New Tree Lines Completed....

I've made a few references to our new Stonehenge project to friends and family, so thought it was time to mention what I was talking about. When Robert and I went to the tree growers a couple weeks ago he noticed that their trees were not blowing over in the wind as ours sometimes do. Upon closer inspection he noticed that they were using a strong black "clip" to hold them on to what appeared to be a type of heavy duty wire. As I was spending my time looking for great trees, he was trying to figure out if we could incorporate this same method at the nursery. We asked for a clip to take home with us, and they did one better, they gave us the name of the company that they buy them from. Turns out is was a orchard clip, used to hold up the wine vines on heavy 12 gauge wire while growing. Robert hasn’t been with me on the last 4 years of tree searching, usually the girls and I go, so it was great to have him this time. We have been needing to replace some of the tree lines that we installed the first spring we had the nursery, 2001, as they have not held up well to the height of most of the larger trees we picked out.

We arrive back home and Robert immediately starts to try and figure out how he can make this new found system work for us. He contacted the company they had given us, only to find out that they only dealt in extremely large commercial quantities, but he found one eventually that would sell us what we needed. He started to tear out the flowering tree lines and this is where the "Stonehenge" project started. When he first started installing the posts he came back into the store and asked me to take a look and make sure that it was what I wanted before ripping out and replacing the others. I walked out and said "well.......actually.......no.........what I really want is for the two large shrub beds to be gone, the area leveled, and the tree lines moved here. That way the shrub beds can go over where they get a little more shade in the afternoon and it frees up more area for large shade trees." The look I received was pretty classic Robert, but the next thing I know I hear the bobcat running and I look out the window of the green room to see him ripping out the shrub beds! Over the next two days he and Cody removed all the old RR ties, leveled the ground, and started placing the poles for the new shade tree lines. After Michelle and I laid it all out, on an angle to make better use of the wind block protection, and the posts were planted, it just reminded me of Stonehenge.

So now the lines are up, the first of the shade trees have been placed, and last weekend Jay Davison used the crab apple that we had planted in the area in the spring of 2005 as his demonstration tree for pruning. Over the next few days the lines will start to fill up, and the path that was placed down the middle will give us our own little forest to walk through on a hot sunny day. Hope to see you along the path sometime soon. Oh, and thank you Robert! It’s going to be a wonderful new addition to the nursery.