Taming the Jungle

Back in 1985, when we moved into the house, there was an area in the backyard which we left sort-of native.  It was surrounded with a stone edging and contained several original growth trees.  When we put in the sprinkler system, we did not extend it into the jungle.  But at one point, as we were doing early landscaping, a nephew designed and installed plants to create a two level view -- Nandina on the bottom and a taller bush (I forget what) on the top.

Over the years, the Nandina grew and flourished.  It eventually grew up and took over the space of the taller bushes and seems to have pushed them out.  And now Linda says that Nandina is not a native plant; it's considered invasive and should not be used.

 

So we have decided to remove it from the jungle.  Our first thought was to use the tree branch loppers and just cut the Nandina stalks off at ground level.  But in addition to the taller stems, there is a lot of just foliage.  The chainsaw is ineffective since most of it just seems to bend and move out of the way.  A hedge trimmer, on the other hand, seems to work pretty well on the foliage and leaves behind the taller stems, which can then be easily cutoff with the loppers.

This exposes the actual trees growing in the jungle and gives a start to re-doing the entire jungle.

Another couple of days of clearing out the Nandina gets everything pretty clear.

 

This exposes a handful of stumps -- a couple large,  most fairly small.  We cut those off at ground level.  We also try to get the stubs of the Nandina stems as close to ground level as we can.