The Cove

We live in a beautiful spot on the Oregon Coast. Our house is surrounded with various very large trees - hemlock, Sitka spruce, Coast redwoods, shore pines, alders, and smaller Japanese maples and a stray dogwood. We've planted most of the trees although some of the spruce and hemlocks were here when we built the house. A large number of spruce are "volunteers." They just grew from seeds the squirrels drop, I think.

When we first built we needed to cut down thirty-five trees, and I was afraid the forest would never grow back in our lifetime. Wrong. Little rhododendrons we planted from one-gallon cans are now six feet high. The little cedars we planted in the front area are over ten feet high. They were less that six inches when we got them from the Forest Dept. So things grow quite quickly here in The Cove. Except for the rhododendrons, however, we don't get a lot of pretty blooming flowers. We just don't seem to have enough sun for them. My hydrangeas do bloom, and Bill took a picture of one covered in snow one year. They often bloom too late in the year!

So I have some flowering things in pots, and when I remember to water and fertilize them they look pretty for about four weeks. It hardly seems worth the effort. I once loved gardening, and still enjoy flowers and greenery, but no longer 'garden.' One great thing about living in the forest - I no longer have to weed!