January 19, 2017 – Reclaiming old garden space – stone mulch

Several years ago the sun encroached on my original vegetable garden and I had to create new vegetable gardens in the sun.  I spent a lot of energy on those new gardens and the previous garden fell into disarray and the first avenue was turned into a perennial nursey of lifted and divided perennials to plant in future locations in my yard. The last raised avenue I tried some experimental crops, but that too ended a few years ago.

Then the weeds simply took it over last year and I let it go planning on a spring cleanup.  When I spotted the hurricane lilies which I discussed in my September 14, 2016, blog, I made a note on my to-do list to reclaim the old vegetable garden area in some manner.  After much thought I have a plan and I started on it yesterday.

There is still nice soil in that location and some slanting sun that could be considered morning sun and afternoon sun.  It is perfect for partial sun or partial shade annuals or perennials.

I spent almost a whole day cleaning up the ruin of a garden.  I took out the matted fallen leaves, moved out the irrigation system and took a pick axe to the perennial weeds that had drifted in.  Set all the bricks aside I had used for the raised beds and hauled off about 12 wheelbarrows of weeds and leaves. I now have a better picture of what I plan to do with it.

The first avenue is still the perennial nursery and now that the last vegetable avenue is free of weeds, I will be tilling it, spreading the soil flat and seeding it down into a lawn.

However, I do have one problem and that is the stone mulch that was so “lovingly” brought in by my husband and put down between the first avenue and the second avenue.  It was “free” and it was pretty to the non-gardener.  He started his “free” stone project before I got home one day and was half way down the pathway between the first avenue and the second vegetable avenue.  There was no turning back. The stones are light colored, smooth and different sizes under 2 inch diameter.  Pretty, yet I discovered pretty useless as soon as they were plunked down.

“It will hold the heat so that you can plant earlier in the spring.” He said.  I had to think about that.  It also did help the “washing away” of the soil in the path and the raised beds due to heavy rains.  The garden slopes down from the east to the west slightly – but not noticeably.

BUT, let me tell you, MISTAKE, [I find] small stone paths unless.  I found there was no way of keeping them “weed free” and pristine of foreign particles, like leaves, dirt, etc.  You would have to continually top dress them with additional stone – of which we no longer had a source as this stone was “given away” by someone who didn’t want it.     

When this vegetable garden was active, I had to constantly weed the Henbit out of this perfect growth area for weeds.  The stones warmed by the sun produced early and quick growth of the Henbit weed.  However, I had to pull that Henbit by hand and as I did the massive white roots dislodged the stones.  I had to wait until the Henbit was large enough for me to get my fingers on it to pull. So that path always looked weedy. I didn’t want to introduce weed killer into my vegetable garden area. The weeding of the small stone path was a waste of my valuable gardening time. Those stone were a mistake, a big mistake, much like the Hazel Nut trees and their suckers.  See Blog December 8, 2016].

Hopefully, you can heed my warning on small stone mulch.  I imagine there is a genuine place for small stone mulch – but so far, I haven’t found it.

I stopped my garden work yesterday when I realized I would have to tackle the stone mulch before I could go on with my plan. I will have to scoop up most of it and move it so that I can spread the soil from the tilled raised bed over the stone path area and then plant grass seed.

Do I dare send the scourge on to some other naïve gardener?  Should I pot it up into 2 gallon pots and haul them to the end of the driveway and put up a sign “FREE”?

Nah – that’s not sporting in this gardening game.