Re: Home and garden projects
 

We had 16 cubic yards of mulch delivered from the Yard Depot on 290 the weekend before last, and we somehow managed to spread all of it that weekend. Our backs ached.

Re: Home and garden projects
 

Yowch, that's a lot of mulch!

Re: Home and garden projects
 

Yes! We have a corner lot, and my wife likes to overdo these things. She is hoping it will last a year.

Re: Home and garden projects
 

We are effectively on a corner, as we have lake on 2 sides, but still don't get anywhere near that. I think I will probably do about 100/110 cuft total - whats that, about 4 yards? My mulch "consumption" is going down as the landscape matures and the shrubs spread out, I have less to cover, but even at "peak mulch" when the backyard was first "done" I think I was only at about 6 yards. I'm not surprised you were sore the next morning!!

Re: Home and garden projects
 

Just replaced the pressure vacuum breaker on the pool autofill line today. Had been on my list for a while, as it was dripping, and I thought it was a simple repair. However when I got the cover off, found the casing was cracked inside, so it was a replacement instead. In getting it off, I managed to crack the PVC piping which has turned pretty brittle so had a rework of that added to the list. All in all cost me $78 and about an hour, including shopping time. I could have saved about $10 on the part if I'd bought off Amazon instead of Home Depot, but wanted to get it done today. Versus the estimates that neighbours were getting of $300-350 to replace the sprinkler PV breakers last year after a hard freeze, I was still happy.

Tomorrow I will be fixing a leak on the inlet line of the pool heater. I am also expecting that to be a simple O-ring replacement - lets hope that one doesn't "escalate" like todays did.

Re: Home and garden projects
 

That's what chlorine does to plastic. :( .... Good luck with the O ring!

I got my pine logs limbed and bucked last weekend, I just need call the sawyer and jolly him along. I cut the logs into three 10ft logs and six 8ft logs, and one that was some where in between. I cut them all approximately 6" over their nominal length so I can tidy them up and still have standard lengths. :)

The rest of the raking of pine needles, and the mulching awaits. :(

Re: Home and garden projects
 

No, the brittle piping was on the supply line to the pool, so just regular water direct from the mains before it gets any of the pool chems in it.:(

Re: Home and garden projects
 

That's not good! Surely your "city water" doesn't have enough chlorine in it to degrade plastic? :unsure:

Re: Home and garden projects
 

The thing with mulch is it doesn't last that long. I have an area in the back yard that has junipers and mulch around it as its in shadow and I don't need lawn in that area. But damn if I didn't do it last year and this year I'll end up getting about twenty bags from Home Depot to top it up.

I'm thinking of using landscaping pebbles instead They don't blow away and get nicked by every passing squirrel for a nest

Re: Home and garden projects
 

Not a home project, and not really a garden, but I built a little indoor garden in the spare bedroom with a plastic pond tub. I can't grow outside but the room gets nice summer and spring sun, so gonna try and grow some basic vegetables and see how it goes.

I've also got some pumpkin seedlings started inside on the window in a pot, gonna relocate them in May to my wife's mothers yard and try my luck with pumpkins and tomatoes there along with Zucchini and peppers and maybe corn.

Can't plant outside yet, while a warm winter thus far, we are still at risk for frost until early May.

I've also replanted all my indoor plants into larger pots, they need to be replanted once a year generally.

I'd love to have a house so I could have an outdoor garden and pond and stuff.

Re: Home and garden projects
 

One of the workers at our favourite nursery hates mulch, and recommends using ground cover plants, including herbs. This does work, except now we have mint that grows like a weed.

I wouldn't use landscaping pebbles, personally. You'll still need to weed them to some extent, and whenever you decide you don't want them any more, you'll need to remove them all by hand.

Re: Home and garden projects
 

Your garden sounds great! It'll be interesting to see what you get.

We had an enclosed porch with big windows that got a lot of sun in the first place we lived here in the northeast, and I was able to grow lettuce fairly well and lots of herbs very successfully. I could never grow much else though.... I tried tomatoes because that porch got quite hot in the summer but they only grew crazily tall & never produced a single tomato. :D

You can plant some things outside even a month or two before the last frost. Spinach, most lettuces, beets, peas & carrots. They like it cool & don't mind a frost.

Re: Home and garden projects
 

Biggest botch job on the fence gate done....now waiting for the pile of snow in the garden to melt where the veg garden should be....I'm sure that'll need massive tidying up. The compost tub is looking a bit knackered too.

Saying all that, at this rate, we'll never be able to plant anything outside to make it worth it, so who knows if we'll bother :(

Re: Home and garden projects
 

I'm with the nursery worker on that one, hence my declining mulch consumption as the landscape matures and covers the exposed ground. Unfortunately there are some areas that I think I will always have to mulch - areas where I have bulb plantings or annuals, and others where I have perennials that take a hard pruning such as drift roses. Leave those areas unmulched and the weeds seem to move in overnight. Conversely, I am looking at removing some vining groundcover I have around the A/C and pool equipment area. I don't know what its called, but you see it in all the "professional" areas where it seems to grow about a foot thick and looks good. Unfortunately for it to look good, it seems to need permanent trimming or it gets out of control - as mine has. So it is slowly but surely being removed - I think that'll be a difficult task, akin to painting the Forth Bridge though...:(

Mint definitely needs containing - I remember as a kid digging a hole with my Dad and burying an old enameled baby bath to plant mint in so it wouldn't spread.




I'm generally not a fan either, and our old HOA specifically banned them in street facing beds, though the current one doesn't have any restrictions. That said, in the area where I'm trying to get rid of the vining groundcover, I'm probably going to get some landscape fabric down, and put some 3"river rock on top - then when the vines start coming through, as they will, I'll just keep hitting them with roundup till they get the message :lol: Not very environmentally friendly, I know, but I do like to squirt the roundup:unsure: Or I might use crushed granite instead, as that may be harder for them to penetrate.

Re: Home and garden projects
 

Ice and snow has finally gone from the pond, switched the aerator on and was pleased to find it worked first time.
Main project is going to be getting rid of all the tree roots on the side of it from the small trees on the side that I cut down late Fall

I've even been looking at ride-on lawn mowers, something I never thought I'd be doing when I was back in England :lol: