While some people create killer web apps in their spare time, Ames and I prefer to make holes in the ground. There are a couple factors here that make hole digging in South Carolina difficult:

  1. Trees, or more accurately stumps. We have been trying to get a maintainable handle on the forrest that is our yard. As a result, we’ve got quite a few stumps around. They range in diameter from about 2 to over 18 inches. Today’s stump was a small one, but then there’s factor 2.
  2. Hard Soil. Back in Florida, the ground was nice and moist. You could actually use a shovel to dig into the ground. Not so here. In addition to shovels, you need a tool called a Mattock that has a pick or axe on one side, and a grub hoe on the other.
My Mattock and I.

Getting this one tiny tree stump out of the ground probably took us a couple hours. We started out thinking we could just dig it up, then moved to hacking at roots with the mattock, then more digging, then I got out the chainsaw…which started smoking, so we went back to digging and hacking again. Here, Ames is clearing out some of the dirt around the roots by hand so I might split them in twain.

Amy trying to find more roots for me to chop at.

Success!!! - Little did we know, we were far from “done” with this project.

Success!

Once we got the stump out we had to bring in some soil from another part of the yard to even out the slope from the house. The goal of all this digging and dirt moving: plant Hydrangeas. We finished leveling out the soil, made our holes, put down some potting soil and got the new plants watered in. They’re looking a little scraggly now, but with some TLC they’ll make it through the winter and create an amazing display in the Spring.

The newly planted Hydrangeas.