Ktr H Garden Line does not necessarily endorse any of the products or services advertised
on this program. Welcome to ktr H Garden Line with Skip Rictor. It's
smell crazy just watching as woods becomes back kicking. Well, good morning on
what is going to be a good Saturday. You're listening to Garden Line.
I'm your host, Skip Rictor, and wow it is. You know,
it's like I've been traveling all this week and it just feels like I've started
in a new dimension here this morning, with with my brain being on all
kinds of other things, and suddenly here we are back in the saddle again,
ready to talk about gardening with you guys. In fact, we're gonna
not even hesitate. David's been out there hanging on for a little wastle.
We're gonna jump on the line and see what's happening with David out in southwest
Houston. How's it going, David, It's going good. Blessed morning,
Skip, Thank you. I noticed in my grass that it's either will it's
turning yellow or gold and some big spots. Don't know if it's brown patch
or what's a bug called chinch bugs? Yes, uh, it's not it's
not chinch bugs. You know, if it's kind of doing gold and you
don't have any fully brown and stuff like that you're seeing, that's not that
and it's not brown patch. I think what you're seeing it could be several
things. First of all, I'm you might just check and grab some of
the grass and pull on it just a little bit, you know, like
a big handful. So try to like you're picking up a carpet, and
see if it does lift up off the ground like that pretty easily, or
if it's still firmly pegged down. That's gonna be a long shot, but
that would be grubs. I think what you're probably looking at is take all
root rot disease. Now, I can't diagnose a disease based on, hey,
my grass is turning yellow, uh, you know, information, but
having seen a lot of this stuff, that would be the first thing I
would I would be curious about. Are these areas in any particular location like
shade or sun or next to a driveway, or you know anything unique about
where you're you're seeing these or are they random? No? Not really,
I have no trees and I am water and at nighttime around three o'clock I
have a sprinkler system, So I don't think it's because you know, not
enough water, too much water. Okay, I did do the can.
I did do the can the other day and push you down and put water
in there and didn't see any bucks come up or anything like that. So
okay, will there be anything of a fungus or anything that, well,
take All is a fungus, and you know, I know water and like
at three the only thing about that, And this isn't a you know,
it's like a black and white issue, like you absolutely can't do that.
But when you water, let's say, toward midnight end of things, or
even late in the evening, your your grass tends to stay wet for longer
over the period of the evening, and that moisture for over time can help
predispose things to certain disease problems. I don't think that's what the problem is
with what you're describing. It could be take All ride and the only way
to tell for sure, I mean, you could send me a photo of
it from a distance. I'm not going to be able to diagnose it specifically,
but I can tell you, yeah, that really does look like take
All instead of me just kind of picture and what you're saying, or the
best way is to take a sample and send it up to the state Plant
clinic and they will for a for a fee, they do a diagnosis of
it. They actually get it in and look at it under a microscope and
look for the fungus itself. So we could do this one or two ways.
I mean, you could you could go that root so we know,
you know what we're aiming for, or you could just aim toward take all
root right treatment, uh, and then hope that works and if it doesn't,
well then you're back to Okay, let's look at plan B here.
Okay, it sounds less for a life. They would have the stuff that
I need to take care of it there. Oh absolutely, yeah they Okay,
you're talking about the products and stuff. Yeah, yeah, I know
that was kind of a dumb question. Okay, Well, yeah, Southwest
Fertilizer they have everything. Oh I know, I know, I know,
I know they're there there. Might go to the outside of call it.
So what's the best time I should set my sprinkler system the water to the
yard? You know. It ideally would be about like six in the morning
or something, because it's the coolest part of the day. Uh, and
it you know, you give it a good soaking and then the sun's coming
up and it's kind of drying off the surfaces. To keep it from sitting
wet for so long, that would be ideal. But again, this isn't
like a huge problem like if you water it three you're gonna kill everything.
It just it's just leans a little bit in that direction. That that's all
I'm saying. But if you'd like to stay on, I can put your
on hold. Josh can give you an email and you can send us a
picture or if you want to go to send a sample in also send me
the email in Los Angeles video on how to take a turf sample. But
you're going to send it to plant clinic. Uh dot TAMU dot edu.
It's really easy. It's plant clinic. One word. Okay, whatche dot
dot it's it's at A and M. So it's dot t A m U
dot E d U. I have a picture, Okay, I appreciate it.
I do have a picture. If you put me on hold, I'll
afford that to you. All right, I'm gonna put your on hole right
here, and Josh is taking care of some callers and he'll be right with
you. All right, Yeah, you know. The diagnosing plant problems,
I mean, we can do it visually. Some of them are easy.
You look at them and like the what people still call brown patch. Technically
it's now large patch is the name, but uh, you know, the
big brown circles and here we are and first of October, get this little
coal front front blow through and here comes the circles. That that's easy visually.
But there are other diseases you really need to get a get a good
look at in order to diagnose them effectively. And that's one of the advantages
of having a plant clinic available, you know. I mean, if you're
going to go out shop for a products, spend money on it, come
home, take time to apply it, and you had the wrong product,
you know, misdiagnosed, Well, nobody's happy with that, right. So
that's one reason why for a lot of things, I just say, especially
with valuable plants, it's probably better to have a diagnosis so you know for
sure what you're going after. Let's see here. This past week I was
at the Texas Nursery and Landscape Association trade Show or Expose, what they call
it in San Antonio, and this is a this is like you know,
it's like going to some giant thing at George O. Brown Conventions that are
I mean, they are booths everywhere. A lot of our sponsors were there.
Is good to kind of touch base and catch up with some of those
folks. Gosh, I can sit here, start to name up. I'm
sure I'll leave you up. But I saw I talked with the folks at
Ego Garden. Nitro FoST fertilizer was there. Let's see. Nelson plant Food
and Microlive plant food were both there at the event. I caught up with
Dave with r CW. That was kind of nice and rich Eddie while Bird
was out there. Just lots of good, kind of a lower reunion to
get out there and get to visit with people. But walking through the place,
I mean there's a lot of cool stuff. I'll talk about that more
a little bit later. Right now, we're gonna go take a break and
do some news or not news, but just get you know, pay the
bills. If you'd like to get on the air, our phone number is
seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy four. Good morning on a
Saturday morning that is going to turn out really nice. I think being outside
yesterday I really enjoyed just early in the day, you know, kind of
getting out was a little cooler and poking around and doing some things. I
was done to Santonio yesterday for a conference and it was just a pleasant time
to get out and walk around. Well, I'll tell you something, you
know, a while back, I was in a let's just say a national
chain store and there was an employee there standing in front of the aisle of
all these pesticides, herbicides, fungicides and everything else. I began talking to
them, asking a couple of questions that I always like to kind of find
out whether people are up to date and know what they're talking about or not.
And they absolutely did not. And I ask him, was, so,
how long you've been working here? Well, they've been there a week.
And what did you do before? Well? I was a hairstylist.
Okay. I don't think that prepares you to sell chemicals to people that are
going to go out and try to kill stuff with it. But anyway,
that is why I love our mom and pop garden centers, and something like
that is not going to happen at a place like Plants for All Seasons.
For example, the Flowerty family there has been doing that for all seasons,
I think since nineteen seventy three. They know what they're talking about. You
bring them in a sample, in a baggie, bring them in a photo.
They can tell you what it is. And that is very valuable because
again, as I said earlier, you know, you go, take time
to get go somewhere, you buy a product, you come home, you
try it, it doesn't work because it was the wrong product for what you
have, and then you got to go back and start over again. Waste
of time and money. Not at Plants for All Seasons. True lawn and
garden experts, from education to selection, to delivery, to planting, even
custom potting. They're the ones. I mean, they know what they're talking
about. They're right there on tom Ballparkway FM two forty nine where Luetta comes
in, right at that intersection or almost at that intersection, and just go
in and it's a beautiful place. Their selection is unbelievable. You can go
online Plants for All Seasons dot com, or you can give them a call
two eight one three seven six one six four six one cool thing that they
have out there that I had not seen one of these before. But rangoon
creeper is a vine that has these big clusters of pink and white. Are
pink red and white as they fade, the change our colors, flowers,
beautiful, beautiful, and they have a double one. I didn't even know
a double one existed. So if you are interested in a plant nobody's got,
well, I would say this would be it, or a good example
of one, and it's out there at plants for all season. Jet to
go check them out. Today, we're gonna head out to the phones and
we're gonna make a long trip out here to Titusville, Florida and talk to
DC. Hello, DC, I should get how are you doing well?
I'm well, thank you. How can we help? I don't know if
you ever heard of this, but we got something here in Florida called alligator
reed. When you look at it, if you if you actually let it
grow, it actually looks like Saint Augustine, but it's a darker color.
But you literally just put your hands in and just pull it right out without
a problem. So it's one of you stop that from spreading, other than
going and picking it out by hand. Yeah, is it. Is it
in your Sat Augustine lawn? Yes, okay, a broad leaf, a
post emergent, we'll do a pretty good job on it. Alligator weed is
not one we normally deal with in lawns over here in Texas. Just just
difference, a little bit difference in our climates like that. But you can
I don't know. The stuff that would have triclopier in it would work very
very well. Triclopier is a brush killer, but you want to be very
careful using it. I would not treat it now, and I would be
very careful with using it. You may have trouble finding tricolo pier in a
lawn labeled home application, so that would be one challenge. Some people will
use just a product that kills everything, like a glyphosate product, and just
rub it over the top of it, just kind of a wicker Wick type
applicator of it. And that that's another strategy that's excuse me, some people
have used for it. Uh, it's just it's it's not a super easy
one to kill without hurting your Saint Augustine. And that's the problem. Now,
you probably don't have control of this, but if you can make it
dryer. Uh, the alligator weed isn't going to do as well as when
it has a lot of water, So that that's a way not to control
it, but just to kind of slow it down a little bit. And
a lot of the waterways they import a certain kind of insect that basically eats
it up. Well, the thing is is that it gets really inside the
Saint Augustine, Yes, and it literally just grows from underneath, and and
the stoles and all that stuff are just they're just covered with this thing.
You're just it's it's like I said, it looks darker green than normals Saint
Augustine like fourte yourself. Yeah, I'm familiar with it, and you're right
about that. The thing about it and has is a little white kind of
white balls blooms on it. The little small white white blooms. I don't
know if you've run across that or not, but yeah, we normally deal
with it in an aquatic habitat, and that's why it's kind of a challenge
once you once you get it down into a lawn. I'm trying to think
of of another product that might might work on it. Pretty much everything I
know that's labeled for it is labeled more for waterways, or it's it's too
hard on your lawn. So I think that that's probably I can't think of
another lawn herbicide that you might you might try on it other than what I
just meantion thing you do. If you go out there, when you see
a patcher, when you pull it out, yeah, that's gonna be a
that's gonna be a job. And I don't know. Let's see the alligator
weed. I believe that one is that that's a perennial. It's gonna come
back each year, and so I don't know that that pulling may not be
that great. I think if it remind what I would do is I would
get a product that kills, you know, just a general killer like a
glyphosate product and a wiper applicator. Because the alligator weed will it'll come up
above your lawn if you don't mow right, doesn't it grow up a little
higher for you? Yeah? Yeah, So if you can give it some
time to get up there, I know that may aesthetically not be acceptable,
but then at least you can get the herbicide on it without getting it on
the saint Augustine. That's that's the thing we're trying to avoid. Okay,
all right, Like I said, you know, I can also let it
grow and it will look a pretty dark green all through the yard. Oh
it's pretty grass. Yeah it is, but it is, but it's uh,
I don't know. I don't know. You're right, it's dark green
and it finds along. But I don't know about aesthetics. That that's up
to you. Okay, all right, thank you for the call, thank
you for the inform machine. I'll talk to you. I'll let you know
how it goes. All right, thank you very much. I appreciate that.
Just be careful with the things I mentioned getting them on your Saint Augustine.
All right, that's all? Yeah, well absolutely absolutely sure, you
bet. Yeah. You know, find talking about finding products and stuff.
When you go aroundtown and you see an ACE hardware store, you know that
that is a garden center. It's going to carry the stuff that you want.
When I say a garden center, i'm talking about you know, they
have their section where they sell all kinds of things. I mean it's insecticides,
the fungicide, herbicides, all of that's there. Fertilizers, if I
recommend it on garden Line. You're going to find it there in an ACE
Hardware, and there's thirty nine around the Houston area. So how convenient is
that ACE Hardware dot Com. Look at their store locator and it will direct
you right to where there is an ACE Hardware near you. And not only
do they have the products, but they got people that can help you,
They can direct you that know what they're talking about. And of course it's
ACE Hardbreast, so they have everything else under the world. I remember the
first time in recent times that I went into an ACE I could not believe
at how amazing the way the stores are stocked, all the stuff they have.
ACE Hardware is just go ahead and see what I'm talking about. Go
in there to get you some garden products, but look around you'll find a
lot more that you definitely want. We're gonna head out to Sugarland now and
we're gonna talk to Gary. Hello, Gary, good morning. How are
you doing well? I'm well, how are you? And I wanted to
know what beneficial nematodes will control chinch bugs and fire ens. They they can,
but the you know how there's off on a yeah, but there's a
yeah, butt to this one. Number one. You got to buy the
right kind of nematode. There's a couple of species out there there don't the
names don't matter, but Steiner needed Nema and headerohabditis, or two genera of
nematodes that are used in insect control. They call them entomopathic nematodes. So
you got to buy one that's labeled for the pests that you're going after.
Flease, they'll attack them in the larval stage. Flease lay eggs in the
lawn and the eggs hatch out into larva that become adult fleas. That's the
stage where the nematodes have to hit them. Chinch bugs. I don't know
that entomopathic nematodes are effective. I would have to look that one up.
I've never heard of using them for chinch bugs. They are used for grubs,
and so when we get into June, when the grubs have hatched and
are young, feeding at the surface. You can use them in a lawn,
but they're living organisms, so you know, you put them out in
the garage for a month and they're probably dead. You got to use them.
You've got to follow the label. You want to water the lawn well
and then use the nematode and then water again to move them down in the
soil, because basically you're spraying a bunch of little tiny worms out there that
are you want to wash down, and they'll crawl around and find the insects
bodies and move in and do what they do. That's very been It would
be good information. I'd like to mention something else. On newly planted trees.
I like to spray the foliage in the trunk several times a day with
a mist, and I think that helps them upsore more water than they can
through the roots. Yet to be careful not to overwater the roots, but
misting the trunk and the foliage I think helps them survive well. I have
to I have to disagree with you on that one. But just the amount
of water that can actually move in through a leaf or trunk compared to a
root system, uh, you know. And plus when you get the leaves
wet a lot, if you do it a lot, you can increase some
of your leaf diseases. But that is interesting that you've had that that observation
or results with it. I think a lot of people recommend doing that and
I think works good for me. Well, well, Gary, I appreciate
the call on good luck with those chinch bugs that you're dealing with out there.
I may look around a little bit if I find anymore, say something
on the air today, if I can find some time to check. But
I'm just I would be hesitant as to the nematodes on chinch bugs, But
on those other lawn pests, they do work pretty good. Thank you very
much. Stay cool, all right, Thank you very much. I appreciate
that very much. You know, are you looking for a quality soil?
And I hope you are, because everything everything begins in the soil. Airloom
Soils is the place you go. I mean, and you don't even have
to go. I mean, they're everywhere. You can go buy airloom soils
at a number of our sponsors that we talk about on here, you know,
hardware stores, feed stores, garden centers there. They're available out there.
You can go online to Airloom Soils of Texas dot com Airloom Soils of
Texas dot com find out more. They've got the one yard superstack super sacks.
So imagine someone brings one of those little take home grocery sacks that holds
a whole cubic yard and drops it on the driveway. That's what we're talking
about. You can call them from seven am to five pm Monday through Saturday.
They have a really good deal new lower price ninety five bucks per cubic
yard on rose and Rose soil is about the best mix you can get for
all kinds of general purpose work. That's Heirloom Soils of Texas. We're gonna
take a break here and do the news. Our phone number is seven one
three two one two fifty eight seventy four. Well, good morning. The
dark sky is lightning just slightly outside there. It is a beautiful day in
the making. Though. I just enjoy getting out in summertime in the morning
early on, getting my gardening work done and just enjoying. I love mornings
outside because of the birds. That's really wildlife. It's just, of course
it's the most pleasant time of the day in the summertime. But just the
songs of the birds are so cool. In fact, I need to talk
a little bit more about birds later today. But it's really just it adds
that extra dimension. You know. We have a number of senses. We've
got a site we got smell, we've got sound and so on. Well,
sound in the garden, the sound of water and the sound of birds
are two things that can really enhance and just make gardening even more pleasant thing
to do. I was saying, here are some houseplants the other day using
of course, the Microlife bio Matrix orange label. That's a seven one three
product seven one three. There's also the Microlife Ocean Harvest Blue label, which
is I think it's best to use for the outdoor plants that you have.
That's a four two three ratio a product. You can dilute it down,
use it as folior feed. Works just great. It being a fish based
fertilizer, it's gonna provide a lot of the nutrients that plants need, and
they do so so well when you do that, and they're in a little
couart jug. I mixed mine and water and just sprinkle them on, you
know, use them as a liquid fertilizer in that way, and it works
really good. You get a good fast result with a Biomatrix orange label.
By the way, it's also packed with nematodes, beneficial nematodes and those improve
the soil root. Oh my gosh, I'm still thinking about the phone call
from Gary. Now it's not packed with beneficial nematodes, it's backed with beneficial
microbes. I guess that's closed. But yeah, you know, roots need
microbes. Absolutely. Microbes make the world go around. And when you got
that biomatrix the orange label, you're getting a lot of microbial activity every time
that you use it on the plants. And I can see from my own
plants that it does. It does very very well. They respond very well
to it. Well, let's head out to League City and we're going to
talk to John V. Good morning, John V, Good morning Skips,
and good morning garden Line. Yes, my question is on the excuse me
one second. Is that the red Texas star hybiscus, And I'd like to
know about I know it. We had a plain red hybiscus before and it
grew all the way about to the second story really so needs a lot of
space. And there's a species a native plant to Texas. Is that why
the name? Uh Texas star? Okay, okay, could you turn the
radio off in the background or something? Oh, yeah, the radio's not
on. I apologize, I'm on the international landline. Oh okay, okay,
so yes, so Texas, I've never seen Texas started at that tall
red Texas star hybiscus. Yeah, okay, well like a two story There's
some other types of hibiscus that can get up that large over time. But
Texas Star. Interestingly enough, it's native to the Gulf Coast, but not
to Texas. It's got Texas in the name, but it is, you
know, Southeast Texas is not quite it's native range. But it loves it
here. It absolutely loves it here, and it does really, really well.
It'll put up with some very wet conditions. It's it doesn't like dry
conditions. I've got some at home in a dry spot that I just I'm
always having to run out there and water to keep it happy. So yeah,
this is but it does well here. It comes in the red that
you're familiar with, but it also has a white and all white form.
How beautiful is that? Well, that's wonderful. So it comes in two
seas because it's got five petals. Yes, the star is the name after
the star, so that's that's wonderful. That's where it got its name.
But just kind of not so well known fact. It's not native here,
but Hey, what do they say, I wasn't born in Texas, but
I got here as fast as I can. That's the right, that's Texas
Star. We'll go ahead and let it keep them in great a grand sayd
Texas. Well, thank you y'all have a wonderful Saturday. All right,
you two, thank you very much. John appreciate that. Do you have
pest problems? Well, if you have a house, you probably have pest
problems. You got some cockroaches running around, you got some silver fish that
are chewing up your books, and all the other things that happen around when
we've got this little six legged creatures living in the world we live in.
McGrath pest Control is the one you need to talk to. You know,
they've been here since what nineteen seventy four, Scott's dad Scott McGrath's dad started
it over over forty eight years ago. Still family run. They cover all
your pest control needs. And what is pest You know, pests don't have
to have six legs. They can have four legs too. In fact,
some people would say some pests have two legs. But anyway, things like
rodents, raccoons, things like termites in the wall, and some mosquitoes.
With each season, the pests we're mostly dealing with change season to season.
You know, September to February, we're about to get into big time rodent
season. McGrath can help with control and exclusion. McGrath does not tell you
I'm gonna come sometime tomorrow afternoon. They schedule a time and they show up
at the time. They said. That's why they're so highly related. On
all the review sites, the owner still is involved in day to day operations.
The owner is accessible to all customers. You can go on line to
McGrath pest Control dot com or call them two eight one four six nine eighty
two forty. With McGrath it's modern technology and techniques with old fashion customer service.
McGrath Pest Control. I always enjoy visiting with Scott. Just a wealth
of information. I mean, if you want to know anything about pess,
that guy knows it for sure. You're listening to garden Line. Our phone
number is seven one three, two one two five eight seven four seven one
three two to fifty eight seventy four. Give Josh a call, get you
on the boards and talk about some things that you're interested in. Hey,
if you're in an active adult age fifty five and better, and you are
looking for a new home, a new community, a place to move to
just really enjoy a very active life, you know, with lifestyle programs designed
around you. Well, that's a dell Web community, I mean. And
there's a new one, by the way going on is going in out there
in full sure. It's on FM three fifty nine, less than two miles
from downtown, and it has a community garden in it. And this community
garden, to me, just makes what was already a perfect community being Dellweb.
Beautiful homes, beautiful quality or a good quality, beautiful walk walking paths
and all the stuff you enjoy. It makes it even better. Community garden.
Find out from your about dell Web for yourself. The Dellweb difference is
really a distinction. You need to see yourself Dellweb dot com, slash Houston.
You can get more information there or just give them call to eight one
four five nine zero six zero nine. I need to get I need to
get back out there effective and talking to some folks about making another trip out
that direction, check on how things are going with all of that project.
I was driving down a street in down I say downtown, you know,
inside the loop, I guess if you will in Houston, And I just
had was noticing that I felt like I was in a jeep going over the
rocky mountains. I mean the soul heaving up and down and moving things.
And you know it breaks water lines in the summer. Well, that's because
our soul moves. And what does that mean. It means when it gets
wet, it swells, When it gets dry, it shrinks. And that
plays havoc on house foundations, on driveways, on sidewalks and so on.
I mean, you've seen it all over town. Priby experienced at your house
or your door sticking is a brick? Is there a brick crack? As
you walk around the outside and you see this crack, or maybe inside in
the sheet rock you see a cra you need to call Tai Strickland with fix
my slab foundation repair. So just go to fix myslab dot com. Easier
to remember fix my slab dot com two eight one, two five five forty
nine forty nine. Tell them you're a gardenline listener because they do a free
estimate for gardenline listeners and they they're committed to a fair price. They're committed
to showing up on time, and they're committed to doing it right. Let's
let's fix it once, and let's fix it right. That fix my slab
foundation repair again, fix myslab dot com. I was in San Antonio this
week, and you know we're at a conference. I'm gonna tell you a
little bit more about that. I want to talk about some of the things
I saw there that I think are new and cool when it comes to horticulture.
Right now, we're gonna take a break and our phone number seven one
three two one two fifty eight seventy four. We'll be right back. Everybody,
say, hey, you're listening to garden Line. I'm your host,
Skip Richter, our phone number seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy
four. Now, when you go to a garden center and shop, what
are you what are you looking for? Well, you want place that has
selection, right, you want a place that has plants that grow Here for
crying out loud, yes, absolutely, you want good customer service. You
just want to have fun too, I mean you want a place it's literally
fun to go to. And what am I describing? Well, tell you
one thing I'm describing is Enchanted Gardens. Enchanted Gardens out in Richmond. If
you're in Richmond, you're head up toward Katie Way there. They're up that
direction. They're on FM three fifty nine. You can go online to Enchanted
Garden Richmond dot com and you can find them. And man, do they
have a selection. Salvia's awesome selection of salvias. And by the way,
the hummingbirds are here. They are, They are arriving here to you know,
beef up and get ready to go. They're gonna have to fly all
the way across the Gulf of Mexico for their overwintering spot, and so they
need food. We need our hummingbird feeders out there. But you also need
to plant hummingbird food, you know, and salvias are one of the many
kinds of plants that do just that. And boy, do they ever have
a good selection. One of my favorite is amistade. The amistade salvia is
kind of a purple type salvia. It's really just deep dark purple and really
beautiful. And I mean there's only a million great salvius. They also have
a good selection of a hibiscus, the southern hibiscus, the perennial hibiscus.
They've got one called Summer Carnival. Another one airbrush effect at midnight Marvel.
When you go to in Channa Gardens, and I hope go do that today.
Check out. Say I want to see your airbrush effect and your summer
Ific, all of those hybistics. They even have a yellow on It's kind
of light buttery yellow called summer Ific French Vanilla. They are beautiful. Go
see what I'm talking about. They laugh at our heat. If you say
I'm going to be one hundred and five degrees and the humidity is one hundred
thousand percent, they just go, okay, I'll take it. I'm here,
let's do this. I mean, they are tough, tough plant as
long as you give them some water. They are super super tough plants.
And it's all out there at Enchanted Gardens out in Richmond again Enchanted Gardens Richmond
dot com. Go and in fact, before you go, grab a friend
and let's make this a let's make this a fun trip together, because it's
really a place. You don't just go, Okay, I'm gonna pick up
a plant and come home. You go and you wander and you wonder the
whole time. At enchanted gardens. We're gonna head out now to pair Land
and talk to Archie. Hello Archie, Good Morning's skip. I got a
couple of problems, actually, but the one is been an ongoing problem off
spring with my grass. And last year I left this time last year for
about three weeks to go to Germany and come back, and my whole backyard
had turned yellow. And uh, at that time, I wasn't sure what
it was. I called Randy. He said, he thought, you know,
it might have been take all patch or something like that. Okay,
So I put a bunch of organic composts all over the yard about you know,
a half an inch thick, and uh, what I got back was
some of the sant Augustine came back, but a lot of bermuda came back.
And I understand that, and you know, I'm cutting it and it
was still green. But now I'm starting to get yellowing again in various parts
of the yard, especially in that backyard area, and part of the soil
kids kind of sunk to where there's like little, you know, fissures in
the in the ground. I'm thinking, do I level that off? And
I've already put out some microlife brown patch, you know, thinking if it's
patch, I'll hit it with that and and I put out some microlife hue
mates. Okay, so uh at this point, I don't know what else
to do. I mean, I went out there and I try to tug
on it. It doesn't come up. I mean it's it's okay, it's
solid to the ground. And did you say sun or shade? I didn't
hear it. If you did, uh, it's part you know. I've
got it. Not not much shade, not much shade, mostly full sun,
all right, okay, and not near masonry or any kind of a
dry since it's in the back well. Yeah, out by the street,
it's really bad out there by the asphalt and by the driveway there's a little
bit of it, but it's mostly in yrds, away from any of the
concrete stuff. So the only thing I've got is rose beds. That but
those are those that's that's that's lumber rest, timber well arch. I tell
you. The challenge with this is a lot of things can cause a similar
symptom, and without actually seeing it, I'm kind of shooting in the dark.
My gut is that if you're pretty sure you're keeping it quickly moist.
The soil is adequately moist. I'm watering like crazy. Okay, then I
would probably look to take all root rot as being the cause of this.
I can again put you on hold, and you can send me a photo
of it from a distance and then something up really close and good sharp focus.
Uh, let me take a look and see if I see anything that
I'm not picturing as we talk on the on the radio here, and I'll
be happy to help you with that. But that that is my gut feeling.
It is not a brown patch, but the product you use a good
product. In fact, you need to hang on. If you got any
extra left, you need to hang on because we're about to be putting that
kind of stuff on again when we hit the fall. That that uh winter
riser kinds of fertilizers. But yeah, let me let me take a look
at a picture. But if I were to, you know, if you're
just say, okay, give me your best guests, I think it's I
think it's take all root rot. But I'd rather see the picture before we
send you out to buy stuff. Okay, all right, now, the
other thing, the other thing I have, I'd bought some hanging kind they're
not hanging baskets, but they're kind of the longer baskets that are metal and
have the coconut liners and they're only about six inches deep. I've got them
an ace and I put them along my fence line, and I got some
this running vinca, the red vinka that runs spreads. But I'm having the
water it twice a day in the morning and in the eave and just keep
it alive that because it's just not enough soil in there. Yeah, there's
no there's no root bank account of moisture. The bigger the more soil you
have, the less off in your water a container or hanging basket. So
that I guess you know. For now it is what it is. Just
keep watering it. But whenever you go back and do this again, I
would put pots like that in a shady area, growing shade loving plants because
the demands are less, and then get a bigger one if you want to
do that out in the sun. Hey, I've got a run. But
I hope that is helpful, and I do appreciate the call. I'm going
to put you on hold, Archie, so if you choose to send me
a photo Joshua, help you do that. You're talking about yards. We
need to be water in our yards properly. That you need to water a
good soaking in frequently. So you're thinking, well, it's hot, I
got a water every day. No, that's not good for the grass.
It doesn't develop good rooting and you spend a lot of money on water and
then the sewer bill goes up to as a result. If you go to
water my yard dot org water my yard dot org, you can get an
app as well as on an Apple App Store or Google Play, but you
can just go to the website. You sign in. They will send you
an email each week as to how much water your grass needs because there's a
local weather station near you that they tie into and they get the exact water
use and that that's important. It saves money, I may saves resources,
but it helps you avoid overwatering, underwatering, or miss watering. So a
good soaking on an infrequent basis, that's how we water. We want to
fill the soil volume and then we want to let it begin to dry out
and let air come back into the soil roots neat oxygen, so to just
constantly keep it saggy wet on top. You are literally depriving roots underground of
good oxygen levels where they can thrive. So when you water wet the sail
deeply. It takes about an inch to do that, and most soils can't
take an inch in at one time. Most of our sprinkler heads put it
out too fast for it to all soak in. So you water for a
little while before it starts to runoff. Have the water go off, Wait
forty five minutes, water again. Do that cycle and soak until you get
an inch in the ground. Can you get the most from your watering dollar.
KTRH Garden Line does not necessarily endorse any of the products or services advertised
on this program. Welcome to KTRH Garden Line with Skip Ricord. Well,
good morning, the light has arrived. It's you can get outside and see
what you're doing right now, get a little early morning gardening, dunk.
