KTRH Garden Line does not necessarily endorse any of the products or services advertised on
this program. Welcome to KTRH Garden Line with Skip rictor so Crazy Trip.
Just watch him as so many sea crazy but not a sign. Well,
good morning on a good Saturday morning for gardening. The weather is here,
Today's going to be beautiful. I can't wait to get outside after the show.
But for now, we're gonna talk about gardening four hours of your calls
and maybe even a couple of comments and thoughts by me, which I'll just
start off doing a little bit of that to begin this morning. First of
all, I want to remind you guys, and I'll remind you a bunch
today about this. But today is the day where, or the weekend where
we have Texas Water Efficient Products sales tax holiday. What does that mean,
Well, it means that anything that helps the soil retain moisture, that prevents
water waste is tax free this weekend only, this weekend May twenty seventh and
twenty eight. That would include all plants, all soils, all mulches.
So summer's coming and here's your opportunity to save a little bit of money on
it. Just by not having to pay the taxes on those kinds of purchases.
It's a tax free weekend for things we buy that help conserve water out
in the garden and landscape, so that would be plants, soils, mulches,
and so on. I'll talk more about that as we go forward,
but I just wanted you to be aware of that. It's another like we
didn't already have enough good reasons to get out there and enjoy the visiting a
garden center and stocking up on plants and supplies. Well, now you even
got another one. I hope you take advantage of that. This past week,
I was noticing that the lawns have It's almost like they shifted gears again
and just took off growing even faster. Hopefully you've you've done your summer fertilization
by now. If you haven't, it's not too late. It's not too
late. Go ahead and you can get it done. We'll talk about some
some good products that'll do that for your lawn. The goal this summer,
goal of every summer and in the lawn is to provide enough nutrition, especially
the nitrogen which is what really pushes the growth, to stimulate good even growth
all through the summertime. And when you know there are places for every type
of fertilizer from immediate release to slow release. But the immediate releases, they
give all the nutrient when you apply them, a dissolve a way you think
about it like I don't know mixing table salt or sugar and water. I
mean, it dissolves and it's it's there, it's available. The slow releases,
it takes them a while to break down, and there's a lot of
different chemistries that are used for that. First of all, natural products or
slow release because microbes have to get a hold of that material that was once
living matter. That's why it's an organic product, and they have to break
it down and release the nutrients out for your plants to be able to eat
and so or to take up. And as a result, natural products give
you a natural slow release that's a normal, a normal thing. On the
other hand, if you have a synthetic product, there are various chemistries that
are used to provide a gradual release over time for the plants, and that's
that's the goal again. We want to provide a good gradual release. So
when you apply one of those kinds of fertilizers. Basically, what you're doing
is you are putting a nutrient out there that week by week, in some
cases even month by month, are going to be gradually made available to the
plant. So that gives you an even growth. You don't have to mow
three times one week and you know then it dies back or slows down a
little bit, and you know at the mow as much we want to gradually
release. And why is that important? Well, for a number of reasons,
and here's one. When you provide a large boost of nitrogen oversupplied amount
of nitrogen, a couple of things happen that are not good. One of
them is, well, more than a couple you get to mo more.
You just mo momo, keeping up with it. Number two, excessive nitrogen
causes top growth at the expense of root development. And we're about to enter
summer when we need our grass plants to have the most robust root system that
we can possibly have, and so excessive nitrogen can do that. Another thing
is it predisposes them to some insect and disease problem. So as a result,
we want to avoid that. Now, when you provide a slow release
nitrogen, something's going to give you an extended release. You smooth things out,
and you want to apply it at the right rate, and that way
you can have the healthiest lawn you can because our number one way to fight
weeds is to create a dense, healthy turf. And I'll talk about that
a little bit more. We're gonna go ahead and start a little earlier than
I normally do on some calls this morning. By the way, our number
is seven one three two one two five eight seven four seven one three two
one two fifty eight seventy four, and we're going to head out to Galveston
and talk to Bill. Good morning, Bill, Good morning. I've got
knockout roses that are about three to four feet high, and you're starting to
eternal leggy. And my question is what's a good time to prune them back?
And isn't okay to do so? It's always okay time to prune them
back. The roses tend to bloom and flushes. You know, you get
a whole bunch of blooms and then they they may still be blooming and knockout.
It's pretty good about continuing to bloom, but it sort of dies down
and that's the time when we would shear them back. You could you could
do it individually cutting with the hand pruners or some people just you know,
kind of trim the whole bush back. Uh. You want to follow that
up bill with a fertilization and a good soaking of water to move that fertilizer
down into the soil, and you'll get fresh new growth and they'll be blooming
like crazy again. Okay, thank you very much. Yeah, and you
can do that. And I usually do it about now because you know,
April's the big, biggest spring bloom show and May is good too, and
then we have a great show in the in the fall too, So I'll
do it now, and I'll do it again in August, and I might
do it in midsummer, So don't worry about that. The more you share
them, the more compact they're going to be, and the more bloom terminals
you're going to have on the bush. Thank you, thank you, Yeah,
thanks for the call. I was looking over some of the social media
of some of our local mom and pops and our independent garden centers, and
I was checking out our CW and they have a lot of they have a
lot of new cool things there. First of all, this weekend, Memorial
Day, they're going to have a fifteen percent off of select trees. Now
fruit trees are also fifteen percent off, but select other trees are fifteen percent
off. So now's a good time. Not only do you have that tax
free weekend, but you can also enjoy a fifteen percent off on their fruit
trees. And r CW is they are just an outstanding source for trees.
They grown themselves out in Plantersville, you know, fifteen to two hundred gallons.
You pick one out, they'll planet for you, and do let them
do that unless it's a very small tree. They know what they're doing.
They'll planet properly, which is important. But r CW is stocked up on
everything right now, and just it's kind of cool. I love to go
buy and see their hibiscus because they always do a really good job of bringing
in some really cool hibiscus, but the roses and every other kind of plant
you can imagine. RCW Nurseries dot com if you want to check out more
information online. They're the nursery there at Tomball Parkway to forty nine and Beltway
eight, and so I hope you'll check them out. And this weekends it
sure is a good time to get the most for your gardening dollar. Something
golden. Well, good morning on a good Saturday morning for gardening. We
are still dark outside, but it's gonna lighten up and we're gonna have a
good day. By the way, if your neighbors are still sleeping, go
wake them up. Tell them they're missing garden Line. They will thank you,
maybe not today, but some day after they've become regular listeners and enjoy
it. Oh my gosh, neighbors everywhere going please don't say that. Please
don't tell them that. Hey, I'm today after the show, I'm going
to be heading out to clear Lake. What's in clear Lake? Well,
i'll tell you what's in clear Lake. The newest wild Birds Unlimited store,
the seventh store in the Houston area out in clear Lake. Now, I'll
be out there for two hours. I will spend some time answering your questions.
We will look at sample as you might have. If you want to
bring some things pictures in on your phone to look over and get some advice
on, I'll be happy to do that. And here, let me tell
you. First of all, we're gonna be giving away some Nelson's fertilizer out
there. Got quite a bit of it actually, some nice little little plastic
containers that quite an amazing amount. Really, you can take it home and
try it out and see how it works for you. I'll be giving those
away. But also the wild Birds Store as part of their grand opening event,
they're going to give away an advanced pole system. Now that is you
set it up in your yard. You can hang your feeders on it,
and it is a really cool system where you you know, you put it
together. You can hang more than one feeder on it, and I have
one myself. They work super well. But anyway, I can't believe they're
given one way, but they are. They're also going to have eliminator bird
feeder that is squirrel proof. Now, if you've ever tried to keep squirrels
out of a bird feeder, you know that that is no simple task.
Well, the eliminator will do it. And again, I've got one of
those systems, and you know the squirrels. I've watched a squirrel one day
try to jump up on it and they couldn't get get past the squirrel poop
proof baffle and they were they were very frustrated, which made me very happy.
They're also going to give away a twenty pound bag per month of their
top selling no Mess bird blend. So if you've bought cheap bird feed before
about half of it or more ends up on the ground, you know,
it gets kicked out. The birds don't want to eat it. They don't
eat eat the little little red milo seeds that are in there. They don't
care for that. The the quality seed is a no mess seed, and
that's what we're talking about here. They're gonna give away if you win this,
that's every month for a year, you're going to be able to go
in and get a free twenty pound bag of their no Mess bird seed.
And that is very efficient. Again, you don't have all the mess on
the ground. A little sprouts coming up. I've got a little sunflower forest
in the back that is coming up where I had some old cheap bird feed
in a feed or a while back, and it still keeps sprouting every year.
Anyway, while Birds Unlimited, I'll be out there, hope you can
come out eleven thirty to one thirty and that'll be out in clear Lake.
Let's let's see our phone number. Excuse me seven one three two one two
fifty eight seventy four, we're going to head out to Spring Branch and talk
to Judy this morning. Good morning, Judy, Hello, Hello. My
question is about knockout roses. I really can't find any information on them all
the long. I know they're so popular, but what's the care. How
much water do they need? Just a moderate amount to keep the soil evenly
moist Once one of those bushes is established, you don't have to water them
all the time, keep them wet all the time. They just need,
you know, a bank account of moisture in the soil because they're going to
have a good, extensive root system and it can take it up. So
I would say, you know, for the first one two three months,
as you're getting it established, you're you're giving it a little more TLC with
some regular light watering. But then after that, with the amount of rain
we get here in this area, you should not have to be pamper in
your rose, your rosebush, knock out rosebush all what about fertilizer moderate amount
and there you know, there's some good quality bird bird I'm still talking about
birds. There's some good quality rose fertilizers out there on the market. I
would give them a good fertilization coming out of spring, maybe late winter,
early spring, and then I would fertilize them again lightly whenever I prune them
back. And I was mentioning earlier that I'll I'll often prune back my roses
about now. I primarily grow shrub type roses, which is what knockout is
as opposed to the long cut flour roses. But whenever I do a shuer
back on them, a prune back on him, I'll fertilize them. And
I'll do that again in August, getting fresh new growth to come out for
a really cool fall bloom. So just small amounts gradually over time do when
you prune them, how much of it do you cut back? It's up
to you. Knockout can get to be really large, you know, I've
seen them over six feet tall in time, but you'll also see them kept
about pocket high, you know, just below waist high by regular pruning.
So it's kind of up to you. But generally I think of a knockout
as a bush that's probably going to be about a four foot bush that in
my gardens, that's that's about where I keep them. And so as they
grow a little bit I just share them back again. It's just it's kind
of all dependent on how they're growing. Okay, well, thank you so
much. Yeah, it's it's probably, Judy, it's probably the easiest roads
you can grow. And that's why it's everywhere. I mean, you see
knockouts all over the place because they're they're just wonderful. I mean they powdery,
mildew, black spot, don't bother them. They're easy, easy to
care for, pretty blooms. So anyway, good, good choice. Okay,
well, thank you all right, Judy, thank you for the call.
I appreciate that. Our phone number is seven one three two one two
fifty eight seventy four two one two fifty eight seventy four. If you live
down in the Dickinson, Santa Fe, League City, Lamark, Webster,
Clear Lake City, El Camino Real, that whole area, and you don't
know about League City Feed, you need to now League City Feed is.
They are standard traditional type of feed store. Carries your feed out for you.
It carries all the products you need for your animals, but an outstanding
supply of the garden materials too. That would include the fertilizers, the soils
that we talk about on here. League City Feed is run by the Thunderbergs
Wes and his sister Madison, and they just have really created that little old
time feed store. It's I always enjoy going in. I grab some snacks
from my dogs too when I'm in a feed store, and they do have
those as well. Now they're on Highway three, a few blocks south of
ninety six, so if you want to give them a call, it's two
eight one three three two one six one two. Now they're closed on Sunday,
but they're open today and Monday through Saturday nine am to six pm.
So check out League City Feed. You will be very impressed with the line
of products that they have, the wide variety of things, everything you need
for your home and garden. I am always interested in new color plants,
just beautiful color in the summer is important and when the weather gets hot.
You may have noticed this, but our landscapes turn into a sea of green,
green grass, green ground, cool green shrubs, green trees, and
nothing wrong with the color green. But there are a few other colors out
there, right, and so we're always looking for ways to get a really
good quality color into the landscape. And the folks that enchanted Forest and Enchanted
Gardens both have an outstanding supply of stocked up on color for this weekend.
And I remember this weekend is the tax free weekend on plants and mulch and
soils, things that save save water in the landscape. And so this is
a good opportunity. It's just like in and of itself, it's just a
little bit of a break on costs right with the tax free now in Chenni
Gardens that if you're at Richmond heading up toward Katie Way, that would be
Enchanted Gardens. If you're in Richmond going up towards sugar Land Way just south
of fifty nine, that's Enchanted Forest, And both nurseries have a wonderful supply.
I was just looking at a list of the herbs that they have on
hand, and now is a great time to start either an herb garden or
an herb container, or just mix some herbs into your vegetables. I kind
of like to do plant things together that I cooked together. So for example,
if you have a tomato bush, why not put an a reganeau ground
cover around it? Why not put some basil around it? Right? And
that way, as you're as you're doing you're cooking. It's just kind of
all there together. No need to do that. I just think it's a
it's a good way to go about go about doing it. But anyway,
check out in Chanted Forest in Chenna Gardens. I know you will really enjoy
it when you do. Let's see, I wanted to mention we're talking about
color plants. The hibiscus, the perennial hibiscus, the big dinner plate size
hibiscus that is a great dependable perennial for this area and you can get it's
truly as dinner plate size. Now they have Typically you're gonna find them in
colors of red and pink and white. There'll be some with kind of a
swirl or a blush or splotchy look to the colors as they combine. But
it's it's super easy. Each bloom just lasts a day, and you need
to pick one of those up this weekend because they just their show stopping.
And did you know this. The bloom just lasts today. But you can
pick them in the morning just as they open up and put them in the
refrigerator. And if you've got an evening gathering and you wanted to decorate with
some hibiscus blooms, you can bring them out in the evening and they still
look good. And you would think, well, if you pick it,
do you have to put it in water? No, no, you don't.
You just set the bloom in the refrigerator. I know some people that
will put like a little fish bowl and they'll float them in the fish bowl.
But that's not for the sake of the bloom. I mean it'll sit
on a counter and look good for a number of hours. And so if
you want a night or an evening, late day Thai hibiscus bloom, that's
a little trick. So go ahead and get you one of those. Today.
Well, we are about to head to news and I we we've talked
about the Nikki news networks. Yeah, I think it's time for that,
right. We got sharks, sharks, sharks on a plane, sharks runway
in the water, in the water. Yeah, I don't want to hear
about that. People. Now, now everybody is perked up because it's from
World Day weekend and people are heading to the beach. Just when you thought
it was safe to go back in the water, I thought it was safe.
Yeah, all right, let's hear it. We need people. I
need a feed. Good morning, it's a good Saturday morning for gardening,
and you are listening to garden Line. I'm your host, Skip Ricter our
phone number. Write this down so you can give us a call seven one
three two one two five eight seven four, and we are going to head
out to Deer Park and talk to Kevin. Hello, Kevin, Hello,
how can we help? Oh? I have a neighbor who I guess has
some bamboo on the other side of the fence, and it's coming through on
our side. Okay, and I've kind of battled with it a little bit.
What's the best way to eliminate that? Oh boy coming through on my
side of the fifth You you're gonna have to either dig it or spray it.
Those are your two options. What do you spray it with? You
would use bamboo as a grass, so you could use either a general purpose
weed killer, you know, a roundup type product, or you could use
a grass killer and that would be things like there's a there's various versions,
but it's one of two ingredients that in these products, but their grass only,
so they spray them in flower beds and it doesn't kill the flowers.
That kills the grass, and so that would be you you're in Deer Park.
There is a deer Park Ace Hardware over there on Center Street, and
they will carry those kind of products. So you might just go talk to
them and say, what I need is something that just kills grass. I
would use that because then you know with something like a roundup type product,
anything you get it on, it's going to get killed. And so you'd
rather be a little more targeted. Now you can. You can spray it
on the bamboo shoots coming up, or you could wipe it. Wipe it
on them. You know where you're let's say you've got your yard is under
it, Well, that's grass. So I wouldn't spray. I would use
some sort of a wiper type applicator to just get the bamboo shoots wet with
it, and you're gonna have to stay on it. It's one SHOT's not
going to do it. But if you stay with it, you can do
that. And if you want to be nice about it, you could.
You could go down the line between you and your neighbor and with a sharpshooter
shovel go down and cut roots that are going the bamboo shoots runners that are
coming across underground there so it doesn't translocate further back. But I think that's
that's probably more of a job than you're gonna want to get into. Yeah,
all right, I appreciate you. Thank you so much. All right,
Kevin, thank you. Appreciate that. Call our phone number seven one
three two one two five eight seven four seven one three two one to fifty
eight seventy four. I was this one of my two do lists that didn't
get done this week but will get done next week, is to put some
asmite out of my gardens. Now, as might we normally think as mighte
as something that you you've used to follow up on your fertilization. You know,
you put the big the big three number bags, you know, MPK
out there to fertilize your lawn. But then we follow up with as might
because it's it's all kinds of trace minerals, lots of trace elements that are
just needed in small amounts, but they're very important to all plants. I
like to use it my gardens because it is the nutrients that my body needs
as well. You know, there are things we need as human beings that
a plant doesn't need nutrient wise, and so when you when you stock your
soil with those kind of materials, your produce is let's just say it's it's
better for you in a way of providing that nutrition. And as might does
that. I meant to get out and do that in the garden. This
week I didn't, but next week I will. I put about ten pounds
per thousand square feet in a vegetable garden. But you can also, you
know, just follow up your fertilization if you haven't got it done yet,
get it done. If you've already fertilized but you didn't put the as might,
there's no problem with going ahead and doing the asmite now and then just
watering it in, because I mean, there's a there's not a magical timing
for it. It's just once we got the fertilizer spreader out and you know
we're going to fertilize, it's easy to just go ahead and do the as
might as well. But you can do as might any time of the year
that you want to do it. If you hadn't, if you haven't already
gotten it done. You're listening to Garden Line and we are here to answer
your gardening questions. So give us a call at seven one three, two,
one two, five eight seven four, seven, one three, two
and two fifty eight seventy four. I mentioned earlier summer color and the way
of breaking up that sea green we were talking about. The perennial hibiscus comes
back year after year, big giant blooms on it. That's beautiful. There
are a lot of other excellent summer color plants, you know. One of
my favorite, I think is Angelonia angelonia. It goes by the name summer
snap dragon. Now, we are always calling plants things that they're not.
You know, every vegetable in the summer that's a green is called something spinach.
You know, Malabar spinach, Egyptian spinach, and so on. They're
not spinach. Well, this is not a snap dragon. It's sorta looks
like one little tiny snap dragons if you really use your imagination. So let's
just call it Angelonia. Angelonia comes in a wide variety of colors. You
can buy some that are very very compact, very short and compact. You
can buy some that are get very tall. You know that something that's going
to be down in a one foot range or something you know, up in
almost a two foot height range. It's just a very dependable color. Plant
zenias are a good one too. If you have not used the betting plant
types of zenias, they do really beautiful. Now. I grew up with
the cut flower types, you know, mom through these seeds out there,
and we had the tall cut flower types of zennias. Those are nice,
but the betting plant ones are really nice as well. And there's a type
of zenia that I just I never hear people talk about it, but I
see it in the garden centers and it's it's a narrow leafed zenia. It's
a very small zenia, the blue. It's a little bigger than a quarter
maybe about a quarter size. They typically come in either yellow, white,
or orange. That's kind of your options. But they're very small and they
deadhead themselves, meaning that after the bloom fades, you don't have this dead
bloom head. It just sort of disappears and goes away. It's a very
neat. These things sort of trail, so if I'm planning a container,
I'll put them around, maybe one around the outside of the container to trail
over the sides. They're not prone to a powdery mildew and some leaf spots,
which can affect some zennias, but the narrow leaf zenia, if you'll
ask about that when you go to a garden center, narrow leave zenia.
And remember this weekend is the weekend to go because it's the tax free weekend
on plants and soils and mulchas and things like that. Anything it's helping you
save water. It's a good tax free, tax free weekend for that,
so I hope you take advantage of that. The summertime for our lawns,
I already mentioned they've kind of kicked into faster growth. This is a time
where we need to be really careful and stay on the mowing schedules. If
you let the grass grow real tall and then you mow it way back,
it's very shocking to the grass plant. It's it's like, imagine this,
you have a shrub. You could cut that shrub off a foot high and
it would sprout out everywhere and come back right. But that is not good
for a shrub. I mean that is a super shocking pruning well in a
lesser sense, but still true. When we let our grass grow real tall
and then mow it way back, it's not good for the health of the
plant and it's not good for the density of the grass plant. So the
more often you mow, the better your lawn looks. And make sure your
lawnmower is sharp, make sure the blade is sharp. That also makes it
look better. Plus it's easier on the wear and tear on your lawnmower.
But when you when you mow regularly, and ideally, Saint Augustine, if
you could mow it over five days, that would be great, But we
tend to go a little bit further. But I'll talk a little bit more
about lawns and lawn care when we come back from break. Give us a
call seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy four and Josh, we'll
get you on the board and Carol, we see you out there on the
board, will come to you first when we get back. Well, good
morning on a good Saturday morning for gardening. I don't know if you're aware
of this, but Dell Webb is building a new community out at full Sure
that's off FM three fifty nine, two miles from downtown fullsher Now. Dell
Webb has been building communities for active adults fifty five and better for over seventy
years. They know what they're doing. They have the inspired designs and the
lifestyle programs that go with those communities and designed around you and gardners. Listen
to this. I'm working with them to create a community garden in this new
Dellweb community in full Shure. So check out the new Fullshire community, discover
the Dellweb difference for yourself. You can go to dellweb dot com slash Houston
for more information or call two eight one four or five nine six o nine.
If you live out in the Kingwood area, you need to check out
Kingwood Garden Center and Warren's Garden Center this weekend. Remember this is the tax
free weekend for plants and soils, mulches, things that help save on water,
so that would include a lot of different things. Now they have the
Microlife and the Nelson's Plant food filling stations for your judge, bring your old
jug back in and just fill it back up again. But I tell you
the amazing thing was I was checking out on Warren's social media, which you
guys need to subscribe to all these independent garden centers social media, Instagram,
Facebook, beautiful, beautiful, beautiful. They are doing these mixed plantings that
are just amazing. Like you can buy a giant container that's already planted with
everything, or you can just go buy here's a little tip. If you
don't want to buy the whole thing, maybe you want to make one yourself.
Well, look at the ones they've created, talk to them about how
they do it, and you can create something that is beautiful. And they
do an excellent job at Warren's out there in Kingwood. On that, I'm
going to run to the phones here real quick. We're going to go over
to Willowbrook and talk to Carol. Hello, Carol, good morning, good
morning. How can I help Well? I have a brand new lawn in
my front yard that is Saint Augustine grass. I've had it for eight weeks
now. I've been watering it every day. I have omitted watering it during
the rain season that we have, but it looks beautiful on the top.
What I'm concerned about are two different things. The first thing is the grass
came with a base. It's kind of a thick dirt. Okay, is
that going to dissolve itself? Or do I need to put something like medina
on it? And the second question is when Should I fertilize it or should
I not fertilize and maybe just put some kind of a humte on it?
Or Okay, what's your questions? Don't worry about that little black clay that
came with the side. As the plant roots go through it and the organic
matter decompose, it's going to be just fine. Nothing to worry about it.
But yes, you do need to fertile right And what I'd recommend right
now would be to go with a Nelson's Plant Food turf Star line. There's
one call slow and Easy because we're entering the summer season, and if you
put the slow and easy down, it's twenty two two ten. That's the
numbers, twenty two two ten. It will feed on through the summer season.
It is designed to gradually release and that'll give you a nice smooth feeding
that won't create top growth at the expense of root growth. It's probably,
you know, just the ideal way to spread out that nutrient release. And
Nelson's Plant Foods are excellent about that, especially this turf Star line. But
the slow and easiest one that I would recommend, Carol, Okay, And
should I do that now or should wait a little bit longer. I'm just
confused. As a brand new loan, I don't know what to do that.
How brand new? When did it go down eight weeks? I'd fertilize
it. Yep, start fertilizing it. And when you do it slow and
easy, you're not going to need to fertilize again until fall. Okay,
Okay, it's one application, that's right, that's right. Okay, Well,
that sounds like great advice. I have some people that mow for me,
and my son says they need to get their blades sharpened on their mower.
I chose this service because I didn't want those heavy lawn mowers going across
that new sod. Okay, And this service has just like they use just
like a regular lawn more that you would use yourself. Okay, well,
I think that's a good idea. They just need to sharpen the blade and
you just need to tell them that if it's not sharp Okay, all right,
all right, thank you so much. All right, thank you for
the call. Hey, if you live out in the Mont Bellevue area,
you need to know about Texas Feedstop. It's located at ninety five thirty four
North Highway one. Forty six. So it's just north of I ten in
mont Bellevue, So if you're in Baytown, this is really close to you.
Brian and Hope Rhoads have created that old time feedstore. They carry the
bags out for you. They have all the products we talk about, you
know, all the fertilizers and soil materials and things that it is just it
is just an enjoyable thing to go in there and see the supply of everything.
If you need pesticides, if you need all the traditional you know,
feed store things, they've got it. But especially when it comes to your
lawn, you're going to find all the stuff recommended on guard line. They're
at Texas Feedstop. And again that's on Highway one forty six, just a
few minutes north of A ten in Mont Bellevue. When we when we're talking
about plants and this weekend, this would be a good time to head out
to Nature's Way resources as well, you know Nature's Way. I don't know
if you know this, but they are traditionally they've been a leader when it
comes to making soils, mulches, composts, things like that. They know
what they're doing. They were the originators of the rose soil and the leaf
mold compost. For example. This weekend, it's that tax weekend, so
you're going to get tax free your purchases of soils and mulches and their native
plants. They're one of the largest selections of native plants in the Houston area.
Two Acres Nursery Garden Center. They have fruit trees, native perennials.
You need to see it. If you haven't been out to Nature's Way in
a while, you need to get back out to Nature's Way. They're just
south of Conro on Interstate forty five, about where fourteen eighty eight comes in
there. But Nature's Way Resources will surprise you with their new plant selection.
And what a better time to purchase to improve your soil, both the amendments
and the mulchus for your soil. I want to go to. We're going
to head out to let's see do we have time for mo in spring?
Let's try that mo. We got just a short time here, but let's
see if we can get your question well as wanting to know what can I
do for a neighbor. Let's purple hole peas and its green beans come over
all my fence and he he don't even take care of me. Just lets
some rival offense, and I've been picking the heck out of them. Sound
like you got a good deal there. I wouldn't complain about free purple hole
peas. I ain't complaining by my grandma's been making as much post of well
sounds like an opportunity. You need to suggest what you want to eat for
him to plant next year. I was wondered, Yeah, I should do
that, mo. Thank you, thank you for that call. Thank I
appreciate a good laugh this morning. That's that's good if you are dealing with
fleas, if you if you're dealing with other kind of ground dwelling pests.
Cedar repel a product by nature's creation. It's little chips of cedar. Now,
it's we can go off the way back to Greek and Roman times where
they realized that cedar repelled insects, and these little tiny cedar repel chips can
be spread around an area. You can put a little a little border,
let's say a little sprinkling of it around your foundation or around the patio or
something like that so they don't want to come crawling up in there. One
or three quarter cubic foot bag covers up to three thousand square feet. So
check out Nature's creation. Cedar repel a very natural way of going about talking
insects into going somewhere other than your place. It's available at RCW Plants for
all seasons, Wabash Moss Nursery, Quality feed and Houston Garden Centers here in
the Houston area. Well, we are going to go to a break and
I just want to remind you that today at eleven thirty I'm going to be
at the Wall Birds Unlimited at clear Lake. It's the new store, the
seventh store in the area. You can go to WBU dot com forward Slash
Houston to find the Wallbirds Unlimited all over the Houston area. But come out
to see me at the grand opening out there at Wahbirds Unlimited and clear Lake.
We're going to give away or they're going to give away an advanced pole
system for your backyard feeders. They're going to give away an eliminator bird feeder
that is squirrel proof, and somebody's going to win a twenty pound bag of
their top selling no Mess blend of bird seed per month for a year.
Now. These are quality feeds. They at quality products while you're out there,
bring me your pictures, maybe some plant samples or insect samples. Put
them in a bag. We'll take a look at them, help diagnose and
give you some recommendations. And I'm going to be given away a little jug
or jar of plastic jar of Nelson plant food when for folks coming out as
long as those lasts, so don't delay. We'll be giving away the free
Nelson plant food as well. I hope to see you out at Wallbird's Unlimited
out in the clear Lake area. The newest store. KTRH Garden Line does
not necessarily endorse any of the products or services advertised on this program. Welcome
to KTRH Garden Line with skip rictor just watch as well. Good Saturday morning,
on a good day for gardening. Lighting up the sky here we're looking
outside and tell you the this is the time of year when I just say
everybody's a gardener because if if you have a pulse, the weather is wonderful,
everything is blooming and beautiful. I mean, this is the time.
And what a good weekend for it too, with that tax free break on
the plants and the compost and the soils mulches, those kinds of things.
Everything that saves water is going to be tax frey this weekend, so you
don't take advantage of that. We're going to head out to Magnolia and we're
going to talk to Terry this morning. Good morning, Terry, Good morning,
Skip. Hey. I've been a long time listening to the garden line.
I just keep learning. Thank you, well, thank you. We
are. We just built a house and I had a friend highly recommend a
grass seed that she used at her home in the Montgomery called centipede, and
it's the tiff Blare variety. It looked on an m website and it really
recommends it more for East Texas north of here, but I wasn't if you
knew anything about it, I do. It looks if you haven't seen centipede
before, it looks sort of like a Saint Augustine that's a little less green,
a little more toward a Chartrussi green rather than an emerald green. Centipede
is a smaller looking plant than Saint Augustine. So imagine a Saint Augustine blade
that's about two thirds size that that's centipede. Centipede likes acidic sandy soils.
