Coming to you from Floriferous Studio a here at proven winners Color Choice Shrubs.
It's time for the Gardening Simplified Show with Stacy Hervella, me, Rick weisst
and our engineer and producer Adrianna Robinson. Okay, today he's gonna be the
I'm ready to give up show. No, I'm not ready to give up.
You ready to give up? I'm actually not, so I am less
ready to give up than I usually i'm at this time of year, very
good. So it's not the I'm ready to give up show, but we
do have to address the issue. Gardening is not an exact science. You're
gonna make mistakes, You're gonna have some frustrations, and seasoned gardeners are relieved
to know that there are others like them that are in the same boat.
It was Winston you know, Winston Churchill. Many people misquote him. Historians
will tell you this, they say, many people will quote Winston Churchill saying
he said, never give up, never give up. The reality is he
said never give in, never give in, never, never, never never.
As gardeners, we never throw in the trowel. There's always a way
to apply common sense and practices where we can deal with some of these frustrations.
Now, looking at a survey, this is interesting, affecting well over
half of gardeners fifty five percent. So at the top of the list was
difficulty in managing insects and pests in the garden. Can you buy that?
I can buy that, but I can also buy that. You know,
that becomes a lot less daunting when you start to learn about your pests.
Sure, you know, when you just see bugs biting holes into things,
you freak out. When you see a leaf spite, you just freak out.
But then you start to dive in. And that's where the magic of
gardening happens. Right, The more you learn, the less scary these things
become. I think that's really smart, Stacy. And as a matter of
fact, knowing you, I know your interest in insects very love and getting
a head education and when it comes to insects is important and it does help.
Unpredictable weather came in a close second on the list of top gardening frustrations,
affecting forty six percent of gardeners. Of course, Stacy allowed to talk
about climate change. Sure well, and there's not much you can do about
that. So that is of all of the things we can control, and
gardening the least, you know, the thing that we can have the least
control over. But you know, it's also where you learn the most.
And like when I said that I am less tired than I usually am of
gardening, it's because our weather has been you know, it was really dry,
but it's been fairly cool for us here in West Michigan. And apologies
to those of you who are sweltering through the heat wave and the rest of
the country right now. But you know, you learn so much when you
do encounter these different types of weather events. If everything was just even keeled
all the time, you would just think that's the way things are, and
you never learned anything. Yeah. True. Thirty seven percent of gardeners in
the survey found the hobby was easier than expected. Twenty four percent it to
be more difficult now one point before we get into the items that we want
to deal with, and that is in this survey, and I don't buy
this. Seventy three percent of respondents agreed that caring for plants required just as
much nurturing as looking after a child. No way, what from a guy
who's had three kids. It's a lot lower steaks. First of all.
I mean, I'm just saying exactly, there are some expensive plants out there,
but nothing like you know, a child exactly. So this survey,
like any other survey, let's take it with a grain of salt. Here's
my list, stacy deer, weeds, pruning, succulents, hydranges, clay
soil, moles growing under trees and tree roots, squirrels and chipmunks, time
and effort, smaller yields than expected, what to do with it when you
have it, it's too hot, and hacks. That's my list of things
that cause frustration for gardeners. That's a good list. Those are definitely things
that cause people to be a little bit discouraged in their gardening. But you
know what, almost every single thing on there you can actually learn about and
then it's no longer discourage. I mean, weeds, you know, weeds
remain an issue. But you could also always take my position, which is
just to like space your plants closely so there's less room for weeds. Plan
a lot of wild native plants so the weeds blend in, and you know,
also just be like, you know what, it's okay if I don't
get to the weeds today. I can live with it. Yeah, exactly.
And like we've talked about on the show before, apply common sense,
a multi pronged approach. Don't get tied up in these hacks that you find
on social media. Gas Please do not start getting worse. They're getting worse.
I saw one the other day. They're recommending pouring coca cola around your
ze is to get them to bloom, and using apple cider vinegar on your
hydranges to turn them blue. Oh my goodness. Yeah. You know,
there's so many things in gardening and I think in life too, right where
you just assume, like, okay, this vinegar is acidic. I know
that hydranges will turn blue under acidic conditions. Therefore by giving them vinegar,
they will turn blue. But you've missed like a whole huge aspects in there,
which is the soil. Because the soil is something you know, there's
like a lot of chemical reactions happening. It's full of minerals and so no,
it's not this straightforward line, and people are forgetting that there's this you
know, convoluted chemical path between the two and so the thing just because something
seems you know, like it might be right, doesn't mean it's it's I
think they call it the concept of truthiness. Yes, exactly, truthiness.
Good word. I like that. And Stacy, you've taught all of us
who watch and listen to the Gardening Simplified Show just don't make assumptions. Don't
make assumptions, and don't do it. You know, there are times where
absolutely those hacks might actually work, but also there are usually tried into your
true products at your garden center that are made specifically, you know, for
the purpose, have instructions so you can apply them properly. Party on the
front, business on the back. There you go and get results, because
that's what this is about. And I understand everyone's like, well, I
have eppleside of vinegar. I don't feel like making the trip to the garden
center to go buy a looinumself fate. So you know, vinegar it is.
But you know that's still a waste of time and materials and possibly,
depending on what you're doing, it could be polluting something with absolutely no benefit.
Yeah, so yeah, it's a I get the need to be like,
oh I figured this out. I stuck it to the man, But
it's not always going that straightforward. Well, when talking about I'm ready to
give up, I would have to probably say dear are tops on the list.
Today's word of the day is dear resistible. I made that word.
I like it. That's a good one, dear resistible. And there are
some plants that are just simply dear resistible, like tulips or hostas, where
they're they're just going to eat them. So to celebrate this show and encouraging
you not to throw in the trowel again, can I give you a limerick?
I would love it? Okay, thank you. The deer have done
their misdeeds. My veggies produced no proceeds. Beetles just ate my hollyhocks.
My plants wilt in the window box. I'm left with just my weeds.
The guardinia has never stood a chance. A wasp just flew up the leg
of my pants. My house plants are drowning. Even my sunflowers are frowning.
My successes are mere happenstance. The bulbs I planted did never appear.
The rabbits the vegetation sheer. My pole beans stand askew, my squash has
powdery mildew. I'm tired of let's wait till next year. So I liberally
mulchwood, manure, till the weed growth, my flowers obscure. I resent
my neighbor's scrutiny. I'm seriously considering mutiny and withdrawing from their garden tour.
That is a good one, an extended limerick. It's very timely. Thank
you. Now. I did want to mention also, I saw on the
internet, and we've talked about that. Don't believe everything you read on the
internet, But this thing about rage gardening. Have you seen that? I
have not seen something about rage gardening. They say, instead of venting your
frustrations out in various ways, do it in the garden pruning, pulling,
digging, slashing, and weeding ferociously. Rage can give you the energy to
tear through the task you may have neglected. Now, I think that that's
ridiculous too. Gardening is fun. Gardening is fun. I would like to
propose a twist on rage gardening and make it rage invasive plant removal. So
let's educate people on invasive of plants. And when they are in a rage,
you know they've got their training, they can recognize the invasive plants and
then they can go into these natural areas and you know, rage pull some
horrible invasive and everyone's the better for it. I like that, I really
do. You know you and I are alike. We kind of enjoy weeding.
I don't mind weeding. Yeah, so it's not a rage like in
my garden. Though we all get a little behind at this time of the
year. So again, you know, the whole point here, Stacey,
is with these various issues that we have where we're ready to give up,
and I know you're not kind to give up. Neither are we applying common
sense and a multi pronged approach. That's how I've been successful with deer,
everything from repellents to deer resistant plants to some barriers. There's a variety of
things you employ. Same thing with pest. Integrated pest management important, very
important, and you know what, have to keep an experimental attitude exactly.
You know, use your brain, but you know you have to keep trying
things. And if you do give up, you know what, there's always
next year. Here's how it goes. Right, winter, you're ready for
spring, Spring comes, you're gung how you're out there, you're working hard,
and then you know by the time, it's getting really hot and you
just kind of feel like, you know what I'm done, and that's okay.
Yeah, that's okay to feel that way. Take a deep breath.
But let's be entrepreneurs like Judson taught us a few weeks ago, risk takers,
Risk takers, you got it, educated risk and Plants on Trial is
coming up next here on The Gardening Simplified Show. Proven Winner's Color Choice Shrubs
cares about your success in the garden. That's why we trial and test all
of our shrubs for eight to ten years, making sure they outperform everything else
on the market. Look for them in the distinctive white container at your local
garden center. Greetings gardening friends, and welcome back to the Gardening is Simplified
Show. It's our Are You Ready to give Up? Episode? And you
know, I do really feel for the people who are going through this heat
wave. I mean it's that nothing will make you want to give up on
your garden like excessive heat. You can't even be out there, you know,
you can't even be out there working, and you can't even be out
there enjoying it. So what's the point of working in it if you can't
enjoy it. And you know, honestly, the truth is if as long
as things are staying watered, the weeds, you can deal with later.