Got a little nice breeze out there to even make it a bit more pleasant,
because this is definitely the time of day when we enjoy being out and
about and enjoying ourselves out in the out, in the garden and in the
landscape. You know, I talk all the time about how everything starts in
the soil, how important soil is. And I don't think I don't think
a lot of gardeners here realize just how fortunate we are in Houston to have
sources of soil that are quality. I didn't apply to everyone, for sure,
but I tell you who it does apply to, and that's Nature's Way,
Nature's Way Resources. They're up there on Interstate forty five. As you're
going north toward conro About where fourteen eighty eight comes in. Just turn right,
cross over the railroad tacks. You're there Nature's Way. Now. You
can find their products bagged and some of our local source local retailers here,
but you can also go out there and you can buy it by bag,
you can buy it by bulk. I mean they have it both ways.
In fact, they got a lot of good quality fungal compost available. They
have a thing called Fungal Friday. Ever Friday ten percent off the bag product,
twenty percent off the bulk product. And fungal compost is a very high
quality compost. That is, it'll change things. It'll change things in your
yard and garden when you fix the soil like that with a quality product and
by the Way, Nature's Way, roast, fungal composts, leave mold composts,
on and on and on. Lots of quality products, all of them
because they take their time to do it right. By the way, when
you're out there, check out their nurse. They have one of the best
selections of native plants here in the Greater Houston area Nature's Way. I think
it's cool. They're they're continuing to change up the plan area a little bit
to get it just step by step nicer and nicer as we go along,
and the selection just continuing to expand and increase out. So while you're out
there picking up the soil, why not why not pick up some plants that
will thrive here because they're from here. Makes sense, doesn't it. You're
listening to Garden Line and I'm your host, Skip Richter and our phone number
seven one three two one two five eight seven four seven one three two one
two fifty eight seventy four. I was talking earlier about being in San Antonio
this past week. In fact, that just drove down yesterday evening, finally
finished up at the Texas Nursery and Landscape Association show. And that is always
fun. Number One, you get to meet a lot of old friends or
see a lot of old friends again, meet a lot of new people.
But there's a ton of new products, all the new plant lines that are
coming out. You know, there's boothfuls of you know, all the companies
that are saying here's our latest greatest, come see it. And that's always
a lot of fun, good a lot of new good tools and you know,
quality things like that. I got to see the folks at Vego bed
while I was out there. That was kind of nice to visit with them.
I think I mentioned earlier. I visited with Dean Nelson, you know,
Mike's ran from from Microlife was out there and some of his team.
Uh it. Got to visit with Dan Snyder over at Nitrofoss and talk to
them about some of the technologies they've got going on and some of the product
line that which as very wide as you know, as you would imagine that.
That was really nice to get out and kind of get to see all
that kinds of thing. Got rented a lot of other good old friends out
there and spend some time out. But it's always refreshing to get out and
see what's new. You know, they say that the most important part of
cutting cutting down trees is sharpening the saw. And boys that ever true.
You may have a sharp saw, but once it gets dull, you were
working lay to try to accomplish anything. Well, the way I look at
it as a horticulture is is I'm constantly sharpening the saw, and the saw
is me. If I don't stay up to date, if I don't continue
to read, to look at research, to talk to people, to visit
with the industry, my advice just becomes less and less valuable because it becomes
dated. And so it's always good to get out and do that. And
I would encourage you if you're interested in gardening at any level, find ways
to learn. There's a lot of good information out there. I mean,
just as a start, you can go to the Aggy Horticulture website. It's
Aggy Dash Horticulture dot TAMU dot edu. There's a section on vegetables, it's
really awesome. There's section on earth kind roses, Texas superstar plants, section
on fruit trees. It's outstanding. Just poke around and just learn. You
know, the smarter you get, the prettier your plants are. Right,
Remember what I say, there's no such thing as a brown thumb. There
is an uninformed when you inform your thumb, suddenly it starts to look a
lot, a lot greener, a lot greener. Hey, let's go out
to bel Air and we're going talk to Greg. Good morning, Greg,
Good morning, Skip. Thank you for taking my call. Yes, I
have a couple of questions. One on an improved Myers lemon. It's it's
new this year. I put it in a pot and it's I've got it
setting next to one that froze back last year, but it came back.
And the one that's in the park, the leaves on it are kind of
was getting some yellow spots or yellowing in it, I guess spots. And
I watered the plant every day, and I was just curious if you had
any thoughts on what might be causing that. You know, I see that
sometimes on citrus. And first of all, you shooting your water in it
plenty. Are you sure the drainage is good and it's not staying too soggy?
Is it? Well, it's it's setting on the ground, so it's
not on a like a block work and drain out even better. But but
maybe I can elevate it somewhat. Yeah, you can just take your finger
too and dig down or a little hand spade, just go down about four
inches and feel the soil and that that'll your answer right there. I doubt
you're overwatering. But sometimes when we set our pots on the ground, especially
at clay soil, it's just like you took a piece of modeling clay and
plug the hole at the bottom of the pot. You know, it didn't
accomplish much. So it could be that, I know, you know,
just in the combination of things like that, something's going on in the roots.
But certainly the heat, you know, is stressful to plants, but
centrist is tough. It can normally take the heat without these any kind of
problems that we worry about. On the yellowing spots, you see them more
on the old leaves or on the new leaves. I guess it's more of
the older or maybe time throughout the plant. But okay, I would say
the older leaves. Perhaps there are okay, there are a few nutrients that
are mobile. In other words, when the plant is lacking, it's steals
them from the old leaves and it supports the new growth with those nutrients.
And so when you see old leaf problems. I think of two things.
Number one, I think of the water content, you know, too much,
too not enough, that kind of thing. And number two the mobile
nutrients. So it could be that that something nutrient wise is lacking. When
was the last time you give them a fertilization? Has it been recently?
Or probably about six weeks two months ago? Okay, well you might consider
giving them another one gets you a good quality fertilizer force citrus and yeah,
and just follow the instructions on how much to put out, you know,
depending on the concentration in the product, you put out more or less.
Yeah, I have a microlife or so yeah, Okay, well that that's
gonna be a good one. Just put it down, follow the label and
water it end really good. Maybe even scratch it into the soul surface if
you could, because that's that microbially breaks down. So hey, Greg,
I'm gonna have to take break. We're hit another break time. But I
hope that helps, and good luck with it, and feel free to call
us back if if you continue to see problems and none of that seem to
help. Our phone number seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy four.
Sweet lit Well, good morning. You're listening to garden Line. I'm
your host, Skip Richter, and we're here to answer your gardening question.
So give us call seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy four.
Now, if you live, if you live up north and west of the
Greater Houston area, up in that direction out, let's say Carlos, Texas.
Does that kind of ring a bell for anybody? Well, I always
talk about this place like God's country, because it is. We're talking about
Rohnes Prairie. We're talking about beat Eyes, Iola I We're talking about neighborhoods
like kings Wood and Kingwood, king Oakes, excuse me, and your Wood.
I always get those two confused. King Oaks and your Wood. We're
talking about College Station and Brian Navasota, that whole region. Your hometown feed
store is Grimes County Feeding Farm, Grimes County keep Feeding Farms on State Highway
thirty and it's about two miles west of FM two forty four. Now it's
a family owned and operated. I mean, you know, Chris and his
family, They've really put together a nice place and they give you the kind
of service. I mean you walk in there and you feel like your family.
It's how they treat you, and it trusts me. Go try it
out. You'll see what I'm talking about. You know, Chris is he
started fifteen years in the Houston Fire Department. Public service always been his passion.
And you see that every day when you go out to the feed store.
I mean he puts his personal cell phone on his business card for crying
out loud. It's not like here, let me say something to go away.
It's like you got any questions, give me a call, because they
are there to make sure you have success. Whether it's livestock feed, whether
it's lawn and garden products. That's what they're doing now. They in fact,
today I believe is the last day of their customer appreciation Week, and
so you should get out there. It's ten percent off on all the tree
hugg sprinklers that they have in stock, ten percent off on Nelson plant food,
Medina products, nitro FoST products, microlife products, ten percent off on
all this. It's a good time to go out and get that because you're
gonna need all those. By the way, we're before very long we're going
to be doing our fall fertilizations here. Believe it or not, and you
need to have those on hand. Now's a good time to purchase some.
Two eight one eight one four twenty four ninety four. Two eight one eight
one four twenty four ninety four. That's Grimes County Feeding Farm. We're gonna
head out to Clear Lake and I believe we're gonna talk to Jim. Good
morning, Jim, good morning. I'm curious about the frequency that I can
put down. The medina has to grow for a long and what's some optimal
time of day to do that. A time of day doesn't I would put
it down, but then go ahead and water it in really well. You
want to kind of get it down there on the soul surface and keep that
moist because it's going to be able to put out the nutrients. This is
the liquid, right talking, right, comes in the while, it comes
in a gallant choke, and then you add it to the spray bottle.
Right. But yeah, So what happens though, is when you spray it,
it's the grass and it what's the thatch, right, the moisture of
your spray with the medina, and it is doing that. I like to
give it a little bit of a watering. I mean, I'm talking about
an inch of water, but just just move it down into the soul surface
there with a little irrigation. I think it works even better. I mean,
it's not the end of the world if you don't. That's just how
I would go about that. As far as the frequency of it, it's
kind of up to you. I would watch your lawn and see what your
lawn says. I you could do it about once a month, and that
would be fine. You know it, You're not putting a ton of it
out at any one time, and so you could do that about once a
month. I've seen people stretch it out a little further. I've seen people
do it a little more often. Just kind of to let your lawn tell
you visually. You know, you'll see the difference and it'll kind of guide
you in that. So one other quick question that a little off topic,
but all of these little brown lizards, are they eating bugs in the lawn
or what are they existing on it? Yeah, they're they're eating insects.
They love caterpillars one thing. I mean, yeah, caterpillars, and one
of their favorite those, I believe the brown I don't know which one you're
talking Abou've got a brown and knowlie that's kind of a slick, slicker skinned,
a light brown lizard. And then there's some other ones but lizards or
predators and they run around grabbing stuff to eat like the Toronto Source rex would.
I haven't seen a bug in the lawn and the longest time, but
I have hundreds of these things running around. Yeah, they're they're not I
wouldn't worry about them, but that's what they're doing. Yeah, they're out
there running around. Fortunately they don't have teeth like a Toronto source X or
we wouldn't be able to go outside. Well, thank you very much,
you bet Jim, thank you. I appreciate your call very much. You
know, you're talking about the medina product. I need to get back out
and do some planting, and when I do, I want to have some
medina has to grow on hand. That's the six twelve six got a pretty
good punch of phosphorus in it. And phosphorus is important, you know.
It helps with the flowering, it helps with rooting, and it affects other
processes in the plant that are absolutely essential for plant life and success. This
has to grow six twelve six. It's also got it's really cool blend.
It's you've got Medina still activator to simulate some biological activity. You've got humic
acid, which is always beneficial. It's going to help with us a little
structure and nutrient uptake. And then of course it's got the seaweed extracts too,
So that's quite a cocktail of cool stuff. And every time I put
a plant in the ground, watered in, watered in five days later,
again, watered in five to seven days later, again, give it about
a succession of I would say about three good soakings with this product to get
that plant. You wanted to hit the ground running. That's basically what you're
aiming for. And Medina has to grow will do absolutely just that and make
your microbes in the soil happy while probably adding a few microbes a few meanings
several million as well. But yeah, it's really good. Just it makes
sense to take care of your plants early on. Especially you know, sometimes
we wait until we see problems. But you know, if I'm gonna put
a plan out there, I know it there's a transition for it to get
established. And that is one of the reasons why we like that Medina products
so much. We're gonna head out to a leaf now and talk to Ralph.
Hello, Ralph, how are you today? Good morning? My grass?
Most of it is turned brown like the color of hay. And so
what in the heck do we do? Well? Well, I bet you're
not the only lawn and a leaf that's looking a little bit like that this
time of the year. So one, one more thing, it might be
helpful. There's one house on the corner. It has no trees in the
front, like ours don't have any trees in the front. So but there's
this is still green. So that's amazingly. There must be doing something right.
Yeah, you may have to go knock on the door find out what
they're doing. I tell you, though, Ralph, it's it's it's going
to come down to just two or three things. Water Is it getting enough
water? Is when you water? Are you wetting the soil deeply or are
you just is it just soaking in and maybe getting the top inch or two
wet? That's one, and right now, with the demand so high,
you gotta work at keeping the sole moisture up doesn't mean soggy, it just
means moist and so that would be number one. There are root diseases,
like take a a root rot. There are chinch bugs. That generally is
going to be something that starts over by a curb or a driveway and kind
of gradually moves out in the yard. So it could be a number of
different things. Grubs also, by this time of year, they're chewing enough
roots that that grass is having trouble pumping water. If you don't have roots,
you can't pump water, So it could be one of those. I
would start with really giving a good look at the lawn moisture content. You
can take a long, straight handle screwdriver and push it in the ground,
and if your soil is moist it'll push through it just like well it's like
soft butter, you know, it just pushes on down when you hit dry
soil. I mean, it'll be like you hit concrete without screwdriver, And
that kind of gives you an idea how deep is this soul went? I
think I would try try that test as the first step. What does the
brown grass turn green or does it just die? And how the grass grow?
Is your lawn Saint Augustine or Zosia Bermuda, what do you have?
We don't We're not lawn people, so we just have we know something's growing.
Okay, Okay, you have green grass, okay. Yeah. So
some lawn grasses will turn brown and a heartbeat when it gets dry, and
they'll just sit there and they'll be ready to come back. And that would
be something like buffalo, which should not be planted here. Others like Saint
Augustine, they live like there's no tomorrow. They just they're all above ground.
There's no underground rhizomes, and so when that turns brown, it may
be dead. Now there are Saint august There is a stage where it goes
pretty brown, but the runners are still green and it can recover. But
there's a stage which it can't recover from. So depending on your grass type,
I mean, if you want to send me a picture really up close
and good sharp focus, I might be able to identify it for you.
But so the answer to your question is, I don't know, because I
don't know for sure which grasses we're talking about. Some of them turn brown,
come right back, some of them not so much. Oh great,
great answer, Well, thank you very much. I thought maybe we'd have
to do braking or things like that course and get everything out. Well,
do you feel like it's staying adequately moist. Do you have a feel for
that? Oh no, definitely not. Okay, well I would, I
would blame that. So if you can't get out there and water, just
wait, you're probably over time going to end up with a mixture of grasses
and weeds. That's what happens when it gets kind of droughty, the grass
gets thin. So but I have a friend of mine over in Mississippi,
and I love this statement. He said, you know, if you want,
if you want a weedy lawn to look good, take your glasses off
weeds. Your green grass is green. It looks great without your glasses.
Thought. I think that's what we'll do. Thank you so much. All
right, you take care. Yeah, that's not advice. It's going to
be that a lot of people are gonna want to embrace. But you get,
you get the idea of what I'm talking about. Speaking of taking care
of your lawn. One of the things we need to do is keep that
nutrient content up there. And we want to keep it up there evenly.
In other words, we don't want famine. You don't want to dump a
bunch of a fertilizer that dissolves and immediately just releases everything you want to have
release over time. At Nitrofists Supertarf, that's their silver bag. I like
these colored bags because you walk in the store, look for the silverbag.
