KATRH Garden Line does not necessarily endorse any of the products or services advertised on
this program. Welcome to KATRH Garden Line with Skip Rictor. Just watch him
as well. Good Saturday morning, on a good day for gardening. You're
listening to garden Line. I'm your host, Skip Rictor, and we are
going to be here until ten am today. Be back tomorrow also same time.
So look over next door. If the lights aren't on, go over
and knock on the door until the neighbors are missing Garden Line. They will
thank you later, probably not today, but eventually, we hope. Oh
gosh. We're here to answer your guard questions. You feel free to give
us a call on garden Line. I'm gonna give you number just a second
here. But first thing I wanted to mention is when you're thinking about calling
into garden Line, if there is i don't know, some hesitancy on your
part. You know, maybe it's like I've never been on the radio before.
I don't don't want my voice out there like that. I don't be
afraid that I might mess up or ask a stupid question or anything like that.
Well, I'm here to tell you don't worry about it. We will
handle that. The way I like to look at it is, don't worry
about the stupid questions. I'll worry about the stupid answers, and then I
think we'll be all good. How does that sound? Is that a good
deal? Well, let's let's get to the calls here as soon as you
are ready to go seven one three, two, one two five eight seven
four seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy four or two one two
ktrh. Just spell it out like that will also work. You know,
I was working out in the yard this past week and just noticing the fact
that our winter weeds are they are loaded with seeds. They are on their
way out. And as I and when I have a situation like you know,
there's some weeds over in this area, and they've already hit reproductive stage.
In other words, they've got blooms or they got seeds even worse already
on them. The best thing you can do is get them out of there
by hand or mechanically, meaning run a lawn mower over it as low as
you can, set them more and capture ever weed seeds you can. It's
even better to just hand pull them at that stage. If the soul's moist,
it's not too hard enough. If you've got an acre of lawn and
it's solid weeds, okay, forget that. We're gonna have to go with
a different strategy. But just some here and there. You know, if
you think about it, a lot of our weeds can make one hundred thousand
seeds per per plan, and so just that one plant not getting out of
there when it's already too late to spray them is a significant consequence. It
sentences you. The way I like to put it is it sentences you to
twenty years of weeding. Now that may be an exaggeration in some situations,
but I guarantee you though not too much. So do what you can to
get them out of there. When we want to prevent weeds, we have
products it'll do that. And when we want to kill existing broad leaf weeds
in the lawn, there are products that can do that. But those things
that came out of winter and are now about to die, they're doing their
last two raw and throwing seed everywhere, those are the ones that are the
concern right now. Now. Next September October, we'll be talking about a
pre emergent to stop next year's cool season weeds from coming. But for right
now, we are in the big middle of dealing of course with our warm
season weeds. And everybody has a different tolerance for weeds. There are some
people who if that lawn does not look like to go back in time AstroTurf,
I mean, if it's not just perfect, nothing uneven, nothing unusual,
all of these things are like the other, then they want to get
rid. They want to spray and get rid of the weed. There are
other people whose tolerance is really high, and it's like, look, weeds
are green, crasses green. I'm willing to mow, water and fertilize and
get myself into a situation where I don't have as many weeds to deal with,
And you can take that approach to it's up to you. We have
a wide range of folks listeners, your abilities to get out and do things,
your willingness to use chemical products on your plants. I understand there's a
range out there, But that's something you might want to think about and something
that we are going to be dealing with here all right. Our phone number
again is seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy four and We're going
to start by going to Alvin and talking to Danny Well. Good morning,
Danny Well, Good morning, Skip, Good morning Nikki. Of first,
I'd like to thank you for helping me make the change in plans on selection
of the grass. I'm going to switch from my plan to use Coastermanuta by
springing it and just go to Bermuda Graphs, which I think would be better
to smother what I'm wanting to do. And I'm wanting to smother some of
these things, mainly the three poisons. So today I'm asking your opinion to
help me perfect my dreamed up technique of eradication of the three poisons, you
know. And so I've got this idea if I would dig a hole with
a postal bigger right next to one of these fresh stems coming up with the
leaves on it, which would be a good time, I think, to
try to poison and just try to bend it over and call it up and
pack it down there in that hole. That about maybe ten or where events
with a post o there and then possibly put some rocks soft in there,
and maybe something else that you might know would be good to add to it.
Then here you're talking about poison ivy. Oh yes, poison ivy,
poison oak and poisons in max. Okay, Well, there's a lot.
There's a lot of it here, and it's just it's just unbelievable how much
I've tried, uh to do it above the ground. I'm thinking if I
would get this below the ground bended over where it's stay stay alive instead of
trying to shear it off, shave it off, uh and put it down
in a little hole and then fill that hole up with some some clay and
then also mixed like I do my post holes, uh p's post hole with
uh. Okay, I got I think, you know, I get,
I get the idea. I think you're making it much harder than it needs
to be. And I don't I don't think that is necessarily a tribe chuse.
It's just it just seems like it's it's impossible. Here. Here's here's
what I do, and here's what a lot of people have had success with,
and that is to get a product that has the ingredient triclopier tri I
clo p y R. And it's in a lot of different things on the
home, you know, garden market. It may be called poison ivy or
poison oak. If the plants are small, you can spram with it.
If they're larger, you cut the stem and you paint the cut surface,
meaning just dab some of the triclopier product on there and it'll translocate down and
that will do the best job you can. And I hope that's help.
I'm gonna have to take a break here, Danny and go to go to
commercial. But yeah, I have always had success with that approach to it.
I hope I hope that you you would too. You're listening to garden
Line. I'm your host, Skip Richter, and if you'd like to get
on the boards seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy four, then
to see you and walk away from me. All right, good Saturday morning.
You are 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.
Let's head on out to sugar Land and we're gonna talk to Carl this
morning. Good morning, Carl, Good morning. How can I help today?
Well, I've got a prob We just moved into a house I've got
I think was called flat iron plant it's your brown and oak tree, okay,
and apparently you're in the winter, it had some damage. If it's
look very green when we moved in, it's looks all ragged. Now I
got a bunch of LEAs or wilton and brown and whatever. I don't know
if it's better to cut it all down and let it go back. Well,
that's a good question. Yeah, that's a very good question, because
a lot of people have That plan is called cast iron, by the way,
because it is as tough as cast iron. And you got two options.
You can go in on your hands and knees and just prune out the
bad leaves and the new growth will is probably already coming up well, is
already coming up through it, and you can kind of selectively take out the
bad that way, or if you needed to, you could cut the whole
thing off at the ground and it would come right back up again. Now
that if it were a late winter, I would say do the second one.
Make it simple and easy. Right now, you got a lot of
good new growth in there already, So I kind of hate to cut the
whole thing back, but that is an option if you don't want to.
If it's a little too tedious to cut out just the ugly ones. Yeah,
it would be if it's one. I've got so much debt in it.
Okay, Yeah, well then you know, cut it, cut it
back down and get all that debris out of there. And it's a tough
plan. It'll be back fantastic. That's what I was thinking about, confirmation.
Well, I'm glad you called, Thank you, and you have a
good rest of your day. You are listening to Garden Line. I'm your
host, Skip Richter Our number seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy
four seven one three two one two five eight seven four. By the way,
I'm going to be out next Saturday at k and m Ace Hardburn,
Kingwood. I'll be there from eleven thirty to one thirty. I hope you'll
come out. All of the folks living up you know, Porter New Knee,
Kingwood, anywhere up north in east and by the way, if you
live anywhere in the listening here and you want to come over there, please
do. I want to see you. We love to visit with the folks
that are listening to the show, and it gives you a chance to have
some one on one time with me. You can bring in a plant sample
and a bag. You can bring in pictures on your phone, and we
can just kind of have the time to sit down and figure out what's going
on, identify things, diagnose things, or even make some suggestions for improving
on your landscape. That's next Saturday. K and m Ason Kingwood by the
way, that's forty five forty Kingwood Drive. Look forward to seeing you.
I hope you can. You will join us there. Let's head out now
to talk to Mark and Willis. Hello, Mark, Hey, good morning
Skip. I have a question about my yard. I have a zois ey
yard. Okay, and do some Two summers ago, I've been fighting Virginia
button week for two years and I sprayed the right chemicals on it. That's
the wrong time of year, okay, and I think I didn't the heat
of the summer skill Okay, two summers ago. So I got dead grass
in my yard. And last year I thought, maybe it's not dead,
it just needs to green up. It's not greening up. What do I
do in a small areas maybe a twelve but twelve area? Okay? Well,
Mark, do you do you happen to know what variety of Zoisia you
have? Okay, I think we think, Mark, we've lost your audio.
So I'm just going to keep going here. Basically, you can cut
zosia back to almost the ground and it'll come back out again. So all
the dead material, you know, use a bagger, use a rake afterwards,
and get that up out of there, kind of clean it up a
little bit so that it doesn't just get even more thatchy, and cut it
back. And then if you've got some zoisia that's living, that's not too
far apart, Like maybe you've got a ten foot area where there's a problem,
but there's living zoisia through it, it should fill back in. If
not, you may need to take some plugs from your lawn to put over
there, or to go buy some more zoysia. And if you know,
if you don't know the name of the variety of you got, it's gonna
be a little hard to match it up. There's a narrow leaf type and
there is a also a it's a broad leaf type and it's not broad at
Saint Augustine, but it's the broader leaf type of that. All right,
Mark, I think we got your back. Okay, Yes, I'm sort
okay. So you said to cut it down to the dirt, cut it
down to the ground. Well well I thought about that, yeah, but
low, not to the dirt, but but low, Okay, got the
dinner is down. A little bit of newl over that area, or just
let the over, No, I just I would let it grow over.
And if it's too big of a gap, you know, once you get
past about you know, a foot or so, it's gonna be bar so
long that it's probably worth just putting new grass into those spots. Uh.
And you can do it by if you know your variety, buying that variety
and getting some side pieces to fill in. Or you can take plugs from
your lawn and plug them in. That's a lot more tedious, a lot
more work, but it saves you a little bit of money. Not a
whole lot, but a little bit. All right. I appreciate it,
all right, I appreciate I appreciate your call. Uh. Yeah. You
know, when we're dealing with problems that are grass killing problems, and we
don't have a lot of things that kill grass. We can in Saint Augustine,
We've about to take all root rot and that that is significant. Others
things like chinch bugs and grubs that can do some damage, but take all
the biggie when it comes to other things. Every grass has its diseases,
Bermuda grass, the asio grass, they all have diseases that can affect them.
Where we get in trouble is, you know, with the broad leaf
weed killer applications when temperatures get warm. Now I'm painting with a big brush
when I say all broad leaf weed killer applications right, because there's a lot
of different products and there's a few that are a little less harmful. When
the temperature, let's say, gets up about ninety two right in there,
that most of the ones that we would have used are no longer recommended because
in the heat. And when I say heat, and I'm talking about herbicides
on turf, broad leaf post emergent herbicides that is mid eighties, certainly upper
eighties, that's where we start getting into problems. And the thing you're putting
out to kill the weeds is making the patient pretty sick too, And so
that's why we avoid those at that time. And just keep that in mind.
We're still in a pretty good time to get broad leaf post emergent weed
control done. So if you need to spray to kill broad leaf weeds.
Our temperatures are pretty moderate still right now, and again mid to opera eighties
is where we start saying, yes, it's time to stop. But the
earlier you get it done, the better. So the warm season weeds,
some of them are perennial. They've been around. They just popped back up
and kept going. Summer annuals. They pop up and they start to grow
when the weather warms up in the spring, and when they're young, it's
easy to get rid of them. As they get older, sometimes it gets
a little more difficult, but there's a way to do it. We just
need to know what the weed is and we can direct you to some options
for managing that. You know, I was talking about being out in the
lawns and looking at weeds, and I've got some areas in my lawn that
do have weeds. By the way, that's true confessions right here on the
air for everybody to hear. My excuse for it is they say the cobbler's
kids go barefoot. So if I'm if I'm running around doing every kind of
thing in the world connected to the radio show or agrilive extension, things like
that, it's kind of hard to get home and take care of the grass.
But we're working on it. But I was noticing I just put some
fertilizer out this past week on the lawn. In fact, I was trying
a couple of different things. For me, it seems like everything's an experiment,
you know, I'll try a little of this fertilizer over here, a
little of that one over there, and see how they do, and you
know, just make notes of the difference, and they all perform well.
The ones we talk about here on garden Line definitely all perform well, and
it's because they've been tested and we've evaluated them. But its just have to
realize that some things are a little slower release than others. Some things or
of course faster release than others, and trying to get the right nutrients down
at the right time is a big part of the key. So what's going
to happen is you're going to get these nutrients down now when you fertilize.
And some of the products, like I was talking a moment ago, I
mentioned Nitrofoss's Superturf nineteen four ten that is going to give you a slower gradual
release. A lot of the organic products because they're biologically broken down in the
soil, they have an extended release feature to them as well naturally, and
when you do that, it spreads that feeding out over a little period of
time. And so that is what we would rather do. You if you
dump all of a fast release and expect the whole year's supply to be put
down at one time, you're going to get a big peak of growth and
then it's gonna wane off. And so we'd rather split that up into at
least two applications to gradually release, or even better yet get something that's going
to gradually over time feed that lawn, and that way you don't have the
severe mowing pressure it seems like the runout every day because it's grown in another
six inches while you slept overnight. We'd like to spread that out a little
bit. It sounds like, do I sound like someone who is speaking from
experience, You go, indeed, don't do that. Yeah, I mean,
you know, if from an environmental standpoint, you overdo it, it
washes off and bodies of water and it's gonna volatilize away when it rains and
stuff. So there's just a lot of reasons to either fertilize gradually over time,
or to get a product that'll do that for you. Well, good
Saturday morning. You are listening to garden Line and I'm your host, Skip
Richter. We are here to answer your gardening questions. Our phone number.
