After the tree was gone and the yard and house were repaired, I decided to focus on the flowerbed in front of our house. I was surprised that almost every square foot was covered with sticks, hickory nuts, leaves, and bark

A sample of what I was picking up: shards of bark, sticks of varying sizes, and hickory nuts. The nuts are from last fall. I didn’t realize that so many were still attached to the tree. The new nuts are only beginning to develop.

After about 5 hours, my trusty lawn container was partially filled with lots stuff from the tree. To do this, I sat on my lawn mat and picked over every inch of the flowerbed. I did it during three mornings. Afternoons last week were too hot to be in the full sun.

It feels good to have this flowerbed looking normal again.