Aftermath

The gas company has been and gone. A couple of days before they came, I dug out the lilies from the section where I thought they would dig, and put them in big pots I had ready. I also dug out the hellebores from the bed at the house where the new gas meter would go.

The hellebores

As it turns out, they couldn't find the "emergency" shut-off valve buried in my yard, and they dug a series of holes. All of them were in the area I had already taken the plants. At one point, they had three different four-foot deep holes.

Where the lilies used to be

They also came in the house to remove the pipes and old meter. They had to cut through drywall to get stuff out, and they had a carpenter to finally repair the drywall and paint. I had set up the area to minimize how much they would need to move through the house and touch any of my stuff. I heard the carpenter coughing while he did the work, so I ended up mostly keeping the basement off limits afterwards for at least a week.

I was able to put the lilies back almost right away, the next day. I had some bags of soil amendments, and any weeds in the middle of lily patch had been eliminated by the digging. The lilies seem to be thriving, (most of them) so no real harm done. The proof will be in June when they should be blooming.

I put some hellebores into a different place along the house. The bed by the meter needs work (better soil) before I plant anything, and I think I need a bush there because the meter is pretty big.

Needs work.