Another One Bites The Dust

The second fruit tree finally gave up the ghost entirely. This one was on the front walk and was going to be int he way for the eventual installation of hedges. The removal was easy for two reasons, it had been shallow watered for years leaving virtually no tap root and it had been mostly dead for some time allowing many of the roots to rot through. A long handled axe does better work at the roots than a saw, unless you have a chain saw as the dirt will dull the blade pretty quick.

Lighting It Up

Installed the Malibu walkway lights and garden spots. The 15 lamp kit was half price at Home Depot. With 10 walk lights it was just enough to do the long front walk if relying on the porch light and garden spots for the last few feet.

Watch out for the stakes on these, the posts and parts of the housing are metal but if you push them in from the lamp at the top you will break the post and the plastic lamp diffuser. These are really very fragile despite what is implied by looks. The spots are more rugged but again the stakes are plastic. Replacements are not readily available but a drip line stake can be used as a replacement.

The spots were used to throw shadows of the elephant ears on the blank walls so the lighting effect is more than just the plant.

Softscape

Planted the hedges along the interior side of the fence. These were obtained from the Garden View wholesale nursery in Irwindale. Prices are average or better but the selection and quality is much larger.

Once the bushes were in the soil could be raked out and leveled by dragging a 2x4 on a rope and then using a rented roller to perfect the surface. The area was seeded with Barenbrug Water Saver Rhizomatous Tall Fescue (RTF) as it has runners that make it self healing and it is more heat tolerant than Scotts.

New Fence

Replaced the wood fence, old redwood and new pine/cedar. About 200 new boards of redwood plus a few posts, concrete and Simpson strong ties to connect the stringers. The existing frame will be used with a replacement of two posts and the addition of a third stringer along the new sections.

The existing section of new fence was put on steel poles sunk into the ends of the block wall. To cut off the steel poles the brick work around the base of the pole had to be chiseled out and the pole cut off with the reciprocating saw. A new brick covered the pole stump.

The new posts ware 4x4 redwood posts set flush with the back of the wall. This allows for the brick topping to show on the exterior while using the wall for one side of the support. The trick is the pour some concrete in the bottom of the hole and let it set before putting the post in. This keeps the dirt from touching the post and letting termites bore into the post.

Another trick was to layout the boards on the patio to let the wood dry. The boards were turned every day to dry them evenly. This keeps bending to a minimum once mounted on the stringers. Even so, the boards shrunk a bit putting ¼ inch gaps between the boards after being mounted flush. An acceptable gap.

Wood stain and waterproofing has been delayed to allow the wood to get a patina first.

Dirt Cheap!

Found the cheap dirt! 8 yards of really rich top soil and 5 yards of leaf post for about $250 delivered.

Soil and leaf post is delivered by Cal Blend. The smell of the leaf post is heavenly! Staged the load in the driveway and remove some fence panels to shovel the dirt over the wall. It’s a great work out and takes three shifts to get it all loaded in, including spreading leaf post under all the plantings. Careful not to mulch too thickly around the base of bushes to avoid rot.

Hedges

Hedges for the interior side of the fence have been planed in the front yard instead. This is because the city inspector said he would measure the fence from the dirt on the back side of the wall. As there was a significant amount of dirt loss during the reconstruction, new dirt will have to be added. 8 yards of topsoil is running about $800 retail. The shopping will continue until I find it dirt cheap.

New sprinkler lines were installed. These were connected onto the existing feeder line but changed the spacing and moved the pipes to where they would not be in the way of planting.


Get lots of parts, you can always return what you don't use.