https://laidbackgardener.blog/2026/09/27/laidback-gardening-what-to-do-in-october-3/

Our thicket is neither pretty nor tidy. If those were requirements for survival, I would have been purged as a child.
It is not the appearance of the thicket that matters, it is its function.  What it does makes it of value.

Things live in the thicket, eat in the thicket and hide in the thicket. Those things matter to me, you see.

A pair of rabbits lives in the protection of the thicket. These two come out in the evenings to graze on grass or eat pieces of Daddy’s apples that have been dropped by careless crows.

I often encounter insects in the thicket. Today, I disturbed a butterfly. This dragonfly was undeterred by my trimming around it.

Birds nest in the thicket. If I spot a nest, I leave that part messy until the season changes. Birds also shelter in it during bad weather.

Once a tiny fawn hid in the thicket while it’s mother wandered elsewhere to feed. The branches of the rhododendrons twist together to make the middle safe from large predators.

Food grows within the thicket. I trim the outer blackberry stalks back, but leave some for foragers. There are pokeberries, too.  The brown thrashers love them. They also love thrashing about in debris under the thicket to find insects.

There is a tiny world inside that thicket. I have pledged to leave it undisturbed in the middle. I just keep the exposed surfaces tidy to placate any picky neighbors. That’s my deal. I plan to keep it.

Yes, the thicket is a bit ugly. But ugly can be useful. Just as pretty can be useless.

FLOW

I knew where Smoky Mountain Autumn was supposed to be, but there were no green shoots above ground. I dug a hole over a foot wide and six inches deep to finally find three shrivelled tubers.
One of my favorite daylilies had been reduced to this. It must have been a deer favorite, too.

I consider this another in a long line of metaphors for my life. I have thought of my dear friend Sandra many times this week. We had long discussions about adapting to change after her husband died. We could not foresee that her first year of widowhood would be her last year of life. We who loved them both would have to adapt again.

I am not one to immediately embrace change, but I am a realist. Change is sometimes forced. Move or lose what is left is the lesson.

Smoky Mountain Autumn has a chance to survive now that it has been relocated and protected. One of its other daylily neighbors totally disappeared. That fate would have been repeated by more every year until most were obliterated.

I made the right choice. With every choice comes some loss. It is a matter of deciding what one is willing to lose in order to maintain or gain something else.

Someday, if we’re are careful and lucky. We will see blooms again on this remnant of a life. That restoration will be the reward.

Smoky Mountain Autumn

FLOWER

Before any plants get relocated, their new home must be prepared. Today I cleared weeds and trimmed herbs in the former bunny yard. Then I put down all the  cardboard I have been collecting to serve as a barrier between the ground and the fabric pots.

I also hooked one of the two labels for each plant to be moved onto the handles of a fabric pot. I placed the fabric pots and plant labels into paper bags for different gardens, so I can easily put the labels on the actual plants.

The crew will check to see if the plant label matches the pot label before moving it inside the fence.

I checked each garden this evening and found some plants that I had forgotten were there. These names must be added to area lists and labels will be made. Unfortunately, I also discovered a whole row that has disappeared. I will dig a bit to be sure they are truly gone in the morning.  These are old plants near the driveway which are easily accessible to deer from the woods

These disappearances confirmed that the moving is necessary. Once all “deer food” is safe inside the fence, I can then care for the victims and find new homes that do not have a herd of hungry deer.

I previously dug sedums and put them in pots on the deck bridge to the entrance. The deer found them and have trimmed them. Some pots were even pushed over and broken.

This behavior shows how hungry and desperate the herd is. Fawns learn what to eat from smelling their mother’s breath. I have had deer eating here since 2018, so seven generations have been trained to eat daylilies, sedums, Solomon’s seal, Pineapple lilies, tiger lilies, lily of the valley, Stokes aster Peachie’s Pick, butterfly weed and gladiolus blooms. Nature always wins. I am not mad about this. Nature must win. That is how it should be. My role is to remove artificial food sources. Discouragement techniques no longer work because of the drought, herd size and habitat loss due to surrounding development.

Mr. Flower saw some of the herd peeking from the forests’ edge this morning. I think they were wondering who that lady was in their produce section.

This is alot of work, but I feel it is the right thing to do for the plants and the herd. They need to disperse and forage on native plants.

FLOWER on the move

More changes are coming. No shift stands alone. Even if you are in control of the first move, you have less control of the effects. Sometimes I refer to this as a cascade.

The Butterfly Effect is real. Although it sounds ridiculous that a butterfly flapping its wings can cause a tornado, a small shift in one part of a system can result in a large change elsewhere.

I have witnessed this over and over. I know to expect the unexpected. Any instability can cause chaos eventually.  A subtle, barely noticeable change can turn drastic over time.

So being the proactive person that I am, I respond with what I call “turtle mode.” I get very quiet and still and hide while peeking out to see what happens. Until I have a grasp of the new situation, I try to just be an observer. This may seem reactive, but why fight the tide as it comes in?

I will be moving most of my plant collection next week, Mr. Flower will officially retire and the house next door in our neighborhood of three is for sale. That sounds like a tornado to me!

FLOW in her shell