Tornados, Driveways and Annuals

Talking about the weather is right up there with watching paint dry but it has been an unusual spring in Northeast Indiana. The wettest April and May on record, Sunday a small but F-1 tornado touched down on Clear Lake and Lake Gage was hit with particularly heavy winds over the Memorial Day week end. A pontoon boat was picked a hurled through the air landing on someones porch and there were multiple large trees uprooted. High water levels in the lakes due to excessive rain have resulted in "no wake" restrictions or in some cases prohibiting motorized boats period. This twisted garage was just one of several destroyed.

Despite the wild weather ride we managed to get over 500 man hours in last week, a new record for Millgrove Landscaping. Eleven people in the field, a bit of overtime and working longer hours on the clear days are helping us catch back up. Theresa is basically done with spring clean up and will concentrate next week on spreading fertilizer, she will be applying "Screaming Green," which as the name implies has high nitrogen. Flat after flat of annuals were installed this past week.

Trish and Doug's driveway is finished and it looks great. A test run with Trish at the wheel of Doug's full size pick up went pretty good. When Trish insisted I drive the truck the results were not as positive when I reversed, I am reverse challenged when driving. I still think it would have been wiser to make the driveway 9' wide instead of 8' but Trish says she will get used to it.

The Belgard permeable paver, Subterra is going down at Dan and Marla's and it is an awesome match to the house. Since the paver butts up to the stone work on the house it is especially rewarding that it looks so cool.

Over on Lake George we are taking a bit of a break from Jane and Craig's as we wait for the builder, Mike to bring the yard up to contractor grade, he is working on it and should be ready Friday. Our next steps in there are finishing up the grill, installing 24' of fence, some large hemlocks and then on to the main landscaping. Jane and Craig are all moved in with big grins, their new lake home is now home sweet home, almost finished except those darn landscapers.

We also started the first phase of landscaping for a log home off 327. Ryan is over there with a crew and they are installing large rocks (boulders), medium rock curbing (50-60 #) and riverwash in the beds. We will be taking a break from this job next week so I can put lots of bodies on finishing Jane and Craig's, then Trish and Doug's.

My blog, GMail account and all things google were lost to me over the Memorial Day week end.

I got a nasty virus imported by accident from a customer. The virus lay in my system for several days collecting address's and worming around. After several days the virus sent over 100 emails from my computer to people from my address book, trying to infect them. I am not sure if anyone opened those bogus emails but I hope not. It took me a lot of work and a visit to the computer Dr. to get my machine up and running. Be careful what you open in your emails.

The Sod Farm Grows

There has been a sod farm in Steuben County as long a I have been here (1978) and I do not know how long before that. The previous owner was Donna Moody who took over operations after she and her husband divorced she ran it well with her partner Cindy for many years. Now Cindy and Donna are living la Vida lo ca in Key West where Donna manages her grandchildren and Cindy manages a small hotel, I like to visit with them when I am in Key West. The new owner expanded his operation from Roanoke (near Ft. Wayne) to this location in Fremont.


In addition to sod they carry all fashion of landscape supplies and are currently expanding into plants, very convenient for us. Tim and his staff are genuinely nice people, Deb Waite who used to work for Donna and Cindy, handles the sod cutter and forklifts like she was born to ride. Tim is our on the scene man for Encore Lighting supplying on site engineering and support as well as being an Encore distributor. He keeps up on all the licensing, management and new advances in pesticides and herbicides making life easier for our four licensed applicators. There is a new product (chemical) he is using in the fields which kills all plants in sod except the blue grass, pretty wild huh? Only growers are licensed for the product thus far.

After May 15th we will begin planting annuals. That is supposed to be the safe date to avoid frost. My favorite annuals for a hanging baskets are Dragon Wing Begonias available in red and pink, they perform fabulous in shade, will tolerate some sun, require little to no dead heading and bloom profusely all summer long. These beauties can run a little dry from time to time and still bounce back. They grow so well a mid summers haircut is needed to reduce the weight of the baskets. For beds Victoria Blue Salvia is my true love the delicate individual flowers combine to form clumping spires of blue that wave on sturdy stems above the green gray foliage. When the bloom fades the silver pods remain attractive adding more color and texture to the plant. They will tolerate light shade and bloom well into November, often outlasting every plant in my garden. I guess if I have a signature plant "Vickie" is it.

We finally poured concrete for our stone bins, the aggregate company was supposed to bring us out a float but they forgot so we have a rough finish but hey we are landscapers not flat workers.
Our concrete pals recommended watering it daily for the first week to help the concrete cure and increase strength.

The house in Michigan is ready for plants this week as Bill and Ryan are on the final walk. We set grade and did some prep work last Thursday and Monday morning the plants arrive. The plant arrangement is seldom exactly like the blueprint I draw, often it is close and sometimes a very different arrangement shows up in the final product. Being on site for the prep work helps me get a feeling for where the plants need to be and where they will perform best. Devils Lake I am certain requires some latitude with
plant arrangement, that is one of the best parts of my job.