That's it. It's nineteen four ten and the nutrients and it it's got some
that are available right now and it'll get green right now. But then it
continues with the chemistry. I was visiting with Dan Snyder out at the Texas
Nursery and Landscape Show and about it, and we're just talking about those technologies
that release that nutrient gradually over time, so you get a good even growth
you're mowing is more smooth. The chinch bugs aren't as happy because you didn't
cause this flush of top growth at the expense of root growth, and the
root system is deeper. Did you know that when you over fertilize with nitrogen,
when you overdo it, and you know one application of overdone, you
get top growth at the expense of root growth. Well, we need heck
of a root system right now for that grass to do good. Nitrofile super
Turf can help you build that kind of root system, and it's available at
all of the places we talked about here the home garden centers that we're talking
about, the feed stores about he's hardware stores not hard to find. Hey,
we're gonna take a break, do a little news network with Niki Nikki
News Network. That's how it works. Our phone number seven one three two
one two fifty eight seventy four. Can't you see well, good morning,
beautiful Saturday morning out there. Every day is a good day for gardening.
I don't care if it's gonna be a hundred degrees. It is a good
day for gardening. That's just that's the way it works. I was I
follow a lot of our sponsors on their social media and stuff, and I
was looking at A and A Plants and Produce up there in Montgomery area,
and on their on their Facebook pager's a little meme of a Kermit the frog.
Okay, Kermit the frog. He's drinking water and he's standing out in
a desert and it says remember to drink lots of water and to stay indoors
between eleven am and November first. If I though it feels like that sometimes.
By the way, up at A and A they have a ton of
cool stuff. I mean, do you want plants that can survive in the
heat. Walk around your landscape. Look at it, I mean, is
it a sea of green? That's what happens in the summer here in this
area. We kind of lose some of our color. Well, how about
a bougainvillea. How about a plumbago. Oh that gorgeous blue sky plumbago flower,
or they have a white form as well. Rose bushes, I mean,
yes, roses, they do well. They do their cycling through the
summer and they are about to really kick off and fall, So you know,
pick up some of those that would be a good time. They're just
a lot of good plants, you know, hibiscus and stuff. And for
those of you up in the Montgomery area, when you go to Ana Plants
and Produce, you're at your hometown garden center and everything you need is going
to be there. They're right there in Montgomery on one oh five if you
go like toward Conro from Montgomery on the east side of Montgomery, they're right
there, easy to find, and they carry all the products we talk about.
That's the thing I like about this is, you know, I know,
when you go there, if you need to pick up some of the
fertilizers and soils and things they're gonna happen right there on hand as well,
and a lot of other stuff at ana plants and produce out there in Montgomery.
So yes, stay indoors between eleven AM and November. First, let's
go out to Richmond, and we're gonna talk to Ruth. Hello, Ruth,
good mornings. What's up in Richmond. Well, we have had in
the ground for several years a small ten by five twelve by five butterfly garden,
and the corners of it we have a copper canyon daisy and until this
summer day looked great. One in one corner. We thought it was mealy
bugs that were affecting it, okay, and we read to spray I think,
I want to say the knem oil, But then we read that nm
oil may be harmful to butterflies. And it's sitting in the butterfly garden.
But anyway, so as one deteriorated to death, the other copper canyon daisies
are declining, but the lantana in between. Of course, we're watering it
and we don't know if it is mealy bugs, how how should we treat
it? And we thought that copper canyon daisy would do good in the heat.
Okay, So mealy bugs, what makes you think it's mealybugs? What
are you seeing? What is the discus? There were some white on the
stems of the plant. Okay, Okay, then again, maybe maybe it
was something else. Because they are not next to each other. It could.
I won't say it can't be mealy bugs, but generally there if you
see the white along the stems, there's an aphid that can do that kind
of thing. There's some other insects that can cause the white kind of material.
Mealy bugs typically are all clustered together around like where the leaf attaches to
the plant or some other places. And if you grab them and squeeze them,
if you're unsqueamish, grab grab some of the white between your thumb and
forefinger and just push and slide to the side, you can dismiss it out.
If it's mealy bugs, it'll be a pinkish goo on your hand.
That's the easiest way to identify me books. I don't think that's what it
is. As to why that one is go ahead, no, that's good
to know. Yeah. As to why that one is going downhill when the
others aren't, I don't know me. Copper canyon daisy can take blazing hot
heat. It can now it doesn't want to be drowned, but it needs
adequate soul moisture. But it can take the heat, so it's not a
heat problem. Spider mites like marigolds, and copper canyon daisy is a marigold
type relative. You might try putting a piece of paper under some branches that
are going from healthy green towards losing that color and thump them real sharply with
your fingers, and then look at the paper for little specks that are crawling
around. That would be spider mites, And so that's a possibility. I
would check that and make sure that that's not what's going on. So soul
moisture, no spider mites. Other than that, I don't know. Send
me a picture. I can take a look. But it's really I just
have not seen copper canyon daisy have a lot of problems. Wow, and
we thought, yes they were. They were quite nice at one time,
and the aroma of them when you walked by, yes, yes, but
now the other two are in decline. Okay, so I will look for
the APIs what are the signs of the APIs no, Oh no, it's
your spider mites. You want to put it, Put a white piece of
paper under a branch and then real sharply, just pup that, thump it
and then look at the paper for little tiny specks crawling around. That's your
sign for spider mites. But you can also send me go ahead, how
would we treat How would we treat if it is spider mites this time of
the year. I would get a blast of water. And it's gonna be
a messy to do this, but just get one of those spray nozzles on
the end of your hose and put it on that hard blast, you know,
just a mist, not a shower like your watering plants, but just
a blasting mist or a fan spray, and get underneath it and just just
drench and blast all the undersides of the pleas leaves around the plant. Do
that once, do it to begin a week later, and you pretty much
have them under control. Avoid avoid oils and soaps when it's going to be
over ninety degrees outside, which it's gonna be for a long time. All
right, Okay, well, thank you very much, and I just send
where do I send? The photo again. I'm gonna put you on hold
and Josh will get you the email. All right, thanks for that call.
Hey, if you are an active adult and you would like to have
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nine oh six o nine all day, but I have no bed to
go. Well, good morning, beautiful Saturday morning. Hey, we made
a little cloud cover out there. That's kind of nice. It kind of
slows things down, heating up a little bit. Nice breeze to be outside,
and it's a good day. To also to be inside talking on the
phone to garden line, talking on the radio. We are here to answer
your gardening questions. That's what this show is all about. We want to
have you, help you have success. That's my goal. How can we
make you enjoy gardening more? How can we make your place more beautiful?
How can we help make your place, your garden more bountiful. That's what
it's about. And we can do that because good gardening is all about having
the right information. It really is. Your thumb is not browned, your
thumb is uninformed. And that's why we're here. We're gonna head out to
Santa Fe now and talk to John. Hello, John, good morning.
How are you. I'm well, how are you doing fine? I want
to know how I start Brussels spros. Okay, growing him before, but
it's been years ago. I want to start from seed. Do I put
some seed in some potting soil in the little cups and get them started there?
When do I need to get him in the ground? All righty?
Well, you want to plan them today in a cup or in a pot
whatever, you know, a little six pack tray, whatever you're gonna grow
them in. Go ahead and get a good quality potting soil or a seat
even better, a seed starting mix that's a finer ground. It's a very
fine textured, so you get good contact between the seed and the potting mix
the growing media, and that helps with germination percentage being better. But go
ahead and do it now, because you're gonna want to put those out as
we get on into late September. Probably it coin depends on what the weather
does. You know, mid to late September. Even you can do it
in October two. But russell sprouts take a long time, and so the
sooner you get them going, probably the better off you're gonna be. Okay,
now, I do have some very good growing okrah right now, And
I have a question. You know, I notice on the ocrapods I see
clusters of ants. Yes, they don't seem to hurt the ocropod, but
I'm wondering, what what part do they play in this? Okay? Well,
it's one of two types of ants, one specifically as fire ants,
and they'll go up there to get some of the oils. They'll even chew
into the pods to get moisture from the fire ants and whatnot. They're basically
oil slash protein. Interested that's their food stuff, and the other type is
just all the other general ants that feet that farm aphids or ranch aphids I
guess would be the term ants actually will pick up aphids that will carry them
up onto a plant and put them there and take care of them because they
can come back later and use their antenna, and they essentially are like dairy
cattle. They literally make the aphid produce a drop of honeydew and they feed
on that. So literally it's like ants being dairy farmers on your plant.
And those ants are of no damage to you, but if the aphids built
up high enough, they could be a problem. I've got a whole big
patch of oakre and I have one plant that is just covered with aphids and
it's because an ant took them up there or they landed there. But ants
will actually protect them too, so they don't you know, like a good
dairy farmer, don't let your cows get killed. Well, I don't see
any damage to the yolkra pod itself, but I see the ants on it,
and I'm wondering, Yeah, what part do they play? Do I
want to keep them away from there? If so, how do I do
that. Well, if it's fire ants, you need to get a bait
with spinosaid, a fire ant bait with spinosaid, and one of the mut's
on the markets called come and get it. Come and get it. Trying
to think of who makes it, but anyway, come and get it.
So when when you go, when you find that come and get it,
you sprinkle it around and the fire iNTS find the bait and it kills the
fire ants other kinds of ants. The only thing would just be blast them
off with water. That's all I would do that. That's what I've been
doing, is blasting them off with water. Yep, that's probably it.
Not much to worry damage the yolkra at all. Well then you know,
I wouldn't worry about it a lot. Just a lesser fire ins and you
go pick oak rah and now you're getting bit. I mean that that's a
problem. But yeah, all right, well, thank you for your information.
Have a good weekend. All right, well you too, thank you
for the call. I appreciate that very much. Bye bye bye. You
know, it is hot outside and it is dry outside, and our birds
have to have water, I mean they do. I just got a new
bird bath. In fact, I've got two different kinds of bird best now
in the backyard. You know, you got to give those things some to
drink. I mean it. There's not a lot of good water sources around
for them. And if you want them to hang out at your yard,
well we put feeders and stuff out, put water out that attracts them into.
Hummingbirds are arriving now, I mean, we need to be getting our
hummingbird feeders out and if you don't have one, you need to go buy
wild Birds Unlimited. Ask them about there. It's I think they call it
a high perch hummingbird feeder. It's a little flat thing and it is super
effective, and it just it's easy for the hummingbirds to get in there and
to do what they do. And you need more than one too. You're
gonna want to put them, you know, quite a little bit of a
distance apart, let them where they start bossing each other and protecting the feeder.
You don't take care of that, so they don't do that. But
Wilbirds has that. Wilbirds has everything related to birds, and I just have
to warn you taking care of birds as addictive it really is. I was
not a bird person before and now I can't imagine not having the sound of
birds. And I sit where where I sit in my living room, I
can look out and watch my feeders and see what they're doing, and it's
just entertaining. And if you're outside, the sound and just the colors and
the antics and everything, it's really cool. By the way, continue to
feed that nesting super blend from wild birds. It's it's our birds are in
their molt and they need it. You know, they're getting new plumage,
keeping it in top condition. Nesting super blend is important. It's one of
the many quality feeds that wallbird has. And do you have to have quality
bird feed, Yes, you do. If you buy feed just full of
those little red beebies, they don't want that. They don't eat that.
And so you think, well, I got a good deal on bird seed.
No, you probably are losing half of your bird seed to stuff birds
aren't eating, so you're paying double for what the birds are eating. Go
to wildbirds. Just let them teach you about it. There's there's different blends
for all kinds of birds. There's a lot of options. And I have
a big sack of a wild bird feed that because it is so effective.
I don't use as much, and I'm the birds are there at the feed
are all the time. But I'm telling you it makes a difference if you
if you are looking, you know, for something that is going to really
help you control a pest or control and maybe managing weeds in the garden or
diseases in the garden. Southwest Fertilizer is the place you need to go.
We were talking about Southwest earlier with another caller and it's just they have everything.
They have everything you need. We're getting ready for fall fertilization. Bob
at Southwest has a soil probe that you can check out. Now, you're
gonna have to leave a deposit so you don't decide you want to keep the
thing right you bring it back, but it's free. Just go buy there,
You leave a deposit, you take the soil probe and you can take
a quality soil sample that's accurate. Soil tests are accurate in measuring what you
send them, but if you don't send them a good representation or your soil,
then it's not The results are not representative of what's in your soil.
Does that make sense? Go by, just get talk to Bob. Get
that soil probe. Go home, sample your soul properly, and you can
send it to soil Testing DOTMU, dot EEDU and they'll give you the results
you need and then you can buy your fertilizers accordingly. And Bob has ever
kind of fertilizer you can imagine there at Southwest Fertilizer. I mean, I
was in the other day just writing some things down. I always check on
what's available in garden centers, and he had that and it was just,
you know, the selection was just unbelievable, unbebelievable and outstanding. And so
check him out at wild Birds wild Birds still got birds in my brain.
A Southwest Fertilizer, and you'll find everything. By the way, if you
need to get your lawn mower blade sharp and maybe a small engine or a
little bit of small engine repair done, they can do that too. But
you'll find your service and the knowledgeable staff they're unparalleled. I mean, they
really know what they're talking about. So when you go home, you spend
your money on a product that is going to work. I can guarantee you
that. Well, here we go again, another break for the news.
Our phone number seven one three two one two five, eight, seven,
four, seven, one three two one two fifty eight seventy four. Give
Josh a call, get on the board. We'll talk to you when we
come back. I'm enjoined being back in the saddle again visiting it. It's
been a it was a wonderful week out at the Texas Nursery and Landscape Association
show. Good to see so many of our sponsors out there, visiting with
Louise and Heirloom Soils for a little while talking about some of the products they
have in line. He did a really good talk too, by the way,
at the number of educational sessions. I was moderating all a lot of
the educational sessions, and Lewis did a really really good talk for garden centers
on some educational tips and techniques for how to have success. A lot of
fun being out there. We'll be right back. 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 Crazy, just watching as the club. Good
morning, good Saturday morning, beautiful outside there. You're listening to Garden Line.
I'm your host, Skip Ricter. Our phone number is seven one three
two one two five eight seven four seven one three two one two fifty eight
seventy four, while I was down in San Antonio at the Texas Nursery and
Landscape Association show, got to visit with Dean Nelson down there. And you
know, Dean started Nelson plant food back in nineteen eighty three. I mean
they've been doing professional grade horticulture fertilizers for a very very long time. A
lot of a lot of professionals are used Dean Nelson's plant foods because they know
they work, they know their quality, and when it comes to your lawn,
you have that same kind of technological advantage by going with something, for
example, like slow and easy. Slow and easy, what is that?
Well, I like that name, slow and easy. That's how it applies
fertilizer. You can take it. It's a twenty two two ten. You
can take it, put it on your lawn, and you're not just going
to get a flush of growth and then here come the chinch bugs and small
roots, you know, all the shorter root system, all the things that
happen when you overdo nitrogen. Nope, this one is designed to release a
little bit early, a little bit later, a little bit later, a
little bit later, and it just gradually feed your lawn over time. That's
why they call it slow and easy. How easier can you get? Then
you put the lawn fertilizer down and it's going to feed for several months for
you. I mean, it's going to give you that gradual release. It
works really well. It's part of their whole turf Star line. You know,
turf Star. They've got a number of products in there. I probably
don't brag about the rest of them enough, but we'll change that. We'll
talk about some other shim bit, but basically, slow and Easy is the
one for your summertime feeding of your lawn. You're going to have the beauty
you want. And while you're talking about while we're talking about Nelson's Color Star,
Neutral Star, our Nature Star, Nature Stars, your organic line of
fertilizers. They have a wide variety of options with Nelson plant Food and that
slow and Easy is one that is very timely to have a beautiful lawn right
now. By the way, when you're taking care of a lawn like that,
you want to also consider the micros that are needed. And that is
why we like a product called azamite. Now, don't think of asamite as
a fertilizer per se. It's like you need to fertilize your lawn, but
you also need to have the nutrient, the small micro trace whatever you want
to call them nutrients available as well. It's a mind product. It comes
out of Utah. They dig it out of the ground and it is just
packed with all kinds of trace elements. You put it on your lawn.
