All the experts say that autumn leaves are garden gold.

On this latest installment of “the Blackberry Project,” you’ll get a peak at all the gold that’s been blowing through the backyard these days.

Leaves make me so happy! And really, they are so beautiful.

Today, I moved leaves around in the backyard and then spent too much time trimming blackberries. I set my timer for 20 minutes, and planned to do my usual “blackberry project” clearing. I even filmed the beginning. But then I started to uncover long, brittle canes, sort of the grandmothers and grandfathers of the green vines that have been plaguing me. Over the years, the canes had formed dense mats of brittle, brown, thorny vines that had completely choked out all other vegetation, except for their children and grandchildren vines, which were flourishing above them. With a simple cut, and a bit of wrestling, the canes started to pull loose.  I bet one of them was at least 15 feet long.  Underneath, there was healthy, rich, blackberry free dirt , something which I had never seen on this part of the property. Getting to the bottom of one of those areas and finding the dirt underneath? That was so encouraging.  With patient cutting, I was able to free a whole new section of land. Even got some vines out of a tree. That’s my favorite thing. To help set the trees free from the choking, invasive vines.

Except I worked at it for too long. Continue Reading…