Rewilding My Lot

When we moved here in February 2023, the lots on either side of us were vacant. Houses have since been built there and after their new turf was laid, this is what was left of the corner near our water meter.

Although it is uneven, like the rest of the lot here, there seems little point in leveling out this particular area now. If I add extra soil, it will just wash away in the first rain. So I think the main priority right now is to encourage plant growth there to minimize erosion.

There are remnants of Bermudagrass in that location, and they will surely grow back. However, to speed things up, I’ve added Frogfruit as well (of which I have plenty), and I’ll let them fight it out. Frogfruit will be fine being trampled, mown, and trimmed. Maybe later I can add a little soil to level the area out, but only after there is more vegetation to hold it.

First I weeded the area and picked out stones.

Then I planted six pieces of Frogfruit. Three were from pots where I had previously propagated pieces, and three were stem pieces cut directly from the “mother plant”, chosen because roots had started growing from a stem node, and trimmed just a couple of inches on either side of those roots. I rather crudely planted them in shallow holes and gave them a good watering. This will tell me if I can successfully transfer pieces of Frogfruit directly from the host plant instead of going through a potted stage. I have a suspicion that when I unsuccessfully tried that method before, I planted pieces of stem that were too long, and I didn’t look for pieces that had already started significant root growth.

The three darker patches are where the potted Frogfruits were placed. The three planted stems are harder to see because I almost completely buried them. I’ll see how these all do before I decide if anything else needs to be done in this corner.