That's its ideal it will grow on a clay soil, but it likes them
and it doesn't need much fertilizer. In fact, if you fertilize it too
much, it's not good for it. The drawback you need to be aware
of on centipede is that in the winter it turns tawny tan color. It
does not maintain the green color as well. Especially once we've had a good
coal snap. It goes, it loses its color. It's not a grass
that's at the on the top three for our southern grasses, but it has
its place. Okay, okay, got something to think about here. Yeah,
it is one you can plant from seed, which is an advantage of
it. But I tell you, starting grass from seeds a little bit of
a challenge because you've got bare soil and you plant the seed and now all
the weeds are coming up too. So you got a little bit of a
challenge there for a while. Okay, Yeah, Well, it would just
be a lot less expensive than hiring somebody to lay side it would melt.
It would be you do want someone to come out and get your soils smoothed
out all levels. You know, you want to get any weeds that are
there in fact, I might even say, you know, let let rainfall
or irrigate the dirt and get the weeds to come up, and then spray
and kill the weeds, and then a week later put your seed out without
disturbing the soil. And that way, all those seeds that at the top
that we're inclined to sprout will sprout and you'll get rid of them. And
then you can put your centipede seed down and get a little bit of a
hash start, gotcha, And the seed can go down anytime as long as
we keep it watered. Yes, yes, you just want to. It's
a tiny little seedling plant and it cannot dry out, so you don't need
to put an inch of water down, just a light watering, just a
light watering. And as the bigger the grass plant gets, then you can
move toward that once a week or something like that. Right right, okay,
all right, thank you for the call, Terry. I appreciate you.
I have not had a centipede question. It's just been a long time.
But that's that's cool. It used to be a grass we talked about
a lot more, and now it just seems like the others Bermuda Saint Augustine's
Oisia have kind of taken over there. There are the ones, but I
appreciate that call from from Terry Buchanan's Plants done in the Heights is one of
the premier places where you're going to find a wonderful selection of Texas natives.
Is that is kind of like, you know, their mainstay. I mean
when I say that, you know, if you want tropicals, perennials,
trees, shrubs, roses, indoor plants, succulents, they've got everything,
all of that kind of stuff. I was checking out their road. There
are herbs the other day. Still got a good selection of herbs out there.
But one thing when I mentioned they have a table that is just dedicated.
They have several tables in sections, the whole section for native plants,
but there's this one table that's dedicated to Harris County natives. These are plants
that you can find wild here. And you know, sometimes we see natives
and it may be native in Central Texas or whatever, but these are Harris
County natives. So if you want to get that specific, they've got it.
They're on East eleventh Street and the Heights and you can go online to
Buchanansplants dot com Buchanansplants dot com. But sign up are like their Facebook and
their Instagram. They have a constant flow of information. You can stay up
to date on what's going on. They also have a newsletter that they send
out by email that you can sign up for its free and just find out
all kinds of good things. Buchanan's Native Plants on East Elevens and the Heights.
It's really really fun place to go and visit. And remember, as
I keep saying today, this is the tax free weekend, So what a
great time to buy a native plant and not have to pay tax on it.
Because it is a water saving feature for sure in your landscape. I
was talking about the lawn care and the importance of a sharp mowing and mowing
regularly so that regular mowing creates the density that we're looking for. And if
you have not fertilized for summer yet, you need to. And one of
the prime products is Nitrofossis super Or from nineteen four ten. Nineteen four ten
gives that gradual release. Now they triple guarantee it basically that it's going to
keep the grass greener longer, and it will. I mean for twelve to
sixteen weeks of green from this summer fertilization, You're not going to mow as
much because it's gradually feeding your grass. And then thirdly cutting down on brown
patch in Saint Augustine, when we put a lot of nutrient down, get
a flush of nitrogen on grass, and especially as we head into brown patch
season or large patch season, which is the fall that just makes it worse
late summer, the chinch bugs will thank you if you over fertilize your lawn
with nitrogen. You want something slow release, and Nitrofoss Superturf does that.
And you're going to find nitro foss at all kinds of places. You know,
a tascaseda Ace arbigate and in tom Ball Fisher's Hardware down South Houston,
Laport area, Lake Jackson Lake Hardware in a clute near Lake Jackson that nitro
foss products are easy to find and the nitrofis Superturf. That's a silver back,
outstanding, outstanding product. I'm going to take a break here in just
a moment, but I do want to remind you that I am going to
be at Wilbird's Unlimited in Clear Lake, Texas today at eleven thirty. Now
that's at fifty five forty El Dorado. El Dorado Boulevard, so which you're
at the store. It faces clear Lake City Boulevard, but El Dorado and
clear Lake City Boulevard where they come together. That is the newest Wilbird's Unlimited
store out in clear Lake. I hope you'll come out there and see me
and we can visit and talk about what you're interested in and answer the questions
you have. We're good morning, good Saturday morning. You're listening to garden
Line. I am your host, Skip Richter, and our phone number.
Write this down seven one three two one two five eight seven four. Always
listen to garden Line with a pen and paper handy, because we give out
phone numbers and emails and all kinds of things. And maybe I'd mentioned a
product and later you're going, what did he say? Well, write it
down, you'll have it and be easy to remember. This is the beginning
of our summer season, and when things start to heat up. We want
to make sure that we are taking good care of all the plants that we
have. We want to make sure that they're being watered properly and taken care
of in that way. And you know this is that water efficient product sales
tax holiday this weekend May twenty seventh and twenty eighth. Anything that helps soil
retain moisture prevents water waste. That includes all plants, soils, and mulches.
So if you want some tips on saving water in your garden, I
would say number one, mulch. You need a couple of inches of a
good mult maybe more depending on how course it is, and that holds the
moisture in the soil. It prevents weeds from stealing your moisture, and it
avoids erosion of the soil as well, and it moderates soil temperature. Secondly,
if you've got a low spot in your landscape, you know we always
talk about plants needing good drainage, Well turn it into a rain garden.
A rain garden is an area that's filled with plants that can take wet feet.
They don't mind wet feet, so daylilies would be an example, iris,
especially Louisiana iris. A turk's cap will put up with that from time
to periodically at least. Rain gardens are a good way to turn lemons into
lemonade in your landscape. And then finally native plants. Native plants or they
just are from here. They know how to live in the climate, in
the soils that we have in this region, including the typical rainfall for our
region, that would all those all three of those things are a good way
to save on your water supply. Now, there are other ways to For
example, when you amend your soil with compost. When you mix a quality
compost mix in your soil, you are going to create a better root zone,
a deeper root zone. You know you've got these plants in your flower
bed, just thrown them into whatever soil you have on the spot without any
preparation. That's not the way to do it. You want to amend them
well with a quality mix. And if you live south and west of the
Houston area down Sandy Point, Pomona, Fresno, Manville, Roescharon, all
those areas out in the Sienna Plantation area, you need to check out CNA
Mulch. You can go to Sienna Mulch dot com to learn more. They
are just north or Rochcharon on FM five twenty one, near where Highway six
and two eighty eight come together. They've got the mulches in bulk and they've
got it in bags. They've got the soil amendments, the compost that I'm
talking about, the rose soil, organic compost and so on that is today's
This weekend is a good time to go do that because first of all,
they're closed on Sunday. I shouldn't say this weekend today is a good time
to get out to CNA Malts if you want to take advantage of this tax
free weekend. And the products they sell are all gonna be products that can
help your landscape be more water efficient. They carry all the fertilizers we talk
about here as well. A CNA mal it's just a wonderful place to go,
Viz. I always love to go out there and see what they've got
going on. Now, that would be the amendments. Drip irrigation is another
thing that is very good for saving water. It's a very efficient way you
put the water right where it needs it, and that's on the soil where
the roots are that take it up. You avoid spraying and wetting the foliage
and increasing disease problems. A hose end timer, now there's a good idea.
I can't tell you well, I won't tell you how many times I
have turned the water on in the evening because I got home from work and
something needed water, and I forget about it. And the next thing you
know, I come out in the morning and the kids have canoes out in
the street at curbside, thanking me for the river that I created for them
to play in. A hose end timer, simple inexpensive way to avoid that
you water for just as much as you need to water. And one other,
one other great idea for a water saving tax free weekend is a tree
hugger sprinkler. I talk about these all the time, but if you're going
to buy a woody ornamental, get a tree Hugger sprinkler. It's a small
investment to make sure your significant investment in that woody ornamental stays alive and not
just stays alive, but thrives. Now you can go to tree Hugger Sprinklers
dot Com to learn more, but you're going to find them all the places
that we talk about. All our sponsors, you carry the tree Hugger sprinklers.
I've got a seven inch, I've got an eleven inch, and I've
got a fifteen inch version. You can turn them on just a little bit
when you have a new plant, just to water the base of that plant
to help you get roots out into the soil. You can crank it up
a little bit more to water a young tree, and you can even turn
it on even higher and water a much much larger area. But tree hugger
sprinkler help target the water and they're a water saving device. As a result
of that, I want to head out. I think we're gonna go out
to League City and we're going to talk to John V. Well. Good
morning, John V. Good Morrie Skip, Good morning everybody. Yes,
my question is on dragon fruit, and yes it's something that can grow down
here in Texas. Yes they can. And could you if your radio is
on in the background, or if your phone's on speakerphone, we're getting a
little feedback from something there. But you can apologize. It's the international landline
Country's calling and we call out, so I apologize. I'll be back on
my other phone just after June first. Yeah, okay, all right,
we'll bear with it today. So, yes, you can grow you can
grow dragon fruit here. They're not a super cold hearted plant, so you're
gonna have to be able to bring them in, have a container that you
could put it to a protected spot when we're going to have really cold weather.
So it's similar to the mango complications with the cold weather. Yeah,
any kind of the real tropical types of things that can't take a hard freeze,
then you're gonna need to bring them in. So that would be that
would be my suggess. Okay, wonderful, Well, thank you, You'll
have a wonderful day. All right, thank you, John V. I
appreciate that. Go, let's see we're gonna go to unless we're going to
head out to Richmond and talk to Brian. Hello, Brian, it's good
Morning's good power, You'm well, thank you, hey man. So I'm
having a ven using weed beater for the crab ground or the mormuda grass that's
creeping up into my garden and flower beds and blueberries and blackberries and um such
hammer for the nut grass. But they're both so slow to kill, and
the wheat beaters labeled for all that. So is there any other over the
top that I can use? It would be faster than wheat beater. And
do I well a non ionic um um madge evan work or do I really
need a methylated seed oil. Oh boy, I don't know on the non
ionic surfactants um as to those particular products. I would have to check that
out. You might want to check. The label should tell you if if
a surfactor is suggested to go with the product. But are you go ahead
by say, does say use methylated um use methylated seed oil. I don't
have any. I've got them the nonionic stuff. I was just curious if
it was much difference. Yeah, and I've used the boneye product for the
nut grass, but my permutograph does not like the doesn't like the boneyed product
very much. It kind of burns it. Yeah, the su chamber works,
It just takes it a week or ten days to start killing stuff.
And I would like to be able to spray it weekly so that I can
get the new stuff. I can't tell the new stuff from the old even
using the dye that my sprinklers washed the die away after a couple of days.
Okay, well it ought to it ast start just coloring a little before
a week. But you know, here's the problem. Both the nuts edge
is hard to kill, and so anything that would work fast is probably it
means it's not translocating down into the nuts underground and doing a more thorough job
for you. And so I don't know a fast nuts edge product. Now
you can burn the top off of it, but I don't know a fast
product that truly kills it. And that's what you're looking for. It's truly
the BONEYE said gender or whatever it's called. It starts killing it in two
or three days. But it just my bermudigrash just doesn't like it. I
mean, it's it's specifically for it. But if you don't know anything else,
you don't know anything else. And that's what we got to work with.
So it's just hey, hey, waiting for that stuff to grow up
in my blueberries and biteberries. Oh I know, I know. It's a
mess. It is truly a mess. So when you say it doesn't like
it, is it like yellowing it or what are the symptoms are saying it
yellows my bermuda grass lawn when I'm spraying the nuggrass and my lawn. Okay,
all right, Well, I don't know where else to take you manage
an image image will even yellow Saint Augustine, I don't know if it yellows
bermuda that's it. I have to check on that. But when you're you
know, when you're in there, have you where you shop if you ask
them about any other options that they carry, because there's a lot of different
products on the market. Yeah, I shop at the Ace of Rosenberg and
the two that they have or are sedgehammer and the bonite product okay, sedge
beater or whatever it's called. There's also a sedge ender I think product sedge
that's the one that's the one I was thinking. And they also carry image.
Yeah. Well, I think as far as I my knowledge is that
you're you're kind of doing what you need to do, and I think that's
just just the nature of it. Brian, I wish we had a better
solution. All right, thanks very much. Appreciate you. Yes, sir,
thank you for the call. Appreciate that. Let's see, let's head
out before we do that. Now, let's head out to talk to Clark.
Good morning, Clark. Yes, hey, thanks for taking a call.
I got a question from the freeze. The past couple of years,
I had centris feed trees out in the backyard, and of course they all
die. So this year be and my wife we determined that we're going to
get some centris tree, Well, I need some recommendations as far as growing
them into container h. You know, for simmoned and some of the orange
tree H terms of what science container? And you know how that careful as
you say, okay, well, I wouldn't try persimmon in a container.
It just it just wants to be too big of a tree. But the
citrus, if you went with a satsuma and you put it in a very
large container, let's say the equivalent of a large whiskey barrel. But don't
use a whiskey barrel because it'll rot out over time. But satsuma could be
grown in that. But the lemons, the mare lemon, the various types
of limes um let's see kumquats would also do good in a very large container.
You just want to be able to move the container around because when cold
cold weather is threatening, you want to be able to wheel that thing into
the garage. And so I always I use a little hand truck or dolly
to do that. But just be prepared to do that. So as large
container as I can say to a handle would be good for the And you
write the mare livings and changerine. Yes, okay, and for simmon,
take my chances in the ground again with them this year. Yeah. Yeah,
as long as it's good drainage, you're gonna do fine on the percimmon
in the ground. Just make sure that that the area drains well. They
don't want to live in a swamp. So all right, all right,
thank you very much, Well, thank you. I appreciate the call very
much. Well, I believe it's time to talk about the news. And
uh, let's say we just we survived sharks. We got through the sharks.
Now I'm listen, I'm eavesdropping on your conversation. In every context.
The word cum quat is funny. It is, it is, I don't
know, it's it just sounds funny. It just sounds funny. Don't know.
Squat get a coume quat. All right, But good morning. It
is a good day. Oh my gosh. The sun is out and they're
just watching the trees waving in the breeze out there outside the studio. You
know that that reminds me seeing the trees. We are coming up not too
long on the hurricane season here in the Greater Houston area, and it is
a good time now to do some hurricane preparedness on your trees. It may
be some limbs that need to be removed. Just making sure that the structure
and everything looks good. You can. I like the folks at Affordable Tree
Service, we talk about him all the time, Martin and his wife Joe.
