It's already March, but this past Saturday was my first time going to the orchard this year.
Did a little spring cleaning and planted a row of 10 black locust trees in a far back corner of the orchard we don't really use. There are some very old plum trees that barely produce anymore and will be cut down soon. In their place we transplanted some young black locust trees that popped up along the front fence of the orchard, from seeds from these guys. Black locust smells and looks so pretty in the spring, feeds the bees and is one of my favorite woods to burn in the fireplace. It crackles and pops so nice and has a good calorific value as well.
It'll be a long time before they'll be used for anything, but I'm happy to have them there.
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plant an ornamental tree > it’s hailed for its beauty and hardiness > tree gets planted everywhere > we regret to inform you that this tree is now invasive
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So during the winter time, I had some kind of baby tree growing in one of my biggest pots; it didn't have any leaves and I wasn't sure what it was, usually black locust will grow on its own because I accidentally bring in the seeds from the forest.
However, I also use my biggest pot as a stand for my artificial tree during the holidays, because the tree was gifted to me without a stand, and the easiest way to fix that was to stab it in a pot of soil. I let my roommate do the stabbing this year, and I warned her, hey, there's also a tree in this pot! But she didn't even notice the feeble tree trunk and squished the soil around the plastic tree instead. I expected the tiny tree would maybe survive this, maybe not.
Anyway, weeks passed and, and as we were taking the artificial tree out, I realized there was something bright green behind it - the baby tree has sprouted leaves. But it made no sense! Not only were we in the dead of winter, but this tree was literally in the darkest possible corner of the entire apartment, and on top of it hidden behind an artificial tree, it would have received zero light, water, even the soil was all messed up and nobody was paying any attention to it!
Removing a fake tree only to find alive real one really got to me, so I got down to my knees and teared up, it was so beautiful and unexpected, like the spring had come early. Life was uncovered. I quickly put the tree directly under the window, to get proper light to the baby leaves, watered it and added fresh soil on top - I wasn't sure if it sprouted leaves as a last-ditch effort to survive, or if the heat of the apartment made it think that it was spring, but in any case it needed light and water very fast.
it's about 3 weeks later now, and the tiny tree is still here! I think it's going to survive, and be my new balcony tree. And it is a black locust!
First picture is the baby tree the first day out of darkness, and the second picture is taken yesterday. (the weird newspaper weaved thing is my treasure chest that I made out of newspaper)
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When Death Magic envelops the remains of a long dead Locust Tree, they can eventually reanimate into the eerie form of a Locust Tree Monitor. These floating undead treestumps drag around a massive collection of deadwood, barbs and thorny vines. Any critter or insect caught within this net of thorns gets grabbed and eventually digested within the roots of this undead tree.
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Made 24th of October 2019
Part of my Fantasy setting - Warmonster
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The line of black locust trees in front of our orchard. Every 5-10 years they need to be cut (not completely, maybe a meter above ground). There's a creek behind them and the creekside is pretty steep, so cutting them regularly helps develop and strengthen their root system, which in turn protects the creeksides from erosion whenever there are storms up in the mountains and the water level (and speed) increases.
Being in front of our orchard, we get asked if we want to do it ourselves and then buy the resulting wood for a much smaller price than the market one. We usually do, black locust wood is one of my favorite woods to burn in the fireplace. It crackles and pops so nice, I like it even more that fir or pine.
Anyway, it's that time again, so we'll be cutting these soon, someone just needs to come and mark them and bring the paperwork first. I'm glad the process is taking a while and they got to bloom once more in the meantime. It always makes me a bit sad to see them gone, but they grow so fast, in 2-3 years they'll be close to the same height again.
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