What I'll do is I'll do a fertilization. I'll turn right around loaded up
with the asamite and apply that separately. It's a different sized gran you'll so
don't mix them together than your fertilizer. But asamite works well. I was
visiting with Mike Hodge at the t n LA show in San Antonio this week.
We're looking at some of the new products they got coming along and pretty
cool stuff. But you can go to azamite Texas dot com. You're gonna
find azamite and a lot of the places we talk about here on garden Line
widely available, easy to find, and azamite as that addition to your fertilizer
to make sure the micronutrient levels are what they need to be. Let's head
out to Fairfield and we're gonna talk to Marty. Now, Hello Marty,
good morning. Skip question my Libularia chapter seat. Plants that I have on
the front porch are have got some kind it almost looks like an aged but
the leaves are just like one day I see a little bit of aphid and
I was spurring them all and the next day they're like brown and dead the
leaves and you're you're seeing apids on lobularia. Well, I don't know if
they're ageds or what kind of bugg it is, but they're sucking the juice
out of the leaves and you're not eating them. I can't see like little
jagged edges, but they're just sucking the juice. And one day they're alive
and one day they're did that's interesting, Well, I don't know I would.
I'm not run into that on those plants. They seem to be pretty
pest free for me, but hey, ever plant has its pest, I
would say probably a block. I would do get up early in the morning
and do it when it's still cool, barely daylight, and I do a
spray of inseexcital soap on those plants follow the label carefully, but you want
to do it early because you don't want the leaves to be wet with soap
when the sun comes out and it gets really hot, or you can burn
plants with that. I would try that the go ahead. They're pure shape.
Well it's I don't know it. I don't know which pesture you're seeing,
unless you could capture some and send me a picture of them. But
I still, you know, whatever the pest is, soap is good against
small, soft bodied pests, and pests in their young immature stages, and
for adult past it just irritates the heck out of them. We use it
to make worms come up, caterpillars come up out of the lawn and chinch
bug come up out of the lawn by by drenching them with soapy water.
So I would I would try that as the simplest if we knew for sure
what kind of pest? Is it a piercing sucking past you said it didn't
seem to be chewing the leaves, so you may be dealing with some sort
of a plant bug that's a piercing sucking that's going to take something a little
bit stronger. But I always hate to send people out to tell you go
buy this product, Marty, because I really don't know what's doing it.
And that's kind of what we need to get to the bottom of. You
know, there are a number of insecticides out there that will kill insects that
are piercing, sucking types of insects. We call it. The true Bugs
is one of the groups, and you can go try one, but you
may be wasting time and money if we don't find what it is. If
you could, you know, I've talked before about putting a a sheet of
paper underneath the plant and swatting the plant and then looking on the paper for
a little tiny things crawling around. Just you may try that and see what
you see. If you can capture anything and get a good picture of it,
I can look at it and identify it, and then we know exactly
what to do. Okay, and then real quick on the acorn they're topping
out that they're like when one day there's a bloom in the next day it's
like six inches tall, and it's this one variety. It's got that kind
of a maroon color with green oh on okra, Yeah, yeah, uh
okay, well yeah, okrew grows fast. Typically we pick okra about three
days after the bloom drops, so we can say pick it when it's four
inches long or two inches long or whatever, but it's really the time because
if it were growing slow for whatever time, it may still be small and
be tough. But about three or four days after bloom, so you may
kind of get out there. Some varieties are long and slender and fast.
One that's like that, Oh gosh, I just went blank on the name
aunt Hetty's. Aunt Hetty's red is a burgundy, and it grows really fast,
really long. So you may have a variety like that, and in
that case, longer is not a problem. You can you can. They
can be a little longer, okay, because like when they pop up,
there's like the next day they're huge. Yeah, so I've been pulling them.
I thought they were chaffs, so I was pooling them and putting the
seeds. Can I still plant the seed? You could once they're dried.
I wouldn't plant them while they're still white. But you can also grab an
ochrapod and just bend it and if it snaps loose, that's a good pod
to eat it. If it's like got some woody strands that are holding it
together. When you try to snap it that throw it away. That's not
worth eating. Okay, Hey, I've got to run for a break,
but I hope that helps. Thanks, thank you for the call, Marty.
Appreciate that our phone number seven one three two one two five eight seven
four In the saddle again, will be time, come back in the saddle
again. Oh that makes me happy. Gene Autry one of the singing cowboys.
Most of us, even me, not old enough to remember remember the
original singing cowboy days. But oh gosh, that's fun, fun stuff.
Hey. We are here on garden Line for one purpose, and that is
to answer your gardening questions, to help you have success with gardening. Our
phone number seven one three two one two five eight seven four seven one three
two and two fifty eight seventy four. Listen, these these hot days are
harder on your trees. Your trees pump a lot of water. To think
about this, Go set you know anything sitting out in the sun. Go
out about two o'clock today and put your hand on it. It's gonna burn
your hand. Think about every leaf on a tree is essentially subjected to that
radiation that literally would cook the plant tissues and kill them. Why are the
leaves all not brown, It's because they transpire water. What happens if they
don't have water? Yeah, you get the idea Affordable tree Care. We're
talking about our good friends at Affordable Tree Care. By the way, the
number seven one three six nine nine two six six three. They can come
out and do the deep root watering. Now you know there's deep root feeding
where you put nutrients in the ground. But Martin will get out there or
him and his team get out there and do the deep root watering, and
that's important and injects water to fill that soil profile because trees need a huge
volume of soil with water in it to be able to survive. For this,
I mean they can survive, but not without water. So any tree
that's important to you, oaks, pecans, elms, any big tree on
your property, keep them healthy now, because here's what happens. A tree
gets drout, stressed and then issues. It wouldn't have been a problem like
hypoxlin canker on oaks suddenly are killing the tree now the draft stress just set
them up for that. Don't let them do that now, Martin can do
all kinds of stuff. I mean they do. They do stump grinding,
you know, they do consulting on your trees. They can clear the power
lines because here comes hurricane season. Right, we're already in it seven one
three six ninety nine two six six three or just go to aff tree Service
dot com. Aff Tree Service dot com. Don't wait until your tree show
problems. It's probably too late by the time you get that. Protect them
now, take care of them now, hydrate him now to help them get
through. Let's head out to sugar Land and we're gonna talk to Mike.
Hello, Mike, good morning, Skip good talking to you again. I
was at the Stafford Center Home and Garden show this summer. Oh good,
yeah, yeah, I met you there, but you get gave me some
of that color Star by Nelson food. Oh man, that's rocket fuel,
man it is. I put it on boogabilias. I haven't found anything that
I'll make it bloom keep it blooming, but it's worked well so far.
Well good, all right, One quick question, then, when can I
start the fall grass feeding and what do you recommend? Well, we're not
gonna be feeding our fall grass until we get close to October or sometime in
October most cases. I see you're done in Sugarland. Yeah, i'd be
about the beginning of October probably we would be looking at putting on a fall
feeding. I've got a new schedule that's about to come out. We're just
trying to get some things worked out with the website. But it'll have all
that on it and I will talk about it incessantly once we get that up
there. But basically, the quick answer to your question is you're gonna put
on your fall fertilizers about the beginning of October. That doesn't mean it has
to happened in a week or two. There's a range. If you do
it eight September, that's fine, If you do it in late October,
that's fine. But you know, we want to get it on there while
the grass still is able to take it up and do some good with it.
Yeah, So what's the combination that you suggest? Well, you want
you want to go ahead? I'm sorry what we're saying. Well, I
lost a lot of grass during the winter last year. I don't know what
it was, due to the freeze of the drought. I don't want to
go through that again. Yeah, no, you sure, you sure don't.
I would say, you know, as far as combination you're talking about,
like the numbers and stuff like that, well, you know you were
talking about nitrofiles. That's a Nelson product, and Nelson also makes something called
carbo load. It's ten ten twenty, so that would be like a one
one two. Now, different companies their fall fertilizers are going to have different
ratios slightly. But unlike summer where we want a three one two or four
one two ratio, when we get to fall, we want a little bit
of nitrogen, but we mainly need to get that third number the potassium in
there. That's the winter heartiness and the chemistry of it is that they are
taking up taken up together and that that helps you. So you know,
if you use the summer fertilizer in the fall, it wouldn't be the end
of the world, but the much much better thing would be to go with
the higher potassium and unless nitrogen like turf Star carbo loade. Right, okay,
great, well, thank you love your show. Well, thank you,
I appreciate that. You take care you bubby. Yeah, and you're
gonna you know, I'm talking about these products like turf Star and whatnot.
You're gonna find every kind of product like that. I mean, we I
talk about a lot of different things on the show and one thing I like
about ACE Hardware is if we're gonna talk about it, they're going to carry
it. You can go to ACE hardware dot com, go to their store
locator, find one of the thirty nine stores near you, and, by
the way, allow yourself a little bit of time because you're gonna find the
fertilizers, you're gonna find the pesticide products and things you want. But you
need to walk through that store and see It would take a long time to
describe the store fully to you because they have so many different kinds of things,
and ACE hardwarees are independently owned, so each can be a little different.
I like to go different ones sometimes just to see what's new. What
do they have? ACE Hardware is going to have it. I mean that's
simple. They've got what you need. By the way, it's grilling season.
Still time to get out there and get that big green egg you can't
live without, or a trigger or maybe a webber grill, or maybe some
bling. They got lots of cool bling for outdoor cooking as well. Let's
head out now to David, and David, you're in kind of the west
central area. That's correct, Skip, thank you very much. I live
on an alley and there's kind of a gravel bed that runs the length of
my town home. And growing out of that gravel bed is a very robust
oleander. It's now recovering from the second breeze, doing good job. But
that gravel bed just had a ton of weeds. I had a guy with
a weed eater I go through it yesterday, and I'm wondering, how close
can I spray the round up to the oliander to just permanently kill those weeds.
Okay, the answer is as close as you want, but don't get
it on any green tissue on the oliander. So if you've got it,
you want to not pump your sprayer up too high where you get that mist
that kind of drifts up. If it gets on green stem or green leaves,
it'll damage that oleander significantly. And second the roots. Well, secondly
on the roots. When you're using a product like that, all you have
to do is dampen the foliage. If you're spraying and it's just dripping off
and you're drenching the soil, then you're gonna you're potentially gonna have a problem
with the roots as well, but in general, just barely with the weeds
that you can't kill it deader than that will kill it, you know.
In other words, if you go beyond just dampening the leaves, you're wasting
the product and potentially having some that secondary damage where you're talking about trying to
avoid it so deep that it saturates the soil that will get the rate that
will that will not do any additional good and can do additional harm. Great,
Thank you very much. I appreciate your show. Thank you, David,
appreciate that call. Appreciate that very much. I keep talking about Texas
Nursery and Landscape Association show because I was out there is visiting with David Williamson
from it, you know, out in RCW Nurseries and uh, just talking
to him about some of the things they've got going on. By the way,
you can go to RCW nurseries dot com. That's for those of you
who aren't from a with the area. That's the nursery that's on Tomball Parkway,
which is Highway two forty nine. Goes up to Tomball Robbery comes into
Beltway eight. You know, it's real easily located northwest northwest Houston, and
r CW's got all kinds of good stuff. I mean they always do.
You can always go there and know that when you go to RCW you're going
to have a good selection of plants. Right now, they got the Mexican
plumb in that's their tree of the month. And Mexican plum is a native
plum. It's it's a single trunk plum. Some of the plums form thickets
and they just become a mess in your yard. Mexican plumb is a single
trunk plum and it does well. It has beautiful spring flowers, it's native,
it's tough, and plus you get something for you know, wildlife as
well with that fruit that's on the little bit of plums. I guess they're
edible. They're not, you know, it's not the if you want fruit,
I would plant a fruit type plum. But they're on there and they
it's this is one heck of a tough trees. I've seen these things survive
in some pretty pretty brutal conditions. So I've been really impressed with that native
plum, but August August time is when they have their sale. Fifteen percent
of perennials select trees and shrubs on sale as well. They're open money through
Saturday seven to four. That would be today seven to four Sunday Tomorrow nine
to four at r CW Nurseries r CW nurseries dot com. Let's go to
Kingwood now and we're gonna talk to Bill. Hello, Bill, good morning,
Good morning. I'm interesting. I have nematodes, and which is like
having some kind of dere deadly social disease. As far as I'm concerned.
They are in both of my beds, both my garden beds at New Caney
and my garden beds in Kingwood. Years ago, I was able to use
some stuff called vapan to kill nematodes and it worked really great. But now
people like me with an advanced orgaining chemistry degree are not able to get that
stuff because they have restrictions on I think it's called controlled use pesticide or something.
Yeah, but what do you recommend? Well, tell me again,
what are the kinds of plants that are growing in the nematodes? Mostly vegetable
plants for an example, cantaloupes and the tomatoes and pepper. Okay, so
here here's the deal on nematodes. And it's not a fast easy answer.
I wish I could say go buy product B and you're done. We don't
have one of those, but we do things that reduce their numbers in the
summertime, growing a wall to wall marigolds in the bed. I mean,
I'm talking about every cubic centimeter or soil has a marigo root in it.
That's the goal that you go in there. Pardon fun specific a marigoles.
The African types are the big pom poms are better, but that's the other
types will work as well, but that would be that. Then you go
to the cool season and you do cereal rye grass, the grain type of
rye, which you can get at a good feed store, and the cereal
rye grass is the trap crop for the winter time. Anytime you grow mustard,
I know people that plant must or not to eat it, but just
wall to wall and then they chop it, turn it under, it decomposes
and kills nematodes. At planning nematode resistant crops, getting in a rotation where
you plant things that they don't get to kind of starve them down. Those
are all some of the options. Solarizing helps a little bit at the surface,
but it doesn't go deep enough to control them. And Bill, I'm
sorry, but I'm running against a hard break here. But those are a
few of the things that you can do that will work pretty well on the
nematodes. Just trying to keep your susceptible crops out of that soil. Maybe
a different garden bed so that you can rotate a little bit better. Thank
you for the calling. I tell it, hey, Bill, Bill,
would you hang on. I'm gonna put you on hold and we'll come right
to you after break. I've got I've got to cut looseier. All right.
There you have it. You were listening to garden line seven one three,
two, one two five eight seven four. We were I was talking
about earlier visiting with Dan Snyder out at the TNLA show and talking about some
of the fertilizers and stuff they have. You know, they have the sweet
Green and I don't know if you've used this before, if this is an
organic fertilizer. It's eleven percent nitrogen, which is one of the higher rates
of nitrogen and you can get in a product. Of course, you just
apply it accordingly. You know, you get stronger products, you apply less
fertilizer products, you apply more fertilizer. But this Sweet Green, it has
a wonderful sweet smell and it is basically a molasses based product. They go
through a certain process that where microbes are involved in it and it breaks it
down and it gets those numbers up where they need to be. But when
you put that on the soil, the microbes go crazy, and microbes are
what makes the world go around. In the root system of a plan.