They Martin will come out and he'll take a look at the trees you
can harm to come out and do a little bit of an assessment, a
little consultation. What needs to be trimmed, what needs to come out,
and what is fine just the way it is, And that is how it
is with Martin. He's not going to say you need to do something you
don't need to do just because he has a chainsaw and wants to use it.
Right, that's the guy that sticks his business card in your door.
Run away from that stuff. But Affordable Tree they know what they're doing and
they're honest. They do good work. They you know, it's worth calling
a professional when someone trims your tree. They either know what they're doing and
it builds the beauty and strength of that tree over time, or they don't
know what they're doing and it ruins it. One bad pruning can be such
that the tree never recovers from it. It always is going to be a
problem and it's probably more likely to break when they don't prune it right.
That is what is important. Maybe you need to clear some limbs out where
you've got some power lines coming into the property. Maybe they're limbs rubbing on
the eaves of your house or on the shingles of your house. That is
an expensive damage, so you want to get those out of there. If
you've got any trees by the way that you're waiting on them to leaf out
and just giving them a little extra time. If they're not leafy now they're
not going to be leafy, They're gone. They need to come out,
or maybe there's just some limbs that need to come out that are that way.
Don't delay, go ahead and get that work done. Martin at Affordable
Tree can do it, and that is aff Tree Service dot com. Afftree
Service dot com or give McCall seven one three six ninety nine twenty six sixty
three seven one three six nine nine twenty six sixty three. I've talked about
being out at Wallbirds Unlimited, and I'm going to be there at the clear
Lake store today. This is the new store, the newest of the seven
locations now in the Houston area. And by the way, wherever you are
in Houston, there's a Wall Birds Unlimited near you. You can go to
WBU dot com forward slash Houston and find the store near you. I hope
you'll come out and see me today at the Wallbirds out at clear Lake on
El Dorado Boulevard fifty four forty I believe Eldorado Boulevard. That's at the corner
of El Dorado and clear Lake City. So the store when you come out
of the Wild Bird Store, it faces clear Lake City Boulevard. I'll be
out there from eleven thirty to one thirty. Let's talk about plant problems,
let's talk about whatever you're interested in. You need to check out the stores
or grand opening and they're going to be given away a lot, a lot
of stuff. This is a this is a time when you can get a
free one will be given away. Advanced pole system for your bird feeders,
an eliminator bird feeder to keep the squirrels out and they work, believe me.
And they're going to give away twenty pound bag one per month for the
next year of their top selling no Mess blend bird seed. So you win
this and each month you can come in for a twenty pound bag of their
no Mess blend bird seed. Wow, what a deal. I'll be giving
away some Nelson plant food also out there lots of good reasons to come out
to the wild Birds Unlimited out in the Clear Lake area. I had been
visiting with folks with Dell Webb talk to him a while back, and they
were visiting with me about a new full Share community that they're putting in and
I'm going to be helping them create a community garden at that community. Isn't
that call a community garden at the new Dell Web community, which is less
than two miles from downtown fullsher on FM three fifty nine. Now, Dell
Webb's been building communities for active adults age fifty five and better for over seventy
years and they are very distinctly inspired. I mean, the lifestyle programs that
are designed around you that are part of those communities amazing. Go to dellweb
dot com for Bridge slash Houston to get more information, or you can call
two eight one four five nine six o nine. You're listening to garden Line
and I'm your host Skip Richter, and we are here to answer gardening questions,
talk about whatever you're interested in regarding gardening. Our phone number is seven
one three two one two five eight seven four seven one three two one two
fifty eight seventy four. If you've got weed problems in the lawn, it's
because those the lawn was thin and sunlight at the soil and nature was able
to plan a weed there. We avoid that by putting down a pre emergent
and barricade is that kind of product. Nitrofoss is barricade. We'll control both
grassy weeds and broad leafweeds. A ten pound bag covers up to five thousand
square feet. Barricade pre emergent prevents the problem before it starts. Now you're
gonna find barricade like you find other nitrofost products all over the place. DND
feed out in Tomball plants and things, and Brenham Knmas Hardware and Kingwood.
In fact, many of the ash hardware stores are going to carry barricade by
Nitrofoss. Let's take a moment and go to Spring Branch and we're going to
talk to Herta this morning. Hello Hrta, good morning, Thank you for
being there for us. My son Provos say, he gave me a Texas
mountain Laurel. Now I grew up the say antonia, and it's rocky soil.
How long can I leave it in the container? And can I still
plant it? Is it too hard or is it getting too late? Well,
you can plant it, and it's probably better to plant it than to
just leave it in the container if you wait until like the fall, when
we plant a lot of woody ornamentals. I just think it you're you're unlikely
to always remember to water it adequately, and I think it's going to be
a stressful summer for that plant if you leave it in the container. Now,
the nurseries that grow them, they've got automatic systems at water them.
But I would get it in the ground. But heard you need to get
it on excellent drainage, even if that means bringing in soil and making a
big Picture's mound there, you know, for them to grow on. But
just make sure that it never is saggy wet around that plant. It will
grow here and it will do well here. But you're right, I mean
they grow out of limestone outcroppings in the hill country and they're very happy with
that. What they're not happy with is a clay soil that holds water and
is overwatered they either by rain or irrigation. They're not happy with that.
But isn't it a great plant? Oh? I love it? And the
fragrance of those blooms in the spring. How close can I? I have
so many trees in my yarm, I mean pine and oak, full grown
tall. How close to any competitive plant can I put it? Well,
here's the thing. You want that Mountain Laurel to never lack for good sunlight.
Okay, all right, So if it can get morning sun up to
at least maybe six hours of sun at least, that's okay. But you
know in the hill country you've seen them. They're growing in bright, bright
sun. So we just have to go oh, yes, yes, okay.
Thank you for the call, and I hope you really enjoy that plant.
That's great to hear. We're gonna take a little break now our phone
number seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy four. Give Josh a
call and he'll get you on the boards when we come back from break.
Love is deeper than strong. Well, good morning, what a great day
it is today? Great day to be out in the gardens, great day
to go visit garden centers. By the way, this is the tax free
weekend on water saving products, which includes plants and soils and composts and malts
and things like that, so take it, take advantage of that. Speaking
of composts and molts and stuff, Heirloom Soils of Texas. You you probably
have seen their products everywhere you shop. I mean, they their bag products
are just widespread. Lots of good products too. I mean we're talking about
things like rose soil. There is a veggie and herb mix that I really
like that a lot. There's a leaf mold compost, and just on and
on. They have lots of products. They also offer the super Sacks.
That's a one cubic yard sack that they set on your driveway. They deliver
it and put it on the driveway. You can go to Airloom Soils of
Texas dot com and find out about that. And remember this is the tax
saving weekend. So if you're thinking about buying malture, if you're thinking about
buying compost, now's the time to do it. Today and tomorrow are the
days that or you can get the tax free on your purchases so airlom Soils
of Texas. If you don't know how much soil you need or how much
compost you need, they have a cubic yard calculator on the website Airloom Soils
of Texas dot com. And on the website you can click on it and
you know the dimensions of the area you want to cover and how deep you
want to put it. You can find exactly how much that you need from
Airloom Soils of Texas. We're going to head out to Magnolia now and visit
with Mike. Good morning, Mike, Good morning, Skip. How can
we help today. I've got three drumming red maple trees that I bought from
RCW a little over two years ago. They've been in the ground probably twenty
six months, and I was wondering, what's sort of protocol to remove the
stakes from around these guys. All Right, Well, if if you brought
them from r CW, they were well grown and those plants are going to
be well anchored in the ground. Uh. You know, there where the
plant enters the ground, there'll be a little bit of a flare at the
base of the trunk and the idea. Now, when they've been staked,
have they been staked tight or have there been a little bit of room for
them to move just a little bit, there's been just some slight room to
move, Okay, that that movement is important because that helps the trunk tissues
to strengthen. In a tree that has been mistaked too tight, I really
recommend loosening them and leave them loose for a month or two before you fully
take them off. But once a tree has been in the ground about six
months, it ought to be established enough to where you can just take the
stakes away that you might take a wire loose and kind of move the trunk
and and just see is it just is the whole thing moving at the ground,
you know what I'm saying, Like it's still wobbly in the in the
hole. I doubt that's the case. But if it was, lead them
a little bit longer. But in general, about six months they shouldn't need
steaking anymore. That sounds perfect to me. So how do you how do
you like that tree? By the way, Mike oh Man, it's probably
in two years has doubled in heightened, quadrupled in width on the on the
triplane excellent, excellent, Yeah, beautiful. I bought a Mexican sycamore from
them too about a year ago when doing the same. I mean, it's
it's wonderful tree. That is that is a very very beautiful tree. I
grew up with sycamore. It's the big giant white trunks, you know,
towering up in the sky. That's an awesome tree. Yep, yep.
And when you go to that's what sold me on. It was when you
go to RCW, they've got a couple of huge ones just all their property.
Well, it sounds like you made a good decision, all right,
Well, I appreciate the advice. I have a morning project. Sounds like,
all right, have fun with that project. And I thank you for
the call. I've mentioned ACE Hardware a million times here on the show,
and it's just because I'm enthusiastic about ACE Hardware. I mean, there's thirty
nine of them here in the Greater Houston area. For crying out loud,
I mean, you don't even need to get in your car, just walk
to the nearest as near to you. Hey, you can go to ACE
hardware dot com, go online to Ace hardware dot com. They've got a
store locator and you can find the ones that are closest to you, and
they're gonna be more than one that's close to you. ACE Hardware carries all
those products we talk about, you know, we talk about the fertilizers and
the mulches. They're going to have a herbicide, fungicide, pesticide, her
all that, all that section amazing wide variety of all kinds of products.
Their associates are friendly and they're helpful. They have everything you need. So
it mean you may go in there to buy, you know, some fertilizer
for your lawn, but you can also pick up things for the home there.
This isn't your father's hardware store when it comes to the limited supply.
This is your father's hardware store when it comes to service. And ACE Hardware
is that kind of place, you know, the local ACE Hardware stores in
our group of thirty nine here, they raised almost a half million dollars for
Texas Children's Hospital in twenty twenty two. I mean, it's just it's just
a win win, win win. When you go shop at ACE, you
get the products you need, you get the service you need, and don't
forget their ACE Rewards program where you earn money back on your purchases. I'm
a member myself, and I think that you you definitely need to belong to
that as well. You're listening to Garden Line. I'm your host, Skip
Richter, and we are here to talk about gardening whatever is of interest to
you. Our phone number seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy four
seven one three two one two five eight seven four. I was checking out
my lawn this week, looking at you know, how are things going?
I got the weeds coming here or there? You know, how's the law
growing or any spots that are of concern? And I stood back and I've
used some different kinds of products on my lawn and this spring I used hast
Grow twelve four eight. It's a liquid lawn food plus. So you just
took it, hook it up to a hose in I mean there's a gallon
in larger sizes, but other size it's a quart size. You just took
it up to your hose and you just it takes about ten minutes to treat
an average lawn. But I just treated one section with the grow because I
wanted to see how it works. Well. It works beautiful green lush green
looks really good. Now you can do that with a hast Grow twelve for
eight liquid lawn food Plus. You can do it about four times for growing
season if you are returning your clippings, which you should be doing now.
If you bag your clippings, you probably need to do it about every month.
But hast Grow twelve for eight, we'll give you a quick response.
It's a natural food supple that's got the Medina sail activator and Humate liquid humus
also in it, and your lawn will show the difference when you use it.
Why don't we head out to Bay City and we're going to talk to
Mike this morning. A good morning, Mike, Good morning. How are
you. I'm well, thank you? What's up to Okay? Well,
I've sent an email, I mean, yeah, an email with some pictures
a week or so ago about a plant that I had, kind of heart
shaped thing. I don't know if you got it or not, because I
don't know if I was supposed to get an email back. All Right,
you're gonna answer it on radio. I like to answer them on the radio.
I'm gonna have to have missed you. Yeah, I'm gonna I'm gonna
have to find your your email here, and so that may tell me just
a minute, can you tell me a little bit more about it while we're
while I'm looking about the picture. About the email, well I could be
from Mike, but anyway, about the picture. Yeah, it was a
heart shape, a little heart shape plant and it's coming up all over my
lawn and it's got a little nodule on the end when it's real small,
just a little not I don't know how it's propagating all through my lawn.
It'll get in my little potted plants. Okay, very small, you know.
And I'm man, they're everywhere and I don't know how they're propagating.
I'd like to get rid of them. Well, that's a little woods Violet.
I found your email, found your pictures, good pictures about the thank
you, and it is everywhere. Uh. They will eventually have little purple
flour on them, but that doesn't mean that you're gonna like having them in
the lawn, right, So you need to use a broad leaf weed control
product to kill them without killing your grass. Now, the good effective broad
leaf weed control products post emergent, killing existing weeds. They're heart on grass
when temperatures get up mid to upper eighties and above. So if you can,
if you you know, I haven't looked at the weather, but we're
we're bordering on that. In fact, we're in the numbers. If you
can find today's we're a little milder and go ahead and get that done.
That would be important because those things do have that underground storage, and so
one application may not take care of it. You may have Yeah, do
you have a recommended broad leaf or just any other there? You know,
there's a number of good ones that are there. You're seat in the base
cite here there. Bonide has a weed beat or Ultra that is a pretty
good one. Fertilan, oh gosh, trying to remember the fertil product.
That's it's a different group of mixus. One other thing you may need to
think about. This is going to be a battle that has to go on
a little further. There is a product called Celsius. It's not cheap,
but our garden centers do carry it. Celsius. You buy a little tiny
pack to mix and water it'll It can be used when temperatures are up nineteen
ninety two degrees without any damage. And so you may want to switch to
that one because it's also very effective for this weed. All right, okay,
all right, hey, thanks for the call. KTRH Garden Line does
not necessarily endorse any of the products or services advertised on this program. Welcome
to KTRH Garden Line with skin rictor just watching as well. Good morning.
It is an absolutely list morning outside. Good day for gardening and good day
for going to a garden center as well. I'm going to be doing a
little bit of traveling around myself that I've got an appearance out at the wild
Birds Unlimited in clear Lake. This is the newest store for wild Birds Unlimited
in our area. They now have seven stores. You can go to WBU
dot com, forward slash Houston find the stores near you at our location out
there today at the clear Lake location, they're going to be as part of
the grand opening giving away an advanced pole system to help establish your backyard bird
sanctuary to hang your feeders on. They have also to give away an eliminator
bird feeder that is squirrelproof, which is important if you've ever tried to deal
with squirrels in a bird feeder. And somebody is going to win a twenty
pound bag per month for a year of their top selling no mess blend bird
seed. That is important. I've used cheap seeds before and they all about
half of it ends up on the ground just making a mess. And so
there are no mess types. I mean everything in it the birds want.
