Hi, all,

This is a note about a weed pile. (How geeky is that?)

Here is the story:

Every week, throughout the year, our garden angel, Mick Sartin, faithfully picks up our garden compost materials at Panera (a tub full of coffee grounds) and Lowes Foods on Hwy 55 (bags and bags of vegetables that would otherwise end up in a dumpster!). Mick wrote us a note last week asking if we would keep a pathway free so he could drive his car up to the compost bins where he drops off his coffee grounds and vegetables for fresh compost. It seems that the weed and rock pile along the treeline is slowly creeping toward the compost bins, and each week the pathway gets more narrow–almost to the point where Mick can’t drive through.

At today’s Saturday workday Paul Steen came to the garden and heroically hacked and forked his way through the weedpile to clear a space for Mick’s car. And Bruce Shannon brought his jungle-ready weed eater and chopped and cleared away all the giant weeds and bushes. (Thank you, Paul! Thank you, Bruce!)

So now it is our job to keep the pathway open for Mick. At future workdays can everyone please roll their wheelbarrows full of rocks and weeds out into the weedpile and up onto the top of the pile, so the weedpile doesn’t expand into Mick’s path to the compost bins?

One caveat: when you roll your wheelbarrow on top of the current weedpile, please watch out for fire ants. We are treating the weedpile with fire-ant bait, but the little beasties are known to hang out there, and we don’t want our gardeners to get stung.

Thank you, everyone. I thank you, Mick thanks you, and the garden thanks you.

Fred