloween buildup 09

As it melted, I took advantage of the blessing, and was able to drive in all our stakes in the softened ground without aggravating my wrist injury.

Oh, and that grass?

It’s formed a little blind for Kyle to hide in. The stuff is GREAT, drives in just like bamboo.

From Halloween buildup 09

Kyle’s hut, torches…

From Halloween buildup 09

Hundreds of stakes across the back yard for the tzompantli.

From Halloween buildup 09

The Pumpkin Carve-O-Meter is sitting at 8/18 at the moment…(what was I thinking…18???)

From Halloween buildup 09

Currently up and pacing, as we are getting buffetted by some substantial wind gusts…but, the only thing that seems it might suffer right now is the flag.

Sowing…

We Halloween folk often speak of reapers and reaping.

Hard to reap, if you don’t sow…

Well, that’s proving difficult for me this year.

A year ago we found a wierdo grass from Michigan.

From Halloween buildup '08

It even proved to grow quite as expected, and we have great hopes for those plants to spread outward this year. 12 ft tall, bamboo-like stalks that looked enough similar to cornstalks, I had this great plan to have bunches of them. Plant some more this year, and we should be able to divide the original plants next year for even more.

From Halloween buildup '08

Now, the place I bought from last year appears to have gone by the wayside this year. For, their site is selling Christmas Trees for 2008…

So, taking the scientific name of the plant, we went out and found a new source.

Now, LAST YEAR, we got root stock. THIS year, however…I’m not even entirely sure if this is the right stuff…

From Halloween buildup 09

To further complicate matters, I wanted 4, but min purchase was 8.

So, uh, any neighbors want 3 of these mysterious plants that may just be seedling starts, or might be something entirely different?

The Great Rot-off.

You may be wondering why Fred was…NAKED…on Halloween.

From Halloween 2008

Well, that story begins back in May. When we buried a few clothes for Fred. Basing it off a tutorial over on SkullandBone.com.

Well, concerned that my fish-tank solution would not be quite as effective as their pond scum, I happened upon some sheet composting information, and figured it may just work for rotting clothes too. So, we put some more clothes to use there.

Thus began the great Rot-Off!

WHICH method would be better? Which one would Fred wear? Will my wife kill me over the piles of rotting crapola in the yard? Would anyone even notice?

We dug things up a week prior to Halloween.

The “pond scum” method came out pretty much as expected. But…a little bad luck made them useless for Fred.

Top half of a shirt that covered a bit too much of Fred’s chest.

From Halloween buildup '08

“Fun” digging up graves…

From Halloween buildup '08

Kyle finds a pair of pants…that had the entire front eaten away.

From Halloween buildup '08

And, that fancy button down white collered shirt…only the right half survived.

From Halloween buildup '08

But, the question remained…just how would the sheet composting match up???

Peeling back the newspaper we were greeted with a most UNIQUE smell…and a bunch of insect life I had never seen before.

From Halloween buildup '08

What remained of the shirt buried here…

From Halloween buildup '08

The pants only had the seems, pockets, and zipper left.

From Halloween buildup '08

But, instead of tossing a bunch of holey pants that no longer fit Alec, we tested them in the sheet compost pile, and the results show just how I can fine tune it for next year!

Alec pants placed on top of the compost pile, show no rot, as expected.

From Halloween buildup '08

Alec pants placed in the middle of the grass, not touching ground have very nice rotting.

From Halloween buildup '08

Alec Pants placed at ground level and covered once again have only the pockets and seams intact.

From Halloween buildup '08

So, just how potent is this sheet composting? Sheet composting on the left, ‘traditional’ method on the right.

From Halloween buildup '08

And, my understanding is that LEAVES make even better material than GRASS clippings for this sheet composting…so, as the leaves fall…maybe it’s time to rot some clothes.