I didn't kill anything today. Not even a birdie on the links. HA! I guess that I'm weird, but I'd take a Texas red oak any day over a Rose of Sharon.

I didn't kill anything either, but anything that is living though this drought...is a keeper.

Kt

I agree. I can't believe this drought!

I killed a bunch of weeds today. But a red oak? Wow.

poor oak is daid, poor red oak is daid (a la oklahoma!)

SOmetimes doing the right thing is harder to do than he wrong. The Oak was a beautiful tree. Trunk was as straight as an arrow. It was a volunteer planted by the tree rats years ago. It was probably 7' from the foundation and the top branches were already extending to the eaves. I was going to leave it but it was the right tree in the worst place. If we had deep soil and not caliche capstone less than a foot under the surface, I would have left it alone and trimmed it up and let it shade the house. But even a deep rooted quality tree can become a problem that close to the foundation in my soil conditions. I have numerous 30' oaks and the amount of large surface roots from these trees in this sol is overwhelming. At least it was a fast death with the SazAll.

OK, I can understand because of the proximity to your house. But had you thought about giving someone the chance to maybe dig it up and replant it? Someone that knows how to do it can often succeed. Just a question?

I didn't kill anything either, things are dying in this heat all right all by themselves. It's been so hot I haven't been able to go out and do any gardening for a couple weeks.

And, oh yeah, our two year old grandson came to live with us two weeks ago so who has time to go outside and look at a plant? I spend every moment chasing him around our three acres trying to keep him out of the worst of the chigger areas, the fire ants, poison ivy and to keep him in sight. The kid is fearless and would take off down the street if I didn't have fence and gates holding him in. His mom, our dear youngest daughter, is on her way to Afghanistan soon. And his daddy, abandoned them both while she was in Iraq in 2008. The little guy is the sweetest dearest little boy you ever saw and I love having him with us. But holy cow, he has more energy than me and DH put together.

Cheryl

Oh my, a two-year-old and this heat. What a combination!

I put an Endless Summer hydrangea out of its misery--not today, but a couple of days ago. I've got my eye on a variegated one that I bought in a weak moment last year. Both of them demand way more than their share of water. I may dig this one up, though, and see if I can give it away.

LT,

That's a great idea in theory but in practice it doesn't work. For this size tree, one of those hydraulic spades are required but because of my soil profile the spades won't go down but 12" before the bounce off the capstone not to mention damaging my irrigation system and other desirable plants adjacent to the Oak. The other alternative is to hand dig but in either case, the recipient needs to bring fill for the remaining hole.

That's not a problem for the digger because he just shoots the spades in his dirt and brings it with him but his machine can't dig deep enough here. So that leaves hand digging. I did that one time with three 15' Crepe Myrtles. They were hand dug, the fill they brought was inadequate and worse than I have on site. I still can feel the depressions on my Z years later where they were dug and I had given up on filling them up to grade.

Once burned, twice learned.

I kill things on a regular basis. Not today, but this week, I relocated two rose bushes. It's always iffy to transplant in this heat (and one of the bushes had hardly any roots). I'm hoping I didn't kill them.
I also killed some hanging baskets earlier in the year by forgetting to water them. And the same thing happened with some plants I forgot to plant!
I may have killed a rose by spraying too closely with roundup (I know, I know, but the bermuda grass had completely taken over there).
That's probably all lately. I rarely kill things ON PURPOSE, but understand about tree roots. I am keeping my eye on a couple of trees I have close to the house, but so far everything seems o.k.

Not today, but a couple of weeks ago we cut down a cherry laurel tree that my FIL planted in the side yard. I don't think he realized how fast that thing would grow! We used the trunk for new walking sticks and all of the long branches for twig trellises. I now have an extra 400 sq ft of garden!

Pam

learned in the past week that the crape myrtle i planted just outside the front door (and away about 7ft) last september on clearance might have been mislabeled to the tune of being a completely different category of plant

the label says a mature height of 8-12ft: you know, a big shrub - i knew it was a bit too close to the house, but with a max size of 12ft, it wasn't *too* bad - the primary reason for planting was to create shade for the front door area *within our lifetime* - i was even making an exception on my newly self-imposed only natives rule for the front yard plantings

in the past week, at four different nurseries, i've seen the same cultivar labeled with a mature height of 20+ft - i never would have planted a 20-30ft "tree" so close to the house - its been just under a year & it was a 3gal to begin with, so i think i can handle the removal - i'm just mad at myself that i didn't do additional research on the cultivar before planting

seamommy: you go, girl! - my grandparents raised my brother and me after my mom died and my dad remarried to a horrible woman - it was the best thing that could have happened to us & we think our grandparents are the best!- oh, and we like to think that we "kept them young" - they turned 86 & 89 this past march

~ freshair

fairview, OK what you say is very true. I just was trying to be an optimist! HA!

When are we going to get some rain??

I always count on either the Colonial Golf Tourney or the TX State Fair to break our usual summer drought.

freshair - nothing I have ever planted ever grew to the size indicated on the label. Always got bigger. Crape myrtles are notorious for that. I have a similar problem, but I'm going to try to hang on to it cause it's right out my kitchen window and is so pretty this time of year. Why is it I could murder a crape myrtle without a second thought, but a red oak I cry over?!?

I'm seriously thinking of killing 3/4 of my gardens. 100s of daylilies, all of which look awful in the summer heat; many bearded irises just taking up way too much space and adding nothing; nandina, moved 8 years ago, growing fine, but adding nothing; white salvia barely blooming--total lack of cohesion--one big mess!!

Why not post and see if someone might want what you have?

ditto carrie's comment about posting

dunno where you're "z7" is, but i'd be all over your white salvia if i was nearby - i'm sure there are plenty of people who'd be willing to help you thin them out

~ freshair

deb: b/c crape myrtles are a dime a dozen, and killing an oak is un-american - if sen. mccarthy were still around . . .
~ freshair

I have oaks germinating in my beds from Apr to whenever it gets to cold for them to germinate. I have 3 Red Oaks, 5 Bur Oaks and 3 TX Ash on my lot. My neighbor has 3 enormous Pecans. Between those 3 trees plus the volunteer Hackberries I'm out there with RoundUp 2x a month just to keep them under control. I've given up on eliminating them.

I have been trying desperately to kill some ivy - it looks like English ivy, can that really grow here? Whatever it is, it is thriving in this heat/drought and nothing I do will kill it.....most I can manage is to stop it from strangling anything else.

Any suggestions on how to get rid of it?

cjra,
A big pair of pliers helps pull the roots up. Those are tough plant roots and I still have lots trying to come back.

I've been pulling roots for the past 2 years......

Can you paint the new growth with Roundup? I do that with poison ivy.

cjra: boiling (or nearly) water

I'm gonna get rid of bur oak next month or so. It never looked right after 4 years of growing. it went from 5 feet to 14 feet but always ended up with brown leaves in the summer. I think it's being suffocated by it's own girdling roots. Ah well. At least I have 100 trees that I grew from to choose from.

Possible replacement tree - 'Midlothian' bald cypress that I found in Midlothian to be very nice looking with deep green color unlike others in alkaline soil.

I will also get rid of a couple others and replace with shantung maples that I grew from seeds. Fast grower for sure.

Possible candidates out of several dozen shantung maple seedlings... Here are pictures of summer growth...

Click on picture to go to photo album of some of shantung maple showing its summer growth color. {{gwi:325838}}Shantung maples