August brought a couple of great improvements in the garden. First, by now many of you will have noticed the massive vegetation removal on the west side of the three plots closest to the tennis courts. The project planning spanned a number of days and included several people, as it required some strategic thinking to develop a solid plan of action. Key considerations included identifying the best and most efficient way of getting through the vegetation and limiting future growth. We were fortunate to have Michelle's muscle power and mastery
with a hedge trimmer. Thanks to a trial project conducted by Tim, she knew that there was a risk of yellow jackets getting disturbed, so she came up with some pretty effective (and cool looking!) armor to keep safe! And, we also knew that a weed whacker did not work so well from Tim's experiment. She was able to get through most of it before the weekend of August 7th, when we had a work party to take care of the rest.
At the work party we focused on clearing out the remaining vegetation, both by chopping it back and by pulling up as many roots as we could. Then we put down cardboard and previously donated pond liner to limit the growth of new vegetation, and we'll be putting chips down here at some point. The search for chips is currently underway! This is definitely an area of the P-Patch that needs regular attention to keep the work manageable. The leadership team is considering how we might schedule this into our regular maintenance plans in the future. Thank you so much to our volunteers to came to the rescue!
The second improvement happened that same weekend, and is similarly noticeable. Thomas and his brother cleared out the bunker where we have compost and chips delivered. The before and after pictures show how much better that space looks--so much tidier and useable. Many thanks to you both!
