WEBVTT

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It's fall, May the forest be
with you. Coming to you from Studio

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AA at proven Winner's color Choice Shrubs. It's time for the Gardening Simplified Show

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with Stacy, Hervella me, Rick
Weist, and our engineer and producer Adrianna

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Robinson. Stacy, we received a
note from a listener and a viewer that

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well, it kind of sparked a
conversation. The note was, I've made

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so many mistakes through the years,
and i always find that I'm never satisfied

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with the placement of my perennials and
shrubs. I'm wondering what mistakes the two

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of you have made, if any. I mean, this is only an

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hour show, and let me tell
this person that you are not alone.

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And by the way, placement is
a challenge for almost everyone, and mistakes

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happen, and Stacy, everyone's made
a placement mistake with a plant, oh

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literally everybody. And you know,
I, before I worked as a rooftop

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gardener, I thought that the designer
I worked for had it all figured out,

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and he had everything worked out within
a fraction of an inch, and

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we would show up on the job
site and it would just, you know,

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go like clockwork, and that was
not the case at all. You

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know, first we go to the
nursery and it's like, oh, wait,

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no, I want this instead.
Oh I'm gonna switch this out and

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I'm gonna get these, and they
don't have this, so now we're gonna

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do these. So already the plan
is not scrapped, but you know,

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so then we get on the job
site and then it's all you know,

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like by feel, and it's like
changing things around and moving things around.

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Even people with plans aren't locked into
their plans. They don't follow them to

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a tee because it's just Gardening is
an art and a science. Yeah,

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I agree. I operate by the
seed of my plants. That's what I

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do, and a lot of people
do it. I think it was Ben

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Franklin too who said, eh,
do it tomorrow. You've made enough mistakes

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for today now. Actually he didn't
say that, and the historians in our

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audience would correct me. But it
does make sense. I mean, when

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life shuts a door open it again, that's how doors work, and that's

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how we work in the garden,
and we make mistakes. So we'll take

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a few minutes here to talk about
some of the mistakes that we've made,

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and I learned very early running a
garden center. There was a day when

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I asked a young man to go
out front and plant the annuals in the

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flower beds, and I was aghast
when I got out there. He was

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working quickly, had half the job
done, but he had planted all the

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annuals roots off. Oh dear me. It never occurred to me to tell

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him the roots go in the soil
and the flowers face the sun. Ah

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that is yep. When I was
in horticulture school, I know, one

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of my first days on rotation at
the display gardens at New York Botanical Garden,

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one of the gardeners took me on
the little golf cart, put me

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in front of this massive container at
a couple of flats of like pa was

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springtimes. It was like a bunch
of random spring stuff. And she said,

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okay, now plant it. I'll
be back in you know, thirty

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minutes or whatever. And she came
back and I had planted like, you

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know, six pansies in it,
and she said, what the heck are

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you doing? I said, well, I was following the spacing instruction.

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She's like, na, nah,
let me show you how it's done.

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And so we pulled those things out
and she smashing the root balls and jam

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and stuff in. And you know, that wasn't really a mistake, but

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that was a similar thing. You
learn, You learn by doing, Yeah,

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exactly, You learn and you learn
from experience. You know. I

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was also thinking working in the industry, and this probably explains a lot.

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Okay, I have a true story. I have fallen off the roof of

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a barn ouch, I have fallen
off a greenhouse. Are you okay?

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And I have fallen out of a
tree with a running chainsaw and walked away

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from all three episodes. Oh my
gosh, it's terrifying. I did well.

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I mean, it's crazy. And
so then I sit here and I

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think about you know, I'm getting
to my mid sixties, and I think

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about it as a kid. I
was a kid in the sixties. Okay,

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In the morning, my mom would
kick me out of the house,

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and you spent the day trying to
figure out what you were going to do

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that day. We didn't wear seat
belts, we didn't wear sunscreen, we

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didn't wear bike helmets. We drank
from the garden hose all day. And

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we survived it. So far,
so amazing. So far. Thank you,

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just say it. I've made mistakes
with clay soil, being out in

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the garden way too early and then
actually seeing landscape timbers and boots and other

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material just sucked up by that soupy
place. You know, you get anxious

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and you get out there too early
in spring. I've been out there way

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too ear oh yeah. And I
think a lot of people, and we

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talked about this. I think last
spring people get really excited about starting their

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seeds, and now I'm going to
start the lettuce indoors. I'm not going

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to read those instructions that say direct
so parsley seed, I'm just going to

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do it. Now. How bad
can it be? And you know,

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you do find out there's no harm
in it, really, but you do

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find out that those things are definitely
going to be much happier if you follow

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those directions. They were almost certainly
written by someone who knows what they're talking

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about exactly exactly. Now, of
course, getting back to the question of

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our listener and whether or not we
make mistakes, Yes, of course we

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make mistakes. We learn from our
mistakes. One suggestion that I would have,

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and we talked about plant placement,
is that with plants. What I

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like to do in fall is in
fall, I start dreaming about what next

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year's garden is going to look like. And in the process, in fall

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and early spring, there are plants
that you dig up, there's plants that

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you move, there's plants that are
too big for this certain area. A

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great thing to do, and I
do it every year, is I take

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pictures in fall, and I make
sure to save those pictures. And then

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in the dead of winter, as
the snow is coming down and you can't

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be out there in the landscape,
you can begin to do your strategizing,

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determine what mistakes you made in the
past year and be better for it.

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You know, it's such a good
strategy because the garden in spring everything's coming

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up. It looks so nice and
tidy and small. And then by midsummer

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your like, holy MACARONI, what
was I thinking? And then in fall

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you're like, Okay, next year, I'm going to do better. And

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then if you're not getting those pictures, it's probably not going to happen because

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you forget exactly. So just a
suggestion for you, and oh hey,

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by the way, also getting back
to the falling out of a tree,

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with a chainsaw. Yeah, when
you're young, you're invincible and you're stupid.

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Oh, you at least think you're
Invinci. You're stupid. And I

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was stupid. And now all of
my work is done by certified arborists.

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I would never do something like that, never encourage anybody to do something like

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that. I remember on one of
my properties, we had to cut down

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a very large cottonwood tree, and
I thought I was doing it right,

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and as the tree started to lean, it was leaning towards my neighbor's grudge.

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Oh dear, And I drove my
nineteen seventy six Monte Carlo out there,

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hooked up a rope to the tree
and to the bumper of my Monte

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Carlo. I pulled the bumper off. Oh my, my nineteen seventy six

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Monte Carlo. I loved that car. Did you get the bumper put back

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on? Oh? Yeah, Okay. I'm much wiser now in my older

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age, because you just you do
some of the dumbest things. I mean,

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one minute your young, fun and
invincible. The next Ye're turning down

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the radio in your car so you
can see better. I'm at that stage.

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I mean, I do feel like
there's some people joke about that a

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lot, but there's some truth.
It's hard to concentrate when there's a lot

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of you know, noise and everything. So it's not like, oh I

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can see better, but you can
concentrate on what you're doing. So I

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have done that my whole life.
So and I'm a bit younger than you.

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So now another good company. Another
mistake that I make, and I'm

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sure you make this one too,
is I get so anxious and spring I

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plant out annuals or tender plants too
early. I jumped the gun and then

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maybe I covered them on cold or
frosty nights. But all you got to

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do is miss one night and Elvis
has left the building. Well yeah,

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and if they don't die, they
do get severely set back. They are

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not equipped to deal with cold weather
at all. I'm lucky I don't have

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that problem because I do my annual
shopping with my mom sometime in May when

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it's already kind of, you know, passed, So I don't have that

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temptation to go out there and get
stuff and say, oh, it'll probably

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be fine. I'll roll the dice
and we probably won't have a frost because

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that never happens, really, so, Stacy, you know, I'm the

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cana king, and one mistake I
made a couple of years ago was I

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stored the canna's infall. I was
impatient. I didn't allow them to dry

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and cure properly, put them in
storage wet, even had a tarp over

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top of them to keep them nice
and warm. Super dumb mistake. Following

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spring, all of those rhizomes were
just mush rock. Right when you said

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super dumb mistake, I thought you
were going to say soup, as in

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that canna has turned into after canna
soup. That's what it was. A

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dump them all. So, you
know, Stacy, the point is we've

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all made a mistake or two or
more. And the great thing about making

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mistakes is that we learn from them. You know. They always say you

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learn you learn by the mistakes of
others, and manytimes, I find myself

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being the other. You definitely learn
from your own mistakes as well. So,

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and you know, when people say, oh, you know, I

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love listening to you and Rick,
you're both so knowledgeable. You know,

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the knowledge that we share on the
show, some of it we've learned in

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books and plant tags and so forth. But honestly, most of it we've

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learned by doing. We've learned by
being gardeners and working with plants, and

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that is the best way that you
learn. And if you want to become

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a garden expert, you don't do
that in a textbook. You do it

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by getting in the dirt and seeing
it firsthand, exactly. Sometimes the school

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of knocks hard knocks, some knocks
worse than others. Not knock joke coming

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out, forget it, Let's go
to let's go to plants on trial here

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on the Gardening Simplified Show that's coming
up next. Stay tuned. Prooven Winners,

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Colored Choice Shrubs cares about your success
in the garden. That's why we

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trial and test all of our shrubs
for eight to ten years, making sure

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they outperform everything else on the market. Look for them and the distinctive white

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container at your local garden center.
Greetings, gardening friends, and welcome back

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to the Gardening Simplified Show. You
know, I do love talking about mistakes

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because the mistakes that I have made
in the garden are the things that definitely

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stick with me the most. And
probably my earliest mistake was cutting back lavender

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in the garden that I had when
I was in college, thinking, oh,

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this thing looks terrible, got to
cut it back, and there went

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my lavender. But I never have
cut back lavender since, so, you

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know, and some mistakes lead to
a vendetta. Do you have any horticultural

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vendettas from your mistakes? Oh?
Yeah, yeah. So when I was

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in horticulture school, we had a
plant id exam and I got one plant

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wrong. And I pride myself on
my plant identification scales. Adrona can tell

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you I'm a very good I'm very
good at plant identification, so I pride

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myself on those scales. I got
one plant wrong and it was egga podium

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photogrourica, the horrendous plant known as
goutweed or Bishop's weed. An awful plant

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to begin with, but now I
hate it even more and I can't even

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look at that invasive thing without becoming, you know, a little bit enraged

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on my you know, twenty five
year old behalf. Take me to your

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weeder. It's good, and you
know what, it's funny being part of

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a plant brand, like obviously,
we don't want people to make mistakes.

