She loved everything that grew in God’s earth, even the weeds. With one exception. If she found a blade of nut grass in her yard it was like the Second Battle of the Marne: she swooped down upon it with a tin tub and subjected it to blasts from beneath with a poisonous substance she said was so powerful it’d kill us all if we didn’t stand out of the way.
“Why can’t you just pull it up?” I asked, after witnessing a prolonged campaign against a blade not three inches high.
“Pull it up, child, pull it up?” She picked up the limp sprout and squeezed her tumb up its tiny stalk. Microscopic grains oozed out. “Why, one sprig of nut grass can ruin a whole yard. Look here. When it comes fall this dries up and the wind blows it all over Maycomb County!” Miss Maudie’s face likened such an occurrence unto an Old Testament pestilence.
From To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
I have read of Miss Maudie's battle against nut grass, or nutsedge, for almost two decades now. Last year, I read a blurb in a gardening magazine that had a photo of this terrible foe, and I paid attention, but happily had never seen such a plant.
Weeding yesterday, I noticed a cute little green plant for the first time. Pulled it up and put it with the rest of the weeds.
But when I headed out to weed the second asparagus bed today, I paid more attention when I found a second plant. And by the third, the little voice in my head said, "This is nutsedge! Pay attention!"
How did my brain know it? Maybe it was the Holy Spirit. I pulled perhaps thirty little plants that have popped up in the last month, and put them in a black garbage bag that will, hopefully, cook them and eventually bring them to a landfill. I don't usually like my weeds to leave the property (this land grew them: this land should get the minerals and whatever else), but in the case of nutsedge (and poison ivy, actually), I make exception.
Phil, the older boys and I then took down the remainder of the tomato T-posts, and cleared a bit more weeds away. The soil remains so moist that, rather than using the T-post puller, we could simply rock the posts back and forth and pull them out by hand. Even the boys could! It made us all feel very strong and tough.
And all afternoon, Phil and I talked through farm strategy. After two years here, in which we've tried pretty much every possible homestead animal and endeavor we can think of, what do we want our enterprises to be?
There were some definite surprises. One of the biggest: nothing we mentioned involved the greenhouse. Hmm. Hopefully at some point we'll figure out a good use for that expensive structure. Another: we couldn't figure out how to make pigs fit. So maybe we keep buying weaned piglets for our personal consumption, but in our list of preferred enterprises, pigs are out. So are chickens, except maybe some layers to follow the cows. Maybe. Maybe we keep some for ourselves.
In talking through the orchard, Phil mentioned that he wouldn't mind pulling the cherry trees and putting in more peaches. I would not have thought of that off the top of my head, but in walking the orchard afterwards, it makes sense. The peaches are thriving. The average tree (see photo) has a good number of leaves, a reasonable trunk, shiny green leaves. And a few trees are magnificent!
The average cherry: not so much. Not only have probably 25% of the trees died in their two year tenure here, but the ones that are yet living are not thriving. They have lost most of their leaves already, struggling along with thin trunks.
So we'll transplant the cherries and hope some make it for our personal consumption, cut a few new swales in the stone fruits, and plan to plant new peaches. I'm good with that.
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