You can put that down. You can see a pretty darn fast response in
my opinion, from it, and it works really well. Again, it's
easy, it's easy to apply, it works well, it does well.
It's got an organic it's basically an organic based product. Sweet Green is available
everywhere nitrofoss is available, which is everywhere. I mean really the ace hardware
stores, we talk about a lot of the home and the home, mom
and pop nurseries and garden center, even feed stores that we talk about here
on garden Line are going to carry the nitrofost products and that would include the
one Sweet Green, and that would be a good time to put some of
that down. It would it would continue to feed your lawn, carry you
on into the upcoming fall fertilization, which is still a little bit away.
But nitrofost sweet green, I think you will be very pleased with it in
many many aspects and regards. We're going to head back and talk to Bill
back in Kingwood. Bill, I think we were still working on some nematode
questions. Right, Yeah, but you know, really have a go to
Joe. Gonna tell you that I was considering using plotonium, but I thought
there might have some mild side effects. Yeah, yeah, just mild.
It wouldn't it wouldn't do much. But you know what you wouldn't need outdoor
landscape lighting make the yard glow. Oh, I got it. You take
care, Thanks for the call. Sorry to waste yours all right, bye,
Hi, it's fun. It's never a waste of time when we're having
fun. Yeah. I need to tell Jason at Pierscapes about that. We
just need nuclear reactive materials to do the landscape lighting. Now. Actually Pierscapes
does landscape lighting, but they do it the right way. These high quality
LED lighting, you know, saves you some energy, and you just don't
want your place glowing like Peerscapes also does irrigation. Maybe maybe your system needs
a little work done. You know, things aren't working right. Most irrigation
systems are not efficiently designed, and they're definitely not maintained properly, and you
waste water and then you end up with brown spots. You know you're watering
and you got this spot over there, stay's brown, and it's because the
sprinkler heads are not reaching that area with the same volume of water they are
other areas and so on. You know what I'm talking about. But Peerscapes
pretty much anything you need done, they're going to do it. Jason and
his team. We're talking about experienced people. We're talking about professionally trained employees.
The average tenure for their employees over ten years. I mean, they
got folks that have been there twenty six years and more. They've got their
certification, they got their license. You want something designed, They've got designers
Bob Candice that they know how to do it right. They can turn your
place into a show place. Maybe it's a front yard. You want people
driving by to see a beautiful home. Maybe it's a backyard where you're enjoying
time with friends. Pierscapes. You can go online to peerscapes dot com or
just Callumn two eight one three seven zero five zero six zero. Oh my
gosh, Antonium, what do we think of next? Right? I was
talking earlier about tree problems and things, and watering our trees is really critical.
Watering them right is also critical. The squirt you put on your lawn
is typically not going to do them much to help the trees. It's just
not going to get down deep enough. And you know, trees and grass
compete, so we need to do additional care. But when a tree is
new, you absolutely have to water it regularly. Right now, in the
heat of summer, a tree that's been planted in the last few months,
you better be watering that thing almost every day. Now. I don't mean
drowning it and creating a swamp. I mean a regular watering of that little
root ball you put in the ground or roots cylinder I prefer to call it,
because that's where all the roots are, and so the soil may be
moist around it, but it pumps dry that little roots cylinder, and gradually,
over the months and years, roots get further and further out and it's
not touching go at all. They're very resilient. But early on that's where
the tree hugger sprinkler comes in. Because tree hugger you can set that thing.
You put it around your trees. It's got a little valve on it,
and go back to the faucet and turn it on. You can have
it water just a little bit to water that root cylinder, and a little
beyond that. You can turn it up more and more. You get a
fifteen inch tree hugger. They come in seven, eleven and fifteen. I
believe the fifteen inch we'll put water all the way out, you know,
put it out fifteen feet or more in both directions or all directions, all
around the tree, so you can really give a good watering underneath that branch
spread of the tree where watering is so critical. So I would say even
the first five years of a tree's life at least that I would be looking
at a tree hugger sprinkler during these days of absolutely blazing hot weather and not
enough rain. Unfortunately. You can go to tree Hugger Sprinkler dot com.
You can find out more information there and they are sold in all the good
places we talk about here on Garden Line. We're gonna head out now to
Tiki Island, Texas and talk to Jeff. Good morning, Jeff Warrant,
Sir, how you do today? I'm well, what's happening in the wild
tropical world of Tiki Island, Texas? Oh, not a whole lot where
I'm looking at some of the mango plants growing, and you know they're they're
not minding the heat too much. But I was gonna rack your brain on
a winter garden. I'm already starting to think of transferring over to uh right
now, the flower or the garden is full of grass clippings and all my
old cuttings and that stuff. But yeah, I already started seeing something baby
tomato plants show up at the stores. And when when do you usually transfer
over to your your winter crop? And what do you do to get the
tomatoes going? Well, you need to do that asap. It is definitely,
uh the later part of tomato planting season. So go ahead and get
those transplants in the ground. Choose varieties that that move fast. You know,
brandywine may take almost eighty days. That's too long for fall, uh,
you know, so get things are a little faster, uh, and
get them in the ground as soon as you can. As far as the
tomatoes. The rest of the fall garden, you know, it comes in
stages where we're planting cucumb and squashing things. Right now, we're gonna as
get to the end of August, we're gonna be putting in potatoes, a
little new potatoes. I've been I've been seeing celebrity. I've been seeing some
of the better boys. Those are the ones that I'm seeing right now.
Yep, that are out there. I don't know if you've got a preference
on that one. Those are usually the two I go to. Yep,
I do quite a bit. I would do the celebrity that's a Texas Superstar.
By Iggonlife Extension or Econlife Research has something called superstar plants, and that
is a superstar plant. It does very very well the benefit of celebrity.
It is also has nemotoad resistance. And you know, you get out near
the coast, get some sandy soils, and you need that nematoade resistance.
Hey, I'm gonna have to take a break here. If you have a
follow up, just hang on and I'll come back to you. If not,
Jeff, it's great to talk to you. Sorry, we got gotta
go to a break. Our phone number seven one three two one two fifty
eight seventy four. Well, good Saturday morning. We are talking gardening today,
which is what we do every Saturday from six am to ten am and
every Sunday from six am to ten am here on garden Line our phone number
seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy four. If you are looking
for a beautiful home in a beautiful neighborhood, walking trails in even an active
lifestyle. We're talking about you know, folks fifty five and better that are
just wanting to enjoy their retirement years or have to be retired, but just
an active lifestyle. That's Dell Web. And Dell Web has a new community
down in the excuse me, full Share area on FM three fifty nine,
a couple of miles out at a full Sure, they have a community garden.
In fact, I was just talking talking to someone the other day.
I'm about to go down there again because I've been helping them with that garden.
That community garden just makes I mean, Dell Web's enough right there,
but you throw a community garden into a Dellweb community. And for those of
you listening on garden Line, wow that I don't know how you do better
than that. It makes sense, right, Dell webs built, it's designed
around you, the lifestyle programs designed around you, and so of course they
would have a community garden. That just makes a lot of sense. Hey,
you can go online to dellweb dot com slash Houston for more information,
or you can call two eight one four to five nine zero six zero nine
two eight one four five nine zero six zero nine, so you can discover
that Dell Web difference for yourself. Well, here we are listening to garden
Line and we are going to go back here. I believe we're gonna talk
to Jeff in Tiki Island. Jeff, I c out there still. I
think we must have more to talk about. Yes, sir, you're previously
talking about nemato and I don't know this is just a wise tale, but
my dad and other senior gardeners always told me to put the remnant crab shells
that I catch down here in the garden after they dried out to help with
the nematode population. And I've been doing it for years I don't know if
it's truthful or not, but it's it's really helped me out. It is
truthful. The kitan in things like you know when you eat crawfish and you
got that pile after you're done of all the body parts. That's basically a
high kitan as is you know, crab shells and other things. You get
the same thing, and there are there are organisms in the soil that they
feed on that material. Your crab shells you put down, and they are
they helped fight nematodes and so you're it's like you're you're increasing their numbers by
putting in the high kiten materials, and then the nematodes that are there have
a tougher time of it, and it helps reduce It doesn't eradicate, but
it does reduce their numbers. Excellent. Next one, I was going to
ask you the plumbarias that I've got going everywhere, they're full bloom and gorgeous.
Is it damaging to the plant if I snip off some of the leaves
They're getting very very heavy, and I'm adding support underneath of them. But
I wanted to kind of cascade the floral a little bit more and it didn't
know if that's damage in because I know it, let's add a white secretion
afterwards. Yeah, am I hurting them at all? It's it's a percentage
game. I mean, every time a plant has a leaf that's green and
active, it's doing that plant some good. So as you take them off,
I gonna take them one leave off. Well, that's not a kill
a plant, but you know, there's it's a it's a gradual from it's
not black and white line, it's gray across there. But at some point
you're taking enough leaves off so that you're probably affecting your balloom production and your
overall plant health. You know, it's carbohydrate production and storage. So I
don't know that there's a certain amount of leaves you can take off, but
just be aware of the fact that the more you take, the more you're
probably setting it back a little bit. I'm keeping it at a pretty I'm
just kind of just getting it to the floral doesn't have the leaves going into
it, okay at all? So not a huge number, all right,
Next, what I have Do you have any recommendations on pineapple plants. I've
had several of them over the years, I've gotten one pineapple, but I
can't get to it to replicate and shoot out the fruit to get Okay,
what you do is, once your plant reaches a good size, it's not
just a little young plant trying to grow, but you've got a good sized
pineapple. You put an apple in the middle of the top and then get
you one of those. What I would use is a dry cleaner bag,
a clear bag put over the whole thing, and basically you're keeping the ethylene
gas from the apple in around the base of that crown of the pineapple,
and it initiates the bud formation that will become the bloom slash fruit that comes
up. I can't remember how long you need to leave the apple there.
It's not a super long time. It's just there long enough to cause that
initiation. But as an apple sets, it does give off gas that will
do that. But you've got to capture it and hold it in. That's
why we have the dry cleaner bag over it. Of course, you wouldn't
want it in the sunshine. When you're doing that. You put anything behind
a clear cover in the sun and it's gonna cook. So I'm moving it
to a shaded area. Apple and I'm covering the entire plant. Yeah,
yeah, you're you're keeping it in. And if you go online and you
know, do a search for just say pineapple, fruit apple, you're probably
gonna find more information on some of the details of it. I'm gonna have
to run to another call. But that is it, you bet, that
is it. In a nutshell, Thank you, Jeff, I appreciate that
call. Buchanis Plants in the Heights. They have one of the best selection
of plants that you're going to find in Houston. And you know, with
hummingbird season arriving now, they've got an excellent selection of hummingbird plants. Firebush,
Jamelia, Patton's butterfly weed, esperans a, Turk's cap the autumn sage
Zavia, greg Guy, the cardinal flour, they cape, honeysuckle, cypers
vine. There's just a lot of really cool plants. Even the even the
Pride of Barbados is a good one for that firecracker bush and coral honeysuck.
Buchanans has all that, and they have a lot a lot more. By
the way, today you need to write this down. It's right out.
In fact, when the show ends, it's starting, so I'll give you
permission to quit listening a few minutes before ten Okay, I'm joking. August
twelve, that's two day ten am to eleven am. There's a totally tomatoes
program put on by Sherry Crews at Buchanans, and she's going to get you
set up for the whole fall season of tomatoes. What do you plant,
how do you plan it? What kind of products do you use in the
soil to have success? That's all of Buchanans and it's today, so don't
delay. I mean you'll miss it. If you wait until after the show
to drive over there, you've missed it. So get over there and look
at it. And while you're there, say I want to see everything you
have that attracts hummingbirds. And by the way, you better have a plenty
of time because they have a lot you can plants dot com. Uh.
They're on East eleventh Street and the heights, easy to find. Everybody who's
been gardening here for a while knows about Buchanan's plants. It is definitely one
of those destination garden centers. Let's head out now to Spring and we're going
to talk to Sherry Hello, Sherry. Hey, Skip, it's nice to
hear your voice. Thank you. Hey. My question is years ago,
you were the county Extension agent in Montgomery County, and I remember there were
volunteer gardens where you could go volunteer and by doing that you would get experiencing
garden gardening, and you know it would help you with problems that you're having
in your own garden. Okay, I was pretty young then, but now
I'm interested in finding something like that. Is there something like that near Spring
Texas? All right, I'm going to give you a quick answer, and
that answer is I don't know, but I'm going to find out. That
is an excellent question, and I'm going to call all or contact all our
garden centers and ask does anybody do this? And I'll announce it on the
air if I get a yes. Thank you for that. I'm sorry to
have to be in a hurry, but I got to run to another call
here and we'll be right back. But yeah, I will announce it on
the air, Sherry. If I do find that out, that's a great
question. Thank you, Thank you. I've been talking about fertilizer and importance
of fertilizing your lawn importance of having a healthy lawn. If you are looking
for a quality organic fertilizer, I'm going to suggest a two product punch,
and that would be Microlife's Green Bag and Microlife's Purple Bag. The green bag
is six to four. That is just a standard top organic fertilizer in the
region. Absolutely in terms of you know, look at how much of sold
the products, the popularity of that product, that's it. And then with
purple humates plus add that to it and you've got that combination. Go to
Microlife Fertilizer dot com for more information. Kelly, I see that we are
about to take a break here. If you will hang on a little longer,
I know you have hung on for a long time. Sorry about that.
You will absolutely be first up when we come back if you'd like to
give us a call. Seven one three two one two five eight seven four
seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy four. K t r H
Garden Line does not necessarily endorse any of the products or services advertised on this
program. Welcome to k t r H Garden Line with Skip rictor that just
watching as we did Saturday morning. You're listening to garden line. I'm your
host, skip rictor, and why are we here. We are here to
help you have a more beautiful garden and a more bountiful landscape. Really,
that's the bottom line. I mean, how do we help you to have
success? Because let me tell you, there is no better hobby than gardening.
And I know folks that listen to the show that are not gardeners.
They're just curious. I mean, I don't know. Maybe they wonder what
the next crazy song we're going to play is. Who knows why, But
I know they're there, that you're out there, and I would encourage you.
Why not this fall? Why not become a gardener? Hey, just
start with some containers, just a few containers. It is therapeutic, it
really is. I mean, if it's just a house plant, let's get
started. Let's give it a try. We will hope you have success.
You live if you're listening in the Houston area, you live in the town
with the best group of nurseries anywhere in the state. And I know what
I'm talking about. I've lived in Austin, I'm in a Santonio area.
I've been ben to Dallas many times. Those are all great towns got some
awesome garden centers. If you're gonna go on a trip to one of those,
just let me know and I'll tell you where to go. Some cool
places, but not like here, not as many and not just the uniqueness
and everything. It is great. It's a great, great place to live.