Write it down, and by the way, I always listen to garden Line
with a pen and a piece of paper in hand, because we give out
URLs, we give our product names, we talk about all kinds of resources,
and you don't want to be like, oh my gosh, I missed
it. What did he say earlier? Well, that's that's the way to
avoid it. And so write this down our phone number seven one three two
one two five eight seven four. Let's head out to Seabrook and we're going
to visit with Sarah. Good morning, Sarah, Good morning, Skip,
Thank you for taking my call. Sure, I wanted to just plug our
Earth Day fair at Unity Spirit Center today from ten to two. It's on
nineteen eleven Highway three South. All right, and the public is welcome and
the free food. All right. Well, I appreciate that. Any gardening
questions to go with that, or are we just talking about the fair?
Well, we're going to plant a tree, And I wanted to ask you
what's a good native tree that would be hardy and not die back when we
have a little freeze. Oh boy, Yeah, we have a bunch of
them that do well. You know, I like them, some of the
red oaks, specifically the nutall nutt a l I believe maybe too many teas
or too many few els or anyway, nuttall is a good red oak for
area, and it's tolerant of wet sites. And so when I'm just speaking
to the general area around Houston, nutall is probably one of your better choices.
All right, all right, okay, Well, we have a pond,
and so we'll plant it close to the pond. Well, and if
you got a pond, cypress is good. You need to get one that
doesn't produce knees unless you just want that effect around your pond. But when
it comes to planting in the yard, I've got us some cypress in the
house. We bought that we're there already, and oh my gosh, I
can tell you each one produces ten thousand knees. And I'm not a big
fan of that. I didn't know you could you could find them without the
knees. Yeah, there are if if you check out you know where you
purchase your plants. There's one called Montezuma cypress that is that is doesn't produce
the knee, so but there may they may have some other lines depending on
where you purchase your trees. Alrighty, all right, thank thank you so
much. I appreciate you. Alrighty, let's head out to Lakeside Estates and
we're going to talk to Maureen. Hello, Marine, good morning. I
had great success with your suggestion on my Okra seeds, and so now I
have thirty eight little plants ready to go, and I'm thinking, oh,
what would you suggest? I have large metal trellises which I can move anywhere
in the yard, So about how many should I plant? Thirty eight seems
to be a lot. Now I do have some pots so I can get
some started, but I wanted to get a rough idea since I've never planted
Okrah before. I do like Okra. I'd be happy. And I do
know some people if I get overwhelmed with my harvest. Okay, so what
is your thought in terms of it will get bulls on. It isn't a
rose soil mix, so it's got a little bit of three things. So
I think I'm off to a good start except for the heavy quantity that may
come in. Okay, well, I'll tell you I would. I would
plant more rather than less. And here's why. Let's say I'll make an
extreme. You have three ochre plants and two of them, well, I'm
saying, let's say you just planted yea. My example is planting eight.
Right. My example is if you don't plant enough. Here's here. If
you have three plants, you're going to get about two okra a day out
of those three plants. And ochre doesn't keep well in the fridge. So
if you're trying to get enough to have a batch. If you love okra
and you like fried okra or gumbo or whatever, you may do more plants.
You can always drop pods on the ground. If you can't, I
mean, that's fine, just keep them picked or give them to your friends.
So I would look at your space and go with more. You won't
need a trellis It sounds like with the soil and the sun you've got,
they should do well. So I don't really need it to trell. Not
for okra. No, Okrah is just like a little tree. Yep.
All right, all right, thank you for your aformation. Well, good
luck. I hear about how it does. You're listening to garden Line.
I'm your host, Skip Richter, and we are available if you call nine
excuse me seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy four seven one three
two one two five eight seven fours come out around no. No, But
as this wild to see, well, good Saturday morning. I see a
glow in the eastern horizon and I don't see a cloud in the sky.
That means this is a good day for gardening. It's also a good day
to visit garden centers. I was out and about yesterday, went to a
bunch of different garden centers. You know, we talk about a garden center
for that part of town. Well, when you become a plant attic like
me, every garden center within a hundred mile one hundred miles is when you
got to check out and see. But there we guysh we are just we
are filthy rich with garden centers around the Houston area. I'm telling you,
I've lived in lived in Austin, lived in the San Antonio area, been
up to Dallas, a lot of different spots. There's good garden centers in
every town, no question about that. In fact, I do garden center
tourism' when I'm traveling, just seeing some of the cool places that are out
there. But Houston, no matter where you live in town, north,
northeast, northwest, southwest, southeast, a central town, that there's an
awesome garden center. And if a friend called me up and said, hey,
I'm coming to Houston, and what are some good garden centers, I
would say, well, well, get out a long piece of paper.
But no matter where they're where they're going to be staying, there are some
places they absolutely have to visit. And I'm telling you this, this isn't
like an ad for a garden center. I'm just saying we've got a lot
of them, and we talk about a lot of them here on Garden Line.
