KTRH Garden Line does not necessarily endorse any of the products or services advertised on
this program. Welcome to KTRH Garden Line with Skip Ricter. Just watch him
as well. Good Saturday morning, on a good day for gardening. If
you're listening to garden Line and I'm your host, Skip Ricter, We're here
to talk to you about whatever is of interest to your regarding plants. Maybe
you've got a question about vegetables or the lawn or some trees, perhaps roses,
bugs are reading the plants, diseases are attacking the plants. Well,
we can walk you through it. Give us a call. Seven one three
two one two fifty eight seventy four seven one three two one two five eight
seven four. Be glad to visit with you and find out what's going on.
You know, we've had some interesting weather here lately. This little front
that move through send us a little rain, and now we're going to get
some sunshine here coming out of it. The temperatures are so nice and mild.
It's kind of an interesting thing for the plants in the landscape. You
know, there's some things that would really like to be taking off and growing
fast right now, and you get a little bit of this cool weather and
it sort of holds things up a little bit. But I do want to
point out one thing about the situation we're in right here, in this big
middle of the spring season, and that is, if you've got broad leaf
weeds in your lawn and you are going to need to use a broad leaf
weed control product that's post emergent, meaning it kills them after they come up
rather than prevents them from coming up and establishing, then you need to get
that done pretty soon. There is an exception or two, but almost all
those products that kill a broad leaf weed that's already growing in your lawn,
those products can be damaging to Saint Augustine when the weather gets hot, and
hot can mean as low as mid to upper eighties. When you get you
know, say your eighty eight degrees, some of those products will stress you're
Saint Augustine. They're not going to kill it right outright, just if used
as directed, but they'll stress it. And so if we're going to try
to control those broad leaf weeds, we need to do so soon rather than
wait, because once it heats up, you put those products down, and
a number of them, again, not everyone but a number of them they
do stress the Saint Augustine. So what's what does that mean? It's stress
is a Saint Augustine, Well, it means that it may yellow a little
bit, it means that it will get weaker. It means that a disease
like take all root rot will get an opportunity to come in and take down
that plant. That plant be in your Saint Augustine grass plants, and so
we try to avoid that by not adding insult to injury. It's almost it
almost becomes like a situation where you're trying to decide between you know, do
I live with the weeds? Do I control them with a spray? Do
I hand pull them? And everybody's got different answers for that, and each
weed is different. You're not going to hand pull dollar weed, you won't
get anywhere at all. You're not going to hand pull in a lawn and
you know, nuts edge or something like that. But if you do need
to do that spraying, now's the time. And so that would be the
perennial weeds, the things that are difficult to control, like dollar weed,
Virginia button weed, if you want to control dichondra, those are just some
examples. You want to get those things taking care of earlier on rather than
later, because later you're not going to have the options. You're just not
and so you just live in mow and try to ignore them as best you
can. But just something to think about getting out there. We try to
avoid stressing plants in every way we can, because I love to anthropomorphize,
and here we go again. But plants in many ways are like us,
and that if you don't eat right, if you don't get enough sleep,
if you know you're not taking care of your body, you're more likely to
get sick than if you do all those things and do them right. You
sleep well, you eat right, you've got healthy food, you exercise.
You know, it doesn't mean you're not going to get sick. It just
means your chances are much much less. And we just get in this loop
with our bodies when we weaken ourselves to where it seems like everything that comes
along, you know, we catch it or we takes us down. And
that happens with plants too. When you weaken a plant, you increase the
chances of problems with it. There are diseases that are absolute opportunists. They're
there in the environment. You may wonder where did that come from. Well,
it's been there all along. It's just the patient, the subject.
The plant got weakened and the disease got a chance to move in. So
take all root rot is one of those diseases of Saint Augustine. It when
Saint Augustine is in a stressed, weakened state. That stress could be from
shading, it could be from drought, it could be from a broad leaf
post emergent weed control product in hot weather. There's a lot of ways we
stress or can stress Saint Augustine. Take all has the opportunity. Another example
of that is with hypoxalin canker, and that's a disease of oak trees.
Primarily we see it on our red oaks, but it can occur on almost,
i guess, just about any kind of oak tree. When the disease
is ubiquitous, it's in the environment. But when the plant gets stressed,
the tree gets stressed, the disease moves in and suddenly you've got bark fallen
off. You've got these big gray areas or big kind of olive brown,
drab, dusty looking areas on the trunk where the bark fell off and the
tree is dying. And someone may say, well, where did Habboxlan come
from? Well, it was already there. I'll continue that in just a
moment. For right now, I want to go to the phones, our
number again seven one three two one two five eight seven four, and we're
going to start off this morning talking to Joe out in Jersey Village. Good
morning, Joe, Hello Joe. All right, I'm gonna put Joe on
hold and see if we can get Joe back here in just a moment.
Josh, let me know if we get him that last year freeze all that,
and it's down to where I've got one big patch of mossing but grown
dirt, and then it's sort of the dead grass. You can see.
It's like the semis, I think it is. But then I've got orders
of the you know, the typical so Augustine wonder, but no leaves on
the order. Okay, So I'm thinking I've got so well born because I've
seen some moths too. I think, all right, well, Joe,
we're a little early for soide web worms, but there are plenty of other
moths out there. But I think, unless you well, we're too I
think I'm gonna say we're too early for the sideweb worms to be the issue.
That when you have runners without leaves on them. We often look at
a disease called large patch. We used to call it brown patch um,
and that rots the leaves off the runners. It makes those big circles in
the cool season. You see them in the fall, in the spring.
But if the run, if the runners are green, that's a good sign
because they can resprout leaves. That that's not the problem. They're actually not
green. They die, but there's no leaves. I mean, I don't
know ways leaves are teacher. So the runner is dead too, it's not
okay, But there are are patches of green still left throughout the yard,
okay, well in areas. So what I would do first is I would
assess how big are the dead patches. You know, if you've got a
dead patch, that's maybe there's a green sprig here and there where the green
parts or a foot apart here and there there's some green life in and among
the dead. It can close back over and over the course of this summer
season with good care. If they're larger than that, I'd consider buying some
some pieces of side to put in and try to get a head start to
fill it back in, because wherever the soil is bare, you're going to
get a lot more weed problems and we'd like to avoid that. I think
starting off, have you fertilized yet this this spring I have, but that
doesn't seem to have done. And it's under twenty I mean, you know
something year old oak tree and uh so I thought it was just not enough
sun. But it's been even the areas of good sun, it's it gets
like this clumps of green grass left. But then there's these bare brown runners
of the Saint Augustine. So I don't know. I didn't know what does
take holl uh look like I didn't. I'm gonna hold on here and take
a break, and you hang on and we'll come back to you right after
break, and we will continue this discussion. If you'd like to call our
number seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy four. Well, good
Saturday morning, on a good day for gardening, as they all are.
We have been talking with Joe out here in Jersey. We're gonna go back
to Joe and just one second here, but I want to give you the
phone number. It is seven one three two one two five eight seven four
seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy four. Well, Joe,
let's continue on. So we got grass dying, and it's in the shade,
it's in the sun, and there's all kinds of patches. I need
to hang on one second, Joe, I need to put you on hold.
Um let's see, we're gonna come back to go there, all right,
Joe, Uh, anyway back back with the um the grass. Are
you there? Okay? Excuse me. We're having trouble with Joe. So
we're gonna get the gremlins out of the system and I'm just going to continue
to talk here about about ter up. Joe's back. Joe, how are
you okay? I didn't know whether lost year are you lost? We have
we have ghosts inhabiting the wires, and so we're trying to run them out
right now. So back to the back to the along Joe. If I
were to just guess, I think you probably have a disease called take all
root rot in that grass based on some of the ways you've described it.
Now for me to diagnose over the air, not even seeing the grass is
a long shot, so I wouldn't I wouldn't assume that's the final word.
You've got a couple of options. One, you can try to manage this
from a cultural standpoint, you know, doing the things that help the grass
get stronger. Or and this may be the better option, you can take
a sample and send it into the state plant clinic where they will truly diagnose
it. They'll culture it out in a petri dish and truly identify it,
and then we know exactly what to go after it with. So if you
wanted to do the diagnosis option, you just take a plug of sick grass,
not healthy, not dead, but sick declining. It doesn't look good,
but it's still alive, and you sent and you go online to plant
clinic one word plant clinic dot TAMU dot e d U Plant Clinic dot TAMU
dot edu and just follow the instructions on the form. That's the way to
find out for sure. If you want to go the other route, what
I would recommend is to begin using fertilizers that are somewhat acidifying to your lawn.
Microlap sixty four, for example, is an acidifying fertilizer. Not the
green bag but it's it's kind of in a pinkish bag. I believe pick
ash red a color, but it's acidifying one. You would use that.
Top dressing the lawn with a very thin layer of pete moss has been shown
to be effective as well. Aerating the lawn has been shown to be effective
also and helping to combat take all root rot. So those would be kind
of your cultural options if you don't want to go to the route of officially
having it identified. Because it never hurts to do some top dressing, it
never hurts the duration, and it never hurts to a moderate amount of fertilization.
Well, i think that's excellent recommend So I'm going to do the test.
And because if I've got a ten by ten spots, even though we
won't grow in, even though that's yeah, that's an unusual situation. Can
you think of anything that was done there in the past, you know that,
Like I don't know, if you were out on property, I'd say,
did you have a big burn pile there, you know, on the
land or is it was that a place where some building side or anything like
that. No, the only thing I can think is is that just because
it's right to it's under this oak tree with heavy shade that I wasn't paying
attention to the grass and died gradually then went away, but it receded.
It receded, and then there's that. Then as you described the other spotsy
areas where there's learned birds and then there's the grass. There's a lot of
fetch that grass. So I think I need to sample, to take the
plant and sample and fit it in, and what about a soil sample should
do that? You could do that, but I put down some medina and
some hemates and I didn't know. You know, that didn't seem to make
as well. But that didn't hurt anything. And we probably just have too
many things going on here at once with it. And so for example,
I would say, you know, the shade, as I was mentioned a
little bit earlier, it can be a contributing factor to take all root rot
because it stresses the grass and so it's usually not just one thing that's happening
soul. I would do that sample. If you want to do a soil
sample, you could because it would inform your future fertilizing. Now or only
question on soil is do you want to sample your whole lawn and small samples
all over, put it together, mix it up so you get an overall
idea. Or do you want to just sample an area that nothing wants to
grow to see if there's something unusual going on just in that one area,
and that could be two different samples that you do. I'm inclined to think
that the reason nothing is growing is because of a soil nutrient or pH issue.
That's what a soil test would tell you is just nutrients and pH nothing
else. And so I'm I'm not as yeah, yeah, you got to
go sample this soil in this case because of what you're calling about. I
would say that if you do the disease, you want to If you do
the disease sample, you want to take the sample correctly. And I don't.
I have a YouTube channel online and there's a video. If you do
a search for skip ricter on YouTube, first you get a bunch of video
games that somehow have skip ricter in the name. I don't know what that's
about, but you also get my channel, and on my channel, if
you do a search for soil or grass sample or you know, turf sample
or something, there's a video that tells you exactly how and where to take
a sample, because when you take the time to do it and spend the
money to have them look at it, you don't want to just have taken
a dead sample and they say, we can't do anything with this. So
I to that video online first. Okay, excellent, excellent, excellent.
I think that's what I'm going to do, because it's the grass is just
it's it's facting weird and I just uh, if I put down new turf,
new side, he would die. It would catch the take all too,
right, well, it could off the stress if the stress or factors
are there, it could take all is already all over the place. It's
not like you know, you brought something in and now you have take all,
and so bringing in new side under good conditions. The fact that take
all is there is not a problem. Otherwise ever long on the block would
be dying right now, would take all root right, It's a it's an
opportunist. So we're trying to avoid stress and the grass, which is kind
of my little monologue today, was talking about the importance of avoiding stressing our
plants because then we skit on this treadmill over spring for this we're spraying for
that, you know. Yeah, yeah, just I mean it's like saying
I don't want to take care of my body. I just want to have
met us and five medicines that I take every day to keep me alive.
Well, that's not a good way to go about it, and so that
that's kind of the approach I take. But I've been I've been doing this
a long long time. And although I can't know that you have take all
root, right, I would put about eighty percent of my guests in that,
and then we'll la when the lab responds to you with the results.
Give us a call, let me know. I'd like to continue this discussion
as to what we do about it. I'll do it. Would you run
that paddress by me one more time? Yes? And I'm sure other people
would want to write that down too. I always say, listen to the
show with a pen and paper and they address for plant samples. Would you
want to say, here's a sick plant, tell me what's wrong? The
lab is plant clinic, plant clinic dot TAMU, dot E d U t
A MU is in Texas a and M University dot edu is an education Okay,
actually, all right, than I appreciate it. Thank you for going
on. All right, I appreciate that call. Thank you very much.
Okay, good good, that's that's what we want to hear. Oh my
goodness. Well, our phone number, you need to give us a call
seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy four seven one three two one
two five eight seven four. We're gonna head to break here in just a
bit, and if you will give us a call, Josh, we'll get
you on the board and you can be first up as we move forward with
the show. Yeah, that that whole concept of predisposing plants to getting sick
are in some cases to insects as well, is something that's important to note
because a lot of times we just think about, you know, we're throwing
these silver bullets at the at the lawn or the garden or whatever we're going
after. And you know, there are a lot of great products. There's
awesome fertilizers, there's good pest control, there's good disease control, and so
on, but we start off with cultural We want it to be healthy as
we can, and then we have very few times where we then need to
apply some product to cure or fix a problem rigging that withtor don't be Babin
man. If that doesn't get your blood flowing and wake up, speaking to
wake up. If you look over at the neighbor's house and the lights are
off, go over and knock on the door and tell them they're missing garden
Line, they will rise up and call you blessed. And maybe not today,
but later on. We love when people listen to garden Line. Right,
Hey, well, we've got a phone number that you need to write
down, in fact, hand it to your neighbors when you go over there
seven one three. Maybe not today. I don't know if I want them
calling me saying why did you tell my neighbor to come wake me up when
I was trying to sleep in seven one three two one two fifty eight seven
tventy four seven one three, two one two fifty eight seventy four. It's
kind of been a why is my grass dying? Morning? So far?
See if it continues that way. Take all is one of those diseases that
is just a real problem because you know, gray leaf spot makes the lawn
look horrible and it does significant damage to the grass blades, but the grass
but can bounce back. The brown patch you st are now called large patch
here in Texas makes the big circles. That's a problem, but the runners
are left green and so the grass comes back. But take all is one
that kills the roots. Take all root rot the name kind of tells you
what's going on there. And when you're dealing with something like take all root
rot, that's a disease that where you get to replace the grass or hopefully
keep it alive and try to grow it back in. We always have options
in gardening and horticulture that you know, you can replace the hold on,
or you can put some little plugs or little pieces of grass in here and
there. There's a lot of range ways to do it, but the bottom
line would take all is it's it's killing grass and that's why we're concerned about
it. Let's now go out to the phones and we're going to talk to
Steve in New Canaan. Hello, Steve, Hi, how are you well?
Thank you great. This was February and I put down a pre emergent
on my Saint Augustine lawn and about a week later or two, one of
the lawn services that tree yards, you know, spray came and by mistake
treated my yard. They did the front yard and realized their mistake before they
did the backyard. So the backyard looks great. It's exactly where I want
it to be. The front yard is horrible. Okay. Is there anything
I can do to counteract that guests in compatibility with the chemical or something?
But you're talking about this take all root rod. That's kind of I've got
bare patches that runners that are brown. Yes, you know, in a
lot of this well, and this would be kind of one of those opportunities
where Takeoff would love to hop in. But we're just gonna have to wait
and see. There's no fixing the eye. You know, they double dosed
the lawn with pre emergence. A lot of the pre emergence, and a
lot of the very effective pre emergence will are what's called DNA inhibitors. What
that means is they don't let roots develop. And if you'll go out to
your lawn where it was double dosed and get out on your hands and knees
and pull up a runner and look at the roots on it. Instead of
long, normal roots going down in the ground, you will see roots that
are stubbed off. You know, they may be a quarter inch long by
the time they hit the soil, they quit growing, or they may be
you know, a half inch long in the end, may kind of be
like a caveman club. We call those clubed roots. That's a sign of
that kind of herbicide, pre emergent herbicide that's been overapplied, damaging the root
system. So here's the double whammy. Your grass needs water and nutrients,
but it can't get a root in the ground, and the old part of
the runner is dying, maybe from a disease, maybe just whatever. And
so now the grass is sitting there without an ability to get water, and
it's like you pull the runner out and through it on the driveway. And
so what we need to do is just try to take care of it as
best we can. If you did kind of a little folier application of nutrient
to the lawn, that would be helpful. But I'm not saying that's the
normal solution to this. It's just we got to get the grass through this
period of time, and it can take sixty days or more for that product
to break down so that it can really get some roots down in the ground.
And in the meantime, we got to try to keep it alive.
So that's the juggling act you're doing right now. Okay, So I've done
the quick green up. Uh you know, I'm using the ncrofoss products every
that's all I use. So I just followed the fertilizer schedule and absolutely just
do the best, do the best I can. Yeah, because so I
don't need to resaw it, or I could resaw it if I wanted to,
Well you could, but i'd wait a while. It is if you
is that Yeah, if you dropped your sad onto that spot right now,
that product is right there at the surface, that's what it's made to do.
It's doing its job. We just kind of overdid it and now you
know, we're kind of having to wait it out. Yeah. Yeah,
because like I said that, it's a too totally diametric where they realized as
I went out and said, well, y'all do it and so, and
they were already packing up realizing that they've gone they've cut intear by mistake.
Yeah. Well, and let me say too that I'm I'm making the assumption
that it's the what I called the DNA type herbicide pre emergent herbicide. So
that's just that what that is. But hey, I appreciate your call.
I wish you good luck with that. We're gonna have to head off to
a break. Well, appreciate, appreciate it. You bet. Her number
is seven one three two one two five eight seven four seven one three two
one two fifty eight seventy four. Right, go, well, good Saturday
morning, on a good morning for gardening. You're listening to garden Line,
which is a good thing to be doing right now at least. Maybe I'm
biased, but I think so. Maybe if you had a head lamp you
could go out and start gardening. But I believe, I believe a cup
of coffee in the radio is good enough for right this minute. How about
that? Hey, if you had any kind of gardening questions you want to
talk about, give me a call at seven one three two one two five
eight seven four seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy four. Talking
about all kinds of things related to the lawns this morning and grass stresses and
whatnot. It is so important to start off by taking care of your soil.
I mentioned that we're talking about cnmals a little bit earlier. Uh,
you know, you go to a place you get, you get the compost
materials, you get the fertilizer materials, you get your soil right, and
then you plan and it's important. And I understand I was at yesterday.
I was, in fact, I was out and enchanted channing gardens down in
four Being County area and just walking around looking at all the color. And
you know, this is that time of year in garden centers around the Houston
area. You just are just eyes are just wide open with oh my gosh,
I have to have one of all of these, right, and the
color the plants, that's what inspires us. But before thinking about the green
stuff, you need to think about the brown stuff, and that's the soil.
Because the awesome plants that are available at our independent garden centers very well
adapted, quality, many cases disease resistant plants that we choose there because they've
selected the best for us. They're not just mass merchandising stuff all over the
United States and their stores because they don't have those They have a store here,
are two stores here, and they're local. But those plants dropped into
unprepared soil that's not given them a chance for success. I mean, they
some of them are so tough. They'll live despite that. But why not
start and get the setting right for the plants so that they can thrive,
create that environment that they can thrive in, and you'll be amazed at the
results. And so you know it's There's two things that at least come to
mind initially that I think or a challenge as I talk to gardeners. One
of them is getting people to look at the fall as as good of a
planting season as the spring. Everybody has spring fever, and we got it
right now. I've got it right now. In fact, I had had
to have a few things to haul home with me because just love, love,
love the spring planning season. But fall is a great planning season,
and yet we don't have that spring fever in the fall. I wish I
could change that and have it in both seasons. Second thing is getting people
to do the soil before they plant the plants. Now, I used to
say, spend a dollar on your soil before you spend a dollar on your
plants. I think that makes the point, But why not spend a dollar
on both at the same time. But when you come home with a plant
and you're not coming home with compost for a heavy clay, you know,
expanded shale for example. With the fertilizers that you need to mix into the
soil and to sup ament the plant, then that plant is not going to
give you its full potential. And that is exactly what we're trying to do
here, is have our plants do the best they can. When you go
to the garden center and you see that flower, you see that tomato plant,
you see whatever your mind's eye pictures, how beautiful your place is going
to be, how productive your garden's going to be, how tasty the tomatoes
you're going to get are going to be. Right, that's what we want,
and we can realize that we live in an area where it is easy
to be successful in gardening if you follow the basic principles, and principle number
one I'm going to say is build a quality soil. It may not be
exciting to look at a handful of brown stuff and that's not as pretty as
a hibiscus bloom that's got you blow in your mind. But if you want
the mind blowing hibiscus bloom, then spend some money on the brown stuff and
the nutrients that go with it so that you can achieve that that's a word
to the wise, and I promise you if you will follow that guide,
you're going to see much more success and you won't be one of the people
that say I have a brown thumb. I planted this, I planted that.
Nothing grows here. We can help with that. So give us a
call. We're going to go to break but write down seven one three,
two one two fifty eight seventy four. Josh will get you on the boards
and when we come out of this segment, you will be the first in
line. We can talk about whatever kind of topics you want. It's kind
of been a turf morning. Maybe we need to get some vegetables and herbs
and flowers and expecting the phone to ring on trees it usually does. We
we'll get to all that kind of stuff. But that's where we're here for.
You're listening to Guardenline. I'm your host, Skip Ricter, and I
can't wait to get back to the next hour. See if them. KTRH
Garden Line does not necessarily endorse any of the products or services advertised on this
program. Welcome to KTRH Garden Line with Skip rictor so Trip. Just watch
him as so many club back rickety, good Saturday morning. You are listening
to garden Line. I'm your host, skip Rictor, and this is a
good morning for gardening, as all mornings are. Our phone number, write
it down, get on the board. Let's have Josh get you ready to
go so I can visit with you about what's of interest to you. Seven
one three two one two five eight seven four. And we are going to
begin by going to talk to Marty. I believe we got Marty online this
morning. Soon as we get more up, we're gonna we're gonna have to
hold on Marty just one second. Well, last segment, I was talking
about the importance of building soil, the importance of keeping our plants healthy through
proper cultural care, and that theme you're going to hear from me week after
week, over and over. You know, we talk about products. Here's
a good fertilizer, here's a good pest control, here's a good disease control,
and all those kind of things. But that's not what we lead with.
We lead with building good soil. We lead with keeping our plants healthy.
Then when we have problems, and we will have problems, then we
deal with the different ways to control those problems. And our nutrients and our
fertilizing is guiding our growth. It's supporting our growth. It's helping plants to
be more floriferous if it's a flower productive, if it's a vegetable or fruit.
You get the idea. And that's kind of what that's our aim.
That's how we go about it. All right, let's talk to Marty this
morning. Good morning Marty out there in Fairfield. Morning, Skip. I
know you wanted to get off the turf questions, but I have one's okay
with the intermittent rains every other day lately, I'm still trying to battle some
crab grass and some dollar weed. I've gotten most of it down. But
what you said there was something I could go ahead and put down now before
the warm season comes the hot Ye, what would that is it? I've
got the weed beater complete, okay, about two bags of it? Can
I put that out and it's still If there's more rain, it'll be okay.
I need to get that ingredient list in front of me on the weed
beater complete. I believe that. I believe that's post emergent if I'm not
mistaken, but I need to check it off the top of it. Yeah
it is, but I didn't know if that was a heat or cold.
It says heat and warm and cold, warm and cool season warm in cool
season. Yeah, I would. I would still watch the temperature on it.