They don't want to kick it out and throw it on the ground. By
the way, that Wahbird's Unlimited in clear Lake is on El Dorado Boulevard fifty
four forty El Dorado Boulevard. That's where El Dorado and clear Lake City Boulevard
come together. Across from the HB. The storefront for the wild Birds faces
clear Lake City Boulevard. Just Mega ladies. You're free to find it and
get there. You need to check it out and come see me. I'm
gonna be given away some Nelson plant food fertilizer. Also got quite a few
of those to give away and first come, first served, so don't delay
in getting there. Bring some samples if you want to talk about plants,
insects, bugs in a bag. If you want to bring some pictures in
on your phone, we can look at those. It's always kind of fun
to help people plan out some stuff that they're doing in the landscape and get
some ideas. So it would be a great time. I always enjoy getting
out doing those. I've talked about the B Supply out in Dayton before,
but I would tell you that the B Supply and Dayton is a bold statement.
I would say that it is a place that everybody would enjoy going to.
Now, maybe you want to be a beekeeper. Maybe you are a
beekeeper. Well, they've got all the supplies you need. Of course,
they also have classes beginner classes twice a month out there in Dayton. Now
you can go to the Bee Supply dot Com online and find out more about
them. But if you're not a beekeeper, you don't want to be a
beekeeper. You just want to learn about the fascinating world of bees. They
have honey tours out there, and a honey tour is a great way to
get an exposure to bees and beekeeping. They'll have a little presentation where they
talk about bees. You learn a lot about them, and then you'll get
to taste about six different kinds of honey. Have you ever tried or in
honey? Have you ever tried creamed honey or BlackBerry honey? You'll get too
on one of these tours. So go to the b supply dot Com find
out about it, get a group together and go out and have some fun.
And it is fun. I've been there. Cool place. Oh,
they also have the largest, the second largest indoor be observation hive in the
world. I think you got to go to New Zealand to find a bigger,
one big plexiglass room up in the air where the bees are building comb
and you can watch them work. You can go up a little steps and
walk all around it and see it really really cool stuff. At the b
supply dot Com. You're listening to garden Line. Our phone number is seven
one three two one two fifty eight seventy four seven one three two and two
five eight seven four. Let's head out to pair Land and we're gonna talk
to Kevin Well. Good morning, Kevin, Hey, good morning. Got
a question about coffee grounds. Used to go to Starbucks all the time and
get a coffee in the morning and they would give you bags of use coffee
grounds for free, and I'd bring it home and just you know, sprinkler
around in the flier beds and whatnot, and then quit going the Starbucks and
kind of quit doing it. But is there any real benefit to doing that.
I just yes, random thought, Yes there is. Coffee grounds actually
have a decent amount of nitrogen in them, and they are an organic substance,
meaning that they will decompose back into the soil. So used in moderation.
They're just fine. I wouldn't put them, you know, four inches
deep all around your plants, but sprinkling a little here and there, working
them into the soil, that's just fine. Yeah, it works pretty good,
all right, appreciate it, brother, have a good weekend. Have
fun with them. Hey. And by the way, Kevin, when you
use coffee grounds as fertilizer around your plants, they grow faster because they they're
up all night growing in addition to being up during the day. That's a
wonderful dad joke, right, that is a very bad dad joke. And
you know what my kids will tell you. I've got a bunch of those.
Thanks for the call. Appreciate it. Bye, Oh gosh the phone
number seven one three two one two five eight seven four ktrh if you would
like some more information there. You know, if you are wanting a beautiful
color container on your patio, you need to consider jungle Land by nitrofos.
Jungle Land is a growing mix that drains well but holds water well. It
has four different sources of aged organic matter. It's got micro rhizal fungi in
it that really just enhanced the root system. Plants and micro riza go together
very well, and having that in a mix is a good thing. Now
you're going to find jungle land everywhere you find nitrofoss products. That would be
places like a tascaseda ACE hardware. Fact, many of the Ace hardwas around
Town Lake Hardware and Angleton, Gemp's Hardware. Montgomery jungle Land potting soil for
beautiful outdoor plants. They also have an indoor version with water holding crystals to
make it a little easier in case you forget to water. It helps the
plants get on a little bit further as a result of that. You know,
talking about nitrophi stuff. There are so many products and so many places
you can get them that it's just it's just a real easy It's an easy
purchase and easy to find. What I'm gonna go out and talk to Ron
and Beaumont run I got about a minute. I think we can get it
done in a minute, Yes or we can yes or good, I got
I got carpet grass, I think you am, I Saint Augustine. What's
the best treatment for that? There is not a way to kill carpet grass
in Saint Augustine. Now, okay, they're just not There's nothing selective to
get between those two. Carpet is a little bit rangier grass right, and
a little bit kind of upright tall rangey. I don't know if you know.
I just don't. It's it's also growing on the surface. So when
you pull up a runner of carpet grass, you've you've gotten rid of that
plant. It's not like bermuda grass. It's also coming up from underground.
But I tell you, I don't other than just killing everything and starting over
our spot, spraying the carpet where you see it, and letting the Saint
Augustine creep back into those areas. None of those answers are good ones.
But that's about the best I think you can do. Yeah. Yeah,
the guy the A, M and D is supplying Bowmont told me the same
thing. Yeah. Well, I thought you might know well, and I
want to I want to compliment you on your presentation over the radio. You're
not running seventy five. You're running down about fifty five miles an hour.
We'll appreciate it. Folk. Don't talk too fast for you. Sometimes I
get a little excited and talk fast. No, no, no, you're
good, Thank you. You're kind to say that. Well, good luck,
good luck with your line out there, and Beaumont run. Appreciate you
all right. See, we're gonna need to take a break here. Let
me give you the number one more time seven one three two one two fifty
eight seventy four. Give a Josh a call, get you on the board,
and we'll talk to you when we come back. Good morning on a
good Saturday morning for getting outside and getting some gardening done. By the way,
that was Tina Turner, Queen of rock and roll, though she passed
away recently, and I just thought we'd throw one of those in. Wow.
What an outstanding performer, especially just stage performer, like like none other.
We you know, I was talking about RCW nurseries and I just I
was reminded of the fact that they have this weekend. By the way,
this weekend is the tax free weekend for plants, soils, compost, multuous
things that save water. And they also have going on fifteen percent off all
fruit trees and fifty percent off select other trees that they have. So I
mean, it's just like reason upon reason to get out to our CW Nursery
this weekend. You can go to OURCW Nursery dot com. They are the
nursery that's there where Tamball Parkway to forty nine comes into Beltway eight where they're
joined together. You're going to find everything you can imagine at OURCW. And
by the way, when you go by there, tell them that you want
to see the tropical hibiscus that Skip keeps talking about on the radio. The
colors are unbelievable. They just have a Cajun line of hibiscus that is unbelievable.
Telling me to take me and show me where are these hibiscus, and
when you see them, you will agree that wow, I gotta have one
of those. Let's head out to Katie and we're going to talk to Stephanie
this morning. Good morning, Stephanie, Hi, Good morning Skip. How
are you. I'm well? Thank you all right. My question is is
I'd like to expand my garden into an existing landscaping bed that we pulled all
the plants out Okay, and I obviously know I need to, you know,
get the mulch out and whatnot. But I'm wondering, we have that
wonderful clay soil, what do I do? I still use the rose soil
and composts that Randy always talked about to mix in with that soil, or
is there something else I need to use to convert that bed into a like
a vegetable garden. No, that that would be just fine. Uh.
There, that's a good combination and it works good just plants in general.
That's a good combination. Now. I know that airbum soils makes a veggie
and herb mix. That's also a good one that you can use if you're
if you're wanting to um, you know, is this vegetables that you're planting
or is this flowers? No, it would be vegetable. Okay, that's
what I thought, but I just didn't want to assume. Yeah either way,
but get a good quality mix. Mix it in very deeply, because
what you're gonna do is you're going to create a huge root zone area that
the roots can thrive in. And that's how you have success above ground is
by making sure the plants are doing good below ground. How deep does it
need to deep need to be turned into? Well, I mean if you
could get it six or eight inches deep, that would be just fine.
Or if you want to mix a little bit of the mix in and then
bring additional mix in on top, so you sort of have a gradual interface
then from the quality mix the rose soil to compose the veggian herb mix whatever
you use on into your native soil. And you know, it's not just
like you're putting a wonderful mix right on top of let's say clay or whatever
you have there. You're right beneficial? No, Okay, would it be
beneficial to also include expanded shale If you have a heavy clay and you want
a long term fix, expanded shale can help with that. But it takes
quite a bit. You may put about three or four inches into a clay
soil to turn it into something much significantly enhanced, because you don't just need
like a particle of shale here and there. You need quite a bit in
terms of the volume of the soil that you have. Okay, let it
lasts a long time. Compost improves clay too. Compost just breaks down over
time, and so if it's if it were a bed where I was doing
vegetables, I probably would avoid the shale and just use compost because you're constantly
going to be going and changing out your crops, and it gives you an
opportunity to put more compost down to amend over time with Like if it was
a rose bed or something where you can't roto till the roses, right,
then you want to use something it's going to last a very very long time,
and that that's where shale would really shine. Okay, well that's what
I needed to know. I appreciate it. Thank you, all right,
Katie, thank you for the call. I appreciate the call. Let's head
out. We're gonna go to Northwest Houston now and we're gonna talk to Ralph.
Good morning, Ralph, good morning. It's great to have your programming.
You the best I've ever had. It's simply I've been listening to you
really are knowledgeable, and I thank you. Oh if in grass I have
overrun of the long runner, they're going on top of the grass, what
what's what's what's called in that? You know? They just I don't know
that I've got some of that in one area of my yard. I've got
some in the other areas don't have it. I've noticed in areas sometimes where
the grass is struggled a little bit as it begins to grow back in you
may you may see some of that, but just other than clipping them off
or usually the mower will lift those up and chop them when you mow over
them, because you know that that kind of vacuuming of the propeller blades on
the mower sort of pulls things up underneath there a little bit. But yeah,
it's it's not a disease, it's not an insect. It's really nothing
that you can do anything about. Having a good thick thatch can also cause
a little bit of that because the grass runner can't get down and put roots
in the soil because it's riding on top of all that dead runner material that's
at the soil surface. Okay, that's great, appreciate your program. Yeah,
and if you got if you got a lot of that, Ralph,
thank you. If you got a lot of that, you might want to
do consider doing a deep tie narration followed with a compost top dressing and that'll
help break down that dead organic matter. And it's just good for the lawn
anyway, But that just a tip. Thank you for that call. Our
phone number is seven one three two one two five eight seven four seven one
three two one two fifty eight seventy four. You know, talking about lawns.
The Nitrofile Super Turf that's their silver bag, the Super Turf nineteen four
ten. That is a product that is going to gradually release those nutrients over
twelve to sixteen weeks. I mean that is a long time of feeding.
You put that down now and you don't worry about fertilizing again until fall.
And nineteen four tens an excellent ratio. It's got a good amount of nitrogen.
So because the numbers higher, you're going to use a little bit less
of it than something that has a lower number. For example, about five
pounds per thousand square feet of lawn would would be a pretty good rate in
most situations. But you're going to find Nitrofoss Super Turf nineteen four ten.
Everywhere you find Nitrofoss, which is everywhere. I mean if you're in Brenn,
I'm at plants and things in Montgomery, and gym's hardware done in Angleton
and Lake Jackson. There's a Lake Hardware in Angleton and a lake Hardware and
clute on I forty five North RCW and Plants for all seasons are gonna have
it. You get the idea Nitrofoss super Turf nineteen four ten. It's just
an excellent choice to have a beautiful lawn. Do it now, forget it.
You've taken care of fertilizing for the rest of summer. I was mentioning
plants for all seasons. There is a place where you can get those nitrofos
products. Plants for all seasons is it is a go to garden center that
if you're a green thumb that you take pride in your lawn in your garden,
you need to visit Plants for All seasons because it will they have the
selection and the products that you're looking for. If you're a brown thumb and
you want to turn your brown thumb green, then you need to visit Plants
for All seasons. It's a family owned nursery, full service retail garden center.
They've been going since nineteen seventy three. They're at the intersection of Louetta
and two forty nine and when you walk in there, you can bring pictures
and samples for diagnosis and solutions. They truly are lawn and garden experts.
I mean the Flowery family. They are just an institution when it comes to
home, mom and pop local retail garden centers. You can give a call
at two eight one three seven six sixteen forty six, or you can go
to Plants for All Seasons dot com and again this weekend tax free weekend by
Plants by Soil by Malt. They got all that, by the way,
and anything that's a water saving product too, is going to be tax free
this weekend, So another good reason to get out there. To Plants for
All Seasons. You'll see what I'm talking about. Amazing, amazing place.
Our phone number is seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy four seven
one three two one two five eight seven four. I was out on my
patio this past week and guess what I was doing. I was swatting mosquitoes.
Yep, it's mosquito season. Had that rain, I've been walking around
the yard looking at where are mosquitoes. Where's the standing water that they're breeding
in? Maybe it's on my neighbors, I don't know, But wherever you
have standing water doesn't take very long, and mosquitoes can complete a life cycle
and next thing you know, your beautiful, enjoyable outdoor environment has now been
invaded by those low pests. Well, mosquito dunks is the simplest way to
deal with this. Mosquito dunk is a small beige donut. It floats on
standing water and slowly dissolves. It's a bacterium that's toxic to mosquito larva,
so it doesn't bother your ladybugs or the pet or birds that come to the
bird bath, or other fish for example. It's an organic product. So
mosquito dunks will control your mosquito problem for up to a month. And so
that one dunk will cover one hundred square feet of water. So you need
to check them out. I mean mosquito dunks. All these places we talk
about on garden Line, to the independent nurseries, the feed stores, the
ace hardware stores, they all have mosquito dunks. Go ahead and buy some
and bring them home so that when you need them, you've got them there.
And you just toss a dunk into that standing water and you take care
of it really simple, really fast, really easy. We're talking about this
being the tax free weekend. Hooray tax free weekend. For anything that is
a plant, that is soil, that is mulch, or anything that saves
on water, this is a good time to do it. And speaking of
cool things and plants, if you have a bend of Verdant Tree Farm,
you need to check it out. Now. The original store out there on
the west side on Barker Cyprus, kind of near the old extension office that
used to be out there at the flood prevention. I can't even say the
name of a reservoir out there, att Ex Reservoir. Anyway. They also
have one done in pair Land on Broadway Street. They've got one in the
Heights which is at three thirty seven Yale Street at ten. With all those
locations, it's not hard to find a Verdant Tree Farm. Memorial Day sail
twenty five percent off all trees and palms twenty five Did you hear that?
Twenty five percent off at Verdant Tree Farm. So if you're thinking about a
palm, and they know they've got all kinds of trees, but wow,
do they have a selection of palms, and palms love to be planted in
the summertime. I mean, this is palm planting season for sure. So
check out Verdant Tree Farm save twenty five percent off this weekend only. Then
this offer ends on May twenty ninth, so do not delay. Well,
Nikki, what are we going to talk about today? We got more news.
I just think it's interesting that whenever a Theatics reservoir comes up, anything
about it, our minds immediately go to Harvey. Those two will forever be
connected, they will. And we lost our extension office twice. The number
one was a Tax Day flood, which was a year or two before Harvey,
and then Harvey took it underwater for weeks and then we never went back.