And what's an example of that. Well, I'll tell you an example
of that. Arbourgate Nursery up in Tomball. It's a destination place. The
plants they have are amazing, The service they give is amazing. Beverly and
Kennon, all the group out there at Arborgate, they know what they're talking
about. They take time. How can they help you, They listen to
what you're asking. They put you and the plant need together so that you
can have beauty, you can have bounty, you can have success. And
while you're out at Arbourgate, then by the way, you can go on
line to Arburgate dot com and find out more about them, where they are
and everything there. They are about a mile and a half west of two
forty nine on twenty nine twenty in Tomball, So go up two forty nine,
turn left on twenty and twenty about a mile and a half on the
left. While you're out there, check out the one two three completely easy
system. It's a food of four four three organic fertilizer plus calcium and it
feeds anything with roots, so that's pretty much anything. They have a soil
for every application. That soil is specially designed knowing the issues we have in
our soils here Arburgates. Soil is designed not just you know, like a
peat and so on. This product is a quality products. It's got compost
in it, a quality compost, it's got large particles sand, and it's
got shale, expanded shale. What does that do? That opens up a
clay. The more shale you add, the better, I mean, because
you need quite a bit of it to really open up a clay. And
when you use their organic Soil Complete over and over over time, you're just
going to be building it up better and better and better. Their compost complete,
Organic compost complete, two different kinds of compost mixed in there into that
product. Tons of microbial diversity, lots of microbial content and diversity, which
are both important. And you know they also have expanded shale in that it
promotes that internal drainage of the soil that is so critical. Now. I
know it hadn't rained in a while here, but boy, when it rains
here, it pours. And if you're soil doesn't have good internal drainage,
you're gonna have issues with your plants. Arbogate dot com check them out.
If you've got family coming into town, there's that destination. They can go
out there. They may even go in the gift houses and just look around
at the little shops that they have. And I mean, just trust me
on this one. If you hadn't seen it before, you got to see
it. And if you have seen it before, you know what I'm talking
about. We're gonna head out now to Base City and talk to Mike.
Hello, Mike, Hello, how are you doing today? I'm doing well.
Got to listen to a lot of it, so I haven't heard you
tell everybody that anyway. Sorry, all right, Hey, you in the
past talking about pepper plants and how you can nurse them through the you know,
into the fall and have great bountiful harvest and all of that. My
question is, I'm they're coming along great, but they're getting kind of Mike.
I lushed you there. Are you still there? Tell you where I
think Mike was going and as we try to get Mike back here, we'll
hopefully I'll I'll tell you what, Mike, I'm gonna put you on hold
just a second and we'll try to get that audio straighten out. You may
have to call back in. We're gonna put you on hold, and I'm
gonna go to Kelly and Centerville. First of all, with a lot of
apologies. Kelly, I said you'd do first, and then next thing you
know, I'm taking a different call. So no worries at all. Is
this center fill up up highway? Okay, yes, that's correct. My
question, I just bought a small track of coastal hay Hay was just cut
off of it, and I did soil samples Monday wedding for the results and
the recommendations. And the previous owner has not fertilized or done any kind of
herbicide this year. And my question is in these drought conditions do you recommend
a liquid or a granular And the other part is would you add any herbicide
at this time? So that that is basically an ad question. And being
in horticulture, I've always worked with agriculturists to handle the pastures and things I'm
I'm fairly aware of it. So I'm gonna give you my answer. Are
you in Leon County? Yes? Okay. Richard Parrish is your agg agent
at the Extension office AIR and Richard is excellent. I would you can listen
to what I say, but then call Richard and believe what he says.
That's how I do it. He is very good at Yeah. So I
don't know that a liquid at this time is going to do you a whole
lot of good. I would you could put a granular down. What the
Bermuda grass needs is moisture though, and so uh, you know, if
we could get some some rain coming and you put a fertilizer down and kind
of get it washed in, it would kick it into high gear. It's
a warm season crop and you've got a lot of growth yet, growth yet
to come on bermuda grass pasture up and in the Centerville area. But as
far as drought is concerned, uh, you know, at the right rate,
you're not going to burn the plants with the fertilizer on the pasture you're
putting on if you don't overdo it. But ultimately it's going to be the
water that it needs and so I don't know, we all need to be
out there doing rain dancers right now. Put an end to this nonsense.
But yeah, that that, But it talked to Richard Parrish. I don't
have his phone rub on the top of my head, biteen f I can
find it. Yeah, yeah, he's he would be the one who would
give you a better answer. As far as the weed control you're gonna wanna,
you need to spray something that has actively growing weeds. If your weeds
are drought stressed and they're just kind of stunted and sitting there, the products
that would normally kill them very effectively will not work very well. Okay,
yeah, so I mean it or not. People will spray round up on
a bermuda grass lawn in the winter to kill winter weeds because the round the
bermuda grass is so out of it asleep not doing anything that round up doesn't
even kill it. Isn't that a weird deal? I mean normally, which
is kill bermuter very well. But that's just that whole point about plants being
stressed or actively growing. I've heard that. Yeah, okay, information,
Hey, hey, are you listening? Are you listening on the radio or
on the computer or what up there. I'm listening on the radio. Okay,
I'm actually yeah, I'm actually down in the in the woodlands right now,
so I'm more local. But I would just I listened to you on
the radio, appuly. I just didn't know if I didn't think the radio
signal carried up to Centerville. So yeah, I'll get it. Okay,
I don't know why, but okay, well good, I'm good. I'm
glad you're listening. Tell your friends and neighbors about it. You take care,
I will. All right, We're gonna take a break ride here our
phone number seven one three two one two five eight seven four will be right
back. You are listening to garden Line, and we're glad you're listening,
because what is this about. Well, this is about you and me talking
and figuring out stuff and making your garden more beautiful, making your gardening more
enjoyable. You know a lot of people have banged around out there trying to
get something done on a garden and just felt like I got a brown thumb,
it doesn't work. Well, that's not true. You don't have a
brown thumb. You have an uninformed thumb or a misinformed thumb. Boy,
there's a lot of misinformation on gardening out there, but we're here to happy
to have success because gardening is way too rewarding, way too much fun for
you to feel disappointed in any way, shape or form. That is absolutely
true. If you've got a little piece of property outside of town, maybe
a few acres, maybe a lot of acres, you need to consider a
Caboda tractor. I mean, though it's the original orange tractor, they are
cool and a lot of fun. I like to say, you know that
the Caboda is kind of like getting a new car. You know you're out
there enjoying it. And speaking of comparing the Caboda tractor L twenty five zero
one, you can get it with a front loader, you can get it
with a little mower behind it, and all kinds of stuff to trick your
riot out. Really really really cool. And where do you get a Caboda
tractor. You get it at LM tractor dot com. LM tractor dot com.
There are several LM tractors in this listening area down here. It's not
hard to find one. And when you put the combination of Cabota and Lansdowne
Moody together, you've really got a winning deal. And let me prove it
this way. They have a deal right now, zero down, zero percent
interest for eighty four months at seven years. I mean that hand like they
say, hands down, it's lansdown, and that is absolutely true. You're
not gonna get a better deal than that. Go buy there. Just sit
on one. Just try some of this stuff. Sit on one, check
it out, let them tell you about it. I think you will be
as absolutely as impressed as I am. And next thing you know, you're
gonna be hauling that mulch with that front end loader around the property and getting
a lot of other good fun stuff done. In fact, it might even
be working on one hundred degree day. I don't know. Maybe that's stretching
a little bit, but I always enjoy being out on a quality tractor.
Let's go to Mike in Bay City. Hello, Mike, Hello, Sorry,
missed your call while ago. Something happening all right? Well, hey,
I think you have a pepper question, right I do. You talked
about nursing your peppers through to the fall and you'll have a great crop.
They're more abundance and so forth. Yes, Well, I'm doing great with
the pairs, but they're getting pretty tall, not necessarily lanky, but pretty
tall. And I'm wondering if I can cut a bunch of little lambs off
and that won't that won't deter anything. You'll be helpful, be a little
more sturdy plant. What do you think about You could do that. Mine
are getting tall too. You could do that and they'll branch out. But
that's gonna delay things, so it's gonna have to you can cut them back.
They're gonna pop for a little bit and then they're gonna start setting out
new shoots. And those shoots have to mature and hit a point where they're
you know, have looms on them and then set peppers. So what I'm
doing on mine is I bought some of these steaks, like survey air type
steaks, right and I just hammer one down right beside each plant, right
in the middle, and then I use some twine or something and just kind
of pull those limbs up and together. Say that it doesn't fall apart,
you know, the limbs, because peppers are a little brittle and you don't
want them to break over little. I would not cut them back. I
would just do that, and I think overall going to be better off as
a result of that, I've been thinking about this every week. I never
called in to ask about it because I'm just tempted to cut them. And
I'm glad I called you so I didn't want to cut them. Well,
I'm glad to hear that and happy to be able to help. And all
we ask is that half your pepper crop you drop off at the studio so
I can enjoy it too. Okay, I'll take them all the ones there.
That's a small price, the man. I have a good time with
your peppers out there. Okay. Take Here's funny. I've talked about trees
a number of times today and different things, you know, importance of that
tree hugger, sprinkler and things like that. By the way, I saw
a tree hugre ride at Verdant Tree Farm a while back. They Verdant Tree
Farm. There's two locations. One is on West Houston over at Barker Cypress.
Actually there's three now, West Houston and Barker Cypress. There's one on
Broadway Street down in Pearland, and then if you go up to the Heights
where Yale comes in to Highway ten, there's one there as well. You
can go online to Verdant Treefarm dot Com. And I know it's verdict.
I don't know why I say verdant, It's just what comes out of my
mouth. But verdict means green and Verdant means green as well. Uh.
It's turnkey service. You pick out a tree, you tag it, they
install it for you, truly simple. I mean, if you want a
huge tree, if you want instant, they go up to like seven hundred
gallons I believe maybe even more than that all sizes of trees. If you
need a palm, they are the play that is the place for palms in
the Greater Houston area. Do you want a Florida sable? Do you want
a mule palm or windmill palmer, a Canary Island palm, or on and
on and on. And they know how to install these trees. So go
out there, pick out the one you like, put it, have them
put a tag on it, They'll bring it to your house and they'll get
it done right. Verdant Tree Farm. You can go to Verdant Tree Farm
Verdant tree Farms dot com and find out more about it. And when you
see that, you will be very impressed, as I am, at the
quality of trees they grow because they know how to grow them, and then
when you have them install it, that's a tree that has the best chance
possible of succeeding and doing very very well. Let's head out now and we're
gonna talk to Dale Read this morning. Well, Hello Dale, Hello,
Kip Harris County Master Gardners. I thought that might be a familiar name.
How are you doing today? Very good? I just called to tell you
about the time all community garden. What's happening up there? I used to
go out there and I've been there in a long time. Well, my
husband told me that somebody, a lady from Spring called it wanted to know
where it was. Oh okay, uh, Spring community gard No, well
he it was a caller from Spring that you had on your show this morning.
Oh was she talking about community guards? I thought she was not garden
centers? Okay, Oh okay, Well my husband taught it was community gardens.
You wanted to learn about gardening? Yes, So I just wanted to
let people know that it was at sixteen oh three Baker Street in Tomball,
sixteen o three Baker. Yeah, it's a cool little community garden out there.
You guys are doing a good job. I like I said, I
haven't seen it in a while, but that's good. Yeah, community gardens
a good place to learn about gardening because you've got a lot of gardeners around.
You know you can will and we are access to teach people and you
know, a guide on the long through, especially what's going on right now.
I mean, we're doing the best we can, but Tomball is now
in mandatory water restrictions. I'm sitting right here at the garden because I came
to do a little hand watering. Well, enjoy that, but yeah,
I feel you're pain. I'm getting tired of running drinking water out on my
plants, but it's what we gotta do. Well, I wanted we only
we work on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and right now we're working summer hours from
eight thirty to nine thirty. So I just wanted to let people know that
we were here all right Tuesday thirty, eight thirty nine up in the Tomball
area, and I know we have a lot of listeners up in that direction.
So there's your job. Thank you, good to talk to you,
Dyl say hi to all the master gardeners for me. Okay, I will
thank you, skip you bet you bet I was. I was talking to
somebody the other day who went to a be class somewhere. It is like
over in San Antonio is San Antonio area I think, And it just reminded
me. If you want to learn about bees, here we have I think
we have the best place in the state, and that is the B Supply,
the B Supply. It's out in data and text. A little bit
of drive out there, but well worth it a great outing because when you
get out there, you number one. Their shop has I mean, their
store is just amazing just learning about all the different things that go into bees
if you want to be a beekeeper. They have beginner classes once a month
out at there and by the way, the website the B Supply dot com,
so you can go out and you can learn about them. And the
folks at the B Supply they don't just want to sell you something, take
your money, move on, good luck, you learned it, leave us
alone. They want to know when you have problems. They want you to
come back in and talk to them and ask questions. And they are willing
to take the time because they know when you have success that is going to
make you one happy customer and that just makes them happy because they really are
into bees. Now, if you just want to go take a tour,
they are free honey tours and they're about one a month out there in Dayton,
and any group can go, you know, a group of youth,
group of kids or something on four each club or garden clubs of adults.
Yeah, adults can do it to church groups, civic organizations. Give them
a call out there and check them out. But go to the b Supply
dot Com. That's where you get all the information you need about how to
call them, where they are and everything like that. I love the honey
tour. You know, you learn about bees, which is fascinating. And
then I think they have like six different kinds of honey that you get to
taste a honey sampling. That's a lot of fun. While you're out there,
you can pick up some honey and all the other bee products that bees
make that are good for us and good for our health too. By the
way, well, our phone number is seven one three two one two five
eight seven four seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy four. Give
us a call. We'll be glad to talk about whatever you're interested in.
For those of you who live down south, we're talking about Rosharon Direction.
Okay, seem Ults is your local mults and rock supplier and garden Line recommended
products supplier. So if we talk about any fertilizer, fertilizer on garden Line,
they've got it down there. So I mean it's a one stop shop.
You head down, you pick up your bags of mults, bags of
composts, you pick up your fertilizers. When you're down there, you can
order it in book. They'll do delivery for a small charge within twenty miles
of the location. And so if you live in Sandy Point, if you
live in Riverstone or Fresno, or from Muriti and our first colony, or
anywhere out you know Braz'spen State Park, anywhere in that whole region, this
is your supplier. CNA Maltz Or open Monday through Friday from seven thirty to
five and today Saturday, seven thirty to two. And if you have not
seen their rock selection, it is amazing. First time I went out there,
I thought, you know, I wouldn't even think about putting it in
a hardscape. When I saw these rocks, it was like, I gotta
do this at my house because this is gorgeous stuff. Just go look,
you'll see what I'm talking about. CNA Maltz SNA dot com. All right,
we're gonna head out to spring. Derek. We got a little over
a minute here. How can we help? Yes, thank you for taking
the call. So we just built a house, We've got just dirt in
our yards. So we're gearing up to plant grass, trees, plants.
I just want to see if the time is right, given the heat,
to go ahead and pull the trigger and everything, or if it'd be better
to hold off a month or two. Yeah, you know, if if
you want to get something planted, you can do it now, and you
can keep them alive and it can be done successfully. It's a challenging time
because it's touch and go. You know, you're having to keep that root
ball wet with daily regular watering really just to get them going until they get
established. The best time overall for planting is in the fall. If you
can get into about October, it that is ideal for especially woody ornamentals and
other things like that. But if you know what you're doing, you follow
the instructs and things, you can still plant now. There's no reason not
to, you know, to plant things now. It's just I would probably
focus maybe on some of your color plants so you can have some summer and
fall color things like that, perennials and whatnot. There's vegetables that need to
be planted now, so that, yeah, hopefully that'll get you off to
a good start. But yes, and you're up there in the Spring area.
