Hedging.

Hedging.

Posted on 6 Oct, 2008 3 comments

Checking on my gardens6 blog I found I already told you about this place we live at now. So with number 6 I have finished telling you about all the gardens in my life. I am now at this new place for a year and it is amazing how many new houses have gone up in the last year. They “knock them up” in just a few months, trying to get the roof on before the seasonal downpours, then just working on inside. I have seen everyone with their new houses hard at work in establishing their gardens. Most resort to buying instant lawn, not a bad idea, not expensive either with a huge turf farm close by. It looks nice and green instantly. Then they put in plants, which are easy care, in borders along the houseline, in between pebbles, in the front garden. Every house has their own garage and drive to it. Some are all paving, some are just flagstones where the car drives and grass in between. The people right across the road of us and below us are still busy with a retaining wall. I have no idea what it is going to be and why they’re building it. It is next to the house, perhaps they want a flat area to have some lawn, no idea at all. The entire garden slopes and the house is on poles. They’re doing a good job, hard work, grey stones or cement bricks are being constructed into a wall and the good terra cotta is being carted in to fill the empty space in front of it. When it is finally completed I will take a picture. For weeks and really for months I have seen them work in the weekends carting wheelbarrow after wheelbarrow, first blue metal for drainage, then sand and earth. I bet you they have a sore back each Sunday night.
The sore back brings me back into my own garden. Whilst we were away the hedge in front of the high front garden had grown so much, when we were sitting on our front veranda we couldn’t even see the valley anymore. Yesterday it drove me insane and I grabbed the hedge clippers. This hedge grows in the front garden below and a wooden retaining wall seperates the high front garden from the low front garden. I hope you can follow, lol. Anyway, there I was balancing on the edge of the retaining wall, trying to reach out as far as possible. The hedge is at least 1.50m wide on top. As I broke my wrist earlier this year ( April ) I was so happy that yesterday I could use these clippers again without getting pain. So I clipped away. But then I had to bother my hubby as he was reading the paper! “Please come and hold the ladder steady”, I asked. Ok then, he got the ladder from the shed and carried it to the below front garden. I climbed to the top ( well, always leave 3 steps on the top clear ) and clipped the rest from the other side. That was one job done. Now I still have to pick up the prunings, but that can wait till tomorrow. I had a sore back this morning, lol. By no means am I ready with the job. The hedge goes on and on and on unto the driveway. Then we have a driveway from the garage’s side through a gate right to the shed at the back, where hubby keeps his precious Jag. The pathway is edged on either side by hedging trees, which also need pruning. Hubby usually does the top, or as far as he wants to reach, whilst I do the bottom section. It is not a hard job and the results are always pleasing. Only trouble is: you’ve got to be on the lookout for green ants, who love to make nests in conspicuous spots in that hedge. And then of course I have to rake all the cuttings, they go onto the refuse heap in the back of the garden, then I have to sweep the little leftovers, and so on. Isn’t gardening a never ending job? Say yes, then I am not alone thinking this. But it is such fun, and whilst you’re doing it you have no chance to think of all the other troubles or problems.
But tomorrow I have a rest. We are having visitors and lunch will be served on the terrace amidst all the green.

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