But it is that it is amazing the quality of plants, the knowledge
of the staff in these places. You know, you can you can always
go someplace to try to find a cheap plant somewhere. But I want to
tell you something. When you go and all you're thinking about is what's the
cheapest plant I can find, I'm going to say you're wasting money and here's
why. I've seen the way that a lot of the big chains, national
chains and whatnot take care of their plants, and basically they don't. The
plant comes off the truck looking good. Two days later it's wilted. They're
not getting it. It's not getting watered. The selection isn't good. You
know, the stuff that they carry often shouldn't be grown here. And I'm
going to avoid using specific names, but I bet you can think of three
or four or and when you have that kind of situation, like, for
example, a red raspberry for sale for Houston. In Houston, a concord
grape. Everybody knows Welch's grape. Use that's conquered grapes, Mogen David wine
if you want, if you will, conquered grapes here. They don't do
well, prone to diseases like crazy. The berries ripen in a cluster about
one at a time practically, and it's it's they shouldn't sell that here.
When you go to an independent guard I know I'm on a soapbox, but
bear with me a minute, because I feel really strong about this. When
you go an independent garden center. Oh, the last thing is they don't
some of these places. If you can even find somebody to help you,
they don't know what they're talking about. And I've tested it out several times.
One time I was in one of these, not to mention the name
places, national places, and I was going to do a training for the
staff, because trust me, any training, and the guy who I raised
it with, by the time I got there, a different guard center manager
was there and it was a guy who was managing the jewelry counter the day
before. So how much is that guy going to know about gardening. I've
been to a place like this and standing there looking at the wall of products
best besides herbicides, all that stuff, and a person came up and said
can I help you? And we began talking and I found out well,
they were new, they'd just been this was our first week, and before
this their job was working in a beauty shop cutting hair. Now is that
the person you want to point you to the best herbicide, to tell you
which herbicide you need to tell you how to apply it? Of course not
when you go to an independent garden center ours here in the Houston area.
I've been to them. I know the families that run them, I know
a lot of the people that work there, and they're trained, they know
what they're talking about. Number One, they greet you at the door and
they will walk through with you, helping you select plants. You know,
say, man, I don't know, really, I want a beautiful flower
bed, but I don't know which, And they go follow me and they
take you to the products that will best meet your needs and they tell you
how to plant them. If you buy products, they tell you how to
use them. They will tell you if you don't need a product. You
know, you think I need a weed. I've got all these winter weeds,
and they'll say, no, don't. Now is not the time.
It's too late. Let's focus on summer. And they avoid that. And
I'm telling you when I started off talking about saving money, it saves money
to buy a quality product. It may cost a little more, but you
have expert advice. And when you come back in and you've got a problem
with it, you have expert advice versus a plant that hasn't been taken care
of, that is probably not the right plant for your area, and that
you're going to be replacing anyway. Along with the disappointment of watching it not
perform. Do you see what I'm saying. Do you see why this is
a soapbox for me. We're fortunate to have these garden centers here, talk
about a lot of them on garden Line, and you need to take advantage
of that, so that whole mindset of I bet I can get a cheaper
whatever over here, it costs you money. It's like cheap pruners you may
have. I could fill a five gallon bucket with the worthless pruners over my
lifetime that I have had, have gotten given to me or something. A
quality set of pruners last year, almost your whole life, replaceable, blade
sharpenable. That's just a poster example of what I'm talking about when I talk
about our independent garden centers. When you think about how do I save money,
think about quality plants, quality advice, and enjoying those for years and
years to come. That's what we're talking about here. We are here to
steer you toward that. You're listening to garden Line by the way, as
I rant this morning, but that's okay. Seven one three two one two
five eight seven four KTRH. Garden Line does not necessarily endorse any of the
products services advertised on this program. Welcome to KTRH Garden Line with Skip Rictords.
Just watching a good Saturday morning, on a good day for gardening,
as ever day is. I see the sun shining through hitting some tree tops
over here at the station. Oh my gosh, what a day. What
a day to be outside, What a day to visit a garden center,
to get some stuff done in the yard. Oh man, I can't wait.
So but we got to stay here till ten ten am and talk to
you about your gardening questions. I say, got to. We get to.
Actually, my two happy places are sitting out in the garden doing anything
in the garden, landscape and garden so on, and talking to gardeners.