Like it's you know, gardening is supposed to be fun, and if it
gets to a point where it's not fun for you, it's causing you stress,
it's causing you health problems. Because it's one hundred and ten degrees out
there, it's okay, so let it go. Yeah, or be like
me out there at two o'clock in the morning with a flashlight. Yeah,
you can always get a nice nap during the heat of the day. There's
where there's a will, there's a way. But you know what it's you
do owe yourself a little bit of benevolence as you go through the season.
So but you know, when it comes to plants on Trial, I like
to tie it into our topic of the day, and so I picked a
plant today for Plants on Trial that is one that if you give up,
it will be not only will it be okay, it will still look amazing.
And while you're in the air conditioning looking out the window, you'll be
patting yourself on the back. Or having chosen this particular plant, I'm already
sold and I don't even know what it is. Well, it's a good
one. It is poly petite hybiscus. Have you seen this one before?
So this is a very interesting hybiscus. And so I'm gonna say right off
the bat, the two things that are are really distinctive about it, and
that make it one of those plants that you don't have to worry about when
you give up number one. It is our smallest hybiscus. So it's a
rosa sharon. You can think about it like that. It's a hybrid,
but ultimately it resembles a rosa sharon, but it only reaches about three to
five feet tall and wide, and it forms just this cute, tidy,
little globe shape. Most rows of sharon they get real tall and they kind
of start to fan out. Um. Some people even would describe the branches
as like an old fashioned caveman club kind of look, you know where they're
all clumpy. Um. I might have used that in regard to rows of
share in earlier. But they're night it's a nice rounded shape. And this
is the least seed set of any hybiscus interest. So, you know,
one of the other issues that people you know have with hybiscus is that they
self so there's seeds drop and they self so everywhere, and you know they're
pretty easy to tear out. But that is another garden shore that you have
to work with. So Polly Petite is all nearly sterile, so you'll get
few, if any seeds from it. And you're probably thinking, Okay,
this all sounds pretty great, but what does it look like? And the
good news is it looks amazing. Um. I love it for two reasons.
Um. It has very very very dark green foliage, so much deeper
green than your average rose of sharon, which can sometimes look a little bit
kind of pale a little anemi. Yeah, they do have pretty high fertilizer
needs rosa sharing in general, and so if it's not getting the nutrients,
it's going to turn kind of like a yellowy color. Polly Petite has a
beautiful dark green and all the better to contrast with its lavender flowers. So
it's kind of like, I mean, it's just like the perfect landscape plant
because it's it's giving you all of these blooms and it requires a little you
don't have to worry about it overgrowing its space. Because it's dwarf. You
don't have to worry about it, you know, throwing seeds out all over
and giving you another maintenance issue. And you know, it just looks fabulous.
And who even if you're not ready to give up, even if you
guard and through the heat of the summer, who doesn't want at least a
couple plants out there that they never have to think about and look good without
even trying. And it blooms on new wood. It blooms on new wood,
right, So this is a USCA Zone five hardy plant, as our
most hardy shrub hibiscus perennial hibiscus are usually hardy to zone four, but shrub
woody plant hibiscuits like Rosa sharon and Polly petite are hardy to USDA Zone five.