It's an abandoned play. In fact, the building's gone now. But
Wolf and we had Harvey. We had the Tax Day flood, we had
the Memorial Day flood, remember that one. Here we are Memorial Day weekend.
Got some news coming up. We're going to talk about Paxton next.
Well, good morning on Hey, wonderful morning for getting out in gardening,
enjoying the yard, kind of sprucing things up and whatnot. Hey, I
want to go to the phones. I've got a special guest here. We're
going to visit with, and that is Jeffrey from Wibird's Unlimited. Hey you
doing this morning? Jeffrey, Hey, good morning, Skip. I'm doing
great. How about yourself? Very good. We've been talking about your place
and the parents coming up out there all morning, so tell us tell us
a little bit about what you got going on. Well, we're excited that
you're coming out to visit us here in our new location in clear Lake.
Customers are excited. We're just waiting for you to come out at eleven thirty.
And the birding activity in the area is fabulous. And just a little
side note, Skip, I'm not sure if you're aware of this, but
gardening, of course, is the number one hobby in the US, and
second to that is birding. Birding is the second most popular hobby in the
US. Wow. And they go together so well? So well they do
they do? Yeah, I'm sitting out on my patio and I'm enjoying my
plants, but I'm also watching the feeder and just all the sound and the
activity there. It's a it's a blast. And you know, we work
in tandem in many ways when it comes to you know, pollinators, we
encourage bees and bats. Surprisingly our pollinators as well as you know, other
other birds that that we we try to encourage the installation of nesting boxes.
Yeah, that's that's help us with a little bit of a pest control too,
you know, that's that's very true. One bat will consume three to
five thousand mosquitos in one night. Oh boy, I think I have three
to five thousand at my house from me and out the other day. So
need to need to send a bat over there? Well we can, we
can, certainly, you know, are the wild Birds Unlimited shops can can
help customers putting together their bird sanctuary and installing the nesting boxes and bad houses
too. Well, good good, And I know you guys have unbelievable supplies.
I mean, every time I go into wild Birds, it's just,
oh my gosh, there there's so many fun things. It is. It's
a it's a wonderful hobby. And and we differentiate ourselves. We have a
quality product. We have expert to people on staff that know birding and know
what is going to attract the birds so that you can enjoy, you know,
sitting back, especially now with all of this stuff going on around us,
it's always fun to sit back relax with a cup of coffee or an
adult beverage. You can listen and watch the birds. That's true. And
I was talking earlier about your nomad blend bird seed. You know, I
have in the past use cheap bird seed and what a mess in the birds.
Half of what's in there, they don't want to eat. But you
guys have one that and you have seeds that are designed are packaged for specific
types of birds, so you know you can even control you know, if
you like maybe finches or tip mouse or whatever, there's seeds that really are
directed toward those birds, right, That is correct. We do tailor a
lot of our seed offerings to specific birds, finches in particular. And also,
you know, squirrels can be a pesky nuisance, and so we have
seed you know that will deter the squirrels. That would be our hot pepper
fiery feast line as well as a lot of people aren't aware that staff flour
is a very good one for deterring the squirrels. Now. Really, staff
flower has a very bitter taste, but you know, the squirrels tend not
to eat it, okay, And if you're really dealing with squirrels, you
need an eliminator. Yeah, and well, as a matter of fact,
you're giving one away today, right. Well, our grand opening event is
continuing this weekend, and I encourage people to come into our shop. We
are on the clear Lake City Boulevard side of El Dorado and clear Lake City
Boulevard, and we are giving away registered to win an eliminator squirrel proof mind
you that squirrel resistance squirrelproof bird feeder, one twenty pound bag of our top
selling no Mess blend bird seed one a month for a year. Wow.
And also our advanced pole system so that you can begin and you can establish
your bird sanctuary in your backyard. And those those advanced full systems are really
cool I tonight, They're wonderful. And hey, you're at fifty four forty
Eldorado Boulevard, which is kind of where El Dorado and clear Lake City Boulevard
come together out there in clear Lake. Yes, we're across the street from
HB Okay, so we face the clear Lake City Boulevard Highway. All right.
Well, and you know I always tell people that when you walk into
a place like wild Birds, even if you're not interested in a particular thing,
when you walk through there. You can think of everybody you know in
the family and friends. They would love that. My mom would love that
hummingbird feeder right there. I mean, you're going to be interested yourself,
but I'm just saying it is a great place to get some really cool gifts
too. Yep. And we have Father's Day upcoming. It's a great place
to come and get dad a new feeder and let him enjoy the birds as
well. Wonderful, wonderful. Hey, Jeffrey, thanks so much. I
can't wait to get out there. I'll be there at eleven thirty, folks,
and you got it. Yeah, thanks for calling, and all right,
take care. We look forward to seeing you. Take care, yes,
sir, bye bye. Yeah, that's gonna be. That's gonna be
fun to get out there and get to enjoy that. You know, Dell
Weeb. You've heard of Dell Weeb. They've been building communities for active adults
age fifty five and better for over seventy years. And I was speaking to
the folks the other day. They got a new community coming up in full
Shure on FM three fifty nine, just two miles from downtown full Shure,
and they were talking to me. I'm going to be helping them with a
community garden that they're putting in at this facility. So, hey, gardeners,
if you want a wonderful community with inspired designs, lifestyle programs designed around
you, and a community garden plus all the wonderful trails and it just you
just go to dellweb dot com slash Houston for more information or calumn to eight
one four five nine O nine or excuse me six O nine two eight one
four five nine zero six zero nine. Dell Web can't wait to see that
community garden all come together, and I just think that's gonna be a great
community. If you haven't fertilized your lawn yet this summer, boy, I'm
getting tongue tight here. Slow and Easy from Nelson is the kind of product
that gives you that all summer long feeding. It's a powerhouse blend it because
it's gradually feeding moless. You don't have the development of thatch that overfeeding too
much at one time can do good root development to your grass, so water
consumption, the need to water goes down a little bit from that. Also,
they have the Bruce's Brew. It's an eighteen four nine. It's ideal
year round, no fuss, and I'm going to be given away Nelson plant
food out at the wild Birds Unlimited. That we're just talking about that being
out there and giving away things and whatnot. Well, come out to the
Wilbirds Unlimited in clear Lake and I will be as first come, first serve,
as long as last, given away some Nelson plant free jars as well
well. Our phone number is seven one, three, two and two fifty
eight seventy four. Give us a call, Josh. We'll get you on
the board and we'll talk to you soon. Good morning, Wow, have
you looked outside? This is this is the day. This is the day
to be outside outside, working in the yard, be outside, maybe visiting
a garden center. I hope you come out and see me out in clear
Lake. Be out there eleven thirty to one thirty at the Wahbird's Unlimited in
clear Lake. A good day to get out and do that. Maybe you've
got some plants you need diagnosed identified, some pest problems. You got some
pictures on your phone you can show me to kind of Hey, what do
I do with this area? How can improve on this? We'll be happy
to do all that. I'll be out there from eleven thirty to one thirty.
Today. We're gonna start off right. Go into the phones. Our
phone number, by the way is seven one three two one two five eight
seven four. Let's go up to Cyprus and talk to Sandy. Hello,
Sandy, either skip, good morning. I have a question about my okras.
They had little holes on the leads. Is that normal? Not all
of them, but some of them have it? Is it is normal?
I've never seen it become a problem. And those okra plants are tough.
They can afford to lose some leaf area without any problem. So I don't
think it's something you need to spray for or worry about. I believe it's
a beetle that's doing it. It could be a caterpillar, but most likely
it's a beetle, a little beetle. Okay. I keep seeing this clear
colored fly looking thing that lands on it. Is that okay for it?
Or is that the thing that's eating it? You're saying it's a fly?
What color looks like a fly? But it's yeah, it looks like a
fly, and it's uh got a red head? Is it? Is it
like a skinny kind of long legged fly compared to a house fly? That's
a beneficial That is a beneficial insect. It's called a long lead fly.
There's a lot of different types. Some of them you'll see the reddish.
Some of them have almost a metallic green reflective or metallic green color to them.
But they're predators, so that's a good thing to have out in the
garden. Nothing to worry about. And these oakra seedlings I planted two weeks
ago, they came up and they're legging. They're like tall and lanky,
okay, but they had they had like leads, and so I snipped off
the top, the one that was the furthest top um. Did I do
it too early? You cut the leaf off? If you're saying, yeah,
the tall one, I left the bottom two leaves that were lower than
the tall one, I left that one. I mean I kept the top.
The one that was on top of the bottom leaves I left alone.
Okay, And why were you taking the leaf off to make it shorter?
No, I thought that year's placed to snip the first set of whatever I
see. I see, No, Sandy, that that's not necessary. I
mean, it wouldn't hurt anything. You did it, But I thought off
like the first um nip the top off when you get leaves. No,
I on okra, I just let mine grow. I don't snip anything off.
So I may not well, I may not be picturing exactly what you're
talking about, but I can just tell you this, when ochre comes up,
just let it grow. Don't worry about it. It's a tough plant.
It's gonna be just fine. Yeah. Is there a good sunlight?
Is it getting good sunlight? Sandy? Oh? Yeah, yeah, Okay,
I've got it on the sun all right. Well, sounds like you're
off to a good start. You're halfway to gumbo. Yeah. On my
blueberries, I've got a bird beater, so I know that it's not the
birds. But they're just not turning purple like there. It's taking them a
long time. And they've got these new light colored leaves that have popped up.
Does that mean that it's done producing for the season. It could be
a nutrient deficiency. If you're seeing light colored leaves, I know they're acid
levers. And I didn't put acid in it for like over a month now,
right, So if the older leaves have the normal blueberry kind of a
blue green color that blueberries have, and then the younger leaves are looking yellowish
to whitish pale. Maybe maybe the veins are green, but the other's rest
of it is white. That's an armed deficient. See. So that's one
reason why we keep blueberries acidic. It makes the iron more available and they're
happier with that. You could put an armed supplement around them, but I
think just everything you do should be acidifying. In fact, you might want
to get a hold of Microlifs. They have an acidifying fertilizer. It's a
six two four, but it's in a red bag and it is acidifying,
and just fertilize with that. It's organic, so it's going to decompose into
the soil and improve the soil. But would I would start fertilizing with an
acidic fertilizer more? I think, And every chance you get and encourage some
new growth, because they're going to go ahead and grow, and by the
time we get to the towards the end of summer, they are already setting
buds for next year. So you want to get them as healthy as you
can by then, so next year you have a good crop. Okay,
cool, Thank you so very much. I have a great yea you two
Sandy, Yeah, thank you very much. Yeah, Microlife. You can
go to Microlife Fertilizer dot com if you want to find out where to buy
Microlife, but I can taste basically everywhere. It's widely available. If it's
your lawn, though, you want to go with the six two four in
the green bag and then get your bag of the purple purple bag. That's
the humates plus, which is like concentrated compost in a bag. So you're
adding a lot of minerals beyond the three, the six two four, the
three numbers on the bag. With Microlife, you've got all kinds of essential
minerals that are also included in that because it's an organic product, it's coming
from organic materials, and you will you will see a difference in your lawn.
Microlife Fertilizer dot Com. Let's head out to Southeast Houston and we're gonna
talk to Todd. Hello, Todd, probably not okay, I can hear
you now, I can hear you now, Todd, go ahead. It's
weird because I'm I'm here and here when I'm not hearing, they're different.
Okay, Todd, I'm gonna we're gonna put you back on hold. I'm
not sure Todd is talking with me there. If we have time, we'll
try to get Todd back back on. You know, yesterday I was in
kind of just north of downtown, like north central Houston, but downtown inside
the Loop, and I had to swing by Quality Feed because I love going
to Quality Feed East to go to them when they're in their other location.
Now they are on Luzon Street eighteen thirteen Luzon, which is near the intersection
of Equipment and a Lesion. But it's the same Quality Feed. It's that
old time feed store. It's been a Houston tradition since nineteen twenty eight and
Ken and Chris have owned it for thirty two years. I was out visiting
with Ken. I was looking at some of his materials. It carries all
the stuff we talk about, all the different fertilizers and soil blends and whatnot.
But he also makes a kens Potting soil, which is very popular with
his customers. And you just go by there and ask him to see the
Kenspotting soil. He's got all kinds of supplies. They're always getting chickens in.
I mean, they're always new groups of chickens coming along, and just
you can go pick them up bring them home. Backyard chickens are a real
popular thing right now. But were we were visiting about the different things they've
got going on there. And by the way, Quality Feed is open Monday
to Friday nine to six, on Saturday from nine to four, and Sunday
from eleven thirty to four pm. So go buy Quality Feed or check them
out online quality feed dot com. Let's head out to southeast Houston and we
are going to talk to Scott. Hey, Scott, we're running short on
time, but let's see if we can help, all right, great,
appreciate that. So I'm calling about bottle brushes and alternatives to bottle brushes.
We've had some bottle brush trees in our yard, not very big ones,
but love the flowers, really nice plants like them. But in the freeze,
they really didn't handle it well, even though we tried to do what
we could to protect them. Yeah, and so I'm kind of looking to
I'm going to have to replace them, and I'm looking to figure out what
can I replace them with that would be attractive and yet be able to deal
with our with Houston's occasional freezes. Oh my, I don't know anything that
looks like a bottle brush. My brain is is skimming the files back there,
trying it doesn't need to look like a bottle brush. But I'm just
looking for something ornamental, small tree, ornamental. I would prefer something that
flowers, but just looking for suggestions. Yeah, that's a that is a
good question, and it's my brain is drawn drawing a blank as to you
know, there's always things like they're burying plants like one of the upright weeping
yopas. They're real beautiful. They're burying plants like that that I think would
be an interesting somewhat bottle brush shape to the plant, if you will.
There's lots of good flowering trees, especially in spring. The vitex, which
is blue colored. You see those around town that goes all summer. It
just blooms and blooms and blooms. If you keep it, prune back,
sheer off the old blooms, the new ones come out. Certainly, crape
myrtles, I mean that's kind of the standard of the South. And you
can buy crape myrtles in different sizes so that you get one that's the size
that you want and you don't have to prune the heck out of it to
try to keep it smaller than it wants to be. That I think would
I would consider a crape myrtle. If you go online and type in skip
Richter and crape myrtle. One of the top things that pops up is a
little chart I put together with another agrilife specialist, and it has from three
foot high all the way up to thirty feet high different crepe myrtles, different
colors. Tells you you know which ones have pretty bark, more beautiful bark,
and disease resistance and all of that. So that might help you nail
down the specific one that best fits the space and size and color that you're
looking for. Okay, let's thank you very much, all right. I
hope that's helpful, But you know, it's always a challenge to It's kind
of like the analogy I use as someone gives you a credit card and says,
go to the mall and buy me clothes, and you know, you're
just thinking, oh, my gosh, do you need a bathe and suit?
