The quickly scrawled planting "diagram" of the slope.
The day has arrived!
One of the reasons we chose 'Hollow' as part of our little orchard's name, is because it aptly describes the lay of the land here. Like so many homes today, our property is the result of an old farm and it's pasture from a bygone time, purchased and then subdivided.
The Webber Farm, as it once was named, is now divided into 6 homes, all with about the same amount of land as we own. The perimeter of the old farmland, like so many of New England, still has smattered vestiges of the rockwall built by clearing the land by stronghands and oxen. These earlier farmers did the unenviable task of attempting to clear their quarry of various stones and boulders that were in the way of decent farming soil so they could do what was natural in their time, if survival for themselves and family was to happen.
Once erected, the walls served to delineate the property, hold back the ever encroaching woodland, and keep in the livestock. I still am deeply saddened that 98% of the beautiful historical rockwall that lined the front of the property was destroyed to make way for "progress" and chop up the farm into new homes. Much of the back wall has crumbled as the woods marched forward to reclaim itself.
Anyway, back to the "hollow"....
The Webber Farm and it's pastureland, sat in a lull of land between a road and a hill. Thereby each parcel now has a home which sits either nearer to the road, or back along the front of that hill.
Our home is situated on a high point, above the road on an earthen-covered granite ledge, with the orchard and garden rolling downward and then begins a gentle slope upwards onto that hill, way out back. The land belonging to our neighbors on either side of us, is at a varying degrees of higher elevation. So there you are left with a bit of a hollow. That, I suppose we could now call phase 1 and 2 of our orchard's development.
Today, began the planting of the slope on that hill, and it faces South. This will be the final frontier for us, as we have no where else to g(ro)w. The property ends just beyond there.
A south-facing slope is a desirable trait in planting of fruit trees. Our intent is to move the apple trees from their nursery bed to there, and along the slopes' s perimeter, instead of a rockwall, we will plant a Sea Buckthorn hedge. There are several reasons for those choices I will detail later in the Etcetera tab. But for today, it is pictures of that new beginning of this particular end, but a good one.
To commemorate the event, it poured rain just about the entire time:
One of the reasons we chose 'Hollow' as part of our little orchard's name, is because it aptly describes the lay of the land here. Like so many homes today, our property is the result of an old farm and it's pasture from a bygone time, purchased and then subdivided.
The Webber Farm, as it once was named, is now divided into 6 homes, all with about the same amount of land as we own. The perimeter of the old farmland, like so many of New England, still has smattered vestiges of the rockwall built by clearing the land by stronghands and oxen. These earlier farmers did the unenviable task of attempting to clear their quarry of various stones and boulders that were in the way of decent farming soil so they could do what was natural in their time, if survival for themselves and family was to happen.
Once erected, the walls served to delineate the property, hold back the ever encroaching woodland, and keep in the livestock. I still am deeply saddened that 98% of the beautiful historical rockwall that lined the front of the property was destroyed to make way for "progress" and chop up the farm into new homes. Much of the back wall has crumbled as the woods marched forward to reclaim itself.
Anyway, back to the "hollow"....
The Webber Farm and it's pastureland, sat in a lull of land between a road and a hill. Thereby each parcel now has a home which sits either nearer to the road, or back along the front of that hill.
Our home is situated on a high point, above the road on an earthen-covered granite ledge, with the orchard and garden rolling downward and then begins a gentle slope upwards onto that hill, way out back. The land belonging to our neighbors on either side of us, is at a varying degrees of higher elevation. So there you are left with a bit of a hollow. That, I suppose we could now call phase 1 and 2 of our orchard's development.
Today, began the planting of the slope on that hill, and it faces South. This will be the final frontier for us, as we have no where else to g(ro)w. The property ends just beyond there.
A south-facing slope is a desirable trait in planting of fruit trees. Our intent is to move the apple trees from their nursery bed to there, and along the slopes' s perimeter, instead of a rockwall, we will plant a Sea Buckthorn hedge. There are several reasons for those choices I will detail later in the Etcetera tab. But for today, it is pictures of that new beginning of this particular end, but a good one.
To commemorate the event, it poured rain just about the entire time:
The Slope, at the back, earlier in the morning.
Raindrops are falling on his head... in the foreground are the aronia planted last year, and one of the new pear trees, far right.
A wee Sea Buckthorn, newly planted.
There is rain, there are holes and there are areas preparing the soil for the apple trees. Yeah, most of it hard to see. The angle of the slope somewhat visible, and to the left along the back, the elderberry hedge as it will rise up to meet the Sea Buckthorn, eventually.
Our Aronia! First flowers about to bloom, ever. Perfect little stars.
Couldn't resist a snapshot of the season's first fruit tree, a Cherry, showing off her pretty blossoms.
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