But yeah, even if it were to get some winter damage, it
doesn't set its flower buds until later in the season, so you know,
you can prune it in the spring if you want to. You don't even
really need to because it does naturally take on that shape. So yeah,
it's just a really fantastic, low maintenance plant. And it comes for a
part of the world where you were recently visiting It comes from Polly Hill Arboretum
on Martha's Vineyard in Massachusett. Yeah. I just got back from the Hydrangea
Festival on Cape Cod So that's weird. Yeah, out it's from out that
way. Well. Yeah, and it was a plant that you know,
they developed there and had been growing there for many years, and we were
really excited to be able to bring it into the line of proven Winner's Color
Choice shrubs and to get it on the market. So, you know,
it is one of those plants. I think people love Rosa Sharon, right,
There's people have so much nostalgia and everything for Rosa Sharon and then they
see Polly Petite. Of course, they're not blooming normally in the garden center
when people are there for shopping season, because they bloom later. But they
see Polly Petite and it looks so different than what they're accustomed to seeing with
Rosa Sharin that they kind of might think like, whoa, you know,
it's impossible for Rosa Sharon to be that size. It's impossible. Yeah,
but this really is a fantastic plant, and you know, I'm really surprised
that it doesn't have more fans. Yeah, you're not trusting. Yeah,
it's it's one that you know, we keep saying like, it's such a
great plant, I've seen it. If you see it in our trial gardens,
you will instantly fall in love. So if you've been looking for a
space saving Rosa Sharon, if you've been looking for a plant that you don't
have to work too hard and looks really great, I think that Polly Petite
is a really, really excellent choice. Well, we got to get the
word out, and that's what we do on the Gardening Simplified Show. And
if you're keeping score at home, we're talking about rows of Sharon or althea
or our Hybiscus stacy. I think in my experience that causes a lot of
confusion. It does, It definitely does. So a lot of people will
will, especially in the South, people will refer to rows of Sharon as
alphia. It's kind of a more old fashioned term for it. But that
can be confusing because there are plants with the botanical name of alphia, and
there's also hollyhocks, a related plant with a botanical name of alcia. Yes.
Yes, and then you have all the different types of hibiscus. Yes,
so you got your tropical hibiscus. You got your perennial highbiscus, So
yeah, it does get pretty. I'm confused. I'm ready to give up.
Don't give up. You can't go wrong. Honestly, you know you
can't go wrong with any of them. I do love hibiscus, I mean,
everyone's herbie at this point. Talk so much about my, you know,
summerrific perennial hibiscus, But I do love the woody hibiscus as well.
So a couple of things about them is these are full sun plants. If
you live in the South, you might be getting away with some shade,
and that's okay. But what you'll usually find if they're in too much shade,
the classic they get kind of, you know, a little bit more
sprawling and open, and they don't have that nice compact habit that you're particularly
going to see with Polly petite. The flower color is muddy. It kind
of has like more some like like just muddy undertones to it, so you're
not getting that like nice crisp contrast, and especially for this one, you're
not going to get that nice shape. So full sun, at least six
hours of sun each day is what I would recommend. Oh, and guess
what it attracts hummingbirds as most hybiscus do. Fabulous. I was just going
to say that what I love about them is buzz pollination. The bees.
We thought before about buzz pollination and getting up close and watching that happen or
watching it not happen because they're so covered in pollen that they can't fly away,
and that's always a really fun thing. See Adrian has captured that on
video many times in fact, So it's a good a good plant for pollinators
and that kind of thing. Again, it doesn't need pruning. If you
want to prune it, you would do that in early spring because it blooms
on new woods, so it will create its flower buds a little bit later
in the year. Overall, I have found hibiscus, including rows of sharon,
to be pretty deer resistant. How about you. You've had similar luck.
Yeah, So I have an old, old fashioned rows of sharon that
was just at our house when we bought it that we still have around,
and they'll nibble that like a little bit in spring, you know, when
the new growth comes out. But for the most part they're really not compromising
the plant's habit. They're not compromising the blooms too much. No, I
don't have a problem with As a matter of fact, I've always tried to
encourage people to prune althea or rows of Sharon, at least the bigger,
older monsters that we have in some of our landscapes. Again because it blooms
on new wood right right, and because if they do get too tall and
you see this like on old homesteads and that kind of thing as you're driving
around in the summer where they just kind of bend over because their stems have
grown so much and they and they flop over. So a little pruning is
a good thing. Now, if I do have one caveat on these,
they're great for summer. They're blooming all summer long, for weeks. They're
one of the longest blooming, you know, summer flower shrubs. You might
be tempted to put it by your swimming pool, but that would not necessarily
be a great choice because hibiscus, when their flowers fade, they kind of
twist up into a little wad and they drop and they kind of leave a
little bit of a mess. So that's fine, you know. I treat
it like I don't clean up after them in the beds. But if you
were to have like a walkway where people are often walking, they can get
slippery when it rains. Keep the cover on the hot tob so not necessarily
a good choice too close to your swimming pool, but put it someplace where
you can definitely enjoy it, whether that is indoors from the comfort of your
air conditioning or outdoors from the comfort of your favorite lounge chair. So if
you want to see photos and all of the information about poly Petite typiscus this
week's plant on trial, you will find it at Gardening Simplified OnAir dot com.
We're going to take a quick little break in When we come back,
guess what we're opening up that garden mail bag. Please stay tuned at proven
winner's color choice. We've got a shrub for every taste and every space.
Whether you're looking for an easycare rose, an unforgettable hydrangea, or something new
and unique, you can be confident that the shrubs and the white containers have
been trialed and tested for your success. Look for them at your local garden
center. Gratings Gardening friends, and welcome back to the Gardening Simplified Show.
While we were taking a break, Adriana reminded me of a word that I
have used to describe It's not my word, it's an old fashioned word that
people use to describe the spent flowers of the hibiscus, and that is mush
mummy. I have never heard that. You never heard that before? Awesome
because that's exactly what it is. Yeah, they're a little bit mushy and
they are kind of like a mummy, like a mummified flower. So if
you are picking them up, you don't have to again. They'll just decompose
and you add to your soil. It's a lot more fun if you're saying
mush mummy. You know. One time, though, my friend Nancy Burton,
who takes care of containers at the at Beach Clubs in on the New
Jersey Shore, was deadheading a tropical hibiscuss. That was one of the things
she did. They're real popular to put in containers there. So she's taken
out the mush mummies and she goes to grab one and it moves. It
was a bat. It was a bat that had roosted in the high biscuits
for the day, and uh yeah, she screamed and made a little bit
of a scene that I guess gardeners at New Jersey beach clubs are not supposed
to do, but who could blame her? So mush mummies would be fun
in October, right, Yes, they're a little bit dried out by then,
but that's mush mummy season. Yeah, correct, cool? All right,
what do we got in the mail bag? All right, let's take
a look. Kate shares a photo of her container in South Georgia, USDA
Zone nine B with some fabulous dichondra, one of the best spillers for sunny
garden. Yeah, so kay, it was nice enough to send in a
photo, and she said she's very proud of her container and it has a
beautiful silver falls dichondra. So you know this plant, silver falls is fabulous,
and you know, people often do wonder like what's the best spiller for
a sunny container? And in Kate's container even though like a lot of her
other And we'll put the picture on on our show notes of course at Gardening
Simplified on air dot com. But you know you'll see her other plants in
the container haven't quite gotten established, but the dichondra is just trailing all the
way down to the ground, and I love it. It just has soft
little leaves, almost like a ginko leaf. They have almost like a ginko
leaf type texture. They're smaller and is so vigorous, and I love that
color. It goes with just about any flower color. It does. And
silver foliage, We've talked about this before, has a tendency to be drought
tolerant, and silver falls is both heat and drought tolerant. Probably an important
thing in South Georgia, Yes, definitely. So if you want to see
a picture of Kate's container, visit gardening simple Fied OnAir dot com. So
what are gardener's asking? Rick Beth asked, watched your butterfly show and want
to grow more Asclepius butterfly weed, but no success. They die out.
Beth, You're asking in the right place, because Stacy is an Asclepius butterfly
weed enthusiasm. I am, and I have an awful lot of them.
Now, I will say that in my garden I mostly take a pretty I
guess you would describe it as a less a fair approach. So I've purchased
larger plants so like of our swamp milkweed Asclepius incarnata, the orange native one
tuberosa, the yellow one. I buy those and then I just let them
do their thing, like they set seed, and I let their seed just
pop up, and if it's coming up somewhere where I don't want them,
then I'll just rip them out. So, you know, Asclepius can be
a little bit difficult to source because they as they have a long tap root,
and a lot of perennials and shrubs and trees for that matter, have
a long tap root, don't really do well in a conventional growing system like
in a little, you know, gallon shot. So a lot of people
do try to grow them from seed, but I think it's worth trying in
earlier, earlier in the season to get the Asclepius plants and then let themselves
sew. I have had luck growing them from seed, but ultimately I think
best question, it depends on which one you're growing. Some of them are
going to be a lot easier than others. The common milkweed Asclepius cyriacus.
I think that there's it grows everywhere. Whether or not you want it,
you probably have it, But so I don't know if you're trying to grow
something that's a little bit different, I know, the tropical Maybe you're accidentally
purchasing the tropical one Asclepius curosavika, because sometimes those are sold, you know,
they're sold as butterfly weed. They're not hardy, so in that case
they would be, you know, dying out for you every season because they're
actually a tropical plant and they attract a ton of butterflies, but they don't
last. So I think the question is which one you're trying to grow.