When we get up above mid to uper eighties, I would start being
careful with that one. And I'll look at the ingredients again. But I'm
ninety percent sure that's one I would. I would go ahead and use it
now. The dollar weed, the broad leaf weeds in your lawn, now
would be the time to use a broad leaf post emergent product on them,
and so that this would be the time if you're gonna if you're gonna do
that now. The pre emergence, like the crab grass, for example,
that's where something like barricade would come in. Well, I go ahead,
I already had the barricade. These are all up already, Okay. So
once the crab grass is in your lawn, you just need to mow it
and ignore it, because you're not going to kill crab grass plants without killing
your lawn. It's a it's a grass growing in a grass and there we've
got a problem. Oh, I've been pulling it out. Well, you
can pull it out too. Yeah. I mean that's that's good. I
mean, you know that that's fine. I'm just saying the pre emergence and
the post emergence once the crab grass is up, neither one is going to
be an option for you because, okay, you'll damage your lawn. But
yeah, fine, is there another product that I can put down now?
For just overall any weeds at all, most of them are the crab grass
and the dollar weedstal Okay, Well, the dollar weed is a perennial,
and so while every plant can come from a seed, it's being a perennial
you you know, it's living and coming back on you. And so I
would for the dollar weed again, I would do the post emergent broad leafs.
Do you say we'd beat or complete or ultra? I can't remember which
which one you mentioned? I have complete, complete, okay, yeah,
and so you could you know, you could use that on the dollar weed
still. Uh, if if you are dealing with the crab grass and there's
going to be others coming up, which there will be, that's where the
barricade helps. How long ago did you do the barricade last time? Back
in February February. Okay, yeah, February March April. So I would
say probably anytime towards the end of this month, depending on when in February
or early May, go ahead and get the barricade out again, just to
continue because warm season weeds can keep germinating through the through the season, and
so okay, that's you know, it's not like you put this stuff down
and it works for eight months. You know, you're probably looking at five
to sixty days, depending on the pre emergent that you use and the conditions
that you have. Okay, well, there's some other weeds that it seems
like they're blowing in from. I had neighbors on both sides that don't have
you know, wonderful soil but or grass, and I've got some weird weeds.
So okay, I just wanted to see if the weed beater complete was
okay to put down, because I'll just do that for everything. Yeah,
and I'll do it today. Yeah, that would be fine. Yeah,
go ahead and get that done. We don't have any more rain schedule that
I for today. You wouldn't want to put something like that downright for it
rains. But now I think that's behind us. So this ought to be
a good time and the weather, temperatures are going to be great. Oh,
I know they're awesome already. All right, you bet get out there
and have some fun. All right, bye bye bye bye. Well let's
head out and now to Katie and talk to Diane. Hello, Diane,
Good morning. We got Diane there, I'm here, there we go.
How are you doing this morning? How can we help? I'm good.
There seems to be a serious decline in crape myrtles all over this side of
town. And I've never seen them be this slow coming out. And if
they do come out, they're coming out just weird, like from the bottom
of the branch, but not all the way to the top. Yes,
there might be a third of it at the top. It just looks dead.
We might have one that's sort of living and then one right to it
that looks sort of dead. Ye. What's causing that? And how can
they be prune so that they might come back? Well, there's more thing,
more than one thing that could cause it. But I think a lot
of what we're seeing here is the result of the December freeze that cut our
plants not fully hardened off and ready for freeze. You know, normally crape
myrtles can take our winner without any problem, but I think that it cut
them off guard and we saw some die back from that. It's normal for
the tips of crape myrtles a little twiggy stuff right out at the end to
freeze and it ends up falling out anyway. You don't even have to prunt
it out. But when you said like a third, you know that's a
big chunk, and so that's probably cold damage. When the new growth comes
in, which it is now, that kind of tells you where to prune
back to. And I would is you prune a crepe, I would rather
than stub it off so that when you cut a branch it looks like the
end of a broom handle. I would go back to where there's a side
branch and I would cut it off just right about there, so that it
leaves a more natural form, because when you have those stubs, you get
a crow's foot or regrowth, and it just it's very unnatural looking. The
branches don't tend to be well attached, so they may break off in future
storms. So cut back to where there's a side shoot. Does that make
sense, Yes, it does. And it just take some more time.
Well, it does, it does, and I mean you can leave it,
but you're gonna happen. You know, a dead branch is a dead
branch, and so you want to get this. Okay, what about the
ones that are just coming back from the ground. You mean, like the
whole top is dead. Yeah, the whole thing is now still looking brown
except for some new growth shoots at the bottom. I'd give it a little
more time. I'd give it a little more time. But you're gonna have
to cut the drunk off if the whole top is dead, and then take
the shoots and leave a bunch of let me maybe three or four right now,
and then gradually go down to one and shoot. You just want to
kind of head your bed a little bit. Hey, I'm gonna have to.
I'm gonna have to go to a break. If you want to hang
on and continue, we can. No, No, that's fine, Thank
you, Thank you for the call. The number is seven one three two
one two five eight seven four. It had a whizzing man with a gun
in his hand and he was looking boy, you know, he said,
fellow with the hair. Yeah, this is one of those songs that you
just have to listen to just let it run a minute here we go,
alright, alright, well that that kind of gets the blood flowing a little
bit. This morning. You're listening to garden Line. I'm your host,
Skip Richter, and we're here to answer your calls. If you want to
give us a call, the number is seven one three two one two five
eight seven four seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy four. Let's
go ahead and head out to the phone right now, and we're going to
talk to Susan in Cyprus. Good morning, Susan, Hey, Skip,
how are you? I'm well, thanks? What's up? So? What
will kill all these little tiny moths that are in my Bermuda gras, my
Bermuda grass. They're not side web worm moths. They're real tiny, you
know, Susan. Killing moths as adults is kind of difficult because for a
lot of the species, the larva or what's doing the eating. The caterpillars
for butterflies and mosart are doing the eating, and in the case of the
moths, they're not. The moth themselves are not chewing on your plants,
so you can't put the poison on the plant and kill the moth. You
just kind of have to basically ignore them. If it's not a moth that
we know is a problem, I would recommend leaving it alone. There are
literally hundreds and hundreds of species of moths that we see around our landscape or
maybe don't even notice, that are just of no big concern. Okay,
it's just when I walk across the grass, there's like literally thousands of them.
They're so tiny, really, yeah, they're they're a little teeny tiny.
It's like even in my whole neighborhood. My neighbors have them. It's
just little teinky ones, and there's like we walk through the grass and that
just there's literally thousands of them that just fly around real close to the grass.
Well, that's very interesting. Have you noticed when they land and stop
flying, do the wings sit out to the sides, making sort of a
triangle shape with the moth like a like an jet air fighter wing? Or
do they lay along the body where they're shaped more like a school bus.
They're so small you couldn't see it. They're they're so small. Okay,
you couldn't even tell what kind of moth it is. It's not like a
web worm, moth where you could actually see it. So you've seen a
side web worm moth before and this is smaller. You're saying, oh my
gosh, yes, no, no, no, I know what sadweb worn
moth? Why these are little teency teenthcy almost clear looking moths, almost clear
looking. Okay, well, I am not aware of any turf pest that
fits that description. You know, when it comes to moths and the turf,
We've got sideweb worms and we have army worms, and they're both much
bigger, much especially the army worm, much bigger. So I know that,
you know, you don't like the idea of them being there, but
they're really I don't think there are any problem, and I don't think you
need to do anything about them. I mean, you could always, you
know, kind of nuke the yard with an insecticide, and you know,
if you got it on, I'm probably kill them. But I just don't
think that'd be an approach i'd take. I think I think they will come
and go. They have a life's a lifespan, a very short lifespan,
and I don't think it's gonna be a long term problem. And if that's
if that turns out to not be right. You can feel free to call
me back. But I see a lot of different kinds of moths that come
and go through the season, and I wish I could tell you exactly what
kind of moth you're seeing, but I'm not, you know, without seeing
it and getting it under a microscope to truly identify it, I'm not sure
what that is. But but again, when I look back at the things
that could be causing your long problems, that's not in the list. So
thank you very much. That wasn't very comforting, but I hope it was
all right. Thank you. You bet, you bet. You know so
so many, so many different kinds of insects out there. You know,
we've been We were talking earlier about some broadly WE control products. Someone mentioned
the weed bitter plus or Ultra or something like that. When you're looking for
products, I can think of no other place in town to go other than
Southwest Fertilizer. Southwest been around since nineteen fifty five, and I was out
visiting with Bob a while back. We did a live appearance out there,
and every time I walk through the store, I just walk up and down
aisles making note of what products they have. So as I guide people,
I can say, well, yeah, this is available in the market and
you can get it here. It takes an hour to do that. It's
Southwest Fertilizer because they have so much and if you're an organic gardener, they
have all the different things you need for that as well. If you need
tools, if you want bags of mulch and compost, soil amendments, if
you need to get your lawn mower blade sharpen. In the back, they
got a shop and they sell equipment and they service equipment back there, so
it's kind of like the one stop shop for what you need. Take a
sample in and let Bob and his team look at it. See what's wrong.
What is this sample in the bag. They won't steer you wrong.
I won't just say you some product because you brought them a bug and it's
an insight killer. They'll take you to the right thing based on you know,
you tell them, hey, I want a garden organically, so they'll
take you to that kind of product, or I just want something that a
systemic or last or what they can direct you because they know what they're doing.
Southwest Fertilizer dot Com is a place you can go to find out more
about them, find a location and everything like that. But they're there,
and what used to be the southwest side of town now it's kind of been
swallowed up as Houston just keep seeming to work its way outward, right,
Well, if you're needing a product like that, and I know we were
talking about the moths as Susan had, you know that this is a kind
of place that's going to find something or have something and direct you to the
right kind of thing that will that will help control them. This morning,
we're talking all kinds of different things, but lawn seems to be a popular
topic. I wanted to mention a little bit about vegetable gardens. We're in
that transition season where we're in the big middle of spring, and when you
know, when we're in the big middle of spring, that means our cool
season is starting to go downhill. The cool season garden is, you know,
winding up. I've still got a few cool season crops in, but
in general kind of winding up pretty well. And the warm season crops are
coming on and now the hot season crops are going in too. So things
like okrah ok is kind of like the poster plant of the hot weather right,
it can take any kind of heat. And I'm going to talk about
some other warm season vegetables that you might want to plant a little bit and
when we get here a little bit after, I'm going to save it probably
until we get after the break time. But there's a number of good greens
and things that we can plant. But when we're in that transition season,
that's your opportunity to improve your soil. And if you haven't had a soil
test done in a while, I would recommend doing that. You can go
online the State Soil Lab Texas A and M is a simple URL. It's
all the all the URLs that I send you to for fire ends and diseases
and insects and soil and all that they all end and dot TAMU, dot
edu and this one is simple. It's soil testing. Soil testing dotam or
dot edu. Get your soil tested now, so when you transition from one
crop to another, you know what to add to the soil to get it
right. And also every time you transition an inch a compost mixed down into
the soil to enrich that soil, to improve the drainage, to help it
to just do better to just really thrive and be the kind of base foundation
that plants need to draw from. You get the water right, you get
the nutrients right, you get the oxygen down in the soil, and things
just do better. So as we do those transitions, take advantage of that
time to do that. You know, I always say buy the brown stuff
before you buy the green stuff, or when you buy the green stuff,
because fixing it to begin with is so very very important in the vegetable garden.
Right now, as I'm pulling out some of the crops that I have,
I've got some radishes that have kind of wound up, and some carrots
that I need to harvest. If I can find time to get off the
radio and run down take care of my own garden. What do they say,
Nikki the cobbler's kids go barefoot? Have you heard that one? Yes,
if we put a picture, if we put a picture in my garden
today on the internet, no one would call garden one. They'd be like,
well, obviously that guy can't help me. Well, it's because I'm
talking to you instead of taking care of my garden. Now, I'll catch
it up. But the radishes have come out. The character about to be
harvested, and I have been slow, but I need to get my black
eyed peas in the I love crowder peas, purple hole peas, cream peas,
all those kinds of things. That is one vegetable that you know people
say stuff tastes better when you grow at yourself. A black eyed pea in
a can versus a fresh shelled black eyed pea is like two different vegetables.
I don't know that I've ever had a fresh one. I've always had in
it is unbelievable. Wow. It's the only way to go anyway, speaking
of the only way to go when we need news, the only way to
go is to Nikki. And here she is tonight is gold. I'll be
a tail bleak so way in this town. See me in the bay like
it. So we'll get the bull hallo like to live. Can see us
coming off? Good morning on a good Saturday morning for gardening. I'm your
host, Skipwrector, and you are listening to garden Line. We're here to
answer your gardening questions, to talk gardening. Let's see our phone number.
