Rosemary removed!

 

 

 

 

Almost the "before" photo. The last of the rosemary hedge to be removed. 

Lots of roots

Digging up the watering line

Who put in this crazy serpentine line anyway. Right in the middle of the planting zone.

There, that's better.

Almost done! At least done for the day.

When I removed the rosemary hedge that was against the house, one friend thought it was because I had gotten tired of it and wanted something new. I was called heartless. Another friend thought that I had removed it for artistic purposes (flattering, but not true). The truth is, I removed it because the rosemary had gotten too big. It grew much wider that this variety was reported to grow. I didn’t have the time to shear it twice a year to keep its size and pruning it back hard would leave dead stumps of branches since rosemary doesn’t tolerate pruning below where there is active growth. The rosemary had grown over the path and I had walk into the gravel to the left to get around the rosemary. The rosemary, being about 9 years old had also become a fire hazard with all the dry resinous fallen leaves and the plants themselves with high oil content. This is the normal fire cycle of its native environment. So over the last 4 or 5 weekends, I've been removing the hedge. Today I revamped the watering system and double dug the ground. Of course the planning is already done, but I’m not saying what’s going in.