And you know, if you can and get a plant, get it established
in your garden, and then let it go to seed, and then as
those seeds float around and find a home, they kind of determine for themselves
where they'll grow and be successful. So that's the approach I take. It's
good advice. And but you know, I mentioned the quote of Winston Churchill
earlier in the show. I also love Stacy hervella quotes lay say fair,
it's as easy as falling off a law right kind of Yeah, you know,
I love my self sowers. I think we should do a show and
self sewing play day. That'd be great. Kathy's writing to us, I'm
considering buying hostile liners from a nursery in Georgia, seeing how I do?
How do I grow them myself? I live in the suburbs of Chicago,
Zone five. If I planted the hosta liners in pots until they got a
little bit bigger, put the pots in the garage over winter for them to
survive, question Mark Kathy writes to us, Do I still cut down the
leaves in the fall? I have two bigger dogs, so don't want to
plant them in the ground until they can hold their own hostile la vista baby,
Well, you know, hostile liners. A liner is just a baby
plant that a grower starts with. Sometimes they are called plugs, it can
be called all different things. It's just a tiny little plant that a grower
starts with, of course to grow it on. And so when you're purchasing
a one or three gallon hosta from a garden center, it started its life
as a liner. They're not usually available to you know, home gardeners,
because they do need a little bit of you know TLC in time. But
if you can get them by all means, I would say, patting them
up into a container and you know, probably going into like a one gallon
depending on the variety. If you're going to grow a really large one,
maybe you want to go into a bigger one. But I think putting a
hostile liner into a one gallon growing it through this year it should be absolutely
fine. And I would think so too. I don't even think you'd really
need to worry about sheltering it indoors. You know, you might want to
gather up all your one gallon hostas kind of put them together in a corner
or some kind of semi protected area. Make sure that they can get water,
you know, through the winter they're not covered by like an overhang or
something like that. They are actually one of the easier grennials to grow and
produce. So I think that it would be a great experiment and a great
way to be successful. Yeah, I would agree. Provided the pots have
drainage holes, very important. Sink them. You could sink them in the
ground for overwinter, and they should do. They should do all right for
it. You know, anyone who's ever looked at hasta roots, you realize
looking at the roots, how tough that planted. Yeah, they are so
thick and fleshy and extensive. That's one of the reasons that they can grow
you know, so robustly, Nikki writes to us. My question is in
regards to my bloody crane's bill. I transplanted it back in May. It
struggled since then. I've noticed brown, black and red spots, but a
different red that it turns in the fall, it seems. Is it super
stressed from the transplant? Is it a disease? If it's diseased, do
you have a recommendation on treatment. I'm in zone eight A, so,
you know, Nikki's question made me realize that we have not really given a
lot of credence to the hard working perennial geranium. And it is tough.
They are very tough and relatively easy to grow. Yeah, they're quite easy
to grow. I you know, I love them. I My mother in
law had a little area in the front of their house kind of like a
little courtyard that it was impossible to get anything to grow because it was really
dry. Shade. Yes sometimes that your gation reached up there. But she
tried hastas and all these different things and was never happy. And then one
day I brought her be a Covo perennial geranium. It's a nice pink color,
and that thing has just absolutely thrived there. It looks beautiful, it's
covered in flowers, and so it's just a great problem solving plant. And
it does divide very well when you have an established plant. So Nikki,
I think that you know, it's when most of the fully they can get
some folliar diseases, but it's really not a detriment to them. You know,
they can get a little spotty looking sometimes, but it's not like it's
going to harm the plant. And it's important when it comes to folliar diseases
that like leaf spot diseases are not in the plant, they're on the plant.
So if you have leaf spot, it's not like, oh, your
plant is permanently infected and is going to have it forever. It literally is
just living on that leaf surface. So if it's deciduous like a hardy geranium
is, then you know that foliage is going to die back and as that
goes away, the leaf spot disease goes away. So some years are bad
depending on the spring, if it's rainy, if it's cool, if it's
humid, if there's low air circulation, and then they're more likely to get
that leaf spot. And I think that by dividing it. Yeah, that
is a little bit stressful on the plant, not to say they won't recover,
but certainly would make it more susceptible as they're recovering from that transplanting,
especially with a perennial gerannium. I've often found that perennials that make those like
thick stems like also yarrow is another there one. When you divide it,
it's it gets a little funky for the next season or two. So I
think Niki Nikki sent pictures and of course we'll post those in the show notes
at Gardening Simplified on air dot com. I really don't think you have anything
to worry about. I agree, just tough. I have three words for
Nikki well drained soil. Yeah my opinion, and I think if you pay
attention to that, you're going to be just fun yep. So give them
some you know, keep the TLC up, give them some time to grow
in and recover from the transplanting and dividing, and you know, next season
they'll probably you probably won't even remember that you divided them because they'll look so
fabulous. So if you have a question for us, you can reach us
at help at Gardening Simplified on Air dot Com or just visit Gardening Simplified on
air dot com, where you will find the photos we've referenced, plants on
trial, links to break branching news, all of that good stuff, as
well as a contact for them to send in your questions. And speaking of
branching news, we're going to take a break in. When we come back,
we're just going to update us on what's happening out there in the world.
The Gardening Simplified Show is brought to you by Proven Winners Color Choice Shrubs.
Our award winning flowering shrubs and evergreens have been trialed and tested for your
success so you enjoy more beauty and less work. Look for Proven Winners Color
Choice Shrubs in the distinctive white container at your local garden center. It's time
for branching news here on the Gardening Simplified Show. And well, I wanted
to let you know I've got some personal branching news, and that is my
cannas are finally blooming. Yay, Long live the Canna King. That's how
you know it's the height of summer when the cannas are blooming and they're all
lush and full and the hummingbirds are going crazy. I love that. Next
come the humming birds exactly. So I'm branching news this week. There are
still snow piles at the Minneapolis airport in July. It's probably not a terrible
surprise to anyone familiar with Minnesota winters, but while we're well into summer now,
of course, these snow piles are primarily sand and debris and that sort
of thing, but there's still a snow pile. So that's quite amazing to
have snow piles, especially when we're hearing all this news of it being the
hottest week on record on the planet. Right, Yeah, unbelievable. So
they might not be run for too much longer at the Minneapolis airport. Snow
it's a terminal problem. Did you get that one? Definitely? Yes,
there it was in plane sight. I'm really trying to think of a comeback
here, but I'm drawn a blank. It's like Christmas in July, all
right. This was interesting In the news, a bear is suspected of stealing
a backpack with a phone, jerky, bird seed, and a Heineken beer
from a mobile home park in Lehigh, Pennsylvania. Police have been tracking and
found the bag later. Actually was a farmer in a field who found the
backpack. The backpack and the phone were recovered. The bear had no interest
in the phone, of course, wanted the jerky and the bird seed,
and police are just hoping the bear is over twenty one. As it relates
to the Heineken beer, I like the implication that if it if it had
been any other type of beer, things might have been different. But it
was specifically the Heineken, you know that. It's like, Oh, if
it was one of those like IPAs, that's too happy for the bear.
I'm not going to go in for that. That's great, that's great.
Yeah. And and the fact he left the phone and the back I you
know, I just got back from Cape Cod. I was walking along the
dock and there's a professor from Cornell University. His name is Daniel Schwartz,
and we just struck up a conversation. Great guy. The point I'm getting
to here is he said that in New York where he's at, they have
this phrase they use all the time, leave something on the table for Murphy.
Oh. I thought that was great. Leave something. So you know,
the bear left something, he didn't take it all he left something on
the table for a murphy. I'm sure if he could have eaten the phone,
he would have just guessing, you know, he might have given it
a little and then it didn't work out so well. I'm surprised he just
didn't try to download a nap. How do plant reversions take place? Remember
that many ornamental cultivars begin when an alert plant enthusiasts notice a tree or a
part of a tree with a unique growing characteristic, and sometimes they revert.
I just wanted to get a comment from you here, Stacy, on that,
because I was out and about the other day and I took a picture
of a dwarf Alberta spruce that was going through a reversion, reverting back to
its I don't know what do we call it? A little species? Yea
a white spruce original form? I guess you would say, yeah. And
that is one of the wildest reversions that you will see. So if you're
not familiar with dwarf Filberta spruce by name, you have certainly seen one.
It's that little, conical, kind of starbursty looking evergreen that everyone seems to
plant next to their front door. And the dwarf a little bit of a
misnomer because sure it's dwarf wointing by it, but they do get quite large
and there's really no way to prune them or anything like that to manage their
size because they have such a tight conical shape. And I think this propensity
to reversion has really increased over the last couple of years. I know.
I mean before I never saw I rarely saw it, and now I feel
like, you know, one in five or ten Albertas that I see have
a reversion. So if you're thinking of the Alberta spruce, basically what happens
is, you know, one day you go out and it's like a whole
spruce tree is just shooting up out of the back of it. A Christmas
tree. Yeah, so full size. Even though dwarf Alberta is very tight
and compact, it just gets this whole, full size shoot of a tree.
And you send a picture, so we'll put that in the show notes
so you can see it and maybe once you see it's one of those things
that like, once you see it, you start to see it everywhere,
you know, that kind of thing, because a lot of people, I
think would just assume it's like a seedling or something that popped up from the
ground under the plant. But no, it is the plant reverting back to
its original form, because you know, dwarf Alberta spruce originated as like a
little branch mutation on that full spruce. So some things are more prone to
reversion. We talked about this a little bit when Megan Attire Plant Breeder was
on. You know, sometimes variation is another plant that often reverts, and
sometimes you'll see that will certainly with things that are grafted that the understock.
It's a little bit of a different type of reversion, but that will kind
of come out. So it's always interesting to see and some people will think,
oh, my gosh, it's a miracle. Well, no, unfortunately
it's not a miracle. And in most cases you should cut the reversion out
as soon as possible because usually the reversion is a much stronger plants and will
quickly destroy whatever that feature was that you bought that plant for, whether it
was the habit, texture, color, etc. Interesting. Interesting, Okay,
A long time landscape staple use yews or Texas taxus are outlawed in various
parts of Idaho in the past few years because animals, after nibbling on the
plants have died, and a three year old Boise girl was hospitalized after eating
a berry from a U plant in her family. Now, this plant has
just been a staple in the garden center in nursery industry for years, so
it was interesting to see that in this area they're saying, no, not
going to plant them anymore. It is and you know, us are okay.
They're extremely they're extremely shade tolerant, and that I think is the main
reason that they have become as popular as they are now. I grew up
in a house in suburban Detroit with us right outside the front door, and
I remember from when I was a very young age, my mom saying,
never ever, ever eat anything from that plant. Those red berries. They
look good, but do not eat anything from that plant. And I remember
her, you know, basically making me so afraid of them. If I
walked out the front door, I would kind of do like a little like
curve around it, so I didn't even touch the thing, you know what
I mean. But they are they are so toxic, and but weirdly deer
eat them. Yeah, So you know, I know that they're a problem
for a lot of livestock. Other ruminants. But it's it's just it baffles
me that a plant that is so toxic to humans and to most other animals,
the deer are just at and just nibble it. They devour, they
will destroy it. And it is a slow growing plant, so their chance
of recovery from severe deer browsing is slim to none, basically. But it's
an interesting plant. And you know, I think that people in the UK
have a much bigger reverence for taxes than we have here, because I don't
know if you've ever looked up like the old I mean, they have taxes
in the UK that are literally thousands of years old, and they're in these
you know, beautiful old churchyards, and they take on these just amazing shapes
we're here in the US. They're a little bit like, you know,
oh, I planted him in my front yard and pruned it into a tuna
can, and isn't it beautiful? And you're a little like less than inspired.
It is that plan, that plant that we prune into meatballs and tuna
cans in our yards and for people keeping at score score at home, use
yews or taxes ta x us. I always remembered the very thing because I
made the analogy death and taxes. Yes, so stay away from evade your
taxes is what you need. Definitely grew up evading taxes and uh so we're
gonna put the link there at Gardening Simplified on air dot com. You can
read about this story this community in Idaho, and fortunately the three year old
girl is okay. Yeah, uh real quickly, if you are in your
Semite National Park, they are recommending that if you come across these stacks of
rocks that people will stack up, knock them over. You ever have the
urge to knock him over, well, knock him over. They want you
to knock him over. People use them to well, you know, create
points of demarcation. I guess along the trail or whatever they're saying, go
ahead, knock them over. Rock and roll, rock on all right,
I'm all for it. So there you go. If you're going to be
vacationing this summer, always a pleasure and privilege to do this show with you.
Stay likewise, and a big thank you very much to our fabulous engineer
and producer, Adrianna Robinson, and thank you to you for watching on YouTube,
listening to us on the radio, and downloading the podcast. Wherever you
download your podcast, have yourself a great week. See it