I love talking to people who are interested in gardening. It's what I've done
my whole career, and I just I just find number one, I always
learned something. I mean, there are folks that know things that I hadn't
even heard before that often come out as you as your garden visiting with a
gardener. I love being able to help people with their gardening questions. There's
a satisfaction in that and steering somebody in the right way. I wanted to
mention something this morning yesterday was Aggie Muster. An Aggie Muster is something's been
done at A and M for over one hundred years, and it is a
remembrance of the students, former students at Texas and M that have passed away
in the last year. And these names are read. Aggie Musters are held
now all over the world. There you know, back you go back to
World War two times. There was a nineteen forty two a Carregador must where
a bunch of Aggie's on the island of Gador and the Philippines got together during
during the time they were being under a shelling attack. That's just an example.
But the reason I bring it up today, Number one, it was
yesterday, But yesterday Randy's name was read, and that, you know,
every time we think about that, it's a it's a sad, sad thought
about losing Randy and just all that he meant to not only the listeners,
but for the many many years that he was host here of Garden Line.
And at the same time, I just know that Randy would be very,
very proud to know that his name is being remembered in some special ways.
One way is a scholarship and I've talked about this before, but Dan Nelson
helped set up through the A and M hort Department, a scholarship on Randy's
name for a horticulture student. These are the folks like myself that keep gardening
going in a modern world. It's called the Randy Lemon Class eighty four Memorial
Scholarship, and it'll be used to provide support for future horticulture students. Now
you can go online to give and let me. Let me give you the
I'm gonna give you a website in just a minute, so time to grab
a pen and paper. But I ask you at least write this down and
consider it. And that's give dot am slash Randy Lemon with two ms.
By the way, give dot am slash Randy Lemon, Ellie M M O
N. I know Randy would be thrilled at the thought of his legacy continuing
to educate horticulture students at the university, and that is just I guess that's
one of the simplest ways to honor his memory in terms of all the help
that he's provided to all of you in this listening area over the many many
years. By the way, I mentioned I was talking about Bruce's Brew,
the eighteen forty nine that Nelson's produces. If you get a bag this weekend,
we're about to come. I think the first May is about the time
of this wind's up, so you need to not delay get it done right
now. But if you get a bag of Bruce's Brew this weekend, two
dollars for each bag purchased will be donated by Turf Star to Camp Hope in
the name of Randy Lemon. A Camp Hope is it was a cause that
was near and dear to Randy, and it just a wonderful resource for veterans.
But if you're thinking about buying a Bruce's Brew, go ahead and get
that done this weekend, because in addition to getting a good fertilizer, you're
gonna be providing two dollars toward a donation to a good cause and Camp Hope,
and that is in the name of Randy Lemon. Let's go to the
phones now. Our number is seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy
four, and we're going to head out to northwest Houston and talk to Ralph.
Hello, Ralph, well, good morning, they're good. Just have
you home. Stir you do a good job. Oh, yes, I'm
my vital would north Maine. He doesn't. Yeah, I can't find me
any butter beans. I've got a big bored I talked to you before,
well big garden, and I need I need some butter bean. They did
for some reason. Okay, So you're looking for where to get seeds,
yes, man, Yes, if you're if you're in northwest Houston, you
ought to be able to find seeds at a place like Plants for All Seasons
or harbor Gate. There ought to be some seeds available there. Uh,
it's a little bit of a drive into town. But I know that UM
Quality Feed, for example, does carry seeds, and they I believe they're
they're um Old seed rack where you just buy them by the scoop. They
probably have got butterbeans in there. You might want to give him a call
to be sure. But they're they're pretty available. Oh, I've been around.
But of nor North Maine, they move that place. Do you know
what they moved off of Nord Maine. Yes, and I'm gonna I'll tell
you what. I'm gonna have to grab that address. I don't have it
in my head, but I will. I will announce that on the air.
Yeah sometimes this morning. Well, Ralph, I appreciate that call.
I also appreciate that you know how to say butterbeans. Butterbeans. Yeah,
well they better than what they're trying to sell me. Okay, oh,
I appreciate it. Thank you, hey, good, thank you so much
for the call of the kind words. You know. I uh, you
can tell where someone is from by by how they say. And I'm gonna
sound it out. Butter bean. Uh. If they're from the North,
they're called lima beans. If they're from the South, they're called butterbeans.
If they're from the Deep South, they're butterbeans instead of two teas two d's
butterbeans. And if you've ever had fresh grown quality butter beans, there are
a few things like it. I you know, some of the black eyed
pea, purple whole things that they come close. But when you cook up
a fresh batch of that, the little bacon, little onions in there,
oh my gosh, that's a whole meal. And really I could just sit
down and eat a bowl of butter beans, and oh my gosh, go
into a butterbean coma from enjoying the wonderful, wonderful flavors of that well,
you're listening to garden Line and our phone number if you'd like to give us
a call seven one three two one two five eight seven four. I just
want to remind you next Saturday, I'll be at k and m Ace Hardware
and Kingwood that's on Kingwood Drive from eleven thirty to one thirty PM. I
hope you'll come out and see us. I believe that Josh is feeling soulful
this morning. We are getting some smooth stuff for our Saturday in the garden.
