We have this neighbor who doesn’t weed. At least he mows. Sort of. For a few years I called the management company and asked nicely if they could do something about the burdock and dames rocket and five-foot-high thistle grove. The creeping belle flower and ditch lilies and all other sorts of horribleness are on my fence line.
Once a year when things tower over the fence, and that means over 6 feet, they send over a mower and kind of cut things back.
I decided last year that it’s their yard. They pay rent, they live there, they can do as they see fit unless their lease requires weeds to be removed. Which it doesn’t.
I had a huge number of hostas that were not thriving in my back yard because it was too sunny. I gave away most of them but kept a few to line the fence. The bushes we planted when we removed the lilacs were finally large enough to provide the perfect shade for those hostas.
Hostas are real bullies when it comes to keeping out a lot of the bullies from next door. It’s not 100%, but the weeds on that side of the yard are so much better now that the hostas are there.
We also planted sedum and that acts as living mulch and helps with all but creeping belle flower. That takes some untangling, but we have so much of it that if we lose some it’s a non-issue.
Monday my helper will come back and we will be moving sedum to the other side and transplanting some of the large plants to the back and dividing them.
I love this quote because I embody it. I have made some gardening choices that were horrible. So now those plants are gone or they got moved. Like the hostas. But I’ve also made some choices that are working. Again with the hostas.
The trick is to make the right choices for you and not for someone else.