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We want to give people everything they
need to be successful when they buy one

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of our plants, and that can
be a little bit difficult when you specialize

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in hydrangeas, sure, because people
love hydrangeas and they are, you know,

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without question, one of the most
problematic plants because they are a little

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bit difficult to understand. And I
think if it comes to one single plant

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in the garden in landscape that people
consistently make mistakes on, I'd say hydrange

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of Macrophylla big leaf hydrange This is
the kind with the big pink, purple

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or blue flowers, is as a
contender for at least the top three.

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I agree. And people live in
fear of making pruning mistakes, and you

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know, because yeah, it's very
disappointing when you've made a pruning mistake and

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the thing doesn't bloom. It's even
more disappointing when you didn't make a pruning

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mistake and it still doesn't bloom.
And that's and that does happen. So

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there's two reasons why big leaf hydrangeas
are so prone to people making mistakes.

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One of them, of course,
is that they bloom on old wood,

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so that basically means they have flower
buds for the next year or the current

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year pretty much all year long.
Basically, they start making their flower buds

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for the following season in August,
so flower buds are on that plant all

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the way until it flowers the following
you know, June or July. And

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that opens up a very wide opportunity
for you know, improper pruning for deer

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or rabbits to munch on the plants
for cold winter, cold or spring frost

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to nip those buds. And the
second reason, and this one I do

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take very personally, is because those
plants look for all the world like you've

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got to cut them back in winter. Exactly. I was just going to

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say that they're so beautiful, and
then they reach that point people feel like

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I gotta do something, or I
know I'm supposed to do something, but

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what do I do. They look
at it and they think that looks horrendous

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and probably dead, and so I'm
going to cut it. It's like they

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dare you to cut them back.
I swear, and I've done it.

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I've cut them back too, because
they just really look like they should be

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cut back. So when we're looking
at developing new hydrangees, we want hydrangees

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that are going to resolve these mistakes
that are going to be almost if you

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will mistake proof. Not to say
you can't learn from them, but we

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want you to be successful. You
know, sometimes maybe you don't want to

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devote your life to learning about when
big leaf hydrangeas set their flower buds and

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when you should prune them, and
this, that and the other. The

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answer to that is you should avoid
pruning them if you can. And so,

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you know, we want to make
it easy for people, and so

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I wanted to cover for today's plants
on trial our best hydrangea, our best

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big leaf hydrange for people who are
just like you know what I'm done.

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I just want something that performs.
I don't want to learn when it blooms.

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I don't want to learn how to
prune it. I just want to

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put something in the ground and have
something that blooms every single year. And

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that hydrangea is Let's dance can do. Hydrangea a beauty. It is a

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beauty. And so you're probably wondering, like, okay, well what makes

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this one so different? And you
have seen, you know, over the

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past years you've been coming here to
visit Studio A at proven Winner's Color Choice

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Shrubs. We have a big line
of let's dance can do hydrangeas right outside

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our office, and I have been
watching those develop over five years and they

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truly are extraordinary. So there's two
things that make them extraordinary in mistake proof,

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if you will. The first one
is that they have better flower bud

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hardiness. So, like I just
said, they have flower buds on them

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basically August until following July when they
start to actually open their flowers. So

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those flower buds being present on the
plant during cold weather are very susceptible to

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cold damage. They could get frosted
zapped just because the temperatures do in fact

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dip so low. Of course,
deer can be an issue, and so

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the flower buds are better able to
withstand the cold weather. They can take

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more cold without getting zapped like older
varieties would. So that's one factor that

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we're always looking for, so we
want that better cold tolerance. And then

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the second factor has to do with
this pruning. Whether you prune it accidentally

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because you think, oh gosh,
this thing looks terrible, I've got to

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cut it back, or a deer
pruned it for you, or a an

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for this all the time, a
well meaning child who's home from college and

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things. They're gonna help you with
your fall cleanup. Landscapers very often don't

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know, you know, they just
they do the whole moblow and go,

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and they don't know. They just
think, got gotta do the full cleanup.

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Better not leave anything standing. So
there's a lot of ways that things

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can be cut back, even if
you know better. So let's dance can

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do. Hydrange just sets its flower
buds along the entire length of its stem.

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Now that doesn't sound like a big
deal, except when you find out

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that big most big leaf hydrange is
conventional. Big leaf hydrange is only set

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their flower buds at the tippy top. So if they were getting you know,

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if they were getting frozen off,
if they were nipped by deer,

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if they were cut off, there
goes the flower buds. Whereas if they

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set it along the entire stem and
there's something left, there are still flower

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buds even way down there towards the
ground to flower. And that's what letstance

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can do does. And you know, I this is it's kind of hard

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to like really explain what this translation
in the performance of the plant until you

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see it yourself. And I knew
all this, you know, before we

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introduced it, Megan Matti, who's
been on the show Our Plant Breeders,

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said oh, this is so extraordinary. And I was like, okay,

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yeah, whatever, until I actually
saw it in front of my own desk

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here at the office over this time, and I have seen. Now I

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don't recommend that you do this,
but I have seen it. Every single

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March, the ground screws come through
and they chop those things down, and

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the first time we were all sitting
out and asks going, oh my gosh,

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what are they doing. They're not
going to flower. And in June

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they were covered in flowers like nothing
ever happened. So again, we don't

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necessarily recommend that you don't do the
right thing, but if the right thing

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is not done, you're still going
to get flowers. And that is pretty

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extraordinary. When it comes to big
leaf hydranges, you essentially, with this

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introduction, took a problem and you
nipped it in the bud. We did

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nip it in the bud, but
not yeah I'm trying to think of that's

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literally or figurative, but we nipped
it in the bud. You just have

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to get lets dance can do hydrange
and see it for yourself because it is

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a seeing is leaving kind of plant. Now it is a lot of its

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genetics are a mix of big Lea
Hydrangea hydrange of Macrophylla and mountain Hydrangea Hydrangea

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serrata, So that's where that better
cold tolerance comes from. Another thing that

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comes from that hydrange of serrata or
mountain hydrange of parentage is that the flowers

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are lace cap so instead of being
those big, full round flowers that everybody

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loves, they are more flat and
open, and not everybody loves that particular

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look. I quite like it because
I like more of a natural kind of

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look, and this is closer to
what hydrangees do in the world. It

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also attracts pollinators, which mopheads typically
don't because all of the good stuff,

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all the pollen and nectar and everything's
hidden deep within the flower. So it

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is a mobhead. But you know
what, if again, if you're tired

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of hydrange is not performing for you, I honestly can say, let's stance

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can do. Hydrangea has absolutely amazed
me, and I think our breeding team

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did an incredible job. So I
love mountains Serrata hydranges. Tough stuff would

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be one. Right, So you're
essentially saying a tough stuff or a mountain

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serrata was packaged with a conventional big
leaf hydrangea and now they benefit from Yeah.

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So we had in exchange of genes
yep. Yeah, So the hydrange

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of Serrata contributed that increased cold hardiness, Okay, and then this ability to

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set flower buds down the entire length
of the stem that came from the big

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leaf ydrange So there's certain varieties of
big leaf Hydrangea that had that quality.

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We identified them, we started breeding
with them and refining and selecting specifically for

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that. So again, great plants
aren't just made. They don't just happen

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and you say, hey, there's
a great looking plant. Oh wow,

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it happens to perform. Well.
You know, we set out with a

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very specific goal for a high performance
hydrangea. Almost mistake prof hydrange I want

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to say almost, because there's so
many factors. Of course, when it

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comes to gardening. I didn't even
get a chance to talk about growing it.

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But it has all the same you
know, care recommendations, and of

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course we'll put those on our website
at Gardening Simplified on air dot com.

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But I really do highly recommend let's
stand can do hydrange and now I do

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just want to say, seeing as
right now it is mid October, if

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you live in a cold climate where
they're fine for cold climates, we actually

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sell them as hard eat Zone four
one of the very few hydranges that actually

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is. If you live in zone
four or five, I would probably wait

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till spring to plant it. But
if you live in zone six or warmer

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and you can get your hands on
one, it's a great time to do

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that. Otherwise, put it on
your planting list for spring. If you

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need a list of garden centers near
you that sell our plants, just go

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to proven Winters Color Choice dot com
or of course, Gardening Simplified on Air

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00:20:30.480 --> 00:20:33.559
dot com. We're going to take
a little bit of a break. When

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we come back, we're opening up
that garden mail bags, so please stay

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tuned at proven Winter's Color Choice.
We've got a shrub for every taste and

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00:20:45.559 --> 00:20:51.240
every space. Whether you're looking for
an easycare rose, an unforgettable hydrangea,

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00:20:51.440 --> 00:20:53.519
or something new and unique, you
can be confident that the shrubs and the

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00:20:53.519 --> 00:20:57.480
white containers have been trialed and tested
for your success. Look for them at

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your local garden center. Greeting's gardening
friends, and welcome back to the Gardening

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Simplified Show. You know, I
could have gone on a lot longer about

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let's dance can do Hydrangea. It's
great. It's such a cool plant.

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And Adriana just reminded me seeing as
it is fault. It also has gray

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fall color, which a lot of
hydrangeas don't have, so it's still blooming

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right now. It's absolutely covered in
pink flowers here at the office in West

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Michigan. And then the flower the
foliage turns purple, so you have those

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really pink flowers with dark purple foliage. It's a really, really great plant.

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So again, check it out at
Gardeningsimplified on air dot com. And

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while you're there, if you have
a gardening question, you can send that

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00:21:36.799 --> 00:21:40.279
to us. There's a contact form
there or you can email us help at

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Gardening Simplified on air dot com.
I know it's at time of year where

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people are trying to tie up a
lot of loose ends in the garden,

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wondering should I do this, should
I do that, shouldn't I do this?

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Remember what we said on our last
show when in doubt, don't prune.

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So keep that in mind. And
with that, let's open up the

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mail bag and see what people are
asking, all right, Stacey Kelly writes

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to us last week the shrubun trial
was the lemony lace elderberry that's a favorite

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of mine. In July, I
planted two of them in part sun.

333
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When I planted them, I surrounded
the riot ball with top soil, which

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contained organic matter with peat moss.
Within a couple of weeks, they both

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had severely wilted leaves, even though
I had watered them twice a week.

336
00:22:19.880 --> 00:22:25.880
One has completely died. Any ideas, Oh, I have an idea?

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00:22:25.920 --> 00:22:32.039
Why? So you know, I
understand it makes so much sense to people

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when they're planting something new that they
want to make the perfect little home for

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00:22:36.240 --> 00:22:38.599
it, and they think that what
that perfect little home looks like is a

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00:22:38.640 --> 00:22:42.799
hole filled with nice, soft soil
that the roots are going to be able

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00:22:42.839 --> 00:22:48.000
to grow into easily. And you
can't be blamed for thinking that. However,

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00:22:48.599 --> 00:22:52.279
it is definitely not the best thing
to do because what happens is called

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the bathtub effect. And I have
explained this to so many gardeners, and

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I think it's one of those mistakes
that you make, and when you understand

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00:23:00.799 --> 00:23:03.119
this, it kind of all clicks
into place. But basically what happens is

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00:23:03.119 --> 00:23:07.079
that amendment that you added, the
potting megs or topsoil or whatever you added,

347
00:23:07.359 --> 00:23:11.119
holds a lot of water. It's
light, it's fluffy, it has

348
00:23:11.240 --> 00:23:14.960
big, big air spaces between the
soil particles, so it can hold a

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lot of water compared to the soil
around it, your natural soil. Which

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this does tend to happen most often
to gardeners who have clay because they think,

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oh, the roots will never be
able to go into that clay.

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And this effect is so so exacerbated
in clay soil situations, and so that

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clay soil has very very tiny spaces
between its particles. So you've applied a

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00:23:37.480 --> 00:23:41.680
bunch of water, that hole just
absorbed it all up, and now gravity's

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00:23:41.680 --> 00:23:45.480
going to take its toll. It's
going to drain out and down, and

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00:23:45.559 --> 00:23:49.440
it's kind of like a crowd trying
to rush through a tiny door. And

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00:23:49.519 --> 00:23:52.559
so because it can't all get out
at once, it can't drain naturally,

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that water ends up sitting around the
roots and leading to root rot. So

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I've seen this happen so many times. Some plants are far more susceptible to

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it than others. Panicle hydranges and
lilacs come to mind. I have so

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so many gardeners who have killed their
panicle hydrangs and lilacs doing this. So

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we generally do not recommend that you
amend the soil when you plant. If

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you insist on amending the soil and
there are those out there, then you

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should try to thoroughly mix it with
your natural soil till they're almost indistinguishable before

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you plant. You don't want to
have that bathtub of you know, the

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outside of your natural soil and then
the soft stuff inside. Well, Kelly,

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I'm in the amendment camp. I
like to use soil amendments, but

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I agree with Stacy one hundred percent. Worst thing you can do is create

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a bathtub. So that's why I
always mention to people, think about the

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roots extending out into the soil profile. If you're going to use amendments,

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just mix it in fifty to fifty
with the parent plant in the surrounding area.

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But those were well spoken words,
Stacey, don't create the bathtub.

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00:25:00.200 --> 00:25:03.519
You're gonna kill a plant, right
and you know lemony lace is a Sambucus

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resumosa or native red elderberry, and
they can actually take some wet soil.

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00:25:07.759 --> 00:25:11.440
But the difference is when they're getting
established, they don't yet have the root

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system to help them through that.
So don't necessarily think that just because a

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plant can withstand wet soil, that's
the best conditions for it while it's getting

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established. So if someone has already
done this and they're seeing this happen,

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then what I recommend is that you
gently remove the plant, thoroughly mix that

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amendment in, and then replant and
it should be able to recover. Good

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advice. Kate writes to us,
my Hawaiian sunset high biscus has something all

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over the stems and branches. What
is it? It's a total loss?

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00:25:41.119 --> 00:25:45.680
Treatable or should I cut it back
and start over? Well, you know

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00:25:45.799 --> 00:25:48.680
it is October and they call this
spooky season. And this photo is not

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00:25:48.839 --> 00:25:55.640
for the faint of heart. H
it's yikece, it's yikes. So we'll

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00:25:55.640 --> 00:26:00.799
put Kate's photo of her high biscus
on the website. You can see it,

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00:26:00.000 --> 00:26:04.079
and what you will see there is
a a hibiscus stem that is completely

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00:26:04.119 --> 00:26:08.359
covered with fluffy white stuff. Yes, very fluffy, very white and very

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covered. We see this on tropical
high biscus. And this is a tropical

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00:26:14.039 --> 00:26:17.319
hibiscus, oh clarify you. Yeah, and I refer to it as snowy

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00:26:17.319 --> 00:26:22.079
scale. This one has a very
bad case. And then you throw into

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00:26:22.119 --> 00:26:26.519
the mix some mealy bug, and
of course with tropical high biscus, I

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00:26:26.599 --> 00:26:30.559
also find aphids to be a problem
in season. And Stacy, you had

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00:26:30.559 --> 00:26:33.400
mentioned to me that this listener was
from down south. Yes, so she

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00:26:33.640 --> 00:26:37.920
is somewhere in southern Georgia. Okay. And so the plant isn't in the

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00:26:37.000 --> 00:26:41.480
landscape. It does look like it's
in a container, but it is.

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00:26:41.559 --> 00:26:47.880
Indeed hibiscus, snowy scale and scales
are fascinating insects. I find them just

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00:26:48.039 --> 00:26:51.680
utterly fascinating. They're a little bit
gross, but also very interesting. So

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00:26:51.799 --> 00:26:55.240
basically what happens is that the insect, the female insects, settle down,

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00:26:55.319 --> 00:27:00.200
hunkered down on the plant. They
have their babies. The babies they are

401
00:27:00.200 --> 00:27:03.119
called crawlers. They crawl out from
under the mom. They settle down on

402
00:27:03.160 --> 00:27:07.200
a new place on the plant or
a neighboring plant. They hunker down,

403
00:27:07.480 --> 00:27:10.880
build a bunker, build a bunker, they have babies. Those babies crawl

404
00:27:10.960 --> 00:27:15.880
out, and so it's very easy
to get this infestation that completely covers the

405
00:27:15.920 --> 00:27:19.079
plant. And there's soft scales which
are relatively easy to treat, and there's

406
00:27:19.240 --> 00:27:22.680
armored scales. And this is an
armored scale, which sounds so metal,

407
00:27:23.160 --> 00:27:27.160
but in fact is just the fact
that they make a hard shell that make

408
00:27:27.240 --> 00:27:30.640
them very difficult to treat. In
fact, when I was looking up snowy

409
00:27:30.680 --> 00:27:36.039
scale and hibiscus, it says the
family constitutes one of the most successful groups

410
00:27:36.039 --> 00:27:41.319
of plant parasitic arthropods and include some
of the most damaging and unmanageable pests of

411
00:27:41.359 --> 00:27:45.000
perennial crops and ornamentals. Yeah,
and I believe it because to try and

412
00:27:45.240 --> 00:27:49.079
get on top of the problem you
would have to spray during the crawler stage.

413
00:27:49.119 --> 00:27:52.440
And when is the crawler stage?
And how quickly does that? You

414
00:27:52.480 --> 00:27:56.759
know, it's just too much work
for me, Stacy. If the problem

415
00:27:56.799 --> 00:28:02.400
hasn't gotten too far, I'd like
to use horticultural oils, or at least

416
00:28:02.440 --> 00:28:07.839
try horticultural oils because of that armor
that you talked about. Yeah, and

417
00:28:07.920 --> 00:28:11.000
so yes, if you're going to
use a regular pesticide, that's actually going

418
00:28:11.079 --> 00:28:14.759
to kill the crawlers. Do you
need to time it exactly perfectly, and

419
00:28:14.759 --> 00:28:18.880
that time could be so short that
you could actually miss it. Oil,

420
00:28:18.920 --> 00:28:22.759
horticultural oil is a much better choice. And what that does is it completely

421
00:28:22.759 --> 00:28:27.240
coats the insects spiracles or their breathing
holes, and so they suffocate, which

422
00:28:27.240 --> 00:28:32.839
sounds cool, but when you see
Kate's picture you'll understand why. So a

423
00:28:32.880 --> 00:28:34.319
good coating of oil will do it. But honestly, I would say,

424
00:28:34.359 --> 00:28:40.480
unless this plant has sentimental value to
you, or is going to be difficult

425
00:28:40.559 --> 00:28:45.000
to remove in some way, I
would not salvage it. I would move

426
00:28:45.000 --> 00:28:48.759
on. Yeah, I would too, at least at that stage. I

427
00:28:48.799 --> 00:28:52.000
would do that. And I'm glad
I had my pen handy, because every

428
00:28:52.039 --> 00:28:57.160
week I learned from you, Stacey, and today I learned spiracles. Yes,

429
00:28:57.200 --> 00:29:02.079
I had never heard that. That's
in second breathe spiracles. I like

430
00:29:02.160 --> 00:29:04.559
that. So the good thing,
though, Kate, is that the Hibiscus

431
00:29:04.599 --> 00:29:08.319
snowy scale is specific to tropical hibiscus, so you don't need to worry about

432
00:29:08.319 --> 00:29:14.240
it going on to any other plants
unless they are also tropical hibiscus. Yes,

433
00:29:14.920 --> 00:29:18.799
all right, Mary writes to us, do you have a suggestion for

434
00:29:18.880 --> 00:29:23.079
the best app that identifies wildflowers and
other plants. Thanks. Yeah, I

435
00:29:23.119 --> 00:29:27.200
thought this was a really good question, Thain question. So I asked around

436
00:29:27.200 --> 00:29:30.480
at work here for some different people
and what they recommended, and the pretty

437
00:29:30.559 --> 00:29:36.759
much unanimous recommendation was Google Lens.
And so Google Lens is an app,

438
00:29:36.839 --> 00:29:38.799
but if you have an Android phone, it's pretty much already on your phone.

439
00:29:38.839 --> 00:29:42.240
You can just take a picture of
something and then it will actually give

440
00:29:42.279 --> 00:29:47.799
you the option to search in Google
Lens. And what that does is basically

441
00:29:48.519 --> 00:29:52.519
resources all of the photographs on Google
for a close match and gives you all

442
00:29:52.559 --> 00:29:56.400
of those results so you can match
it yourself. Now, this is going

443
00:29:56.440 --> 00:30:00.559
to work better if something is more
distinctive. You know, if it's just

444
00:30:00.640 --> 00:30:03.359
kind of like a regular green leaf, you might see might get a lot

445
00:30:03.400 --> 00:30:07.119
of results that are difficult to decipher. But if you have something like an

446
00:30:07.160 --> 00:30:11.079
oak leaf or you know, I
was experimenting with a beautiful rebeccia that was

447
00:30:11.079 --> 00:30:15.279
growing I found growing in my neighborhood. Henry Islers, do you know that

448
00:30:15.359 --> 00:30:18.400
variety has beautiful quilled pedals, very
distinctive. And then it was immediately like,

449
00:30:18.400 --> 00:30:22.480
oh yeah, that's Henry Elers Redbekia. But even if you have an

450
00:30:22.480 --> 00:30:26.480
iPhone, you can download Google Lens
as an app, or iPhones kind of

451
00:30:26.519 --> 00:30:30.359
have their own version of this.
So if you go into your photos,

452
00:30:30.720 --> 00:30:33.119
if it's a photo of a plant
or an animal or something like this,

453
00:30:33.240 --> 00:30:36.359
and you look down at the bottom, there's a little eye in a circle

454
00:30:36.359 --> 00:30:38.119
and has two little stars on it. If that appears and you click it,

455
00:30:38.559 --> 00:30:41.119
it will say look up plant,
animal, whatever, and then it

456
00:30:41.119 --> 00:30:45.359
will give you the examples that it
might potentially be the potential matches right there

457
00:30:45.359 --> 00:30:48.599
in your photo app, so you
don't even have to get kicked over to

458
00:30:48.599 --> 00:30:52.000
the internet. It's great and there
are many other great apps also, and

459
00:30:52.160 --> 00:30:55.799
many of them are free, which
is great. If you're asking why someone

460
00:30:55.839 --> 00:31:00.720
would use a free plant identification app, is like asking why would you use

461
00:31:02.000 --> 00:31:04.240
a free search engine. I mean, it's the same thing, and so

462
00:31:04.599 --> 00:31:08.039
it's a great thing. And I
noticed that in some areas they're doing bio

463
00:31:08.240 --> 00:31:11.720
blitzes for kids. It's kind of
like an Easter egg hunt, but they

464
00:31:11.839 --> 00:31:15.359
use the app and identify as many
plants as they That's a fun idea.

465
00:31:15.400 --> 00:31:18.359
And then I did want to mention
one other one. I have not used

466
00:31:18.359 --> 00:31:21.440
this myself, but a lot of
gardeners have talked about it. It's called

467
00:31:21.559 --> 00:31:25.480
right Plants, and it's specifically for
gardeners because not only is it going to

468
00:31:25.519 --> 00:31:27.279
identify the plant for you, it
will give you information about growing it.

469
00:31:29.039 --> 00:31:30.279
So if you're looking not just for
what you find in the wild, but

470
00:31:30.319 --> 00:31:33.519
for how you can add stuff to
your garden, Right Plants is an app

471
00:31:33.599 --> 00:31:36.880
worth looking into. We've got to
take a little break. When we come

472
00:31:36.880 --> 00:31:38.920
back. Guess what The birdman is
back. He's in studio. You're not

473
00:31:38.920 --> 00:31:48.279
going to want to miss this,
so stay tuned. The Gardening Simplified Show

474
00:31:48.519 --> 00:31:52.920
is brought to you by proven winners
Color Choice Shrubs. Our award winning flowering

475
00:31:52.960 --> 00:31:56.759
shrubs and evergreens have been trialed and
tested for your success so you enjoy more

476
00:31:56.799 --> 00:32:01.359
beauty and less work. Look for
winners Color Choice Shrubs and the distinctive White

477
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Container at your local garden center.
Welcome back to the Gardening Simplified Show.

478
00:32:08.240 --> 00:32:13.359
It's time for branching news and Boyd, we have a great episode for you

479
00:32:13.480 --> 00:32:17.839
today. He flew in not under
the cover of darkness. It's broad daylight.

480
00:32:17.880 --> 00:32:23.960
As we record the Birdman, Bill
Stovell bill Is has been a friend

481
00:32:24.000 --> 00:32:28.000
of mine for many, many years. And of course I know Stacy,

482
00:32:28.440 --> 00:32:34.000
you just love birds, and it's
migration season, so what a great time

483
00:32:34.039 --> 00:32:36.720
to talk about birds. It's always
a good time to talk about birds,

484
00:32:36.720 --> 00:32:39.279
but especially during a migration season.
So welcome to the show Bill. Thank

485
00:32:39.279 --> 00:32:42.720
you Rich. Great to be here. Hey, let me start off with

486
00:32:42.880 --> 00:32:46.799
loons. You brought along a loon
on the table here, beautiful, not

487
00:32:46.839 --> 00:32:51.680
a real one for our listeners,
one for our listeners, but on YouTube

488
00:32:52.440 --> 00:32:55.079
you can see this loon. These
are wood carvings, correct, correct.

489
00:32:55.200 --> 00:32:59.920
I have a friend as a master
carver, and he carved not only that,

490
00:33:00.279 --> 00:33:04.880
but these two beautiful wood ducks,
and they're great replicas. The loons

491
00:33:04.920 --> 00:33:10.160
are a fantastic bird. The othernmost
ones are in Berry County, Michigan,

492
00:33:10.680 --> 00:33:16.160
but all up north. We've developed
a group called the loon Watchers, and

493
00:33:16.440 --> 00:33:23.119
I'm a loon ranger, means I'm
responsible for it, putting out the platforms

494
00:33:23.119 --> 00:33:28.480
and the buoys to keep boaters away
from them when they nest. And the

495
00:33:28.519 --> 00:33:30.960
birds are very gregarious. I'll come
up quite close to your boat because they're

496
00:33:31.000 --> 00:33:37.680
so confident, being good swimmers,
but they protect they're young quite aggressively.

497
00:33:37.079 --> 00:33:42.559
That's fantastic. Now, as gardeners
and people who love plants and flowering shrubs

498
00:33:42.599 --> 00:33:46.599
and that sort of thing, let's
start here adding flowering shrubs to your landscape

499
00:33:46.720 --> 00:33:52.519
or various plants. Stacy those berries, especially during migration season as they need

500
00:33:52.559 --> 00:33:58.720
to eat and stay fueled up.
Important to landscape for wildlife. Yeah,

501
00:33:58.720 --> 00:34:00.559
and you know, the fruit,
of course is important. Everyone associates fall

502
00:34:00.599 --> 00:34:05.160
with fruit, but flowers as well
because many birds are insect eaters, and

503
00:34:05.200 --> 00:34:07.760
if you still have flowers blooming,
that's going to attract insects. A lot

504
00:34:07.800 --> 00:34:12.760
of the flowers that I grow are
in seed right now, so goldfinches,

505
00:34:12.960 --> 00:34:15.519
migrating, you know, all sorts
of things are just going bananas fighting each

506
00:34:15.519 --> 00:34:20.199
other over the seed crop in my
garden right now. That answers a question

507
00:34:20.280 --> 00:34:23.239
about why so many birds are not
at feeders right now, because nature is

508
00:34:23.519 --> 00:34:29.199
blessed the ground with all kinds of
feed And that's true. And I mean

509
00:34:29.239 --> 00:34:35.000
there's no better natural weed control right
than birds or insect control. Yeah,

510
00:34:35.119 --> 00:34:37.000
that's why it's good to feed birds
all year around, because they'll be there

511
00:34:37.000 --> 00:34:40.599
if they're nesting, they'll be there
feeding their babies insects because you can't feed

512
00:34:40.599 --> 00:34:45.039
a baby a seed. That's true. I never thought about that. Even

513
00:34:45.079 --> 00:34:49.760
now in October, the birds,
like hummingbirds, are very very active,

514
00:34:49.800 --> 00:34:52.519
at least at my house. Shed
are they still active for you? So

515
00:34:52.679 --> 00:34:55.679
as we've had some warmer days,
they've come back, but I had a

516
00:34:55.760 --> 00:34:59.519
couple when it got a little cooler
and cloudier they kind of disappeared. But

517
00:34:59.519 --> 00:35:04.519
I'm keeping my feet are stocked just
in case those slow pokes are on their

518
00:35:04.559 --> 00:35:07.880
way down south and a little hungry
and mine are completely gone. I haven't

519
00:35:07.880 --> 00:35:10.400
seen them for three weeks. Oh
really, and what's happening. They're accumulating

520
00:35:10.760 --> 00:35:15.079
flocks and because you guys are over
here by the edge of the lake,

521
00:35:15.400 --> 00:35:17.679
they use that as a guide and
just fly south. And I'm more in

522
00:35:17.679 --> 00:35:22.280
the center of the state, so
they're coming over to meet with a group.

523
00:35:22.440 --> 00:35:24.519
Well that's really good to know,
because I know I've seen in a

524
00:35:24.519 --> 00:35:29.440
lot of birding groups on Facebook that
people get really concerned when some people are

525
00:35:29.480 --> 00:35:30.920
like, I haven't seen a hummingbird
in weeks, and others are like,

526
00:35:30.960 --> 00:35:32.920
well, jeez, I still have
them, And then they think, oh,

527
00:35:34.039 --> 00:35:36.320
is something wrong? Did they die, did they get hurt. So

528
00:35:36.360 --> 00:35:39.119
it's good to know that where you're
located will impact how late you're going to

529
00:35:39.119 --> 00:35:44.360
see hummingbirds, and hummingbirds understand what
they're doing. That's true, but we

530
00:35:44.360 --> 00:35:46.280
should give them a little over our
credit. We don't have a problem with

531
00:35:46.440 --> 00:35:51.639
population. It's a distribution thing that
makes the question. I have a question

532
00:35:51.639 --> 00:35:58.079
about hummingbirds. So it appears that
the males leave sooner than the females,

533
00:35:58.400 --> 00:36:02.519
at least towards this Now, I
seem to see males first and then females,

534
00:36:02.559 --> 00:36:06.400
and in fall I've had females,
but I haven't seen a male in

535
00:36:06.519 --> 00:36:09.800
probably about six weeks. Is that
normal or do the males migrat earlier.

536
00:36:09.960 --> 00:36:15.000
I don't know about that. I
hadn't observed that. I think it makes

537
00:36:15.039 --> 00:36:20.360
sense. I know that the males
come back first to capture the territory and

538
00:36:20.360 --> 00:36:22.480
then andraw a lot of birds.
A lot of the males come back.

539
00:36:22.519 --> 00:36:27.079
Some even stay here because they want
to keep the best spot well. I

540
00:36:27.119 --> 00:36:30.480
wouldn't be surprised if the females are
chasing them away, because by about August,

541
00:36:30.960 --> 00:36:32.920
none of the females in my yard
are letting a male get anywhere close

542
00:36:32.960 --> 00:36:38.320
to my feeders or plants at all, competition for food exactly. There was

543
00:36:38.360 --> 00:36:45.960
an article in the Smithsonian magazine about
migration, speaking of hummingbirds and other birds

544
00:36:45.079 --> 00:36:50.199
or waterfowl, and it was fascinating. We're going to put the link on

545
00:36:50.239 --> 00:36:55.000
the website Gardening Simplified on air dot
Com. I had fun reading this article,

546
00:36:55.039 --> 00:36:59.840
and I think you will too.
In Europe in the eighteen hundreds,

547
00:37:00.079 --> 00:37:05.440
naturalists could not explain how local birds
disappeared during the winter, and then in

548
00:37:05.519 --> 00:37:09.800
a German village in eighteen twenty two, there were a number of birds that

549
00:37:09.880 --> 00:37:15.719
showed up with a thin spear through
their neck and they determined, well,

550
00:37:15.800 --> 00:37:21.079
they were in Africa during the cold
weather and were shot at. They had

551
00:37:21.119 --> 00:37:24.880
a number of theories, and then
if you fast forward, many people would

552
00:37:25.039 --> 00:37:30.280
use the moon at night because a
lot of the migration takes place at night,

553
00:37:30.719 --> 00:37:36.599
and use the moon to capture the
silhouettes and determine what species of bird

554
00:37:36.800 --> 00:37:43.679
was flying south. Fast forward to
today. Artificial intelligence being used by Cornell

555
00:37:43.840 --> 00:37:49.920
University and Birdwatch fascinating stacy and they've
gotten to the point where they can give

556
00:37:49.960 --> 00:37:54.159
people a three day warning so that
lights are turned off, because that's a

557
00:37:54.159 --> 00:38:00.639
big problem in cities during migration.
They lose birds that way, they can't

558
00:38:00.639 --> 00:38:05.039
find their way with the light.
And this is a big season for waterfowl,

559
00:38:05.239 --> 00:38:08.119
right, exactly right, Yeah,
they're getting ready to go south.

560
00:38:08.239 --> 00:38:12.639
They can't feed well through the ice, so they have to get to where

561
00:38:12.639 --> 00:38:15.079
there is no ice. That's the
whole concept of the migration in the first

562
00:38:15.079 --> 00:38:19.960
place, to get to where the
food sources are on a consistent basis so

563
00:38:20.000 --> 00:38:22.760
they can make it to the next
year. And that's why we tend to

564
00:38:22.800 --> 00:38:28.360
have seed eating birds that persist through
winter because they can find food, whereas

565
00:38:28.360 --> 00:38:32.280
insectiv warious birds and waterfowl ice no
bugs around can be a problem, except

566
00:38:32.280 --> 00:38:38.599
for woodpeckers. Well, we like
woodpeckers a lot. I love woodfower.

567
00:38:38.599 --> 00:38:42.960
You don't want to get me started. I love them. Bill. You've

568
00:38:43.000 --> 00:38:47.519
often mentioned that it's important to provide
water in winter. Winter birds can find

569
00:38:47.840 --> 00:38:52.119
the seed eating birds they come to
your feeders can find food. They're mobile,

570
00:38:52.159 --> 00:38:57.280
they can find that easily. Frozen
water makes a real problem. So

571
00:38:57.320 --> 00:39:00.519
a heated bird bath is a lifesaver
for a lot of the birds, and

572
00:39:00.559 --> 00:39:07.800
many times will get reports of a
small group of bluebirds males in watering in

573
00:39:07.840 --> 00:39:12.000
a bird bath in the winter,
right middle, And is that a startling

574
00:39:12.079 --> 00:39:15.920
shot? Hey, you know what, you need a little good luck even

575
00:39:15.960 --> 00:39:21.960
in the winter. Right So I'm
curious now you with Stovall wood products,

576
00:39:21.960 --> 00:39:25.079
you make bird feeders and bird houses. And I think that there are a

577
00:39:25.119 --> 00:39:31.320
lot of misconceptions in confusion about bird
houses because you know, they've kind of

578
00:39:31.400 --> 00:39:35.639
a lot of bird houses out there
are strictly decorative, correct, and you

579
00:39:35.679 --> 00:39:37.639
know, people just say, oh, well, I put out this,

580
00:39:37.880 --> 00:39:39.360
you know, cutesy little bird feeder
I got at the Hallmark shop, and

581
00:39:39.400 --> 00:39:43.320
I never got any birds, So
guess I'm not putting up any more bird

582
00:39:43.320 --> 00:39:49.000
houses. But you make bird houses
the birds will actually use. There are

583
00:39:49.079 --> 00:39:52.679
about eighty four species of birds out
of many, many ones that are cavity

584
00:39:52.760 --> 00:39:57.559
dwellers, and they're the ones that
use the houses. And a birdhouse is

585
00:39:57.599 --> 00:40:01.000
actually just a hold on a rotten
tree. But by putting the right sized

586
00:40:01.239 --> 00:40:07.239
entrance hole, you restrict larger birds
from disturbing the smaller birds, and that's

587
00:40:07.840 --> 00:40:12.360
how that works. A lot of
the ones that are decorative don't have any

588
00:40:12.400 --> 00:40:15.119
care about the thickness of the wood
and the size of the hole. They

589
00:40:15.199 --> 00:40:19.519
just want it to be pretty,
and those don't work well. So can

590
00:40:19.559 --> 00:40:22.840
you give us some tips about choosing
the right bird house in the first place.

591
00:40:24.599 --> 00:40:29.000
The most universal bird house as a
one and a half inch entrance hole,

592
00:40:29.039 --> 00:40:32.079
which is the same size as a
downy woodpecker. That's the reason we

593
00:40:32.159 --> 00:40:37.000
had cavity dwelling birds other than woodpeckers
for all these years. Now we're able

594
00:40:37.079 --> 00:40:44.159
to supplement that with good bird houses
with it one and a half inch entrance

595
00:40:44.159 --> 00:40:47.880
hole. But that's just the right
size for nuthatches and tip mice and chickadees

596
00:40:49.079 --> 00:40:54.960
and whole raft of smaller birds.
And that's most of your nesting birds.

597
00:40:55.320 --> 00:41:00.800
The others, the larger birds are
specific to how it's like a wood duck.

598
00:41:00.119 --> 00:41:07.320
They need a specific size hole,
and for that there just aren't enough

599
00:41:07.320 --> 00:41:13.800
big trees, big dead trees.
Owls have the same problem. So how

600
00:41:13.840 --> 00:41:15.960
do you know now when you're talking
about those bigger birds like a wood duck

601
00:41:16.039 --> 00:41:19.639
or an owl. No, those
are going to want a home much higher

602
00:41:19.679 --> 00:41:22.119
up in a tree than something like
a rent or a Chickenye. No,

603
00:41:22.639 --> 00:41:28.159
height has less to do with it
than location. As long as the wind

604
00:41:28.199 --> 00:41:34.559
isn't blowing directly into the entrance hole
and it's above let me say six eight

605
00:41:34.800 --> 00:41:38.920
ten feet. That's high enough for
most birds because nature doesn't have any decision

606
00:41:38.960 --> 00:41:44.280
about where to put their hole in
a tree. The reason that you see

607
00:41:44.360 --> 00:41:46.719
holes in the top of the trees, that's where the bugs are. Ah,

608
00:41:46.719 --> 00:41:51.239
that makes sense. Interesting, we're
chatting with Bill Stovell, he is

609
00:41:51.360 --> 00:41:57.400
the birdman here in the studio,
and you know you mentioned the decorative bird

610
00:41:57.440 --> 00:42:01.440
houses that you see around, especially
during I have found that they really do

611
00:42:01.559 --> 00:42:06.679
not have many of them do not
have a means of cleaning out the bird

612
00:42:06.719 --> 00:42:09.719
house. Now that's been a frustration
for me in the landscape because I never

613
00:42:09.800 --> 00:42:14.920
know when should I get in that
bird house and clean it out, or

614
00:42:14.920 --> 00:42:19.880
should I even be messing around in
their house? In the spring is a

615
00:42:19.880 --> 00:42:22.440
good time to march is a good
time to go check that bird house,

616
00:42:22.559 --> 00:42:28.000
open it up and see. If
a bird house doesn't have a way to

617
00:42:28.039 --> 00:42:31.639
clean it out, it's not going
to be functional. But at that point

618
00:42:31.840 --> 00:42:36.400
you may have things left over from
mice or things from the from the winter.

619
00:42:37.239 --> 00:42:42.119
During the season. It's probably best, unless you're going to be monitoring

620
00:42:42.159 --> 00:42:45.000
those bird houses on a regular basis, to just leave them alone, and

621
00:42:45.119 --> 00:42:50.639
often when you check it in in
March, you'll see there are three different

622
00:42:50.639 --> 00:42:54.000
nests in there. There'll be a
bluebird nest first, and then a chickadee

623
00:42:54.000 --> 00:42:58.880
nest second, and then a wren
nest third, So three different species of

624
00:42:58.880 --> 00:43:01.840
birds have been in the same house
in the winter. It's good to have

625
00:43:01.920 --> 00:43:07.079
the nest in there because they use
it for roosting because if you have an

626
00:43:07.119 --> 00:43:10.000
empty house, their body temperature has
to heat up the whole house. But

627
00:43:10.000 --> 00:43:15.480
if the house is half full of
nest, then they and many birds that

628
00:43:15.559 --> 00:43:17.400
you get two or three or four
birds going the same bird out if it's

629
00:43:17.400 --> 00:43:21.679
really really cold. Oh interesting,
I didn't think about that. Roosting is

630
00:43:21.679 --> 00:43:25.159
really important for birds up here that
are surviving the colder weather. I just

631
00:43:25.159 --> 00:43:31.039
can't resist cleaning the house because you
see them loading that thing. They're putting

632
00:43:31.119 --> 00:43:37.039
cigarette butts in there, and dryer
lint and all kinds of stuff to pack

633
00:43:37.119 --> 00:43:39.840
their house, and it just seems
like there should be some house cleaning.

634
00:43:39.840 --> 00:43:45.679
At some point. I watched missus
Wren take sticks out of a house that

635
00:43:45.719 --> 00:43:50.599
I'd forgotten to clean, and I
watched her put new sticks back in,

636
00:43:50.840 --> 00:43:53.559
so she changed the furniture around to
suit her. They're not going to be

637
00:43:55.639 --> 00:43:59.960
in words. Oh, they loved
to see you keep your hands off.

638
00:44:02.360 --> 00:44:07.760
So now it's October. When is
the best time to put out a birdhouse?

639
00:44:07.599 --> 00:44:13.400
Every day, so it's never too
late, never too late. Birds

640
00:44:13.440 --> 00:44:15.639
will start to look for them.
They're always interested in what's going on.

641
00:44:15.679 --> 00:44:19.480
They're watching you. They're watching you
in the garden, they're watching you in

642
00:44:19.519 --> 00:44:22.519
the forest. And when a new
thing comes out, they'll check it out

643
00:44:22.159 --> 00:44:25.840
and then they'll mark it on their
calendar for when they return. Some of

644
00:44:25.880 --> 00:44:30.239
them will stay there, some of
them use it for roosting during the winter.

645
00:44:30.000 --> 00:44:32.920
But in the middle of the summer
is not a bad time. Whenever

646
00:44:32.920 --> 00:44:36.639
you have a chance to put out
a birdhouse, it's going to be a

647
00:44:36.679 --> 00:44:39.039
positive. There is no in the
spring. Of course, we think about

648
00:44:39.039 --> 00:44:42.960
it and we put a lot more
out at that point in time, and

649
00:44:43.000 --> 00:44:47.559
then we capture that whole season's input
of birds. But anytime it is a

650
00:44:47.599 --> 00:44:52.119
good time. And it's particularly important
for the big, big houses, like

651
00:44:52.199 --> 00:44:57.960
the owl houses and wood duck houses
to get those up in the fall,

652
00:44:58.679 --> 00:45:01.119
because they come back about in the
first part of April, and you're not

653
00:45:01.159 --> 00:45:06.840
gonna be one slipping and sliding up
in a tree in april. That's true.

654
00:45:07.320 --> 00:45:12.119
Now does it matter if a bird
house is a fixed firmly to a

655
00:45:12.159 --> 00:45:17.239
tree or if it's hanging. I'll
tell you this in confidence. Wrens are

656
00:45:17.280 --> 00:45:25.760
swingers. The rest of the bird
population likes them to be stable. Well

657
00:45:25.760 --> 00:45:30.320
that's good, that's really. I
mean, rens are delightful to have around,

658
00:45:30.800 --> 00:45:34.599
so that's good to know if you
want rents. So does this mean

659
00:45:34.639 --> 00:45:38.320
I know sometimes there's an issue of
like European sparrows or starlings or something getting

660
00:45:38.360 --> 00:45:44.679
into nests and causing problems. If
you have a free hanging nest like that,

661
00:45:44.960 --> 00:45:50.440
does that exclude some of those problematic
birds? Not really. The one

662
00:45:50.480 --> 00:45:53.800
you're seeing most often are the sparrows
because they have the same size entrance sole

663
00:45:53.920 --> 00:45:59.559
as the universal size as darling as
you need a larger entrance, so they

664
00:45:59.639 --> 00:46:06.000
don't they're not as invasive. But
sparrows are a real nuisance and other birds

665
00:46:06.000 --> 00:46:08.400
have to fight off the sparrows.
And there's a chance where you can get

666
00:46:08.440 --> 00:46:13.519
busy rick because if you see a
sparrow in your house, keep an eye

667
00:46:13.519 --> 00:46:15.039
on them. As soon as they
fill it up, take it out and

668
00:46:15.079 --> 00:46:17.519
as soon as they fill it up
again, take it out, and what

669
00:46:17.599 --> 00:46:22.760
they'll do, they'll give up and
then the bluebirds or the tree swallows can

670
00:46:22.840 --> 00:46:27.320
use that house. So you have
to be persistent, be persistent. And

671
00:46:27.760 --> 00:46:31.519
Rick is, swallows are fascinating and
we're so lucky living by the lake shore,

672
00:46:31.639 --> 00:46:37.360
have so so many to watch,
I mean so many birds here along

673
00:46:37.400 --> 00:46:40.880
the lake shore. Again for our
viewers and our listeners, we're broadcasting from

674
00:46:42.239 --> 00:46:45.360
West Michigan. Bill, Is is
it because we have so much water around

675
00:46:45.440 --> 00:46:50.440
here that we're blessed with so many
different species and birds. I think it

676
00:46:50.519 --> 00:46:54.880
has water as one part of it. But the habitat that we have along

677
00:46:55.000 --> 00:47:00.440
all this wetlands and all these shorelands
and all these that we have in southwest

678
00:47:00.519 --> 00:47:05.800
Michigan just make a natural habitat.
Habitats that way you keep birds and have

679
00:47:05.960 --> 00:47:10.119
birds having good food, good cover, good nesting areas. That's why we

680
00:47:10.159 --> 00:47:14.840
have a population like we do.
We've got areas of treetops where we have

681
00:47:14.920 --> 00:47:20.039
lots of warblers. It's just a
bonanza places for birds. Well, you

682
00:47:20.079 --> 00:47:22.679
know what, And I've been thinking
a lot lately about that concept of habitat

683
00:47:22.719 --> 00:47:27.079
and what that means for a gardener
and for gardening, because anytime you plant

684
00:47:27.079 --> 00:47:30.360
something, you are creating habitat.
And the choices that you make of the

685
00:47:30.360 --> 00:47:35.880
plants that you put in the ground
in your garden are what determines what's going

686
00:47:35.960 --> 00:47:38.840
to take up residence in your yard. And with good decisions, you can

687
00:47:38.840 --> 00:47:43.840
make your yard much more hospitable for
birds that we actually want to see and

688
00:47:43.920 --> 00:47:47.800
birds that need that extra help.
If you can get dogwoods and wounder berry

689
00:47:49.039 --> 00:47:59.239
and a lot of the understory type
shrubbery, if you can get perennials that

690
00:47:59.639 --> 00:48:07.239
see like cone flower and black eyed
Susan and several of the others, you're

691
00:48:07.280 --> 00:48:13.840
developing a nice seed base. And
as long as crab apples, all of

692
00:48:13.840 --> 00:48:19.960
those things are excellent. And the
birds will help you if you just let

693
00:48:20.039 --> 00:48:23.079
them drop the seeds around in your
woodland and let them grow. Let the

694
00:48:23.159 --> 00:48:28.960
volunteers show up. We have an
amazing number of I only had a couple

695
00:48:28.960 --> 00:48:30.840
of winterberries once upon a time.
Not lots of them. Oh that must

696
00:48:30.880 --> 00:48:36.519
be beautiful. You know, when
I travel, I put a note in

697
00:48:36.559 --> 00:48:38.760
my phone and I know when I'm
going to go to the airport and hit

698
00:48:38.800 --> 00:48:44.880
the road. Now with these birds
we're talking about habitat, they do migrate.

699
00:48:45.760 --> 00:48:49.679
Is it because the days are getting
shorter? Is it because the food

700
00:48:50.039 --> 00:48:54.599
is less available? What causes a
bird obviously not a calendar, but what

701
00:48:54.840 --> 00:49:00.320
causes a bird to say, I'm
gonna hit the road, I'm leaving this

702
00:49:00.440 --> 00:49:04.559
habitat and see you later. I'm
going to vacation down south. I think

703
00:49:04.599 --> 00:49:07.320
there have been a lot of studies, but a lot of it's light.

704
00:49:07.880 --> 00:49:10.440
When the light is at a certain
position, then they get itchy and they

705
00:49:12.039 --> 00:49:16.480
start to make for the south,
and that tells them that the flowers are

706
00:49:16.519 --> 00:49:20.719
not going to bloom as vigorously,
or they're going to be losing their leaves,

707
00:49:20.719 --> 00:49:23.400
They're not going to be producing berries. So it relates to the vegetables,

708
00:49:23.400 --> 00:49:30.079
and you know the natural habitat and
light has a great influence on that.

709
00:49:30.199 --> 00:49:32.800
So I think they're all tied together. See I'm hoping this year again,

710
00:49:32.840 --> 00:49:37.679
I'm keeping my fingers crossed that it's
an El Nino winter and that they

711
00:49:37.719 --> 00:49:42.880
decide more of them decide to stick
around this year. I mean, you

712
00:49:42.920 --> 00:49:47.280
do have winters where some birds stick
around longer, right, That happens all

713
00:49:47.320 --> 00:49:51.800
the time. We have more geese
than we would like to have because they

714
00:49:51.920 --> 00:49:54.280
decided they could stick around. But
there are a lot of birds that we

715
00:49:54.320 --> 00:49:59.960
didn't used to have that We've seen
more robins now, we see more blue

716
00:50:00.039 --> 00:50:02.800
birds that are wintering over now,
and not only the males. They were

717
00:50:02.920 --> 00:50:07.360
seeing a few of the females staying. And they do it for a couple

718
00:50:07.320 --> 00:50:09.360
of reasons. One is they're selfish. They want their old habitat back,

719
00:50:09.400 --> 00:50:14.559
they want their old house back.
But they also can survive on a lot

720
00:50:14.599 --> 00:50:16.880
of the berries and the water,
and they can eat little vegetables, long

721
00:50:17.039 --> 00:50:21.199
edges of when there's snow, you
can see them right along on a stream

722
00:50:21.280 --> 00:50:25.519
side eating bits of grass or leaves
or stuff. They're pretty incredible. And

723
00:50:25.599 --> 00:50:29.960
of course more people are feeding.
You know, bird feed has become quite

724
00:50:29.960 --> 00:50:32.000
popular, so that also helps.
Does that help or does that hurt?

725
00:50:32.000 --> 00:50:37.880
Does that confuse things? I think
it helps considerably because they have a place

726
00:50:37.920 --> 00:50:42.440
they can go that they can depend
on food, and then they can they

727
00:50:42.480 --> 00:50:47.599
eat food from around the surrounding area. So you're reducing your insect population by

728
00:50:47.880 --> 00:50:54.960
having feeders out. But bluebirds don't
really eat seeds, so they eat meal

729
00:50:55.000 --> 00:50:59.440
worms and things like that, so
that's a specific kind of feeding. But

730
00:50:59.480 --> 00:51:01.400
sue people put out to it and
as you know, meal worms and that

731
00:51:01.480 --> 00:51:07.360
kind of thing in it. But
bluebirds like the water. But they find

732
00:51:08.079 --> 00:51:12.199
everything. They find everything in nature
that they need. You don't have to

733
00:51:12.320 --> 00:51:15.360
supplement that too much other than if
you want to see them, get them

734
00:51:15.400 --> 00:51:20.000
started on meal worms and then go
see people sell meal worms because we love

735
00:51:20.039 --> 00:51:27.239
them. I don't want to duck
the question hat ducks hack ducks. They're

736
00:51:27.280 --> 00:51:30.960
going to stick around up north,
they head south. Tell me about ducks

737
00:51:30.000 --> 00:51:36.280
because I love ducks. Well.
Ducks migrate, and they migrate in great

738
00:51:36.360 --> 00:51:38.840
flocks. And that's the time when
the duck hunters have the best time along

739
00:51:39.119 --> 00:51:43.400
in their duck blinds and the black
labs go out and splash around in their

740
00:51:43.440 --> 00:51:47.800
puddles. And but this is a
great time to see them along the shorelines

741
00:51:47.840 --> 00:51:54.280
and little lakes and ponds that you
find, because they'll come in flocks and

742
00:51:55.400 --> 00:52:00.280
then they imprint to a particular place
for a very good time two three four

743
00:52:00.320 --> 00:52:04.199
weeks and you can see them every
night coming in. We have that not

744
00:52:04.280 --> 00:52:07.400
only the ducks, so we have
wood ducks coming in on a lot of

745
00:52:07.440 --> 00:52:10.480
them. We have mallards coming in
a lot of them, but we have

746
00:52:10.599 --> 00:52:16.320
sand hill cranes. Huge quantities of
sand hill cranes for this region come in

747
00:52:16.559 --> 00:52:21.639
and they come back every night.
Now, I was in Wisconsin a couple

748
00:52:21.679 --> 00:52:27.320
of weeks ago, and there's Northern's
constant Green Bay and some sand hill cranes

749
00:52:27.360 --> 00:52:30.280
landed in a park and they were
about as close as me to you,

750
00:52:30.480 --> 00:52:32.840
and they were not the least bit
phazed by us. Is that typical behavior

751
00:52:35.039 --> 00:52:38.239
They can be acclimated by people.
That happens in Florida all the time.

752
00:52:38.880 --> 00:52:43.679
They'll walk right up to a knock
on your window for some popcorn, but

753
00:52:43.800 --> 00:52:46.559
it's not the onliest thing for the
birds. And they've got a kind of

754
00:52:46.559 --> 00:52:51.400
a pointy beak. You know,
they could stick you pretty easy, So

755
00:52:51.880 --> 00:52:54.599
I wouldn't they try to feed them
they But I was quite quite surprised because

756
00:52:54.599 --> 00:52:58.400
I feel like every other time I
had encountered one that was very far away,

757
00:52:58.480 --> 00:53:00.519
or I was driving on the highway
or something like that, and it

758
00:53:00.599 --> 00:53:02.079
was like, oh my gosh,
Like I thought they were sculptures at first

759
00:53:02.119 --> 00:53:06.719
because they were so close. Well, we don't hunt them anymore that we

760
00:53:06.760 --> 00:53:09.239
did a long time ago. Uh, And some states do hunt them,

761
00:53:09.280 --> 00:53:14.320
but they found they're very difficult because
they're very bright birds there. Well,

762
00:53:14.599 --> 00:53:17.960
cranes are the oldest. They're one
of the oldest birds in the universe.

763
00:53:19.239 --> 00:53:27.400
Loons of the other that that those
two birds evolved the longest adough, But

764
00:53:27.760 --> 00:53:30.559
if a man shows up in a
field with a stick in his hand,

765
00:53:31.199 --> 00:53:37.719
the santual cranes could be long gone, maybe after the second shot. But

766
00:53:37.159 --> 00:53:42.519
they're not going to be around.
They're real. They leave fast. But

767
00:53:42.599 --> 00:53:46.199
they've the ones you've seen must be
in They may have been in park areas

768
00:53:46.280 --> 00:53:49.159
up north where they were fed.
Yeah, it was a it was a

769
00:53:49.199 --> 00:53:51.480
city park. I mean, they
didn't seem to be looking for food,

770
00:53:51.480 --> 00:53:54.639
but they just seemed completely unfazed by
the fact that we were, you know,

771
00:53:54.880 --> 00:53:59.480
ten feet away talking about parks up
Nord. Years ago, we used

772
00:53:59.480 --> 00:54:02.440
to see swans all over the place. Not anymore. No, I've never

773
00:54:02.440 --> 00:54:07.639
seen one, and I go bird
watching almost every weekend. But since my

774
00:54:07.679 --> 00:54:14.760
friend Joe Johnson planted trumpeter swans in
southwest Michigan, we have several hundred pairs.

775
00:54:15.400 --> 00:54:17.199
They're all and that's our native swan, right, Sorry I got those

776
00:54:17.239 --> 00:54:21.559
confused. Yes, so now we
only have mute swans because they were released

777
00:54:21.599 --> 00:54:25.840
in we only have no I'm confused. The mute swans are the ones with

778
00:54:25.880 --> 00:54:29.719
the yellow bill okay, Yes,
and they're the ones that were brought over

779
00:54:29.760 --> 00:54:34.079
from Europe, yes, as decorative
birds and they made a mess. Yeah,

780
00:54:34.119 --> 00:54:38.599
And now the Department of Natural Resources
and trumpeter swans have pretty much eliminated

781
00:54:38.639 --> 00:54:44.800
them. So it's our native bird. The trumpeter swan is the one that's

782
00:54:45.519 --> 00:54:49.119
around all the time, a lot
of them, and they're doing a really

783
00:54:49.159 --> 00:54:53.440
great job of reproducing and growing.
That's good to hear for a moment of

784
00:54:53.599 --> 00:54:59.519
color. Commentary bird Man. A
few weeks ago, quite a stir was

785
00:54:59.599 --> 00:55:05.719
created when some flamingos got off track
and ended up in Lake Michigan. I

786
00:55:05.719 --> 00:55:08.880
mean, how often does that happen? I picture a hurricane coming along and

787
00:55:08.920 --> 00:55:14.760
they get blown off course. Now, of course, with migration, and

788
00:55:15.199 --> 00:55:20.000
because a lot of birds migrate at
night again, big cities, lights,

789
00:55:20.159 --> 00:55:22.800
buildings, that type of thing can
become a real problem and the birds become

790
00:55:23.159 --> 00:55:29.599
disoriented. But from time to time
we learn of a disoriented bird. Had

791
00:55:29.639 --> 00:55:34.559
you ever heard of flamingos in Lake
Michigan before? That? Is that's a

792
00:55:34.599 --> 00:55:38.559
real oddity. It hadn't happened in
reading the literature, it may not happen

793
00:55:38.599 --> 00:55:45.280
again. But flamingoes eat shrimp.
We don't have shrimp in Lake Michigan.

794
00:55:45.400 --> 00:55:47.559
We have crayfish. They better learn
how to eat a crayfish. Watch their

795
00:55:47.559 --> 00:55:52.159
little bills. They can get takeout
at the red lobster. They can.

796
00:55:52.599 --> 00:55:55.679
I hadn't thought of the red lobster. Do they have little chips or how

797
00:55:55.719 --> 00:56:00.679
do they pay? Well, you
know, if people had seen flamingoes,

798
00:56:00.000 --> 00:56:02.920
you know, fifty or one hundred
years ago, no one would have believed

799
00:56:02.960 --> 00:56:07.159
them. They would have thought they
were hallucinating or something. And thank goodness

800
00:56:07.159 --> 00:56:12.719
people were able to get photographic proof
because it's it seems totally improbable. Well,

801
00:56:13.079 --> 00:56:16.719
it's a strange. It's just absolutely
strange that they come up here.

802
00:56:17.440 --> 00:56:21.159
They probably saw the water when they
were flying in, but they need to

803
00:56:21.159 --> 00:56:22.960
stay down south. Well, hopefully
they made it back safely. Maybe it

804
00:56:23.039 --> 00:56:28.360
was a hurricane. Yeah, they
say, Bill, How important is it

805
00:56:28.480 --> 00:56:36.760
to teach kids about birds and watching
birds, caring for birds, paying attention?

806
00:56:37.119 --> 00:56:40.239
How important is that to you?
Why is that important? Well?

807
00:56:40.239 --> 00:56:45.960
I think we all need some serenity, and one of the most important things

808
00:56:45.000 --> 00:56:50.239
about bird watching is seeing who is
at your feet or who was in your

809
00:56:50.360 --> 00:56:55.800
yard and identifying them by name.
Same with shrubbery and trees, and that's

810
00:56:55.800 --> 00:57:00.800
how you get a base of the
conservation of the of the country. And

811
00:57:00.920 --> 00:57:07.519
with birds, they're a primary indicator. It's like the canaryan k and a

812
00:57:07.199 --> 00:57:13.519
mine. But when population is decreasing, that means there's a change in the

813
00:57:13.559 --> 00:57:16.400
habitat, and we don't know that. At least people keep track of them,

814
00:57:16.440 --> 00:57:20.159
and our next generation are the ones
that are going to have to do

815
00:57:20.199 --> 00:57:23.960
it. We're doing more banding now, we're getting more information. You mentioned

816
00:57:23.960 --> 00:57:30.280
the AI possibilities at nighttime. We're
learning more about it and if we can

817
00:57:30.800 --> 00:57:36.360
stop the changing of the habitat or
make sure that habitat is available for some

818
00:57:36.400 --> 00:57:38.119
of the birds that are in trouble. But the only way that we're going

819
00:57:38.159 --> 00:57:43.000
to know is teach the children about
nature, all kinds of it. Go

820
00:57:43.119 --> 00:57:45.480
for a walk, get your feet
well, turn over a rock, find

821
00:57:45.519 --> 00:57:49.559
something, Just get outdoors. If
you've got to go trout fishing, look

822
00:57:49.599 --> 00:57:52.800
up in the sky and see see
what's going on around you. I go

823
00:57:52.840 --> 00:57:55.079
trout fishing, not so much to
catch fish, just to be there.

824
00:57:57.400 --> 00:58:01.159
Sometimes that's what it's all about.
You love bird watching? Why do you

825
00:58:01.199 --> 00:58:05.840
love it so much? I mean, it's a lot of what Bill just

826
00:58:05.880 --> 00:58:10.119
said. I love seeing the interactions
of birds and their habitat. And you

827
00:58:10.159 --> 00:58:14.440
know, the thing that's so fun
about it is it's never the same day

828
00:58:14.440 --> 00:58:17.000
twice. You really never know when
it comes to birds. They're so mobile,

829
00:58:17.480 --> 00:58:21.960
you really never know what you're going
to encounter. And I've found that

830
00:58:22.000 --> 00:58:27.239
birding is a lot like gardening in
that once you start looking, you see

831
00:58:27.280 --> 00:58:30.519
more and more and more, and
the world just expands in a way that

832
00:58:31.039 --> 00:58:35.480
you didn't know was even there when
you first started looking. It's great.

833
00:58:35.920 --> 00:58:38.440
Oh you're both professionals in all kinds
of areas. But the more you know

834
00:58:38.559 --> 00:58:43.519
about birding, the more you know
you don't know. It's just incredible.

835
00:58:43.679 --> 00:58:46.400
That's absolutly true of gardening too.
I don't know if I'd look at myself

836
00:58:46.440 --> 00:58:52.679
as a professional. I kind of
wing it. He is the birdman,

837
00:58:53.000 --> 00:58:58.119
Bill Stovell and Bill, thanks for
joining us on the Gardening Simplified Show.

838
00:58:58.159 --> 00:59:00.480
It's been a pleasure to have you
here. My hope to help with the

839
00:59:00.559 --> 00:59:04.679
education of this stuff. Oh and
Stacy, always fun to do this show.

840
00:59:04.719 --> 00:59:07.159
This is great. It is and
you know, if you're looking for

841
00:59:07.199 --> 00:59:09.719
a bird house that will actually get
birds taking up residents, you can find

842
00:59:09.719 --> 00:59:15.119
stubble wood products online, are at
your local bird bird store. There are

843
00:59:15.159 --> 00:59:20.639
many many brick and mortar stores around
the country. My distributor in Saint Louis

844
00:59:20.679 --> 00:59:24.440
area has four thousand out there around
the last dates and the ones in Wisconsin

845
00:59:24.519 --> 00:59:30.000
there's they cover with salesmen eight states
and the people out of Grand Rapids have

846
00:59:30.079 --> 00:59:35.280
five warehouses, so there's lots of
about there. But this is really about

847
00:59:35.400 --> 00:59:39.639
education, reds and then and keeping
the birds safe and having places for them

848
00:59:39.639 --> 00:59:44.239
to have a safe life. Bill, We're going to let you fly off

849
00:59:44.280 --> 00:59:47.239
to your next destination. Stacey,
it's been fun. Thank you so much.

850
00:59:47.280 --> 00:59:50.920
Thank you, and thanks Adriana,
and thanks to all of you for listening.