Do you need an evening gown? What kind of clothes are we talking
about? What do you like? And so on? And there's so many
good plants out there and apologize of Scott that my brain kind of draws a
blank there when I'm trying to think in the wide world of plants. But
hopefully it's a few good ideas to kind of get you off to a good
start. They don't forget that. I'm going to be out at the wild
Birds Unlimited at clear Lake in clear Lake. Now. That is on Eldorado
Boulevard. It's where Elderado and clear Lake City Boulevard come together, right across
from the HB. And I will be there from eleven thirty to one thirty
today. They're going to be giving away some wonderful prizes. I'll be giving
away some Nelson's fertilizer, first Come, first serve. KATRH Garden Line does
not necessarily endorse any of the products or services advertised on this program. Welcome
to KTRH Garden Line with Skip Rictord. Just watching moving well, good Saturday
morning. I'm a good day for gardening. Wow, look at the weather.
This is awesome. I love it. I love it. I love
it, I love it. It's a good day to be outside right now.
It's a good day to be inside. Listening to garden Line. You
got a radio you can carry along with you and listen while you work.
We are in our last hour this morning. We hear at All at ten
o'clock. After that, I am heading to Clear Lake. I'm gonna go
to the wild Birds Unlimited, be there from eleven thirty to one thirty.
I hope you can come out and join me out there. If you want
beautiful plants on your patio, if you have outdoor containers and you want a
quality mix to put in them, Nitrofosts jungle Land fits the bill. Nitrofoss
jungle Land drains well. It holds moisture, but it drains well. That's
a combination that is very important if you want success with plants. It's mixed
with a blend of Canadian blonde peat, four different sources of decomposed organic matter
and the micro rhizal fungi that work in harmony with the plant roots to make
the roots even more efficient. And it really helps the plants to have the
micro rhizal that are associated the micro rhyzing that are associated with the plant roots
themselves. Now indoors, they've got the indoor with water saving crystals, and
that is another jungle land product. For indoor plants. It works really well.
Now you're gonna find jungle land everywhere you find nitrofosts, and that is
pretty much everywhere. I mean, you've got nitro FoST products and bearings hardware
up in Bisonette and maybe bearings hard rout on Westheimer. You go out to
Richmond Rosenberg, enchanted Forest and enchanted gardens and plantation Ace. All those places
carry nitrofos products, including the nitrofis jungle land. So don't just go out
and buy a plant by a beautiful pot, but also by a quality mix
to put that plan in, because it all begins in the soil. If
you don't prepare your soil ahead of time, if you don't pick a quality
mix for a container soil or raised bed soil, your chances of success go
downhill, less bounty, less beauty, and that's not what you're getting into
the gardening to do. Right. You want to be able to enjoy that
dndie feet up in Tumble. They're about three miles west of Highway two forty
nine. I don't know if you've been by there, but they've already expanded.
They've got a bigger facility now where they can put even more products like
they already didn't have enough. They are stocked with all of the fertilizers and
the potting mixes and things that we talk about here on Garden Line. You're
gonna be able to buy plants out front as well. Beautiful plants sitting out
front. They have the high quality dog food like Origin, Diamond, Victor
and Star Pro, and food for all your pets, food for your livestock,
and your horse care products. If you've got a problem with pass or
with rodents, for example, they can help you with that as well.
We talked about mosquito dunks earlier. They carry those, even pool cleaners.
I mean, there's a lot of reasons to stop at D and D Feed,
three miles west of Tumball on Highway two forty nine. I think what
we'll do now is we're gonna go and start on the phones out here.
We're gonna go to Texas City and talk to Sharon. Good morning, Sharon,
Well, good morning, how are you. I'm well, thank you?
What's up today? Well, I've got two beautiful egg plants, the
little Japanese ones that make the long egg plants, and they're blooming. The
plants are beautiful, but the blooms dyeing. They're not producing any egg plant.
What do I need to do for them? Well, eggplant. A
lot of our plants in that family, peppers, tomatoes, eggplant, they
have some trouble setting during the heat, but eggplants usually one of the better
ones for that. So I don't think we've hit a point where we can
blame it on the heat on the eggplant. So it must be a pollination
problem for some reason the plant. You fertilize the plants, I assume,
and you're water and them regularly. Oh yeah, yeah. The plants themselves
are beautiful, but they're and they're blooming, but the blooms not. You
know, it is possible to overfertilize, especially with nitrogen, and and it
just it seems to promote vegetative growth at the expense of good bloom setting.
So I'll just throw that out there as a possibility. I don't know how
much you've fertilized, and it's kind of hard to figure it out over you
know, over the phone here, but that maybe watch that you don't overdo
the fertilizer. Other than that, it's just kind of waiting it out.
Have you noticed any bees on the blooms. No, Okay, well maybe
I don't know. Maybe there's something going on with the pollination, But it
sounds like you're doing everything right based on your description of the plant. So
I think I would just give them a little bit more time and see if
they settle down. Don't give up on them, though. Eggplant is a
good summer, tough plant, and they should be performing better for you with
just the proper care. Just just watch that excessive fertilizer. Okay, Well,
I've got tomatoes. Um, it's it's a big raised bed, and
I've got tomatoes in the same dirt, same fertilizer, everything, and they're
doing fantastic and putting on tomatoes like crazy. Yeah, but the egg egg
plants just sitting there looking at me, that is, I don't know.
That's kind of a stumper. Uh. You know, you obviously know how
to grow vegetables, and so, um, the eggplant ought to be it
had to be setting better than tomatoes, especially as we get into some hotter
weather here coming up. Well that's what I'm thinking too. I don't know
what's going on with it, but I was hoping maybe you could tell me
now you just need to give him a good talking to. That's that's probably,
that's probably the last resort. They're right. Have you tried putting the
radio out there and playing garden line for the plants that they I'm sorry,
I'm just messing around with you that now. I'm guys, give him some
time, is my best. My best answer on that one. I can't
think of a cause that you would fix at this point on those egg plants.
Okay, well, I appreciate it, Thank you, all right,
all right, thank you, and I hope you get into some baba ganoosh
with your egg plants here real soon. Thank you. Let's go to Dickinson
and we're going to talk to Dale. Hello, Dale'll hire you this morning.
I am very fine, sir, thank you for taking my call.
I have a monerary oak about twenty five feet tall that I purchased for our
new home. And it I got a three years ago, beautiful tree,
perfect tree. Two years ago. During that cold snap that we had,
you know, those four or five days, the trunk split, okay,
from the from the ground up maybe six feet, And of course I've been
very concerned about this tree ever since. And what if anything I can do
to heal that split in the trunk. I've been told to put insecticide soap
on it, which I have done. But that's the only thing I've been
able to do to this tree. Okay, now you know this spring,
the leaves are out and it's it's beautiful, but that trunk is still split
and it's black. Hey, Dale, I'm gonna have to take a break.
I want to give you some time on this call, So would you
hang on and we'll be right back with you after break. Sure seven one
three two and two five eight seven four. If you'd like to call in,
doctor, doctor, give me the news. I gotta batcakes. Loving
you some good music right there by the way. I got some music I
bet you've never heard in your life before. Coming up after the next break,
stick around. It's worth it's worth hearing. I promise you you never
heard this song before in your life. We are Garden Line. I'm your
host, Skip Richter, and our phone number is seven one three two one
two fifth seventy four. Listen if you want to kick your lawn into high
gear. Maybe it's struggling from last year's drought. Maybe you had to take
all root rod or chinch bugs or something that kind of took it backwards.
You need to consider having a good quality core aeration and compost stop dressing.
And the folks to do that are green Pro. Green Pro. They are
the experts in the field of compost top dressing. They've been doing it for
fifteen years. I'll tell you one thing about Greenpro that is I think is
a distinction. When they leave your place is clean and neat. There's not
composts and stuff all over the driveway. It's not a mess. They're not
tracking it around. They know what they're doing, they know how to do
it right, and they use a high quality leaf mold compost that is fine
textured so it falls down in those aeration holes and it just improves your soil.
Go to green Pro Texas dot com or dial two eight one three five
one green to get a hold of the folks at green Pro. We're gonna
go back now. We were in conversation with Dale about the split in the
tree, and Dale, I can tell you this the Monterey oak. I
love Monterey oak, Mexican white oaks another name for it. It is on
the less hardy side of all our recommendable trees that we have, and when
a freeze hit like the one we had there that I can see why that
was a little hard on that tree. They're using the soap though in the
cracks and the trunks. None of that's necessary. What it needs is whatever
makes it vigorous so that it can close that wound over. Have you noticed
dale on each side of the crack, any callous tissues starting to form,
moving toward closing the area over? A little, very little, very little?
Okay, Well, those longitudinal splits are a slow heel compared to a
branch pruning. But I just would say, continue to use a good quality
fertilizer, get those get that tree in as vigorous a state as you can.
I wouldn't fertilize after about August, though, we don't want to push
it into lush growth late in the season because you get another freeze and you've
helped the plant and I get ready for winter rather than get ready and so,
but I would get a good quality mix if whatever fertilizer you use,
I mean, you could even use a lawn fertilizer if you want, or
there's a lot of companies that make fertilizer for trees and shrubs, those are
great too. But for every inch of trunk diameter, just kind of put
your thumb up there and how many thumb widths across. Give it one to
two cups of fertilizer for each inch of trunk diameter, and sprinkle it through
an area as wide as a branch, spread and watered in. Really good.
If it's got grass up to the trunk competing against it, get that
away, give it a little molster area, and you'll get faster growth out
of it as well. But those are the things that are in your power.
Now, as you look dale at the canopy of the tree, is
there a lot of dead wood up in there? Or is it all?
It's all been removed, wasn't he? Well, there was very little to
be removed. There was one there was one branch on the lower part of
the tree that I did cut this year, But other than that, no
very little dead wood at all. Okay, Well, I would just say,
you know, when we get into summer and it hadn't rained for two
weeks and it's upper nineties, a good soaking you get you out. I'd
use a tree hugger sprinkler because they're so good for that. Because they put
the water right where you want it, but run it and soak that soil.
Well, you don't have to do it every don't do it every day,
don't even do it every other day. Just when head and rained in
a couple of weeks, give them a good soaking. You just want the
soil to be adequately moist and you want to have good nutrition. And that
that's all that you can do. And it's up to the tree from there
to take off and get growing where it can heal over faster. Well a
question, you know, I paid a fortune for that tree to have it
planted here. And why are species, if you will, of like this
tree or other trees that don't do well in this area because of these infrequent
freezes, why are they even sold here? Well, I think that I
think that's kind of a harsh judgment on this tree. I would even recommend
the trees here. And you know the freeze that got your tree, that
was that was a very unusual occurrence. I mean, it wasn't something that
you would foresee coming. And we can't if we just planted plants that could
not be hurt by any weather condition that ever might show up, well,
it would it would limit our options a lot. But Mexican white oak is
a great oak. It's resistant to oak wilt, it grows very fast for
an oak. It is a good, long lived tree. It's an attractive
tree, and I would plant them here. I just think that that tree
got caught not prepared for the kind of freeze that hit, and that was
not a normal, normal freeze. We have a number of species that are
good species. Some of the elms that I think a lot of the oh
gosh, what's the other fall color Chinese pistache trees were hit pretty hard by
it, and I even it's all live oaks that were hit by that freeze
in some places. So yeah, I wouldn't say it's a species that shouldn't
be planted here at all. Okay, all right, thank your question.
Yes, I also planted a pear tree in our backyard, same thing,
same scenario. You know what that freeze that this pear tree is just now
starting to sprout leaves? Is that normal? No, that's kind of unusual.
But the fact that it's sprouting is good because I would have said if
it still didn't have leaves, I would have said it's it's dead. But
it sometimes plants can be a little slow to come out of winter. I'm
not sure. I don't know what to think about that pear tree just coming
out now. I mean, if you had some other symptoms, maybe we
could delve a little deeper into it. But just the fact that it's slow
to come out, usually that's a chilling related issue, and that's not going
to be the case with that pair. We can eliminate chilling is the cause.
Okay, yeah, all right, you got some unusual things going on
around there, saying well, well, good luck, good luck with them
though, no, thank you for speaking with me. I appreciate it very
much, you bet, I appreciate that. Calldale. Hey, I'm want
to tabot a product, actually a series of products up at the Arbourgate and
tom Ball. Now, if you haven't been to Arburgate, you gotta go.
It's on FM twenty nine twenty just west on the west end of Tomball,
just a little bit west of town. You can go to www dot
Arburgate dot com Arburgate dot com find out more about it. But here's what
I'm talking about, talking about their one two three system. Now, with
a one two three system, you get a compost that is a high quality,
high quality compost. You get a soil that fits any situation, any
application you have, and then you get a food that feeds anything with roots.
And the food is organic food Complete. It's a four four three.
It's an organic product. It also has calcium in it, it has micro
rhizal fungi in it. And they can even tell you every setting on you
know, the setting on whatever kind of fertilizer spreader you have to properly apply
it. It fits all of those Or if you're looking for a quality organic
food, Microlife organic Food Complete four four three. Part of that three part
system that said microL What am I talking about? Arburgate that three part system
is just it's just a win win And like all the Arburgate products that they
have out there, if they sell it there, you know it's going to
do well here in the Greater Houston area. One of those destination garden centers.
Folks that know what they're talking about, quality plants, quality products,
And I'm telling you it's just fun. Go out and you will spend a
couple of hours they're just wandering around looking at all of the things that are
available out at Arburgate Arburgate dot com. We were talking about taking care of
your plants and making a beautiful landscape, and I talked about the sea of
Green earlier today. And you want color in your landscape. Now, you
can do that by buying plants. But if you look at your landscape and
it's just like there's something missing, I don't know. I buy plants,
I plan them, but it just doesn't look right. You need to contact
the folks at Peerscapes. Peerscapes is our preferred landscaper here on garden Line,
and they're a one stop shop. They do it all new gardens, rock
borders, walkways, drainage issues, on and on. They know what they're
talking about. Experienced professionals, very trained employees. Go to pierce Scapes dot
com and have them design that show place that your place can be for you.
They can do that. Two eight one three seven zero five zero six
zero. I'm visiting with Jason Garty out there at pier Scapes a while back,
and I just tell you their expertise, their knowledge, it's it's impressive.
And when you go see the work that they've done well, then it
all begins to make a whole more sense. You were listening to garden Line
our phone number seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy four. Give
a call. Josh will get you up on the boards and we will be
happy to talk to you about whatever questions that you have. By the way,
coming coming out, coming out of this break, I've got a unique
song that I promise you've never heard before. You know, I always say
we try to stretch your musical what earworms or tastes or whatever. We do
that here on garden Line. And you've already heard everything today, that's all
across the board, but you haven't heard what's coming up, So hanging around
for that. Southwest Fertilizer has been a Houston lawn and garden tradition since nineteen
fifty five, I mean back in the Dewey Compton days. In fact,
I'm the fifth garden Line host to speak for Southwest Fertilizer. And they've got
every kind of fertilizer. We talk about every kind you can imagine. They
even have their own Southwest Premium Gold. If you want organic products, you're
not going to find a better selection than Southwest Fertilizer, all herbicides, fertilizers,
fungicides, expert advice. When you walk in there with a picture or
a plant problem, they put their eyes on it and they take you to
what you need to fix the situation. Because you know, it's one thing
to just go in and say, I have an insect, I need an
insecticide. It's another no, no, which one which insect is it?
