Cutting back the grasses

Yesterday was the perfect day to spend cutting back the grasses in the garden. Although the weather channel said the temperature was in the high 40's, the bright sunshine made it feel much warmer. Still, you don't want it to be too warm when cutting the grasses, they can be quite sharp and it's nice to wear long sleeves and still be comfortable.

Rather than show photos of dead looking grass stumps, I've chosen the fall shots of these grasses. The first grass was the easiest, the various clumps of Hakonechloa (Japanese Hakone Grass) only need household scissors to cut them back. I like to vary the tools I'm working with so I don't end up with one massive blister.

The clump of Miscanthus sinensis 'Morning Light' seen behind my spring cherub was the hardest to cut back. Due to it's location, I used a pair of hand held felco pruners. The palm of my hand is quite sore today.

This clump is boxed in on two sides with stone and concrete patio so it's become quite dense. Hopefully I'll get to digging it up and dividing it this spring.

The Miscanthus sinensis 'Strictus' (Porcupine grass) was actually quite easy to cut back even though it was by far the largest clump in the garden. I used my husbands new bypass lopers and it only took about ten minutes to clean this out.

I really love this grass. When it first begins to grow, it doesn't have the markings on it. It's not until it gets at least chin high that pale yellow bands start to appear.

The final clump of grass that was cut back was the Molina 'Sky Racer'. It's another grass that I just couldn't live without. The foliage on this grass stays quite low but the blooms shoot up in the sky to form a a thin veil that you can still see through. I used the Felco pruners on this one too, it wasn't very difficult to cut back at all.

Like the other grasses in the garden, this one is due to be divided this year.

BONUS! If you are wondering why I was using hand held tools instead of attacking all the grasses with lopers, well it's because I was looking for treasure in the garden.

My diligence was rewarded, in total I found 6 praying mantis egg cases in the grasses. I've cut them off carefully and stored them outside, in my breezeway. I sent an e-mail to the school offering some of them to any elementary school teacher that would like one. We'll see if anybody takes me up on that offer.

I never did get around to planting peas although I did ready the pots that I plan to plant them in. Today looks like another great gardening day so I hope to squeeze a few hours in out there before the afternoon and evening meetings begin.

Happy digging,
Melanie