Locust Seedlings
Monday, July 11th, 2022 09:44 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
snoozefestaudioSo, I finished, The Hidden Life of Trees by Peter Wohlleben, and then, late last week, began Finding the Mother Tree by Suzanne Simard.
I've only gotten a few chapters into Simard's book, because I had to spend a few days doing different chores like mowing the lawn, and finally had a handy man job today, which was nice!
But after reading Wohlleben, Simard's opening chapters were pretty heart wrenching. And it's all a bit backward for me, because I think Suzanne Simard is the person who first discovered the wood wide web, at least for white science, because the Native Americans, according to her, were perfectly aware of it centuries ago...
But at any rate, Wohlleben, already aware of Simard's discoveries, is simply introducing you to trees as being actual conscious beings, with relationships, desires, and personalities. So... to then go into Simard's story, which begins with her working as a grad student, for a lumber company that's engaged in clear-cutting?... is just devastating!
Fern Gully was one thing!..
...But when you're burdened with the scientific proof that trees actually do communicate and associate with one another via a complex underground network of roots and fungi, as a kind of forest brain?..
...In additon to communicating through the air via chemicals, and interconnecting with a whole ecosystem of insects and animals to create microclimates, keep the soil fertile, and in a thousand other ways keep the forest thriving?..
The idea of growing trees on plantations, like they're corn, and then just clear-cutting hundreds of acres, and planting some seedlings to start over... is abominable!
Also the idea that tree plantations should be monocultures of a single tree species, with ZERO "weeds" or other plants to interfere?
A thing they refer to in corporate speak as, "free growth," or some bullshit, which was the reason Monsanto created the herbicide, Round-Up, which poisons everything from plants, to insects, animals, and birds... in the name of monocoulture?.. is abhorrent!
--<>--
As I said, I was only a few chapters in, so... I'm looking forward to getting back to Finding the Mother Tree tomorrow, now that I've taken care of different chores, and a handyman job, and tweaks to my business profile, to hopefully get more calls.
------------{=0=}------------
As for mowing the lawn, it was the first mow in a month... as we had a dry spell and nothing had grown much.
But then, more recently we'd had a few days of rain. So I waited until a relatively cool, dry day and finally went over the lawn with that blade set to it's highest height.
The goal; to do the least damage, and keep the ground cover of grass, clover, and 10 other species of leafy stuff... as tall as possible, for my crickets.
--<>--
But when I was done, I scraped out the grass clippings from the inner housing of the mower and put them into a wheelbarrow.
Only a few handfuls. But I took them into the dog yard.
The dog yard, is a small, fenced-in area around the side porch and back door, accessed by a light frame gate door.
Once upon a time, Bella, the dog before our current one, Yvette, dug a very deep hole into the dirt, there in the dog yard.
After Bella's death, I tried to fill the hole with some gravel and mulch, but it wasn't enough.
So in the years after that, I started raking all the locust pods that fell into the dog yard, into Bella's hole.
Locust pods, of course, are the leathery, boomerang looking seed pods that get dropped by the locust tree in our yard by the thousands every fall. Each one is a good six to eight inches long, with ten to fifteen seeds sealed inside.
Many get eaten by squirrels, or mulched by the mower, but there are always extras around... stuck in the gutters, lost in the grass, crunched up in the driveway.
At any rate, after three years of raking them into bella's hole, along with leaf litter... it had finally all decomposed into humus.
0--------------------0
hu·mus
/ˈ(h)yo͞oməs/
noun
The organic component of soil, formed by the decomposition of leaves and other plant material by soil microorganisms.
0--------------------0
And in that hole, that's been largely closed-in with clover... in that top layer of exposed humus... there were about ten locust seedlings, sprouted, with their little leaves open to the sun.
So, carefully, with a shovel, I scooped out three of the seedlings, roots, humus, and all, into the wheelbarrow, and took them, along with the grass clippings out to a spot in the deeper back yard, where there is a patch of wide open sky.
There, I dug out a little divot of soil, and filled it with the humus, and seedlings... then covered the surface with the grass clippings, and cordoned off the spot with four bricks... so I don't accidentally step there, or mow there.
It was a translpant experiment.
And the idea is to grow a new locust tree, there, in the mid back yard.
------------{=0=}------------
A lot of the shade in the back yard is coming from two huge mulberry trees, which are both at the end of their run. They won't be around much longer, and I'd like to avoid a situation where... when they both get cut down... there's just a gaping void in the canopy for a decade!
Even after they're cut down, the mullberry stumps, I'm sure, will resurrect.
There are already two other mulberry saplings in the yard... one on the west line, and one on the north line... too tall to cut down!.. and three others I had to turn into shrubs, they were so insistent on growing out of old stumps!