By gosh, look at the weather. Look outside. You need to
not be indoors all day to day, that's for sure. My gosh,
it's a good time to get out in garden. I love you know.
There is something therapeutic about just being outside in the garden. And I've talked
about this before, but they're literally a scientific research on the benefits of just
being in nature around plants, and it's significant. It's you know, it's
not just exercise and fresh air. It's it's the mental benefits that occur if
you're young, if you're old, if you're dealing with add if you're dealing
with depression, plants or your medicine and I encourage those of you who are
listening, who maybe aren't gardeners, but you just love to listen the garden
line, or maybe you tune in because you don't know what crazy song or
stupid thing I'm gonna say the next time, But seriously, give it a
try for your own sake. And if you've got kiddos, get them involved
in the garden. That this is a lifetime benefit for them. When they
grow things and they learn to eat fresh vegetables because they grow in themselves,
they're more willing to It could change their health for the rest of their life,
because we all know that our main health problem is what we put in
our mouths, right, And so I would encourage that it's a wonderful hobby
too, just an absolute wonderful hobby. I obviously am biased, but I'm
telling you I'm pointing to research you could make. In fact, one time,
I start printing out research on the benefits of gardening, the many different
types of benefits, and on and on, and the stack just kept getting
hired. Here. I bet, I bet you could make a foot high
stack of just the stuff that has been studied in a replicated trial established as
a fact that these are ways that gardening helped you. So congratulations for listening
to Garden Line. If you are in any way interested in gardening, you
are on the right path for many many reasons. Hey, our phone number
if you'd like to give us a call is seven to one three two one
two fifty eight seventy four seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy four.
I was mentioning heirloom soils a little bit earlier, and I have had
in over the years. I have had I purchased soil by bags. I
have had a dump truck dump soil in my driveway. I have gone in
a flatbed trailer to pick up a big bucket full of soil to bring home,
try to strap it down and keep it from all blowing out and going
down the highway. But then the innovation that I think is just remarkable are
the large super sacks. We're talking about a one cubic yard supersac, and
Heirloom Soil provides those. They have a lot of the products, so some
of their select products, not everything they sell, but a lot of them
are available in bulk and in the one yard supersack. So you can go
to the porter location and by the way, go to Airloom Soils of Texas
dot com Airlooms Soils of Texas dot com and you can find out where they're
located. You can drive up there with your big your big trailer and have
them set some supersacks on it for you, or you can have them deliver
it. You just need to call. And you know there's a delivery fee
to get them out. Of course, that's that's always the case when you're
hauling things around town. But they can deliver it to you, so give
them a call. Check out that website and if you've not tried supersacks before,
you should. It is neat and clean. You're not sweeping and blowing
off and washing off your driveway afterwards. Supersacks, I think are the way
to go. Well, you're listening to Gardenline. I'm your host, Skip
Wrecter, and we are here to answer your gardening questions. We you know,
try to be as as informative as we can. We try to give
you the options that you have. I always have to balance between going nerdy
and giving all the facts about a question versus the caller who wants to know
just tell me what to get and where to get it. Just tell me
how to kill it. Just tell me you know what to do. And
so we try to walk between that line here because I think there's a benefit
in knowing some of the why, some of the why would you do this?
Behind the how do you do this? And when you when you learn
that, it helps you make more informed, informed decisions and helps you understand
why what you're doing is helpful and why it's going to be successful. Well,
let's take a moment and go back to the phones. And by the
way, the number seven one three two one two five eight seven four.
We're going to Lisa in Seabrook. Hello, Lisa, warning. I have
a question about thornless blackberries. Can they be grown in containers? And do
they produce well? Because I'm just used to the one, the wow one.
Yeah, thornless blackberries will do well if the container is large enough.
So I'm thinking, oh, picture a half whiskey barrel. You know,
you may want to get a plastic or a pottery version of it. So,
because the whiskey barrels rot out over time, they're not treated wood.
And but about that volume of soil, I grew some blackberries and I grew
one called punk up Eo NCA. It probably can find. It's a little
hard to find, but there are a couple of one called Traveler Arkansas Traveler,
and then let's see what's the other one. The couple of their thornless
and they're newer varieties from Arkansas. Think of it in just a moment,
but they're they're prime primo cane bearing. Now the blackberries you've been used to
picking, Lisa, they grow a one year, or grow a cane upwards
one year, and then the next year, after it's gone through winter,
that's when it blooms in fruits and then it dies. So you've got a
cycle going on. Eat at any point in time, like right now,
if you had a BlackBerry patch, you would have blackberries that were setting on
last year's growth, and then you would have new shoots coming way up for
next year. And with the prima cane bearers, they bear the first year
as well as the second year. So that's a really unique thing, and
i'd encourage you if you're looking for a thornless a couple of names. There
are other good varieties out there, but two that come to mind. The
one I was trying to think of is prime Arc pr I m r K
like Prima Cane Bearing from Arkansas. Primark Freedom and Primark Traveler are two good
ones and where depending on where you shop, you're going to find some other
good options. But if you go to a good quality nursery, they won't
steer your Can you use road soil? I would use rose soil. You
can use a lot of different soils. But this is a long term planting.
