A thread about gardening stuff!

Step one; Dirt!

Alright, so to those unaware, my "studio" is truly in the middle of nowhere. Long story how that ended up happening but let's just say I'm in a very rural setting at the moment.

This is my "lawn"

You may notice there is no grass. This is because, although it looks deceptively sunny now, this south-facing "yard" has all of these trees providing it with ample shade.

Once the leaves appear, the entire lawn except for a very small section is shaded nearly constantly

You may also have noticed that the lawn appears to end abruptly. This is correct!

For just on the other side of that edge is a massive, deep ravine.

Now, in addition to all of the shade, the soil which makes up the "lawn" is also very very awful. It is extremely dense, clay-like soil which is often difficult to grow things in.

But! Fairly good soil can be found at the bottom of the ravine

So, I have been digging this hole. And I have been carrying dirt up to the level of the lawn.

The only trouble is, of course, that this hole is about 40 feet lower than where I want the dirt to be. It is quite a climb back to the top!

I have been at this for a few hours now, and this is the fruit of my labor.

I feel quite a bit like Sisyphus, but it is it least good exercise and I would rather relocate the soil rather than purchase topsoil

Now, I do not want a lawn. I would instead like to have a hosta garden. These are my favorite plants, and they grow in nearly any soil and under plenty of shade. The reason for bringing up more soil is simply that I need to regrade portions of the lawn

Funnily enough I'm sitting here putting my next tweet together and a couple turkeys walk through the yard.

I'm not kidding when I say I'm in the middle of nowhere!

Now, for those who may be unfamiliar with hosta or else simply don't know its name, here is a reference for you;

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hosta 

A lot of people think that hostas are boring plants, but I very much enjoy them. But I am a tad weird...

What I like about hostas is that it is nearly impossible to kill and they come back year after year. They also grow into dense clumps, rather quickly. They also shade out weeds, making for a rather maintenance-free garden once established

The other neat thing is that the clumps can be split apart to create more clumps! So, if you have patience, you can start with just a few plants and end up with more than you know what to do with.

Incidentally, right now is the best time to split them (when they first poke thru)

We'll see how easy it will be for me to buy hosta in the near future, but my parents have quite a few established hosta and were nice enough to let me split some of theirs.

Here's a pair of clumps I planted

They don't look like much now, but the little purple nubbins will each turn into a very large leaf in the coming weeks. I'll share their progress with you!

Here's a clump of a smaller variety which is much further along.

This particular hosta variety was split from the house that I grew up in, so it's very sentimental in that respect. Plus, luckily, whatever variety this is is hardy as hell!