So the root network definitely favors fast growing mullberries back there... and also Hackberries!
There are currently seven hackberry saplings... also quite tall and mature, out in the back yard... again on the property lines... being fed by that mother hackberry in the front yard.
But the poor Locust tree has not had one successful offspring, so I want to give her one, in the mid back yard... not on a property line, to be a long-living shade tree out there.
------------{=0=}------------
Mullberries only live about 70 years, whereas locust trees can live upward of 150 years.
So, the idea is... these locust seedlings should be able to benefit from the existing root resource web to grow fast in the first few years.
Even though that resource web favors hackberries and mulberries, it's also been observed to help out every single locust seedling that takes root anywhere in the yard.
So... I'd like to have a new locust tree big enough to join the canopy and create new shade, just as the old mulberries die, and leave their openings.
It will not just preserve the canopy, but expand that species diversity a bit by giving us a second locust tree... that will eventually outlive the original, and open the door for a third one... in about 70 years.
------------{=0=}------------
It's only been two days since I transplanted the locust seedlings, but they're standing tall... opening their leaves to daylight & closing them at sunset... and bouncing back against heavy breezes.
Their site, with the four bricks, and the grass clippings, has become a hot spot for insects, like the grand opening of a coffeehouse.
Flies, bees, ants, butterflies, gnats, and more, can't stop investigating this novel new fixture on the lawn landscape... inspecting the seedlings... burrowing into the dead grass clippings... or just sunning themselves on the bricks.
My hope is that just beneath the surface, the fungi and bacteria transplanted within that humus, will connect up with the main network out in the mid yard soil... perhaps with the help of curious worms and beetles... to get those locust seedling roots online.
------------{=0=}------------
Of course, this whole experiment could go belly up in a week, when I get out there and find the seedlings have just dried up and died.
I really hope not! But I'll let you know how it goes.
I do still have more seedlings and humus in bellas hole to try and jump start this process again, before summer's out, if I have to.
------------{=0=}------------
A long time ago, I reasoned that seeds were just programs. And to run that program, you simply needed to plug the seed into the soil.
They're actually more like devices, that need the right drivers and network connections to function.
And that is best left up to the local network administrators (trees), their IT staff (fungal employees), and bots (insects), to integrate the device and it's software into the... environment!
I would hope to stand a better than average chance with native seedlings that have already activated. All I'm trying to do is relocate them sixty feet west.
------------{=0=}------------
Alright! I've blathered on long enough!
Stay tuned!
°¦}
https://soundcloud.com/snoozefestaudio
I've only gotten a few chapters into Simard's book, because I had to spend a few days doing different chores like mowing the lawn, and finally had a handy man job today, which was nice!
But after reading Wohlleben, Simard's opening chapters were pretty heart wrenching. And it's all a bit backward for me, because I think Suzanne Simard is the person who first discovered the wood wide web, at least for white science, because the Native Americans, according to her, were perfectly aware of it centuries ago...
But at any rate, Wohlleben, already aware of Simard's discoveries, is simply introducing you to trees as being actual conscious beings, with relationships, desires, and personalities. So... to then go into Simard's story, which begins with her working as a grad student, for a lumber company that's engaged in clear-cutting?... is just devastating!
Fern Gully was one thing!..
...But when you're burdened with the scientific proof that trees actually do communicate and associate with one another via a complex underground network of roots and fungi, as a kind of forest brain?..
...In additon to communicating through the air via chemicals, and interconnecting with a whole ecosystem of insects and animals to create microclimates, keep the soil fertile, and in a thousand other ways keep the forest thriving?..
The idea of growing trees on plantations, like they're corn, and then just clear-cutting hundreds of acres, and planting some seedlings to start over... is abominable!
Also the idea that tree plantations should be monocultures of a single tree species, with ZERO "weeds" or other plants to interfere?
A thing they refer to in corporate speak as, "free growth," or some bullshit, which was the reason Monsanto created the herbicide, Round-Up, which poisons everything from plants, to insects, animals, and birds... in the name of monocoulture?.. is abhorrent!
As I said, I was only a few chapters in, so... I'm looking forward to getting back to Finding the Mother Tree tomorrow, now that I've taken care of different chores, and a handyman job, and tweaks to my business profile, to hopefully get more calls.
As for mowing the lawn, it was the first mow in a month... as we had a dry spell and nothing had grown much.
But then, more recently we'd had a few days of rain. So I waited until a relatively cool, dry day and finally went over the lawn with that blade set to it's highest height.
The goal; to do the least damage, and keep the ground cover of grass, clover, and 10 other species of leafy stuff... as tall as possible, for my crickets.