You want to write this down seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy
four seven one three, two, one, two, five, eight seven
four, And we're going to start this segment off by going out to Oak
four Rest and talking with Sharon. Good morning, Sharon, Hey, Skip.
My question is about how to get rid of bamboo. My neighbor planted
bamboo and he doesn't want to get rid of it, and it's growing under
my fence and coming in my yard. Oh boy, okay, well do
you is this? It sounds like it maybe the running type of bamboo as
opposed to the clumping type of bamboo. Correct, Oh boy, okay.
Well, the public service message to everyone listening, don't plant a running bamboo
unless you have a way to contain it because they run. It's like planting
bermuda grass next to a flower bed that doesn't end up well usually right,
So what your options are pretty much is to dig down, put in some
sort of a barrier to prevent It's like an undergo thigk of it as an
underground wall, and they make some very strong materials that you can put in
the ground. It is not easy, it's not cheap to do that,
but that creates the wall. The alternative is either hand digging it or to
spray as it pops up. On your side. But the problem with spraying
is it translocates over. Just like if you sprayed bermuda grass in one spot,
that chemical is going to move out to the other bermuda grass nearby and
affect it as well, so that that sort of becomes a neighbor issue.
But it sounds like they're not being very good neighbors to begin with. So
how deep does that barrier have to go down? That is a good question,
and that is outside my area of expertise, so I'm not going to
give you a definitive answer, but I would think if you could get down
about eighteen inches that would do it. I would talk to a bamboo expert.
You know, there are number of places to sell bamboo and their landscapers
that can do that kind of barrier, and they can probably tell us.
Expect some of it may be related to soil type too, but it's going
to have to be a company that has access to the kind of product.
I mean, you can't just put a little piece of tin or a little
piece of plastic down in there. This is a this is a special,
very dense, less forever kind of plastic that's put down as a barrier in
the ground. I'm sorry you're in that situation. I know it's a it's
frustrating. Very okay, well, thank you for your information. I appreciate
it all right, Sharon, thank you for that call. Our phone number
if you'd like to be on the Aaron Talk Gardening is seven one three two
one two five eight seven four. You know bamboo, I actually love bamboo,
and I love the clumping types, especially because they kind of behave.
I think about grasses. You've got clumping grasses like maiden grass or miscanthus and
other grasses. It just form a clump, and the clump gets bigger over
time, but it stays a clump. Then you have the runners, and
that would be a Bermuda grass is the best example. It's going underground above
ground. Branbew bamboo has these underground rhizomes that pop up, and so it
just keeps going and as long as there's some soul moisture to keep it alive,
which welcome to Houston. There's always some soul moisture. It's just going
to keep going and it becomes not really good if you can contain it.
Running bamboos. There's some beautiful, wonderful types of running bamboo. But to
just plant it, especially on the border with your neighbor, and not contain
it is just I mean that what would that be some form of horticultural terrorism
that might that might be a good way to put it. All right,
Well, let's let's go back to the phone seven one three two one two
five eight seven four. We're going to go to Friendswood now and talk to
Mitchell. Good morning, Mitchell, Good morning, sir. Hey done,
the first time caller here. Thank you, glad you called. I've got
a pond. We live out in a rural area. In the back my
place. I got a pond. It's roughubly one hundred and fifty foot wide
by probably two hundred foot in link and you know the depths, of course
change from four foot too. I probably had in the middle of that maybe
fourteen foot. Okay. I've got a bunch of this algae style mos moss
in it, I call it. And it's just like overgrowing the pond.
And I've got a bunch of fish in it. And I don't want to
kill the fish. I want to reduce the algae. And I'm looking for
something to maybe sprinkle in the water that's safe, safe and you know,
environmental environmentally compliant. All right, So I'm going to give you a website
because it's gonna we could talk for an hour just on the pond kinds of
things like you're asking, and this website is you will love it. It
is Aqua plant a qua p l A n T as in water plant aqua
plant dot dot TAMU dot edu. Like all the websites I give you in
you can go on there and it'll help you a If I a weed plant
in your pond, it will help you manage the weed plant and even as
stuff if you want to stock them with fish and all kinds of things like
that. But it has helpful videos and especially when it comes to dealing with
specific like for example, there's a section on floating plants, you know,
like duckweed. There's a section on submerged plants or plants that come up to
the surface like lilypads would for example, And then there's a whole section just
on algae, and it divides them by the types of algae. You see
what I mean. But we could talk for an hour. You go to
this website and it will take you through everything that you need on dealing with
the things in your pond, all right, and that's aqua plant. You
spend something at the end of kind of order. Yeah, aqua plant is
the word first word and then dot T A m u as in Texas A
and m university t A m U dot e d u as in the first
letters of education. All right, well, thank you, sir, and
we will we will investigate. Thank you so much, so much pretending.
All right, thank you for the call. And you are listening to garden
Line. I'm your host, Skip Richter, and we are going to be
back after a little break to answer your gardening questions. Right down the number
and give us a call. Seven one three two one two five eight seven
four. I'm not crazy. I'm just but stay you'll see. I'm just
I'm all right now, you don't care. Well, I'm not crazy.
I'm just a little crazy about horticulture, I guess you could say, in
gardening. And I hope you are too. Obviously you're listening to garden Line,
and you know I know this. We have people that listen to garden
Line who are not gardeners. They just just like to listen to hear about
gardening and learn about things, and so you're welcome to but imis you.
If you keep listening, we're going to make a gardener out of you.
I mean, at least we're going to get you to go out and get
a house plant and bring it back, and that's the gateway drug. Next
thing you know, you'll be plowing up the backyard and well, you get
the idea. That's why we're here, though, to answer your gardening questions
and hopefully inspire a little bit. Our phone number seven one three two one
two five eight seven four seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy four.
Looks like we've about to enter the eight o'clock time here for the last
two segments, so we've got a little time. It's going to be short.
I believe we've got a call coming on the board. We'll move to
that in just one second. But I was talking about warm season vegetables while
ago, and I mentioned that I would talk about some greens and if you
and i've talked about this before, but I'm always wanting to expand our palette,
but both in terms of color and plants, new plants we haven't tried
before, but also in terms of vegetables and things that we eat and when
I say greens, you think cool season. I promise you do, because
if I said name greens, you would name lettuce, you would name spinach,
you would name collars, you would name kale, you would name maybe
a rugula. You get the idea. We're talking about cool season greens.
But in the warm season, we have things like malibar. They call it
malibar spinach. It's not spinach, but malabar is a good name for it.
We have things like molochia, which is a green very popular in various
parts of the world, but especially in the Middle East area. It's a
really, really happy to be in Houston kind of green. We've got amaranth,
the vegetable types of amaranth that will grow in the summer, and on
and on. I probably name ten or twelve different warm season greens. So
as our weather moves hotter now in the coming months, and things like well
my tomatoes aren't setting as well, or the squash and cucumbers aren't doing as
well, there is a group of vegetables to carry you through that season and
have fresh, healthy, nutrient rich produce that helps you to have a healthy
life and also to enjoy some new flavors and new kinds of cuisine. I'm
crazy to give those a shot. Let's head out now to the phones.
We're gonna go to clear Lake and talk to Stephen. Good morning, Stephen.
How are you, sir? I'm well? How are you today?
Well? On vertical and at my age, that's good. You know,
every day I get up, I read the obets first, and if my
name isn't in the paper, I figure it's going to be a good day.
You know you're not doing that online. Now you're actually reading the paper.
Yeah, I hold the old stuff and no, actually i'd do it
online. I've just reading my paper online. Well, I have a couple
of comments to make about other callers. I'm pope. I can mention the
name of these organizations, but in terms of the bamboo, do West Foundations
deals with that? I think most foundation companies do, and they can counsel
you. But you know, do you know about Caldwell Nursery and Rosenberg?
I do know about Caldwell, but go ahead and go ahead and mention it.
Regarding the bamboo, well, they specialize in bamboo, and I don't
know if you've been out there, but they have stands of bamboo set up
like a jungle set. And you know, I even asked them if they've
rented out for folks that are doing actual movies. It's just fantastic. So
they're they're what I would consider. You don't mistake me for some of those
he was talking about, but I would consider them experts on bamboo and how
to take care of it and make sure it doesn't creep into your neighbor's yard.
Yeah. And I was gonna say, do you know if they have
the products and they do that service or just advise. I don't believe they
do the service, but once again, don't mistake me, right, but
they certainly can advise. Yeah, And I would think if you go there,
they can point you to somebody. I know. That's how it is
with all our good mom pop garden centers. Is you go there and you
say, hey, who would you recommend for our landscape or you know whatever,
They're going to point you to somebody. Well, it's out of the
way a little bit certainly for us. And clearly here we've been there a
couple of times. The setting is just amazing. But if you don't want
to go there, I'm sure you could call them and they could counsel you
as to what to do. And then the third thing is the seventh wild
Birds Unlimited is now open. They haven't had their grand opening yet, but
they've had the soft opening and they're doing business. It's in the area that's
called the Reserve in Clear Lakes, Oh and clear Lake. You know,
I'm going to be out there at wild Birds and clear Lake on May twenty
seventh, towards the end of May, and I can't I can't wait to
see the new store. I hear it's really really cool. No, it's
really really nice yea. And of course the guy that runs it, the
Jeff, is just a wonderful dude. Well, hey, I thank you.
I appreciate that call, Stephen. We're going to head another break sure
those of you listening seven one three two one two five eight seven four.
And by the way, I'm going to be today in Kingwood at K and
m Ace Hardware from eleven thirty to one thirty. I'll be there for two
hours making an appearance. We're going to be giving away a bag of nitro
phos fertilizer every thirty minute, so you want to get there and sign up
for it. Give me a chance to meet you. Let's talk. Bring
in samples, bring them in a bag so you don't have stuff flying all
over the store. Bring them in a bag, or bring me photos on
your phone. We can talk about whatever you're interested in. K and m
Ace Hardware in Kingwood. I'll get there by eleven thirty and I look forward
to seeing you. I hope you will stop by, especially anyone that lives
out in the Kingwood New Caney Porter anywhere in that area. Plus, you
need to get by and see this Ace Hardware store. You will be impressed.
KTRH Garden Line does not necessarily endorse any of the products or services advertised
on this program. Welcome to KTRH Garden Line with Skip Rictord. Just watch
him well, good Saturday morning, on a good day for gardening. I'm
your host, Skip Richter, and you're listening to garden Line, and this
show is about talking to you about what you're interested in. I'll offer some
thoughts and monologues as we go through here, but I think the best part
of the show is hearing from callers, hearing your questions, because I guarantee
you, if you've got a question, somebody else probably has the same kind
of question. If you'd like to call, our number is seven one three
two one two five eight seven four seven one three two one two fifty eight
seventy four, and we will get you, Josh, We get you up
with there on the board, and we can talk to you and visit about,
you know, the kinds of things that you particularly find interesting. Well,
we've talked lawns today, we talk a little bit about trees today.
I've talked a little bit about vegetables today. Have you ever thought about herbs?
You know, I mean maybe you picture an herb garden as being this
formal garden, you know, where everything is a metric and it's all well,
those are beautiful, those are gorgeous. Most people don't have room for
one of those, right. If you've got a patio, you can grow
herbs. You can grow them in pots. In fact, I grow I
grow my chives, I grow my oregano. What else do I have in
there? I've got time and containers. I've got rosemary and a different container
that's growing. I always grow my basil out in the containers on the patio.
All of these things can be grown. All these herbs can be grown
even without an herb garden. I put herbs in my vegetable garden at the
end of the rows because certain herbs, like chives, they bloom and they
bring in a lot of pollinators and a lot of beneficial insects too, and
basil too. When basil blooms, that's very popular. In fact, just
the other day I bought a basil. I can't remember where I was when
I found that thing. I think I was. I believe I was out
at Arbor Gate and they had one called African Blue and it's what I've grown
before out there or in my house, and it is just a loanator magnet.
Now it's not one that I would plant just for culinary purposes. I
mean you can it's a basil. You can consume it, but I prefer
some of the other types of basil for cooking or pesto or something. But
this one, it blooms like crazy. It makes a bush about I don't
know, three feet high eventually, and it just loads up and it'll be
covered with so many you'll see bees and you'll go, I don't even know
what kind of bee that is. Well, it's one of our native bees.
