Maybe I Have a Plant Problem

I do not know if there is such a thing as too many plants.

There must be, but I haven’t gotten to that point yet. (I don’t think.)

But I am not a fan of all plants. Some plants are wrong, or at least they are growing in places where they don’t belong and choke out the plants that are supposed to be there. I do not love the Himalayan blackberry bushes that have taken over the hillside by the creek or the infernal Breath of Heaven trees that seem to grow a foot overnight and leave stinky sap on my hands when I yank them out. Invasive plants are not my friends.

But the rest? Especially natives and ones that nurture the butterflies, birds, bees, and even bears? I adore them.

Perennials, annuals, bulbs, seeds. Trees, shrubs, vegetables, fruit.

So I love to buy plants, especially this time of year when many of them go on sale. It’s so easy and fun to buy them! It’s less easy to get them in the ground.

I had a plan to plant my plants this week. I had a day off from work, my hat, my sunscreen, my shovel, my garden gloves. I found the bag of compost to mix in with the regular dirt. I was ready.

I was just about to dig a hole for the Russian sage bush.

But then I noticed that the blackberries at the back of my property were going wild. They had even climbed up into the redwood tree that was growing next to them. This was unacceptable! They had to be tamed. This very minute. (In spite of the fact that they had probably been growing out of control for months now)

How long would it take to trim those rascals? Maybe ten minutes or so? And then I would carry on with my original goal, to get the Russian sage in the ground. Also the hyacinth bulbs that I just bought at Costco. And the two butterfly bushes that were half price at the Ace Hardware store the other day.

Somehow ten minutes turned into an hour (maybe more) of trimming blackberries and then cutting a few of the lower hanging branches from the trees around them. And then I saw that the evil baby Hawthorn tree had grown several feet since the last time I chopped at it and was trying to sneak its thorny way back into my flower bed, so I had to purge it again.

I ended up with a pile of branches, blackberry brambles, and poky hawthorn suckers. I did not get anything planted. I was exhausted.

Unfortunately, this kind of thing is not unusual for me. I go into the yard with a clear goal. And those goals are important! Because the plants need to get into the ground. But then I am distracted by something that also seems important. Or maybe (and I think this is true) I think that it will only take five minutes to do the trimming, and how lovely it would be to get that done, and then I could move along and plant the plants. I could do it all!

Maybe the lesson here is that everything takes more time than I think and more energy than I anticipate. And I sometimes do not stop doing one thing that is important for another thing that was my aim for the day in the first place. Not that the weeding and trimming is bad. It’s just not what I set out to do.

The weeding and chopping get the best of me. And it can mean not planting or sowing my seeds at the right time.

Later that week, I got the Russian sage and the butterfly bushes planted. And then later that same day, I went back to the Ace Hardware store, to spend my $5.00 off any purchase “happy birthday” coupon. Can you guess what I bought?

More plants.

I bought a six pack of “bright lights chard” and some spinach plants and am trying to figure out where to plant them. I think the zucchini and yellow squash which took over half of one of my garden planter boxes are about done. I might pull them out and put the chard and spinach in their place. I also found a six pack of pansies, because those things are adorable, and a couple of mums, just to put in my front flower pots, because mums sing of autumn to me, and even though they act like annuals, they are lovely.

I made a new rule for myself, though: I am not allowed to buy more plants until any plants I’ve already purchased are nestled happily in the ground.

It might be awhile before I can buy anything else.

Maybe I do not have a plant problem. Maybe I have a planting problem! But I have a plan for my plants now (no trimming blackberries on planting days. Ever)! So at least that’s a good start.