So Long, Big Green, We Hardly Knew Ye

We killed it. Well, we may not have wielded the chainsaws, but we signed the death warrant when we faxed the contract back to the landscaping company.

The trunk of the tree was less than a foot away from the foundation, and the whole bulk of it pitched at a crazy angle.

We knew when we moved here last year that we would be taking it out. The roots had already cracked the sidewalk, and probably contributed to the large crack on the porch slab:

We didn't want to risk any further damage to the foundation. Keeping an 85-year-old building structurally sound is difficult enough. This particular corner of the basement seems to have a bit of a moisture problem; there was a lot of efflorescence on the brick walls.

Still, it weighs heavy on the heart to take out such a large tree. Not counting the parkway trees, it's the biggest one we had on the lot. It was a favorite roosting spot for mourning doves, who would gather in the late evening.

The kittens spent large parts of their afternoon watching the activy 'round the bird feeders, just inches from their noses.

Were we to keep the tree, I would have tried to find a way to discourage the daily visits of the red-headed woodpecker. But I enjoyed the brief encounters.

The landscapers came early this morning, and in less than two hours, all traces of the tree were gone.

The house looms so much larger now. And the porch I'm not overly fond of stands out like a sore thumb. We need to figure out a way to minimize the mass of it with something decorative.

While they were here, we had the landscapers take out several other trees as well, including a forsythia way past its prime, with a weed tree growing through the middle of it.

Yep, that's actually two trees in the picture. The landscapers made quick work of these, too.

There were other casualties this day. There was, apparently, a robin's nest in the tree. We found the eggs knocked to the ground, carelessly crushed beneath the boots of the workers. Mom wrapped up the tiny, half-formed birds and took them away. It was sad to see the mother robin hopping along the trunk of the downed tree, searching for her nest. For much of the afternoon, she sat in one of the parkway trees, staring at the house, staring at the empty spot where the tree used to be. Staring at me whenever I looked out the window to check on her. But I haven't seen her since the thunderstorms started up this afternoon.

Without these trees, The Box House looks so much boxier now. We'll replace them with others, set away from the house at a safe distance. But it will be a while before they reach any sort of great height. What we need now is a really fast grower.

Glass Rock Landscape Mulch

When I started to regrade along the alley side of our garage, I kept coming across these shiny, brown obsidian-like rocks. They were everywhere. Each shovelful of dirt yielded a few more and it was like finding buried treasure. I asked the neighbor across the alley, who has lived here for ten years, if she knew what they were, but she had never seen them before. We figured it was some kind of landscaping rocks. She took one over to the previous owners' granddaughter's house (she had lived here for fourteen years prior), but K. had never seen them before, either.

Eventually--um, when I dropped one on the concrete driveway and chipped it--I figured out they were made of glass. Very thick, dense glass. I had never even heard of glass being used as landscaping rocks! But I did find a few vendors online, calling glass the "new" landscaping medium. The following pics are from The Garden of Glass.

They come in several sizes--from itty-bitty to egg-sized rocks like the ones I found--and in just about every color imaginable. So now I'm intrigued. I want to create two flower beds on either side of the walkway up to the front door and these might add that unique, eye-catching appeal I'm looking for. I like the more natural-looking grass green or amber, but the glass also comes in such colors as cobalt blue, hot pink, and neon orange.

So what do y'all think--way cool or incredibly tacky? Go on, give me your honest opinion!

Or is this something best left to a Southwest or more temperate garden than our Chicago-area one?

Free Shrubs to New Home, Come and Get 'Em!

Along the entire front of the house is a row of kinda nice but very badly placed evergreen shrubs. (Ignore, for the moment, the tall fir tree practically growing out of the foundation--that's a separate issue to be dealt with later.) The bushes completely block a row of windows. Aside from smothering any light that trys to make its way to our basement, they block important egress routes from the building. I'd hate to be caught in the basement if something blows up or catches fire and the only route out is by trying to struggle through a bush. And if I dread the thought, imagine my mom trying to make her way past them.

So we don't want them.

I'll be calling around to a few tree removal places to get a quote on what it would cost to take out the lot. No doubt it will be prohibitively expensive, so we will also look into the DIY route and maybe rent the equipment to chip out the roots. But because I'm a big softy when it comes to trees--even shrubs I don't want--I'd rather see them go to a new home than be chopped up.

So, I just placed an ad on Craigslist, but if there is anyone in the house blogging community who wants a bunch of bushes for their yard or knows of someone who might, drop me an e-mail at blog(a)compassrose.com or post a reply. They're free!

(The pics are from last fall; I have actually raked up the leaves since then.)