And you're helping keep them alive because they are helping us with pollination.
You'll find a little surfeit fly on it, that lay larva that eat a
fens for example. You'll find parasitoid wasps on it. Just another reason to
grow herbs. That many many good reasons out there. But if you've not
tried that before, today'd be a good day to go out. Get you
a good container, get you some good quality growing mix to put in the
container, and then pick an herb or two, depending on the size of
the container. If you go to a good independent nursery, they're going to
tell you, you know, if you're buying this size pot and you want
these herbs that yes, you can put all those in one pot or no
eat this one needs its own pot or whatever, and they'll get you off
to a good start. So if you haven't tried grown herbs before, you
really need to. I mean, they're beautiful. We have some herbs at
bloom pineapple sage for example. It's a salvia. The leaves smell like pineapple
when you crush them. It has beautiful, long red blooms that are attractive
to hummingbirds. For example, there is Mexican meant marigold it smells. The
leaves smell like black jelly beans, you know, the liquorice jelly beans.
I happen to love that. Now some people aren't crazy about it, but
the leaves smell like that. It's used as a substitute for French tarragon in
our cooking. But in the late season, when the day length starts to
shorten up, we see blooms, just all kinds of yellow blooms on top
of the Mexican met marigolds. So they're ornamental herbs that are there. I
mean, what other work could you want from a plant? You can eat
it. It is ornamental. It attracts beneficial insects. I mean that that's
kind of like a trifector right there. And herbs can be that kind of
plant. So if you've not tried them before, when you're out and about
shopping today, and boy, I hope you will be, because this is
going to be a good day to get out to a garden center, that
you will check out some of those herbs. Well, let's now head to
the phones our number seven one three, two one two five eight seven four,
and we're going to head all the way out to Grange your land and
talk to Eugene. Good morning, Eugene. Yes, sir, I told
the man to McCall. I want, I want to plan a ruby red
grapefruit, and I'd like to grow a pear tree. I want. I
want one that grows soft yellow pears. And I'm wandering work and find one.
And if it's too late in a season to try planting. And granger
Land, I'm where on earth are you were? Granger Land Roma? Oh
gosh, I've driven through there. I should know where grain chure Land.
Sorry, you're out south southeast of Cutton Shoot or something right? Well,
yes, yes, sir, exactly, there you go. So you are,
you were pretty close to being over in the Kingwood area, and you
can head over to Kingwood Garden Center or Warren's Southern Garden and they are going
to have the kinds of like Kingwood where i'd go, Yeah, Kingwood Garden
Center, but Warren Southern Gardens is in Kingwood, and I would I would
go check them out. And if you you know, if you can't find
that one, the other one's probably gonna have it. But those they're going
to carry the kinds of things you're looking for out in in that particular area.
So that that would be my suggestion for you, sir. Okay,
well the soul I noticed so where I was wanting to plan it all this
rain. Now some crowd edge built some mounds. So I'm wondering if that's
going to be too wet. Do I need to have some dirt hold in?
Yes, crowdads tell you there's a water table down there, and so
you're gonna want to bring in and create a raised mound. I would try
to get it a foot high. And here's why it's going to settle.
Well, you won't get an eighteen wheeler to bring in a dump croke load.
Okay, Well, if you can get up, if you can get
soiled, that's up about a foot high. It be better to be a
little higher because it is going to settle down. But get you a good
quality mix. Now, you're also near airloom soils. They're in Porter,
so airloom soils is close to you. They will deliver to your house.
You can have them dump it on the driveway or you can have them bring
it in the big supersacks. Now, the nice thing about the super sacks,
it's a big bag that they drop off on your driveway. And think
of you know those cloth grocery bag some people shop with. Well, imagine
something that holds a cubic yard of soil, right, and if you need
more than that, you can they can bring it and dump it. But
talk to the folks at Heirloom Soils because they they're gonna they're gonna have exactly
you know what you need, and they can give you the right mix.
Tell them you're wanting to grow fruit trees and they will get you a mix
for fruit trees. Okay, yeah, I want to put them at about
five or six foot from the building and probably about five or six foot apart.
Okay, well, that's all good, and they can direct you and
all that, and I'm gonna have to go to break here, but I
would definitely get a hold of them, because before you put that tree in
the ground, you need to know you have good prepared soil, and you
need to know you've picked the right kind of grapefruit and pear. And the
two places I've sent you, three places I've sent you won't won't steer you
wrong there. Thank you very much for that call. We're gonna take a
break now and I will be back the number seven, one, three,
two one, two fifty eight, seventy four. Give Josh a call.
Let's get you on the boards. Just say those old shouts got the same
side. Well, good Saturday morning, on a good day for gardening.
You are listening to garden Line and I'm your host, Skip Rictor, and
we're here to talk about whatever you are interested in. This is the season
for spring color and spring excitement and spring in the garden. This is the
time to get your lawn right. You I've got infection. Talk about the
cobbler's kids go barefoot. The other day. I've got a couple of bags
of fertilizer that a couple of different kinds I'm trying out, just testing.
I always like to try different things and get experience with them. You know,
how fast do they kick in, how well do they work, and
so on. And I've been able to get to my lawn to fertilize it.
For the fertilizer that'll carry me through the summer. So I need to
get out there and do that. And I was talking about, you know,
some of the color plants, and one of the one of the plants
that I've not grown a lot in the past. I've grown them off and
on, but I just have kind of been focusing on other things. But
that's hibiscus, and I love the perennial hibiscus. Those are the kind that
have the big dinner plate sized blooms and they die to the ground and come
back. But if you want color, you just can't do better than the
tropical hibiscus and checking out some of those. RCW has an unbelievable collection of
those out there. For example, you can, you know, you can
have the standard colors, like here's a red one, here's a yellow one.
But some of these, especially some of the kind of Cajun series of
hibiscus that they're carrying out there. Now, it's like you stare at the
bloom and try to name the colors. I mean, it may start off
orange and go through some sort of a coral look and the next thing you
know, you're into kind of a pink and then a purple and this is
all in one bloom. I mean, it's just absolutely amazing, and that
that's typical for our CW to have color. I mean the right now,
the hanging baskets they have are unbelievable. They are absolutely unbelievable. If you
don't know where they are first of all, go to RCW Nurseries dot com.
RCW nurseries dot com. They're on Tumba Parkway, which is two forty
nine about where two forty nine comes into Beltway eight and they're open Monday through
Saturday from eight to five and on Sunday from ten to five as well.
But trust me on this one, if you go out there, you're going
to come home with color. It is. It is amazing, just the
pizzazz and the pop that purchase like that can make in the landscape. I
was, you know, out, I've been out. I think one of
my favorite things to do is just to basically go out and drive around to
some of our awesome nurseries that we have in this area and just see what
they have. And you know, I've been doing horticulture for thirty four years,
well longer than that, but officially professionally for thirty four years, and
I always learned something new when I visit. Now, I'm not talking about
some big box store that's got the cookie cutter junk they sell all over the
country. I'm talking about a mom and pop, an independent garden center that
brings in some really cool and unique things and We talk about these garden centers
all the time. We're fortunate to have them as sponsors on garden Line because
that just gives us more of an opportunity to talk about the awesome garden centers.
But when you go there, you're going to see things you've never seen
before. And I'm telling you I do every time I go to an independent
garden center and look hard enough and long enough, it's like, I didn't
know that variety was out there. I didn't know they had developed that plant.
What is this species? I've been doing this thirty four years and never
even heard of this before. And you visit them, and of course they
know, they sell it and they know what it is. And that's one
of the fun things about gardening is trying out new stuff. And some people
think of it like, well, you gotta do this landscape once and either
get it right or wrong. And no landscapes evolve. If you have a
landscape that's twenty years old, it has outlived its original planting. In other
words, maybe the trees have gotten bigger and now an area that was sunny
is now too shady for that rosebush to bloom. Well, well move the
rosebush to a sunny spot. Put it in a container on the patio if
you have to. But get some things that like the shade, some of
the old shrubs that we used to plant the house I grew up in.
I was looking at a picture the other day and the house I grew up
in had Nandina and Glossiabelia and red tip potnia out in front. And the
last time I drove by there and looked at it, and this was a
long time ago, the shrubs were over the eaves. Whoever was living in
the house now, but you had given up trying to prune them. Well,
now we have shrubs that stay low. It used to be that Chinese
witch Hazel Laura Peddlum just became a tree. Well, you can buy them
now that size, but you can buy them now that are compact. So
your landscape is constantly in need of an evolution, of a change, of
moving things, in of trying new things. You know, it's like clothes.
You know, you can wear clothes for ten years, I guess,
but why not have something new to try out? By the way, one
of my daughters posted on social media, when I see old pictures of mom
and dad, and I see mom I think that's a beautiful dress. When
I see pictures of mom and dad and I look at Dad, I think
he still wears that shirt. It's true, I'm guilty, but they're helping
me, helping me overcome that, helping me overcome that. Hey, give
us a call seven one three two one two five eight seven four. So
don't let people look at your landscape and go you know, I've been here
twenty years ago, I've seen it ten years ago, and I'm looking at
it today and nothing has changed except everything's overgrown, you know, and things
that used to bloom or not blooming as well. We can fix that.
And that's the fun part about gardening. Look at your landscape and look at
your garden like it were an etch A sketch. You remember those. You
got the two little knobs and one goes up and down, one goes sideways,
and you try to draw something, but inevitably your brain says go left
instead of right, and you end up messing up your diagram. What do
you do? You turn it upside down, you shake it, and you
start over with a brand new picture. Our gardens are like an etch A
sketch, and we can't turn them upside down and shake them. But we
do have this thing called a roto teller, and don't be afraid to use
it. There is no shame in pulling out a plant. Maybe you bought
it and you just don't like it anymore, Maybe it's not doing well.
Maybe we can move it to another area. We'll give us a call.
Let's talk about those kinds of things. We would be happy to visit with
you about anything related to your landscape and your garden and maybe how to give
it a good face. Left and by the way, Today at eleven thirty,
I will be at K and m Ace Hardware out in Kingwood, and
I hope you will come out to see me. If you live in the
Kingwood Porter, New Caney, anywhere north and east like that, or if
you just want to drive across town, I would love to see you out
at K and m Ace Hardware and Kingwood from eleven thirty to one thirty.
We'll be giving away four bags of nitro FoST fertilizer, one every thirty minutes,
so you want to get in and sign up. But when you come,
bring me samples of plants you want to identified or issues you will have
solved in a baggie or bring photos from your phone, Like, here's a
dark area in the back of the landscape. What could I plant back there
with a good photo where I can see the setting. We can help you
with that. So I hope you'll come out to K and m Ace Hardware
and Kingwood today. Let's head out now we're going to go to Richmond and
we're going to visit with Michael. Good morning, Michael, Good morning,
Skip Well. I want to thank you for all your knowledge. It's a
pleasure to listen to you. And my question is around what you're talking about
the other week, about them Maugustrum bush and probably even like the Indian Hawthorne
boxwood seem to be going through a lot of stress right now with the root
broad And my question really is about do you think this is kind of a
permanent issue with the boxwood. Should I not be trying to replace him because
I'm going to keep struggling with that. Well, you know, boxwood,
there are so many wonderful types of boxwood. The problem with boxwood for us
is there are several things that they're susceptible to. They can get nematodes.
If you're in a sandy soil. You can have problems with that. There's
certain kinds of root diseases that plug the plumbing that can get in a boxwood.
Occasionally an untimely cold snap can catch them off guard. So as much
as I like boxwood, I wouldn't put it at the top of my list.
There. If you have the right soil in place where the things I
just mentioned are not present in your yard, they can be a nice edition.
So that's kind of the trade off. It's hard to give a yes
no Michael. Yeah. I think my problem where I want to put them
is that the soil stays moist because of where the sun in space and north
and I just you know, it's hard to keep them there. All right,
Well, I got I got about thirty seconds, and if you if
you want to continue the conversation after break, we can do that. Basically,
a moist soil is fine as long as it's not saggy wet for an
extended period of times. But Carl, I'm going to put you on hold,
and if you want to hang on, that's fine. If you've gotten
your answer and want to go, that's good too. But I thank you.
I do appreciate that call. Our phone number is seven one three two
one two five eight seven four. You're listening to garden Line, and now
you're about to hear the news from Nikki. I took a halt. She
said, look what good Saturday morning? On a good Saturday for gardening,
like they all are. The light is out, I can see everywhere.
Don't see a little signed yet, got some haze. But listen, this
is gonna get better today. This is a good day to get out in
the yard and garden. This is a good day to go visit a garden
center. And we're gonna head back to the phones. By the way,
the number is seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy four. We
are going to go back and visit with Michael out in Richmond. Michael,
we were talking about the boxwoods, and I think you had some other follow
up to that. Yeah, another question for you. I've got my neighbor
that's right on the fence line has a like a series. It's for country
that come out of the ground in a nice circle. And I was wondering
what you would recommend to if there's any like I guess organic food that you
can put down to strengthen those pond trees to keep them healthy. Okay,
what would you say as a trunk diameter on those trees about chest high?
How big are they? Yeah? I would say they're probably a foot if
not maybe foot to have. Okay, so pretty good size. Yeah.
Up, A coin that reaches that size is you know, it's it's hit
its kind of mature level. I mean, they'll get a lot lot bigger,
of course, but we're not talking about a young tree that we're trying
to get to grow fast anymore. We're talking about tree that's now established.
And so there's this balance act where there's a certain amount of soil moisture available,
there's a certain amount of nutrients available, and that kind of determines how
big a tree can get. You know, when you go around the country,
you see the same species a tree different sizes depending on growing conditions.
So with our pecans, we don't want to just push, push, push
with nitrogen all the time because they know there's a certain size that the soil
inside and climate is going to allow them to be. And so once we
get close to that, we kind of let them let them just gradually take
off from there and do what they're going to do. And I find that
the lawn fertilizing that you do, if there's a lawn underneath the trees or
around the trees anywhere, that's going to be adequate to keep the trees healthy.
Now, if you look up in the tree and you see issues in
the foliage, sometimes and high pH soils pecans can have zinc deficiency, and
so we supplement with that, but that's a very specific way of supplementing.
If they're just as a general lack of good vibrant green leaf color, then
maybe we do need to add a little nitrogen or have a soil test to
guide us to a mystery nutrient that may be missing. But other than that,
fertilize your lawn. And a tree that size, I wouldn't do additional
fertilizing for it unless you just really are needing it to get bigger faster.
Okay, Yeah, it was more about you know, there there was one
branch or one tree that seemed to bloom later than the other three and then
circumference if you will, And so I didn't know if it was just a
sign of like stress on that tree, or it could be a couple of
things. Yeah, Micah, could be genetics, there's their variations. Just
like people are genetically different, pecan trees are genetically different unless you have exactly
the same variety in each tree. It also sometimes when we see that,
it's because the variety of pecan. There's two types of pecans. One produces
the pollen catkins first and then the nutlets that are receptive to pollen. The
other one does it the other way around. It produces the receptive nutlets and
then later the pollen. So when you say bloom, you're probably referring to
seeing those catkins out there, because the nutlets aren't that noticeable, they're so
tiny at that stage, and you probably are looking at one that is the
other type from the ones that are as you said bloom first, you're probably
looking at one that's just switched. And that is good that you have both
because the technical terms for those who like to nerd out is protogenous and protendrous
on the pecans. But basically, when you have both a protogenous and a
protendrous pecan, then they can pollinate each other even better. Now, pollen
is wind blown on pecan, So if you just had one type any pollen,
any pecan in the neighborhood, but the wind blow in the right way
is going to send your pollen to your tree. But when you have on
your one site both types, you're covered and you're you're always going to have
the pollination necessary for a good set of pecans, which will make all the
squirrels in the neighborhood very happy. Yes, they are very happy. Okay,
well, very good, shake that skip and thanks again. All right,
Michael, thank you for the call. I appreciate that very much.
Let's head out. I think we're going to talk to Carl in spring next.
Carl, how are you great? Good morning, Thank you, you're
doing a great job. Really appreciate you answering everybody's questions, so thank quickly
and clearly. But two questions. One, is it too late to transplant
great mortles that are on the smaller side. Are you talking about you digging
them up? Are you talking about taking them out of a container to plan
them digging them up? I moved them two years ago from the back to
the front because they weren't doing very good, and now I'm ready to put
them back in the back. Carl, if you have to do it,
I would do it right away, and I would get as much of the
roots as you practically can get, not so much going deeper, but going
wider. Okay, if you get even a foot deep as plenty, but
wider is more important. And water them in right away, maybe put a
little shade cloth over them to just kind of take a little bit of the
intensity to sign out until they get some roots down. If you could at
all wait, I would wait and do it this fall. It'll be way
better to do it in early November. Okay, okay, great. My
second question is what would you recommend. I need a freeze resistant, fast
growing screening bush, and I do like logustrums, but just is there something
better than a lugustrum that grows faster and taller and wider. All right,
well, I'm gonna come in on lugustrum and then we're going to go to
break and if you'll hang on, that's a big question, and so I
like to give it a little bit more time. But lugustrum is not a
plant. I like, they're everywhere, They've been around forever, but they
get a foliage leaf spot disease that just plagues them, and they are a
painting. It's a pain in the neck to deal with. We got other
ways we can steer you and when I come back from break, we'll talk
about some of those options. Okay, okay, thanks, thank you very
much for hanging on. You're listening to garden Line. I'm your host,
Skip Rictor, and our phone number. Write this down seven one three two
one two fifty eight seventy four. Real quick to band apologize. I'll tell
you you gotta you gotta appreciate the fact that country music sings your life,
or at least sometimes what you hope isn't your life, but it has a
way of putting it into song. You're listening to garden Line and I'm your
host, Skip Richter our phone number seven one three two one two five eight
seven four seven one three two one two eight seventy four. We're gonna go
back now to talk to Carl in spring and we're going to continue our disco.
No I think we got do we lose? Michael? Are we to
Carl? Now? Yes? All right, Carl? How can we help
today? Yeah, we're guarding a tall, fast growing great bush to use
of a screen or along a fence line. Okay, privacy, yeah,
you know that that's the challenge is we want something that gives us instant privacy,
which is hard to come by. We want something that's evergreen, which
limits the plant palette a little bit, and we want something that doesn't get
as fat as it gets tall, so it doesn't eat up the whole yard,
right, And that's the challenge that we have. There are some pretty
good upright hollies that will do well if your area is well drained and you
provide good moisture sole moisture for them as they begin to grow. Certainly,
there are some yopons that can be upright and give you some good growth.
The problem with the upright yopuns, carl is as they get older, they
tend to kind of open up. We say they fall apart, meaning they,
you know, what's upright, begins to lean out, and so they're
not at the top of my list for those kinds of that kind of use.
There is the oh gosh cherry Laurel Southern or Carolina cherry laurel. There's
a variety called Brighton type. There's some other compact types. And by compact
it just means they they're more compact, they grow slower, but they still
get tall, and so that would be that would be a good one to
use as well, so that those are a few of the opportunities that you're
in spring. Is that right, correct? Yes, if you will,
If you will head up, I don't know how far away you are from.
Like our CW Nursery which is bout way eight and two forty nine or
even up to m plants for all seasons. They're going to have a wide
variety of shrubs, and they're going to have things that are not coming to
my mind right at this moment that they can direct you to also, so
I know, I don't want to give you too limited of a list there,
but one of those places is going to be able to steer you correct.
How high do you think that the screen is going to need to be.
I would prefer it to get to around eight feet tall? Okay,
well, I would throw southern wax myrtle in there, and if you keep
it sheered. The nice thing about it is it puts up with wet soil
too. So I hope that helps. I'm going to have to run.
We're at the end of the segment, but I hope that's helpful to you,
that those folks won't steer you wrong. You know, I was talking
about soils I was talking about soils earlier, and the folks at Heirloom Soils
they have every blend you can imagine, and they know how to make it.
When you talk to Louise out there, when you talk to Mark out
there, those are experts at it. And if you don't want soil dumped
on your driveway, which by the way, is fine to do, but
if you don't consider their supersack, they can put a cubic yard in a
giant superstack that they set right on your driveway. You is it up,
it's clean, it's easy, it's nice. Go to Airloom Soils of Texas
dot com. And while you're at Airloom Soils of Texas dot com, check
out their cubic yard calculator. It is the most extensive, amazing one I've
seen online. I've seen a lot of them. I mean, if you
want to know how many five gallon buckets is in a yard, they can
tell you that this calculator for whatever amount of soil you need will help you
calculate and therefore purchase the right amount. Airloom Soils of Texas dot com.
The nice thing about you know when you when you do a calculator like that,
because you think, what is a cubic yard of soil? I mean
it there's three by three, But I'm a soil of that really. I
mean I need a pile out here. I want it to be ten inches
high and four feet wide and so many feet long. How do you figure
all that out? That's a nice thing about a calculator like that, and
the quality products that they that they make. You know, I'm gonna heading
out here. We are. We got about another what hour in the books
before we're done. But don't forget if you're anywhere out in the Kingwood,
New Porter, New Caney, anywhere out in northeast. I hope you'll come
out today to K and m Ace Hardware in Kingwood. I'm gonna leave after
the show. I'll be set up and ready to go by eleven thirty and
I'll go till at least one thirty out there at K and m As Hardware.
It's a chance to meet you know. On the air, I only
have time to take a few phone calls each day. But when you come
out, you get eye to eye time with me. We can discuss whatever
kinds of planting plans you have, whatever kinds of questions you have, we
can do a diagnostic to kind of help you maybe figure out what's this bug
or what's this disease, or bring me a picture, let's look at what's
going on. And by the way, when you take pictures, always take
them in good sharp focus. Sometimes someone will hold up a leaf and they'll
put their phone up there and take a picture in the phone focuses on the
backyard, not on the leaf right in front of the phone. Make sure
it's in good sharp focus. Because the diagnosis and the identification is only as
good as the picture, and so we want to make sure and get that.
While you're out there at K and M, you're going to see the
store and the products that they have on the shelf. And it is really
really amazing, you know, when you're when we're talking about Ace Hardware stores,
we've got Ace Hardware all over the place. And so if you're going,
well, where is K and M Ace Hardware? Where is my Ace
Hardware in the community where I live? Ace Hardware dot com. It's as
simple as that Ace Hardware dot Com find a store near you. You can
find and join me at K and M today, and I hope you will
by the way. Even if you don't live that way, come on out.
You will not be disappointed. Believe me, it is a cool place
with lots and lots of good products. I was out visiting with Ace Hardware
the other day and looking at the things they carry, and again I can't
believe the variety of products. If you're organic, if you're synthetic, if
you don't care, they've got products for you. You want soils, you
want fertilizers, and we talk about all these fertilizers all the time. They're
going to have it all there for you as well. So you know,
a good hardware store is going to help you get the right paint. A
good hardware store is going to help you understand how to use what they sell
you and bring in a piece of piefin. What do I? How do
I fix this? They'll tell you. But when it comes to lawn and
garden, Ace Hardware is exactly the same kind of service. KTRH Garden Line
does not necessarily endorse any of the products or services advertised on this program.
Welcome to KTRH Garden Line with Scared rectors. Just what a well, good
good Saturday morning on a good day for gardening. As all days are good
for gardening. You are listening to garden Line and I'm your host skip rictor,
and we are here to talk to you about whatever you're interested in when
it comes to gardening, maybe the lawn, maybe trees, maybe shrubs,
flowers. We talked a little bit about herbs a little bit earlier today.
I hope I made my best pitch at talking you and to trying herbs.
They are one of the most versable plants that we can add to the landscape.
I would would always consider other ways to plant things. You know,
when you're a plant collector, which a lot of us are. I know,
uh, you know, us plant collectors, we don't start with a
landscape plan usually, and we should be is that's what makes the place is
most beautiful. But we start by walking through a nursery going oh, I
don't have one of those. Oh that's a new house plant. I think
I need one of those. You see what I'm saying. And then we
bring it home, we try to figure out where to put it, and
we just kind of put them where we put them. But hey, it's
your property. Between you and the homeowners association. You can do what you
can do. What you want to do. We have all these gardening rules.
You know, the nice sweeping, gradual curves in the landscape makes for
easier mowing and more esthetic on the eyes. And we want to blend our
colors so that they're appropriate in terms of the way they match within the color,
you know, the span of colors around the circle, of all the
different options of colors that we have, and so on. But you get
the idea. Hey, there's no rules in gardening except have fun. Now,
the Homeowners Association does right rules, But when it comes to gardening,
enjoy it. Grow what you want to grow. I mean, you could
put in a flower bed and do annuals and stuff and decide, you know
what, I'd rather have some perennials or a shrub there. I'm going to
grow vegetable as well. How about some ornamental vegetables the bright light Swiss chard,
rhubarb, charred those are beautiful. I don't think I've ever mentioned salad
burnette. Salad burnett is a little mounding plant. I don't know whether to
call it a vegetable or an herb. It's kind of in between. But
it has a little leaves that have a cute, fresh cucumber like taste.
But it makes a mound. So if you used a row of salad burnett
around a board a border, it would be it would be really attractive.
It'd be like you know how people use lo rioty to form a border,
Well, you could use salid burnett. Now, it's not going to be
green all year and so it's going to have its season. But I'm just
saying, get creative, and you can put things you can eat in all
kinds of places around the landscape. So don't just have the mindset of there's
my flower garden, there's my vegetable garden, there's my herb garden. If
you want that, do it, but otherwise mix it up. I even
sometimes will mix herbs with ornamentals, other ornamental plants in the same container.
I've put herbs with a vegetable plant before in the same container. It's fun.
Get out there and have fun. Well, we're going to go to
the phones. You're listening to garden Line. I'm your host, Skip Richter,
and our phone number is seven one three two one two five eight seven
four two and two fifty eight seventy four. Or make it easy, Katie
R. H Let's head out to Westchase now and we are going to visit
with Sharon. Good morning, Sharon, Hi Skip, Thanks. I have
a question and it's not for me, it's for my friends asking for a
friend. Okay, Yes, she will not call in. She googles everything.
But I've been telling arm about your show, and I said, you
know, you should really call a garden Line about She wants to know about
ants in her stable garden and I don't have a vegetable garden, so I
don't even know how to praise this question. Okay, but she said she
kicked over a mound and ants crawled out everywhere, and I said, well,
you know, you need to be careful what you put on those in
it for your to control the antswer And that's when I told her to call
it a skip and she said, will you call? So what? How?
What is she? What is the best way to deal with that for
her? All right, Well, first of all, thank you and her
for the question. We have got to get her comfort level up. You
know, if you've listened to Garden Line very long, you know that I
make it easy for callers, right, And I'm not going to go answer
that's a stupid question. Don't call me by I'm going to give it another
answer. She's an engineer and she does everything online. Okay, well,
so we coordinate, she and I because I don't know much about it online
and she helps me there, so we kind of help each other. All
right, Well, here's the answer for your friend. And there are a
lot of other people listening that have the same question. Now I'm going to
assume by ants she means fire ants because she talked about kicking off the over
the top of a mound, and that sounds like fire ants. Do you
know offhand if that's it or did she just say aunt? I don't know
offhand, but I suspect. I think I'm trying to remember our conversation.
I think it might be. Okay, well, it's probably fireans because every
other aunt in the vegetable garden you don't need to worry about. There is
one ant called a leaf cutter aunt, but you don't have a mound in
your in your garden. A mound of a colony of leaf cutters is bigger
than your garden. But we're gonna say fire ants. So here's here's two
things. First of all, you want to start with a bait if you
just treat fire ant mounds individually, it's like playing whack a mole. You
see a mound pop up, you kill it, and then over here a
mound pops up, and you kill it, and then over here a mound
pops up. Because you never really get rid of the underlying colonies that you
don't see. So a bait, even invisible mounds that haven't boiled of the
surface yet, a bait will get them, and you spread it evenly through
the garden. And I only know of one bait labeled for use inside vegetable
gardens. There maybe some others, but I've looked and so far I haven't
found any others. But it's called come and Get It, Come and Get
It. It's a product I believe it's made by Fertile Home and it is
a bait based on an organic ingredient called spinosid. And so the ants pick
it up, they take it back to the colony, they feed the queen
and it takes it from there. So I would use that product in the
vegetable garden. If the garden is small, you can use other baits around
the garden. And there are many fire ant baits on the market that you
just wouldn't put them in the garden, but the ants would go find a
granule because they're not just hunting around the mound. They're going pretty far out
and searching for food, and they'll find them and bring them back to the
mound. The other thing I would tell your friend Sharon is if she's working
in the garden and ants crawling up on her legs and two up the handle
of tools and things is a problem if you dust, if you wear rubber
boots and dust the outsides with a baby powder, or if you dust the
handles of your tools with baby powder, ants try to climb up and they
fall off, and it's just a way like someone will often say, you
know, I've got a nice compost pile, but the ants are in it,
and I can't turn the compost without getting bit. Well, baby powder
is your friend. It'll take care. That's just a little added tip for
your friend. Okay, So let me read you fertilem makes it. It's
got Spinoza and it's called come and get it. Come and get it.
That's right, and we're gonna right. It is safe for edible vegetable gard
It's labeled for edible vegetable gardens. That's right, and I thank you for
the call. I'm gonna have to run to break, but thank you very
much, and thank your friend. Okay, our phone number is seven one
three two one two five eight seven four. We'll be right back. Well,
welcome back to garden Line. You are listening to garden Line and this
is a call in show. So here's the number to call in. Seven
one three two one two fifty eight seventy four seven one three two one two
five eight seven four. You know I've talked about fertilizing today and that this
is the time to get all those summer fertilizers down. But I don't want
to forget to mention something, and that is when you put your fertilizer out,
you need to follow it with an application of azamite. If you want
more information on azamite, which is by the way, I mind material dug
up out of the soil full of micronutrients, the little trace elements that are
essential for not only plant health, but for human health, you can go
to Azamite Texas dot com and find that I'd like to use azamite in a
vegetable guard about ten pounds per thousand square feet and a vegetable garden provides all
those minor things that we need. And so we talk about nutrients a lot,
and you're probably thinking, well, what you know, how do you
know how much nutrients and why is this or that important. Well, on
the typical fertilizer bag, you got three numbers, which is three nutrients,
and those three numbers are going to represent nitrogen, phosphors, and potassium.
Sometimes they'll add sulfur and magnesium into the numbers on the bag occasionally you see
that. But plants need a lot of different nutrients. They need about sixteen
seventeen nutrients that are essential for just the basic things that plants have to do
to grow and survive. But we need additional nutrients. So when I put
like an azamite into my garden, I'm building that soil full of all kinds
of trace elements that are part of good food. And you want your vegetable
garden. You're growing a vegetable garden to grow healthy, quality food for you
to consume. Because what we eat determines our health, right, That's one
of the main reasons we have problems is because of the way we eat.
Well, when you build your soil that way, and your produce is built
and packed with that kind of nutrient, it's going to be healthy. And
that's why I would recommend something like an asamite product for your vegetable garden as
well. Well, let's head to the phone's the phone number seven one three
two one two fifty eight seventy four. Let's talk to Francis out in Memorial.
Hello, Francis high skip. Good morning to you, Thank you,
Good morning to you. I wanted to talk to you about my amarillis that
are container rised and is it too late to put them in the ground.
No, it's not at all. You can go ahead and set those things
in the ground and they'll get their roots down. Try to not disturb the
roots more than you have to, and that will be that will be the
best for them. But yes, you can move them right out and now
no problem. Okay, I have them in real big pots right now,
like six or eight and how deep. I know I need to leave some
of the top bulb. Yeah, yeah, amarillas, it kind of sits
up near the soil surface. You can you know, I wouldn't if the
top of the bulb is just right up at about the soil surface that should
be pretty good. There's somewhat flexible there. But I wouldn't bury them down
deep like you would a daffodil for example. Okay, and what about a
kubo's? Can maybe try and spline it? Now? Well, now I'm
assuming you're meaning you're digging them up. You're not pulling them out of a
container, right right. I want to try and splint them. They've gotten
too big for the area. Yeah, you know, can you yes?
But you need to dig down about probably eight inches only. But why does
you can get If you can get two feet three feet out on each side
of the shrub, that's even better. What I do on my is I
dig up one dig under one side and slide a tarp under there, and
then I dig the other side, and then you can just drag that plant
onto the tarp. Because if you try to pick up the amount of soil
you're going to have, you might as well call your chiropractor and ask him
if he makes house visits, because that's there you go. But when it's
on a tarp, Fransis, you can just drag it. I mean,
one person, if you want to, you just grab the tarp and it
just slides right over the lawn and goes right to where you want to put
it, and you just slide it right back and you never pick the thing
up. That's that's why to do it now. Having said how to do
it now, if you can wait until November, that would be a better
time. Your chances of success. It won't be as touching go at this
point. You got to get it into the new location, watered in really
well, and then once you've done that, then continue to give small light
waterings to keep it going until it gets a good extensive root system. I
did theyse of the freeze, and my hibiscus didn't. Well, the tropical
biscus aren't very cold hearty. Cubas is pretty cold hearty, okay, okay,
okay. And what about um so sian quota um hedges and that sort
of thing. We used them over in Mobile quite a bit. Oh yes,
yes, yes, that's a nice evergreen And if you got the right
location, which is decent drainage and an acidic type soil, they're going to
be the happiest. That's certainly prettier than um um. What is the japonica?
No, that's the glass stop chameilias, but they're certainly nicer than Tom
and Hedge. We have rand here. Okay, I got you. Yeah,
Chamillias, both the Sasanko and the Japonicas both will will grow here.
Uh, and you can learn about how to grow them. They do have
some unique requirements. Are we're a little of course, we're much further east
than you were. And it's the acidic soils are not as prevalent here in
the general Houston area, but we have some. But you can. The
nice thing is you can buy a good bed mix and you can make it
feel very much at home. It'll think it's in the Deep South somewhere,
and just and just do real well for you. Okay, Well, I
show thank you and really enjoying your program. Well, thank you. I
appreciate you saying that, and thank you for being a listener. Thank you.
Yeah, the community is well, I haven't I haven't talked about those
here, and I really need to because communias are a beautiful, beautiful flower.
You get that you enjoy them during the December January season. Depend on
what kind of communities you're planting. Well, but yeah, success with camelias
is important, and you know, I'm an old broken record when it comes
to talking about soils and the importance of that. But to get a good
quality soil, a fungal compost soil, a leaf mold compost soil, that's
the key. And if you're going to try something like a camellia, you
especially need to build that soil right. And a place where you can do
that is Nature's Way Resources John and Ian Ferguson up in Nature's Way, which
is just off Highway forty five, just south of Conro, north of the
Woodlands. They have those kind of products. They have been a leader in
terms of soil for a long time. They were the original creators of the
leaf mold compost and the rose bed mix. You know, you hear us
talk about those kind of things. They take their time with soil, so
it's not just let's rush some organic matter through, make it turn brown and
sell it. Let's give it the time it needs to fully compost and fully
develop. And the results of plants, it's very significantly different when you have
that. By the way, when you're at Nature's Way, they have two
acres of display gardens and plants, plants for sale, and they have a
wide variety of plants. Last time I was there, the second to last
time, they had a decent start on the plants. But the last time
I went it was just a month or so ago. I was surprised at
how many plants that they had. So while you're there, you're picking up
your compost, you're picking up your malts, You're picking up maybe the mineralizer
that helps add the nutrients and minerals to the soil. You can also pick
up some plants as well, but start with the soil, and Nature's way
is a great way to start with the soil and get it right so that
it looks like your thumb is greener than anybody's down the block. Do you
have a green thumb, Nikki? I do not unless I'm painting and it
happens to be green. But short of that, no, Well, I
always say it's there's this thing as brown thumbs. There's uninformed thumbs there you
go. That's why we're hearing. We teach your thumb how to grow things,
and everybody thinks you have a green thumb, you know. I hear
people say, well, grandma everything she planted grew, well, Grandma knew
how to do it. So anyway, I'm taking up the nice news time.
Well, we'll jump into it. It's plan two line. When you've
been crying all those blund shot eyes with me, you know, it's hard
for me to do a whole show without at least one Western Swing asleep at
the wheel. In fact, I think I may haven't done undone one for
two or three shows, but I love that Western Swing, and a sleep
at the wheel show gets the job done. You're listening to Garden Line.
I'm your host, Skipper Richter, and it is getting near our last couple
of segments here. So if you're it shouldn't calling in now. I'd be
a good time to do it. Seven one three, two, one two
five eight seven four seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy four.
By the way, those of you who are out northeast in the Kingwood area,
tasks are the Porter, New Caney all that direction. I'm going to
be today eleven thirty to one thirty at the K and m Ace Hardware in
Kingwood. K and m Ace Hardware in Kingwood. And when you come out
there, bring me a sample of a plant, bring me a sample of
a bug. Whatever you want identified, whatever you want diagnosed you want to
bring pictures on your phone. It was like, here's an area where I
can't see him to get stuff to grow. What would you suggest planting there?
It's a little too shady. Or maybe you know some other feature that
you just really want to enhance. Well, let's take a look at those.
Just make sure the pictures are good sharp focus. By the way,
go to Ace Hardware dot com. That's where you're going to find the Ace
hardware near you. And if you want to look at well, where's k
and m Ace Hardware, Well, rather than me reading out the whole address,
go to Ace Hardware dot com. It's on king It's in Kingwood,
so that can't be too hard to find ken it so Ace Hardware dot com.
When we are out at these sites, it is always good. You
get to visit with people that are listening, get to meet you, You
get to meet me, We get to talk and kind of you get to
see the face behind the radio. What do they say, a face made
for radio? I hope, I hope I don't know that, but maybe
I do. Anyway, Knmas hard Word looking forward to seeing you. We
are we are going, we are Josh is talking to my ear cracking me
up. We're going to go out to Magnolia now and talk to Barbara.
Well, Barbara, good morning, how can we help? Good morning,
Skip. I have another question about Amarilla's. Mine are usually abundant at this
time, and this year I have no blooms, so I don't know if
there's anything going to happen this year. What should I do? Wow,
are these in containers? Are in the ground? They're in the ground.
Well, that's a that is a bit of a stumper, you know.
I'm sorry. I have the green, but no blooms. Are yours?
Do you know? Are yours the old type called Johnson's amarellas that have the
skinnier petals or do you have one of the new florist amarellas that have the
big wide petals. Johnson's is always just red. The others can be red
and pink and kind of a yeah, I would say these are old.
They came from a very dear friend's garden who's no longer here, so they
were dug up quite a few years ago. But this is the first year
I have no flower. Well, just thinking horticulturally through it, there's not
some common amorellas thing that I've run across that causes, you know, particular
to them to not bloom one year, but horticulturally, your bulbs bloom and
then the leaves capture sunlight and bring the carbohydrates in to get the new bloom
bud created over time for next year. Right, So if if you were
to prune off the foliage early and it has to use stored energy to grow
ran new foliage, that could throw them off a little bit. If anything
that prevents that rejuvenation of the bulb period could affect the next year's bloom and
a bulb in general. So I don't you know, you're probably gonna tell
me, no, I didn't do that, and yeah, and so I
don't know why they wouldn't bloom again. I mean, they're they're dependable.
These are bulbs, especially the old type like you're talking about. They'd live
in abandoned places and just keep doing their thing. So it's not like you
have to pamper them. But that is the bloom cycle. So somewhere in
there, I don't know why, but that got off. But I wouldn't
worry about them. I think they'll be right back. It's not like a
disease. It's at them until now. They're never going to bloom again.
They'll be back. Is it too late for them to come this year?
Tell me what what area you're in? I'm in m Magnolia. They hate
us to say that, but new Magnolia, New Magna U. I don't
know. They could. They could surprise me and just be a little slow
putting up some balloons. I this is stretching past what I've experienced with those,
So I just I don't want to give you an answer like it's authoritative
when I'm giving you my best shot. Guess. Okay, And in this
case, let's just wait and see hopefully, and if they do bloom,
please call and let me know. I'd like to know that. Okay.
I'll keep hoping and wait for the surprise one day. All right, there
you go. That sounds like a good boy. Have a good tape of
bye. Well, thank you, Barbara. I appreciate that call. Thank
you very much. All Right, we're gonna take a break here. I
did want to talk to you before we do go to break though about sweet
green. Sweet green is Nitrofosters product that is an organic plant food. It
is rich in a molasses type material, gives it that nice, fresh sweet
smell. It's got a high analysis of nitrogen about eleven percent nitrogen. It
agular releases over time. It feeds the microbes in the soil, which microbes
are the key to making things happen, making that rich soil environment that promotes
optimum health and optimum performance. And you're gonna find sweet green everywhere you find
nitrofoss. If you're up in Brannam at Plants and Things, or at Montgomery
at Gem's Hardware, or if you come out to see me today at K
and m Ace Hardware in Kingwood, I'll be there from eleven thirty to one
thirty. You can get you some sweet green while you're out there too,
nitrofoss sweet green everywhere nitrofoss is sold. Because I'm my vegacine, I'm the
kind of heat gonna make it, George, I can get. My gift
to you today is that I'm not singing at hammer. You're listening to garden
Line and I'm your host, Skip Richter, and we are here to answer
your gardening questions. We are entering our last segment of the day, So
if you got a call, give us a call. If you got a
question, give us a call. Seven one three two one two fifty eight
seventy four. Seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy four. Josh
says, we need to take a promo picture of me in Gucci. I
just want to go on the record. This like outranks the I promise no
new taxes. I promise you will never see a picture of me in Gucci.
Number one, I'm not gonna pay for it. Number two, I'm
not gonna do it. How's that? If nominated, I will not run.
If elected, I will not serve. Yeah, that's not gonna happen.
Josh, all right, seven one three two on two five eight seven
four or two on two k t R eight. We will look forward to
talking to you about whatever kinds of things you're interested in visiting with today.
By the way, we'll be back tomorrow. We're every Saturday and every Sunday
from six am to ten am, and so tomorrow morning six am. That
by the way, just a little tip for garden line listeners. If you
want to get right on the boards, the best time to do it is
on early Sunday morning. For some reason, there are a few people sleeping
in at that hour, and so that's your chance to get on and be
part of garden line. Well, let's head out now, and we're gonna
go to Kingwood and talk to Allen. Hello, Allan, good morning.
We got Ellen there. I think we'll have him in just one moment here
and in Kingwood. All right, Well, I'm gonna wait one second on
Allen. We will get to him. He will be here in just a
moment. By the way, I will be out at Kingwood at K and
MS Hardware at eleven thirty to one thirty today and so bring me. You're
tired, you're weary, you're sick, plants yearning to breathe free or whatever,
so please please please do that? Do we got Alan ready to go
out there in Kingwood? Hey, Alan, good morning? Well, Hello,
good morning to you, sir. Hello, could you hear me?
I can? Let's do that? Okay? Uh? I need Where are
you going to be in Kingwood again? I want to be sure I show
up and I didn't hear you. I hope you will. We are going
to be at K and m Ace Hardware in Kingwood. It's on Kingwood Drive
if you want to be specific. Dat Well, I'll be there. Hey,
I have a new house. And when they put the bermuda in,
they did a very very poor chart a job. It's not level, it's
real lumpy. It's up and down. Okay, And I need some knowledge
on how you level a yard or who I could call to come in and
level the yard. Okay. Well, a good a good quality landscape service
place could bring in the kind of material you need to do that leveling.
Now, when when you have bermuda, that's fortunate in this case, but
as you could cover it up with dirt and it'll pop right through the top,
you know, Saint Augustine, you cover it with enough dirt if you
got a real low level or a low hole or something, and it won't
it ain't able to come through it as to crawl through from the sides.
So but bermuda, bermuda pops right through. So I would use kind of
a top soil type mix just to do the leveling. Now we're not talking
about a top dressing. That's when we go with a fine screened quality leaf
mold compost. But compost breaks down. So if you have a hole and
you fill it with compost, it's going to be full but then it's going
to become a hole again as that compost breaks down, right, it sinks
down. So we want to use something with a little more structure to it,
like a top soil type mix, just to get that those holes leveled,
the area evened out like you want it to be, and then going
forward for that, then the top compost top dressing. So someone's listening and
you know thaying skips tell us you put top soil all over your yond.
Well, no, only for filling in holes, because we want something structurally
solid to you know, to keep that level for us. Okay, wow,
that's good because everything I'm here and put sand down, well, you
know you hear that. And one of the reasons is because on golf course
greens and things, they use sand as a top dressing because it's a super
super well drained mix that they water the heck out of. So anyway,
but I hope that helps. I'm gonna helps a hold on, hold on,
thank you very much, Yes, sir, I'm gonna look forward to
seeing you out there. I gotta run now. I'm going to go over
to a Taska Ceda and talk to Ruby. Hello, Ruby, Yes,
I am looking for a good place where they sell orchids, a nice selection
of variety of orchids. If you can just help me with that, that's
all I need. Yeah, Well, you're out in the Taska Ceda areas.
What's your favorite closest nursery that you go to out in that area?
So we go to We've been to Warrens, We've gone to Ace Hardware.
I've even driven out to Orchids Express, which they're fabulous. I'm going there,
but I just want a variety, not just orchids, but orchids and
other plants. Well, you know there are places that specialize in orchids,
but for the variety, you're not going to do better than Kingwood Garden Center
and Warren Southern Gardens those two. And uh, you know, I'm gonna
by the way, I hope you come over to k and m Ace to
see me today. When I'm out there. It's eleven thirty to one thirty.
But you're going to be right in that area. You've got to supergarden
centers with a wide variety of plants that you can check out as well.
And that Okay, I think you're going to find what you're looking for.
If you're looking for a particular type, you know, a certain species of
orchid. We may have to go to a more kind of obscure orchids specialty
place. But I think what you need as a place that has a wider
variety of things. Yes, all right, thank you, all right,
thank you very much. You know you're talking about talking about ACE Hardware.
If you would just go online to ACE Hardware dot com. I talk about
him all the time. But thirty nine locally owned and operated stores. I
mean that they're all over this listening area, and our Houston group of ACE
Hardware stores does an excellent job of making sure that when we talk about it
on garden Line, they carry it in the store. And that's nice because
what a better deal. I mean, you need to go into a hardware
store for all the things you go into the traditional hardware store for. When
you walk into an ACE, you're going to have people that it's the old
time hardware. Remember when maybe growing up, you walked into a hardware store
and there's some old guy that comes shuffling up, and you know, you
show him a piece of pipe or something you're fixing the plumbing, and he
knows exactly where to take you and he tells you exactly how you do it
and it just has that kind of knowledge. Well that's Ace Hardware. But
take that over to the garden Center. So all the products we talk about
are going to be available, and then some there. They have a great
selection. By the way, if you're a griller, Webber, Trager,
Big Green Egg, they've got all that kind of stuff as well. Make
sure and sign up Race rewards programs where every time you buy something you earn
money back on your purchase. But go to ACE Hardware dot com and find
a store near you that. I can't give you better advice than that.
And if you'll come out to the K and M A's Hardware in Kingwood on
Kingwood Drive eleven thirty to one thirty as soon as the show's over, I'm
heading that way. We're there to answer your questions. I just like shake
your hand and meet you. But if you want to bring in pictures and
have me kind of advise on some plantings you'd like to put in, I'll
be there and I'll be available for that and look forward to getting to talk
to you. You know. Garden Line is here from six am to ten
am every Saturday and Sunday, and we're here to answer your gardening questions.
We also are available by podcast. And if you miss the show and you
want to go back and what was that thing he said, Maybe you didn't
listen with a paper and pen handy, Well you can go back and listen
to a pass show and get some more information. But we enjoy getting to
visit with gardeners. We enjoy your questions and calls. And I would suggest
that you become our advocate in your neighborhood. Tell your other friends and family
and people in your neighborhood to listen to garden Line. They can get a
lot of good information. We really work hard and providing good quality, research
based solid information, not just advice, not just someone's opinion, but something
that's been tried and proven and that works. Because your yard and your garden,
they're your show place and I'm here to make them more bountiful and more
beautiful. And that's the purpose of the advice we give. So when you
run into problems, when you're looking for ideas, that's why we're here.
You know, there are not many towns that I know of in Texas where
you get eight hours of garden show on a weekend. I mean, that's
a lot of opportunity and the combination of that with oh so many wonderful garden
centers Houston area. What a great place to live in garden