Goodbye trees

Last week we had two trees cut down after our informative consult with AZ Plant Lady. One removal I’m elated over which is this tall tree in the back, that half dead verde something tree.

Ta-da!  Thank you to Top Leaf Tree Service for handling all of it and grinding the stump.  Wow it looks really bright now doesn’t it?  (I’m aware I remark and caption before a photo, to me that seems more natural for blog reading and scrolling.)  By the way, we didn’t take out the grapefruit tree, I stepped in front of it to take this picture below, so I hope I didn’t confuse you.

Now we have a big Whitfill Nursery delivery tomorrow and we’re planting a Chinese Elm in our backyard sort of in this big grassy space.  We’ll also line the back wall on the outside of our property line with red oleander that should provide more shade if we can get it 18 feet tall!  That new white gate on the right?  Yes it’s new, and I’ll tell you about that real soon!

Remember our aprium tree – the one in the middle and real tall?  Well, it got really sick, had a real bad fungus that has also spread to our sweet grapefruit trees.

So we had to cut her down too.  *tear* Looks so empty!  I think I’ll add vines to that wall unless you guys have some better ideas.  I do have to say it’s made my gardening easier.

I don’t like the death of plants or trees, it makes me super sad and I don’t like when they get sick from old age.  I have always been one of those “I wish everything lasted FOREVER,” people since I was a child.  I’m realizing that our grapefruit trees will be passing probably in the next few years (they are about 60+ years old) so we’ll have to be prepared to plant a big tree in it’s place.  Word to the wise – be educated on how to prune trees correctly so they can heal properly.  The former owners of our place didn’t do it correctly which allowed a lot of disease to occur in our trees.

I was also told we should 409 clean our tools before cutting the next to avoid transferring disease – there’s a lot of weird tree diseases going on and you can infect the rest of your green babies, like the thing that’s killing oleanders in our valley lately.  We’re hoping from here on out we can take care of what we’re placing on our property to last many wonderful years!  I’ll show an update we get our big delivery!

Equipment used: Sony NEX-5R (c/o), 50mm f1/.8, 16mm f/2.8 + 18-55mm (c/o).

Diana Elizabeth took a class last week on composting – she was surprised at how long it will take but thinking behind that white spikey fence above, they have about eight feet of a run before the alley way that would be perfect to start.