06/13/13: The Dirt Patch

Last fall I was hatching plans to create a shade garden out of a dirt patch in the backyard, the site of the previous owners' play set. The area is almost fully under the drip line of our medium-sized oak tree, and the clay soil was very compacted from heavy foot traffic. Last fall we planted three conical yew bushes along the west side of the would-be bed. Someday they will grow 8ft tall to hide the neighbor's garage behind them. Here's the dirt patch earlier this spring, with our little yews and the oak tree.

After aerating the soul with a hand trowel (so as not to disturb the tree roots too much), I planted a mix of hostas and ferns, some of which we purchased online. (This was, incidentally, our first experience buying plants from the Internet.) From the good people at New Hampshire Hostas (who also sell ferns), we bought five hosta plants-- two Maui Buttercup, two Touch of Class, and one Blue Hawaii--and two plants each of Christmas Fern and Branford Beauty Painted Fern. To this we added two Japanese Painted Ferns, two Tassel Ferns, one Bressingham Blue hosta, and one Frances William hosta, all from the fairly decent people at Lowe's. After charting the bed out on graph paper, everything went into the ground, and the bed was mulched with cocoa hulls, a byproduct of the chocolate industry. As an added bonus, the whole backyard was perfumed with the scent of chocolate!

Here's the finished product, about 6 weeks after everything was planted: