It's pouring outside, one of the sweetest sounds on earth after a hot, dusty, dry summer. We received several inches of rain earlier this week, a break yesterday, and today the rains began earlier than forecast. Before it began raining, I walked among the flower beds and studied my perennials. The cherry Echinacea, lovingly started from seed in February, finally looks at home in the front of the garden, and although the ones I planted near the peonies look like some insect or another are chewing on their leaves, the front ones have four sets of big, bold leaves and look about as happy as plants can look.
I am, however, still doing battle with the sumac trees. Even though the land has been officially cleared of tree for three years this October, the sumac trees keep seeding themselves in the flower garden. And I've got one doozy of a tree in the middle of the daylily patch!
This tree has become my nemesis. Every year, I cut it way down to the ground, hoping to weaken it. In the spirit of "What doesn't kill me makes me strong" it pops back up, big and bold as you please, waving big green leaves as if sticking its metaphorical tongue out at me and daring me back into the patch with my secateurs. Honestly, if a tree could talk, I'd hear "nah-nah" and a raspberry blown my way.
But this year I will have the last laugh. The orange daylilies Mr Sumac decided to hide among for cover have grown very large and dense which means...daylily division time. And guess what? When I dig up the clump, I can finally get in there with the pick axe and remove Mr Sumac - root, leaf and stem.
Who's laughing now, eh tree?
Don't you wish your flowers grew as vigorously as the weeds?
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