But when I was done, I scraped out the grass clippings from the inner housing of the mower and put them into a wheelbarrow.
Only a few handfuls. But I took them into the dog yard.
The dog yard, is a small, fenced-in area around the side porch and back door, accessed by a light frame gate door.
Once upon a time, Bella, the dog before our current one, Yvette, dug a very deep hole into the dirt, there in the dog yard.
After Bella's death, I tried to fill the hole with some gravel and mulch, but it wasn't enough.
So in the years after that, I started raking all the locust pods that fell into the dog yard, into Bella's hole.
Locust pods, of course, are the leathery, boomerang looking seed pods that get dropped by the locust tree in our yard by the thousands every fall. Each one is a good six to eight inches long, with ten to fifteen seeds sealed inside.
Many get eaten by squirrels, or mulched by the mower, but there are always extras around... stuck in the gutters, lost in the grass, crunched up in the driveway.
At any rate, after three years of raking them into bella's hole, along with leaf litter... it had finally all decomposed into humus.
hu·mus
/ˈ(h)yo͞oməs/
noun
The organic component of soil, formed by the decomposition of leaves and other plant material by soil microorganisms.
And in that hole, that's been largely closed-in with clover... in that top layer of exposed humus... there were about ten locust seedlings, sprouted, with their little leaves open to the sun.
So, carefully, with a shovel, I scooped out three of the seedlings, roots, humus, and all, into the wheelbarrow, and took them, along with the grass clippings out to a spot in the deeper back yard, where there is a patch of wide open sky.
There, I dug out a little divot of soil, and filled it with the humus, and seedlings... then covered the surface with the grass clippings, and cordoned off the spot with four bricks... so I don't accidentally step there, or mow there.
It was a translpant experiment.
And the idea is to grow a new locust tree, there, in the mid back yard.
A lot of the shade in the back yard is coming from two huge mulberry trees, which are both at the end of their run. They won't be around much longer, and I'd like to avoid a situation where... when they both get cut down... there's just a gaping void in the canopy for a decade!
Even after they're cut down, the mullberry stumps, I'm sure, will resurrect.
There are already two other mulberry saplings in the yard... one on the west line, and one on the north line... too tall to cut down!.. and three others I had to turn into shrubs, they were so insistent on growing out of old stumps!
So the root network definitely favors fast growing mullberries back there... and also Hackberries!
There are currently seven hackberry saplings... also quite tall and mature, out in the back yard... again on the property lines... being fed by that mother hackberry in the front yard.
But the poor Locust tree has not had one successful offspring, so I want to give her one, in the mid back yard... not on a property line, to be a long-living shade tree out there.
Mullberries only live about 70 years, whereas locust trees can live upward of 150 years.
So, the idea is... these locust seedlings should be able to benefit from the existing root resource web to grow fast in the first few years.
Even though that resource web favors hackberries and mulberries, it's also been observed to help out every single locust seedling that takes root anywhere in the yard.
So... I'd like to have a new locust tree big enough to join the canopy and create new shade, just as the old mulberries die, and leave their openings.
It will not just preserve the canopy, but expand that species diversity a bit by giving us a second locust tree... that will eventually outlive the original, and open the door for a third one... in about 70 years.
It's only been two days since I transplanted the locust seedlings, but they're standing tall... opening their leaves to daylight & closing them at sunset... and bouncing back against heavy breezes.
Their site, with the four bricks, and the grass clippings, has become a hot spot for insects, like the grand opening of a coffeehouse.
Flies, bees, ants, butterflies, gnats, and more, can't stop investigating this novel new fixture on the lawn landscape... inspecting the seedlings... burrowing into the dead grass clippings... or just sunning themselves on the bricks.
My hope is that just beneath the surface, the fungi and bacteria transplanted within that humus, will connect up with the main network out in the mid yard soil... perhaps with the help of curious worms and beetles... to get those locust seedling roots online.
Of course, this whole experiment could go belly up in a week, when I get out there and find the seedlings have just dried up and died.
I really hope not! But I'll let you know how it goes.
I do still have more seedlings and humus in bellas hole to try and jump start this process again, before summer's out, if I have to.
A long time ago, I reasoned that seeds were just programs. And to run that program, you simply needed to plug the seed into the soil.
They're actually more like devices, that need the right drivers and network connections to function.
And that is best left up to the local network administrators (trees), their IT staff (fungal employees), and bots (insects), to integrate the device and it's software into the... environment!
I would hope to stand a better than average chance with native seedlings that have already activated. All I'm trying to do is relocate them sixty feet west.
Alright! I've blathered on long enough!
Stay tuned!
°¦}