You got a lot of good, good nurseries and garden centers in your
area, you know, from plants for all seasons. A little further up
Arbor Gate up there in the Tomball area years and R. C. W
is right there, not too far from you, where Beltway eight and two
forty nine come together. So those kind of places they can give you the
advice and say, hey, here's a plant, and you know here here's
the best ones to be planting right now. I'm sorry, I gotta run.
We're on a hard break, but thank you so much for that.
Call our phone number seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy four.
That's upbeat. You're listening to garden line seven one three two one two fifty
eight seventy four. That's our number. Give us a call if you're interested
in talking about any kind of thing gardening. If you're interested in fertilizing your
lawn and having a beautiful place, I'm talking about lawn that is fed gradually
over time with quality nutrition. That would be Nitrofists Superturf nineteen four ten.
Good example, silver bag, easy to spot, easy to find. You
know when you put it down, you're not going to burn your lawn.
People ask me all the time it's summer, if I fertilize them or burn
my lawn. No not. If you do it at the right right and
then give it a good watering in, it's going to be just fine.
In fact, it's a good time to get that done. Nitrofists Superturf nineteen
four ten that releases gradually over time. Now is this is the design of
fertilizer. This is the ratio or fertilizer that has been re commended by Texas
A and M for a long time for our southern lawn grasses. We know
that that's the ratio that plants take up nutrients, and so why not feed
them in the way that they eat if you want to think of it that
way. Nitrofos Superturf is available everywhere Nitrofoss is sold. And where is that,
Well, that's everywhere. All the ace hardwares. We're talking about our
mom and pop garden centers, our feed stores. Easy to find it,
silver bag. Just look for that, if you may forget the names and
the numbers, silver bag by Nitrofoss. That is the gradual feed that you're
going to find. We're gonna head out to Sour Lake and talk to John.
Hello, John, Hello, I got to us ten twenty ten.
Yes, our raid and murt was good for vining plants like pepcumbers or watermelons
and uh, somepins. Okay, do you recommend that or well, I've
never heard. I've never heard that. I don't know about that. Just
because it's a vine means it needs ten twenty ten. I don't recommend it
a lot because it's got a lot of phosphors in it, and some soils
already have enough. Now, if you have a soil test done, it
may be that it says you need a higher phosphorus fertilizer. There's nothing wrong
with using it if you got it, but in general I would probably shift
toward a larger first number and a lower second number in terms of you know
the ratio between them. But when you put it out, if you're putting
it in your garden, just mix it into the soil and water it in
real well, and you know it's a good fertilizer. I mean, just
gonna do some good. Just I wouldn't use it over and over year after
year. Yeah, I don't know how I ended up with it, and
I don't use very little of it. Okay. I was reading about it
as well. I've got some fresh plants starting in the south, okay,
and I thought I'd give them a little shot and let them soak in.
That's fine, you can do that. Just just be moderate in your application
of it. But in the meantime, be looking to get something else with
a higher first number for most of the gardening things, or you know,
John Bestia, to just get a soul test about every three years and find
out what you have, because you know, I recommend all the time,
you know, use this fertilizer, use that fertilizer. And the bottom line
is really what's already in the soil. So you know, like let's just
say you in your next door neighbor, you may have super high phosphorus already.
They may not have enough phosphorus. And so if I recommended the same
fertilizer to both of you, I'd be misleading somebody, right, Yeah,
yeah, you think it's too early plant purple peas and sugar snap peas purple
holes. It's probably too late. They take a long time. I'd have
to look at a chart to see if we still could. No, I
don't think. I don't know, we might squeeze a member. I think
it's too late on purple holes, on sugar snaps, the cool season peas,
I would wait until about the third or fourth week, accept member and
get those planted. Then you want it to cool start just a little bit,
cooling off. We're planning them when it's hotter than they want it to
be. But it's gonna cool real quick after we plan them. And so
I would say about the third or fourth week, let's see where are you.
You're done sour like I'd probably able to do the fourth week of September
for the purple hole. I mean, sorry, any kind of a cool
season pea. That'd be snow peas, that'd be English peas, that'd be
sugar snap peas, all of those snow peas. Yeah, yeah, all
right, well, thank you very much. Hey, thanks for listening.
I appreciate you calling you take care yep. There. You know, there's
a lot of information out there, and sometimes it can be misleading. I
don't know how to say it other than I see social media. I listen
to talks people give, listen to radio shows driving around the country, and
sometimes I cringe. In fact, let me not be so. In almost
all the time, I cringe because a little information can be true in one
situation, that can be absolutely untrue in a different situation. Or it can
be true in a certain sense, but if you expand that out far enough,
it becomes untrue. You know, I'd be like me saying, hey,
if your yard is turning brown, you got chinch bugs. Well,
you might have chinch bugs, you might have drought, you might take all
root rot, you might have grubs chewing on the leaf. And folks that
don't fully understand what they're talking about them and trained in that, you end
up then with them giving an answer that is partial, but they don't have
that perspective to see the whole thing. And then sometimes there's just people that
I don't know where on earth they got that. I heard one time driving
through Houston. It was in the October time of the year, and the
host of a radio show was saying, this is was in Houston, This
was where? What town was I in? Anyway? Driving through town,
the host of radio show was saying, yeah, you want to plant winter
squash? Now? Well, yeah, if you want them to die at
the first frost and never do anything. But you know it makes sense winter
squash, so they just extrapolated, that's for winter. Why am I talking
about all this? Well, good information is important, and I'm not saying
I can never make a mistake on gardening. I certainly can and do probably,
But you've got to get good research based information to have success, because
the whole reason for gardening is to have success, to have fun, to
enjoy it, you know. And so let's get you off to a good
start. Well as a long droning thing there, but I think you know
what I'm talking about. If you are an active and adult age fifty five
and better and you're looking for a place to move, you'd you'd like an
active lifestyle. You want to enjoy the rest of your life, all the
years of retirement and things, not just you know, sitting a rocking chair
I mean, I guess you could sit in a rocket chair if you want.
But we're talking about a Dell Web community. They've got those lifestyle programs
that are designed around you. The designs, the quality of the home,
the beauty of the community, the walking trails and all that. That's all
part of Dellweb. The community down in Full Shirt, two miles from downtown
Full Shore on FM three fifty nine. It has a community garden going in
and this new community is really beautiful and with a community garden, wow,
it's just a win win win. Dellweb dot Com slash Houston will get you
more information, or you can call them at two eight one four five nine
zero six zero nine two eight one four five nine zero six zero nine.
Someone the other day was asking me about they had moved in up in kind
of north northern part of Houston, kind of over toward Magnolia direction, and
they were saying, what's a good feed store for here? Well, that's
an easy one, because Spring Creek Feed is your hometown feed store if you
live up in that area. We're talking about a FM twenty nine, twenty
eight Spring Creek Feed, big, old, beautiful, barn looking. It
just makes you want to go in. When you drive up, it looks
so cool on the outside. What's cool on the inside too? To carry
all the products we talk about. They about lawn supplies, garden supplies,
pond supplies, friendly staff to help you, discounts for senior citizens, for
military, for for h FA, they'll special order if they don't have it.
To quality food, quality for pets, livestock, but especially for my
interest, quality products. The fertilizers are recommend and other supplies for your garden.
Minutes away from Graham Parkway and Highway two forty nine on FM twenty nine
seventy eight. That's Spring Creek Feed. I'm gonna take a break right now.
Our number is seven one three two one two five eight seven four.
Give Josh call, let's get you on the boards. And who knows what
you want to talk about, but I bet we find out after the break.
Well, good morning, good Saturday morning, on a great day for
gardening. Every day is a great day for gardening. I'm sorry if it
were outside and it was hailing and snowing and nine hundred degrees and I don't
know, let's make up stuff. You could be inside taking care of house
plants. You could be inside starting your fall garden. By the way,
now's the time. If you want to have broccoli, cabbage, cauliflower,
call Robbie, all those transplants. You can start them indoors right now because
it's cooler indoors give them good lighting. Best is to buy an artificial light
to get them going, but if not, at least get the seeds up
and growing and then move them out during the day into a bright, shady
area where they get good light but not direct sun initially and get them going.
About six eight weeks later, you're putting those things in the ground and
enjoying it. So even today, even today, a hundred degrees daylight today,
I don't know how hot it's going to get here, but every day
feels like one hundred and five degrees. Sometimes when you're in this part of
the summer, you can be gardening indoors of course as well. You know
the one of the mini destination garden centers throughout this area, and again I
always brag on them, but I'm telling you it's unique. If you live
in the Houston area, you've got a selection of awesome garden centers North southeast,
West Central that are just outstanding and worth a visit. Family comes into
town that likes gardening, Oh my gosh, you can spend all day Saturday
just running around having a good time all over the place. Up in the
Northwest area in Kingwood, we're fortunate to have two that would be Kingwood Garden
Center and Warrens Southern Gardens now Kingwood Garden Center. That one's on Stonehallow Driving
Kingwood. Warren's Garden Center just a little crosstown there, North Park driving Kingwood.
And they have unbelievable supplies of stuff. If I'm talking about fertilizers,
you know, like, hey, you gotta go buy this fertilizer, They've
got it there. The products I talk about, like mosquito dunks for example,
they've got it there. In fact, right now, one of their
products, key products for this month is the tree Hugger sprinkler. And how
many times have I bragged on those? They are wonderful. You can get
them at Kingwood Garden Center. Warren Southern Gardens, they're out there. They've
had hibiscus for a while, just cajun hibiscus. I don't know, you
just need to go see one to see what I'm talking about. But they
are. They're amazing. They ask when you're out there, ask for the
case. I want to see a Cajun hibiscus. Now that's not one kind
of biscus. There's a lot of different bloom forms. It's a series.
But oh my gosh, some of them you look at and you go,
I didn't know a hibiscus could look like that same thing. You know.
They got manda villas out there. They just got in some Cricuma ginger that's
the hidden ginger. Really good in a bright shade. It's got these beautiful
stalks that come up yell pink and some other related colors right around there.
Just really beautiful. It makes a good cut flower too, by the way.
Outstanding cut flower, those Cricuma gingers. And they got the Calandra which
is pink powder puff. It's just a little wispy pink bloom. You gotta
see it. I'm not going to try to describe it. It's just beautiful.
A good tough plant too, by the way, summer tough. While
you're thinking about it, grab your calendar and write down August nineteenth from nine
to ten am at Warren's Southern Gardens again August nineteenth. That would be from
nine to ten am at Warren's Southern Gardens on North Park Drive. They're going
to have their Cultivate a Harvest of Abundance program. Now, this is fall
gardening, soil and prep. You're going to talk to their seasoned garden team.
They know what they're talking about. They'll take you step by step through
the process of getting your soil ready. So so important. I know it's
exciting to get the big hibiscus blooms. Maybe a bag of brown stuff isn't
so exciting, but it is the rocket fuel that makes anything you put in
it succeed and makes you look good as a gardener. So check this out
nine am to ten am. It's Warren's Gardens that are cultivated Harvest of Abundance
August nineteen. You need to put that on your calendar because if you want
to do one thing, if you want to learn one thing to make you
a better gardener, this is it. It all begins in the soil.
Oh and while you're out there, you can take home some soil and you
can take home the plants that you're going to put in it. Now that
you'll know what to do. That love that. I'm so excited they're putting
that kind of a program on. Let's head out to Spring Branch and we're
going to talk to Bill. Hello, Bill, Hello, Skip. How
you doing today? Well? I think I'm all right. How are you
doing? I'm doing well, Thank you, sir. I have a Yoshino
flowering cherry tree. I got it from Tattown Nurseries and Georgia about two years
ago, and it'd been doing really, really well. And after the last
rain we had about a week and a half ago, I cut back on
watering. Now all the leaves about halfway up are turning brown, so I
started watering again. I have a two foot diameter ring around it so the
long more doesn't hit it. But when I water, I get about a
six foot diameter circle of water out on the ground. Am I overwatering?
I don't know what to do? What can I do to help it?
Yeah? You know, it's hard for me to say if you're overwatering or
not. But the way to tell is to get a little hand trial,
dig down about four or five inches and feel the soil. Cherry is a
prunus species. It's like plums, it's like peaches and nectarines, and they
do not like soggy soil. But they also, of course don't want to
dry out too far, and so you need to be able to provide them
that you are stretching the zone on your Chino cherry, that is we are.
I would say, in general, I probably would tell someb I don't
plant one, but you your tree may prove me wrong, but in general,
you know, we're looking zones five to eight little further north on that
particular one, and so it's probably really struggling with the summer heat and sun.
So even if your soil is moist, it just may it just may
be struggling with that. But we're not too much longer before we're out of
this period of time and it can get a little relief. Okay, Well
they told me we're zone nine and they said it was good for zone man,
so maybe maybe they lied to me. Well, no comment, no
comment, I'm just I'm just telling you. You know, when you look
at a plant range and it says zone five to zone eighth, if it
would do a wider and I guess, let me say this carefully from a
reliable source that is not selling you the plant, uh, look at the
range and that sometimes you have to look at two or three. Sometimes I'm
stunned. I'll go to two or three places and they'll say a plant will
grow in zone nine, and another one says, no, it won't grow
south zone seven. It's like, come on, man's what gives here?
So you can't believe everything you see you're here. But I hope it does
well, and if it does as it does, I'd like to hear from
you, because I'm always open to learning something new. But that that's a
stretch on it. But I hope it does well for you. But I
think I think it's probably just saying, what in the heck did you do
hauling me down here to one hundred degree weather for months, months at a
time. Uh? I wouldn't, now, does it. You know?
If generally we do fertilizer in the spring on those, we can do a
little bit in the summer when the plant is young. But you just you
want a moderate growth rate. You need a decent amount of nutrient for it
to do well. So that that's what I would say on that one.
Just go easy if you fertilize it. Maybe let's do it this way,
Bill. Let's say that go up to the trunk of the tree. Take
your thumb, stick it out there, and for every thumb with across the
trunk, give it one cup of a good lawn fertilizer, just a good
quality lawn Elijah, one cup per inch of trunk diameter across the trunk,
not circumfers, but diameter and watered in really well. I would do that
now, do to get in the spring, and I'd do again probably in
June. Okay, you shouldn't be a liquid fertilizer. I know. I
just use one pound of dry fertilizer, just a bag of dry lovel and
fertilizer and not weed and feed because that'll that'll do damage. Okay, Okay,
thank you so much. If you have a good weekend you too,
Thank you very much. And I do hope to hear back from you that
that thing is actually doing better and better because plants. It proved me wrong
more than once I tell you. Something else it's proved me wrong is deer.
I used to work in Travis Kenny in Austin, Texas, and I
gosh, there's more deer than people I think around there, and they come
in the yard. They're starving to death and they eat everything. So I
had a deerproof plant list. One night, some deer broke into the extension
office, got into my office, opened to fall drawer, took the list
out and ate it, and so I lost my deerproof plantless. Seriously,
though there are plants deer would prefer not to eat, but when a deer
is hungry, they will eat cactus and have thorns in their lips. And
so I've just learned through the years be careful because there's always exceptions.