Maybe it's a beneficial insect. Folks at Southwest Fertilizer they can direct you go
to Southwest Fertilizer dot com and find out more about them. You know,
they're down there on the corner of Bissonette and Renwick in Southwest Houston. Southwest
Fertilizer dot com. Well, Nikki, we uh, we've been talking about
all kinds of things plants today and I know you do you right? Who
who'd have thought about that? But it is news that this weekend is tax
free on all water saving things, which includes plant sales, includes compost sales,
that includes molt sales. That's big news. Two days where the state
of Texas doesn't get a little bit of your money. So that's like a
sale right there. There you go, tax free weekend. This is your
moment of sound. You can thankful. That's enough Fronzel. I don't know
a better yodor than that guy. Pretty amazing. Maybe it's not your gig,
but hey, we're trying. We're trying. We're trying to spread the
musical taste out a little farther and wider. I'd just be glad you didn't
grow up in my household. My kids were subjected to everything from that to
barbershop to you name it. If it was a musical style, we gave
it a shot around the house. You're listening to Garden Line, not you
know, Polka Hour. It's seven one three, two one two fifty eight
seventy four. I'm your host, Skip Richter, and we are here to
answer your gardening questions. If you live up in the Late Conro Montgomery area,
you need to check out an A Plants. They are your backyard nursery
right up in that area. They are just on Highway one oh five,
just on the east side of Montgomery, and they carry all the products we
talk about, the fertilizers, you know, the soils and things that we
talk about here. They do some landscaping up in that area and in do
some delivery up in that area around the Lake Conrow area as well. So
you need to check them out. They've got all the plants that you need.
I mean, that's for sure, Like three anchors. You can wander
through everything, shade trees, fruit, nut citrus, berries, vegetables,
herbs, perennials, annuals, palm trees, cactus. Have I read enough?
I mean, they're all there. Plus they have an amazing amount of
bling, you know, whimsicle yard art, concrete, statuary, gazebos,
arches, topiaries, maybe a chiminaia from the patio that is that is ana
plants in produce. So check them out. You will. You will be
amazed. If you haven't been in there, you will be amazing. I
used to go a long time ago through there, and then by the last
couple of years, I've been going back again to see it, and it
is it just keeps getting better. It is. It is really really cool.
I'm gonna ask go ahead and head to the phones. Here. Let's
talk to Don up in Menville. Hello, Don wait, Skiptan pre taking
the call, sir, Yes, sir, I've got a comment and in
a question. The comment is Nikki you see my favorite broadcaster, Okay,
and then my question, Yeah, she's really good. I like her a
lot. My question is one would be the last day that I should be
able to put my tomatoes in the ground. I know what I'm going to
plant are the little romas. I think they're about a seventy five day to
maturity. Yeah, we're a little late. We're a little late for that.
In fact, that roma is okay about setting in the summer. It's
not as bad as the big slicers, but it's not as good as the
little cherry types. You know. I'm trying to think what I would do
if I had a tomato right now. When we get to about July,
it's time to put them in again. I was just wondering. I guess
you could plan them. You're you're not gonna see yield until the weather breaks
the fall, and that's why we sometimes do a fall planting a little later.
But give them a shot. Maybe they'll prove me wrong. Give them
a well, let me ask you, Let me ask your questions when I
do plant them. Should they be like semi sunny I mean? Or can
I plant them all in the sun the sun is going to hit them all
day? Or should I How should I do that? Well, it's just
the air temperature. It's the nighttime and daytime air temperatures. When night when
daytimes are up in the nineties and nighttimes are in the upper eight upper seventies,
which welcome to summer in Houston. Uh, that is just it's hard
on the plants. They don't the pollen clumps, and it doesn't pollinate well,
and you don't get good fruit sut. So I would if you got
them, I would put them in a spot. If you can choose a
spot that has morning sun for at least six hours and then some afternoon shade,
maybe that'll help a little bit. But it's not going to change the
air temperature. And so give it, give it your best shot, and
then call me back and tell me, you know, especially if they end
up doing okay, I'd like to know that because I I've not tried planting
roma that late. So well, what would you suggest instead of room of
I'm not stuck on those. What do you think would do better? Maybe
the little cherries, yea, the big boys or what the little cherries and
grapes do better in the summer. They don't like it in the summer,
but they'll they'll set better. They set fruit better in the in the summer
time, so I mean something, well, that's something that we have in
common. I don't like the summer down here either. Yeah, and not
the truth. So yeah, I mean if if you just need some tomato
flavor and things, you know, in the summer, the skin gets a
little tough on those on those and say you eat the cherry tomato and then
you spit a little red cellophane out of your mouth. That was the skin.
So but anyway, yeah, if you want to want to try one,
I would, I would, I would do that. Okay, don
yes, sir, thank you. I'll give it a shot. All right,
good luck with that. Now you've probably heard of Dell Web Communities.
I mean they've been building communities for active adults age fifty five for over seventy
years. Well, they got a new community going in State of the Art
less than two miles from downtown Full Sure on FM three fifty nine. They've
got the inspired designs and the lifestyle programs that you would expect from Dellweb Plus
and gardeners hear this. I'm working with them to create a community garden on
site at that community for the residents. So go to dellweb dot com Slash
Houston to get more information or give him a call two eight one four or
five nine six o nine. Check out the dellweb difference for yourself. If
you have not gotten your pre emergent fertilizer, fertilizers herbicide out and you've got
an ongoing weed problem, you might want to consider a barricade application. Now,
barricade is not going to kill weeds are existing. It's a pre emergence,
so it prevents them from coming up. So maybe you've prepared a soil
area and you know the weeds you're worried about weeds coming up in it,
Well, barricade can hold those down. Just remember that it stops the broad
leaf and the thin grassy weeds and it'll go a long time. One ten
pound bag goes over five thousand square feet. You're gonna find barricade everywhere you
find nitrofost products. If you're up in the Taska cedat the ace hardware there,
if you are on plants for all seasons up on I thirty five,
if you're up in the woodlands direction, I'll spash ace in the woodlands and
shades of Texas, all places that you can get barricade products. Well,
let's head out. We're gonna go now all the way out to Crosby and
talk to Delilah. Hey, Delilah, good morning, Hi, good morning.
Um. I have a oak tree and it used to drop a lot
of acorns, and after the freeze it's stopped. Okay. Is it a
live yes, yes, sir, and it's about twenty five years old.
Okay, Well, I wouldn't worry about it. Different things can affect the
cycle of acorns under an oak, and you know, the different types of
oaks produce them on a different schedule, some every year, some every other
year, and so on. But I well, I know we had got
them every year, and we don't have a lot of squirrels in our neighborhood,
so they were all over under the tree. And then, like I
said, just after the freeze, Yeah, we have not gotten them since
then. I can't connect up to the freeze, but I don't know why
that is. But I'm sure they'll be back. Yeah, okay, all
right, all right, definitely not much, you bet, definitely not a
problem with that oak tree. We're gonna take a quick break here. The
number seven one three, two one two fifty eight seventy four, called Josh,
get on the boards. We'll talk to you when we come back in
Charles in Texas City, you'll be first up. No body, I got
some. I just got shots too. Well, good morning on a great
Saturday for gardening, for talking about gardening. It's just an inspired day,
I tell you this is this is the kind of weather that turns landscapes beautiful
because it catches everybody's interest. We're out there buying plants, planning plans,
fertilizing plants, taking care of them. That's why we're here advise you on
those kind of things. You're listening to Garden Line our phone number seven one
three two one two five eight seven four. Let's head out to Texas City
and we're going to talk to Charles. Hello Charles, Well, I'm lucky
again I get to speak with you. This is a continuing saga. Can
harmon me? Continuing saga of the stink bugs? Bugs? Do you think
that the guy to feed store anywhere? Uh? Do you think the mallet's
ion would would help or maybe eradicate the problem with those sting bows on the
tomato plants? Yea, nothing's going to eradicate them, but a malifane will
kill stink bugs. Um, I am very fortunate I have bees are available.
I mean they got pollinators. Well, malion kill bees if they're coming
around. If I spray with malthan, yes, if you if you spray
a bee, or if you spray the plant and then the bee lands on
the plant um, then malifan is toxic to bees, that's for sure.
Now tomatoes, tomatoes are not bee pollinated. They are pollinated when the blossoms
move and the pollen falls within the flower from the the anthers to the to
the female parts of the flower, and and so. But that's you wouldn't
want to kill bees anyway. But anyway, that no, sir, Yeah,
that's the case. Stink bugs are just tough. You know, learning
what they look like when they're in an egg stage and when they're in their
little nymphs stages. That's the best thing that tomato rour can do. Because
you're out there looking at your tomato plants and if you see a cluster of
eggs, you know what a stink bug egg or their cousin, the leaf
footed bug, which is also essentially a stink bug, what they look like.
You can just you can just snip them out and throw them away.
When they're little nymphs, they tend to hang out in herds. They don't
have wings yet, and so it's really easy. I mean, somebody doesn't
want to spray, you can just swat them into a pale of soapy water
because they don't need wings to fly away once they got wings, and they're
everywhere like you probably have now, Charles, Uh, I mean you're putting
out a lot of pesticide. That's pretty strong stuff to try to get ahead
of stink bugs. Yeah, and these are those black ones with the yellow
bands are and they just they are they are just as thick as flies out
there. Oh I know, I know that is the leaf footed bug.
And yeah, they are a problem there. You know, it's probably not
going to help you this year. But another strategy, there's things they like
even as much or more than tomatoes, and that is they like sunflowers,
the kind that have the seed, big seat heads on them. They like
what do they like the not artichoke cardoon, a little cartoon has a little
blooms on them. They like black eyed peas, and so some people will
put a planting in just to attract the stink bugs to it, and then
they'll spray them on that planting and try to get in ahead before they move
into your tomatoes, for example, before the tomatoes start to come on.
They're and they're doing that. That's a little bit of a timing trick.
But I know there's some research done by the Extension Service over in Alabama on
looking at trap crops for stink bugs, and that's basically what they're doing.
They're trying to draw them off. They've used they've done that, and it's
probably more than you will know, but they've done that in pecan orchards,
planted black eyed peas around the periphery and then they just spray the black eyed
peas and try to stop the stink bugs before they move up into the pecan
trees to do the damage there. That's well, we got about sixty or
seventy plants, So it's sir, Yeah, it's it's terrible. Yeah yeah,
it's it's stuck and grabbing, smashing, Yeah yeah yeah, Charles.
Once they get wings, you've kind of lost the battle at that stage.
I mean, yes, there are things you can nuke them with, but
basically, um I would I would back up and come up with some other
strategies for the next next round of the tomato season. Uh and and and
try to come up with someone those if somebody build a crap like I get
for the flies that well, yeahs they have natural enemies. But apparently natural
enemies aren't doing their job very good because they are a garden annual problem around
here. Yeah. Yeah, I ain't daddy, Okay, Well, I
just want to make sure for I did what was suggested. And yeah,
because I don't want to hurt no bees. Yeah, their problems. Yeah,
i'd p that's that's true. That's true. All right, you take
care, thanks to me, and keep doing what you're doing. Put it
well, thank you. That means a lot. I appreciate that thought.
You know. Ace Hardware is everywhere you are, thirty nine stores in Houston.
I mean, go to Ace Hardware dot com look for their store.
There's a place you click for the store locator and you can find the one
near you, And there is one near you. Ace Hardware carries the products
we talk about all the time. So if you need a beautiful garden and
a bountiful landscape, Ace Hardware's got it. They got the fertilizers, they
got the soils, they got the products that you might need to spray for
controlling pests and diseases and weeds and things like that. Ace Hardware has got
one of the largest grilling selections on the market. I mean Webber, Tragger,
Big Green Egg, and more. I mean it is. It is
a wonderland to walk through an Ace Hardware and see all that they have.
And if you knew the Ace Hardware from years and years ago, you need
to see the new. Ace Hardware still got that serve us that we love
from a good old hometown hardware store. But with Ace Hardware, in addition
to the service, you get a selection that is just unbelievable. Go to
Ace Hardware dot com and find the store near you. We're going to now
head out to East Houston and talk to Tom good Morning. Tom good Morning,
serves a beautiful day for Accepted by call. You're bat. My question
is I'm going to buy a vego a raised bed good for you? And
and yes and uh. Earlier in the in your show, you mentioned a
soil company that provided the specs of how to how to calculate how many qbic
feet of soil I need for my good? Could you please, could you
you spoke real fast there have a PN I guess, but could you repeat
that for me please and all the other listeners. I would be happy to
That is airloom soils. They're out in porter, they deliver through the area.
But airloom soils of Texas dot Com, heirlooms soils plural of Texas dot
Com. And that the qbcard calculators on there, it's it's the best one
I've ever seen. It's because I mean, like literally, if you wanted
to know how many five gallon buckets of soiler in a qubic yard or how
many wheelbarrows of soil, they'll give you a real good rough estimate on that
calculator. It's pretty cares that airloom of Texas airloom. Let me just I'm
gonna spell the whole thing out because I want everybody to get them. It's
h E I R l O O M S O I L S O F
T e x S heirloom soils of Texas dot Com. Oh air h yeah,
heirloom like a like a family heirloom. Okay, Lau of Texas Okay,
good, all right, you good luck. Yeah. I have fun
with that. Have fun with that vego bad Those are super cool. Hey,
Can I ask you one other question? Yes, sir, okay,
I know tomatoes have a deep root, and so right now I have been
large containers. Okay, probably Tim, Tim gallant that you're doing it right.
And uh, but when I get my vego they come in seventeen h
high or two two foot high, I believe, yes, check out my
specs. Is uh, I know twenty four would be better than seventeen.
Is it would there be that much difference in the preparation of Yeah, okay,
tom are you putting this bed on the ground or are you putting it
on like a sidewalk or okay, So the roots, the tomato roots are
going to go down in the ground. So what I would do is the
seventeen is fine, that's enough. That's enough. So you just want to
break up the soil and kind of mix it with the bed mix that you're
going to put in there, and then fill it with bed mix and you'll
be good to go. The tomato roots will get down in that soil and
it I mean in the soil below as well, so you'll be fine.
The soil is hard clay, well, that's why I spread a little bit
of the bed mix and mix it with the hard clay so you don't go
from a transition from this beautiful bed mixed soil to the hard clay. You
heard. I think it's funny, absolutely is you bet well? You've been
listening to Garden Line Goodness. They flew by. We are going to be
out. I will be out at clear Lake at the wild Birds Unlimited at
clear Lake. They're going to be given away an advanced pole system. They're
giving them away, an eliminator bird feater that's squirrel proof. They're going to
give away. Somebody's going to win a twenty pound bag of their no Mess
bird seed blend per month for the next year. Now, go out to
El Dorado Boulevard, corner of El Dorado and clear Lake City, across from
HB storefront faces Blair Lake City Boulevard. I'll be there from eleven thirty to
one. I hope you'll come out and see me today. Looking forward to
talking to you.