So you know a lot of times with potting soil you got something really
fine textured and it it just oxidizes away. You want something that's going to
hold up in that container for a period of time, so something a little
bit chunkier can be helpful. Now I'm not talking about you know, big
wood junks that like mulch, but for a longer term like that, I
think that would be a good choice. And rose soil certainly would would be
fine for that. Thank you, all right, good luck. I love
thornless blackberries. They are super. Hey. Let's run out to Richmond now
and we're going to talk to Betty. Hello, Betty, good morning.
How are you this morning? Well? I'm doing absolutely wonderful, and it's
because I keep looking outside thinking about what all I'm going to enjoy outdoors after
ten am me too. All right, I'm calling this morning because I have
been overcome with nails. They're brown, they're sticky, They're everywhere. I've
put soap on and I've tried salt on them. They just keep eating everything
in my garden. I've tried coffee grounds, which I've seen on the internet,
and I just I'm inundated with them. I don't know where they come
from and how to get rid of them. Help me, Betty, I'm
gonna tell you how to do it. You need to go and buy what's
called a snail bait, and there's several brands in the market, so I'm
not going to get into specific brands again. A good garden center will take
you to the one they sell, and they will sell the ones at work.
But it's it's the snail killer ingredient that's mixed into a bait that they
want to eat. You want to use it when it's fresh. Don't store
it in a garage or in a building all summer outside because if it doesn't
if it's not appealing for the snails to eat, they're not going to eat
it. And so you want to put them out. Don't just dribble a
little here and there, follow the label because you want them to eat it,
get sick and die, and snail bait is probably the simplest, least
toxic way to get that done. So we can go around my vegetables,
no problem. Yes, what I do is I'll put it out in a
little flat trays on the ground and the snails will find it. Put it
near the plants that they're going up. Okay, okay, thank you,
so you bad good luck with that. And I guess another option would be,
you know they say, when life gives you lemons, make an Maybe
we just need an s cargo recipe, Oh, garlic, a little butter.
I don't want to infer you can eat all the snails out there.
So this is a disclaimer. It was a joke. It was those are
not the ones that you want to have when life gives you snails, make
s cargo. Indeed, it's not It's not unusual to see, well,
good morning on a good day for gardening, as I always say, because
every day is a good day for gardening. If you're wondering, well,
how can you say that? What if it's freezing outside? What if it's
raining outside and a hurricane is blowing through. It's a good day for gardening
because you have houseplants, you have seeds to start indoors. You've got catalogs
to peruse or things to check out online that will make you a better gardener.
Every day is a good day for gardening. And you're listening to garden
Line, I'm your host, Skip Richter our phone number. Write this down
seven one three two one two five eight seven four seven one three two one
two fifty eight seventy four. I was mentioning earlier talking about lawns and different
things in the vegetable garden. In my vegetable garden, I've got some vegetables
that I haven't grown before, and I do that all the time. I
just my policy when I plant a garden is to start with the species and
varieties that I know will do well here. So something just an example,
celebrity tomato. It's an old time tomato, been around a long time,
resistance and nematodes, which is rare in tomatoes, and it's just a good
one. But then I always add two or three others to just try out.
That's how you end up finding your favorites just by exploring a little bit.
This past two winters, I've tried a vegetable called chi jim assai and
that is what one seed company calls it. I believe it's Baker Creek calls
there. There's chie jim Assi. There are other companies that offer this same
cross between tutsi and another Asian vegetable that's not coming to me right now.
But chi jim assi hi ji m i s Ai, I believe, and
that are spelling. It has dark green leaves and it's mild. It's in
that Cabot family of vegetables that some things can be very mild and then when
you get over on the mustard end it gets it gets pretty strong flavored.
This one is a mild flavored, so I can eat it fresh. I
don't you know. I don't need to cook it or mix it with other
things. You can use it in a stir fry or whatnot. But it's
just an unusual one, and I don't know. I'm not here to promote
chi Gennosia. I'm just saying that that's a new one that I tried.
And if you haven't tried it before, and you're a vegetable gardener. You
ought to give that a try. I think you'll find it interesting. But
most of all, when you plant your garden, maybe it's time for a
summer garden. There's some greens that are for warm season, and let me
talk about those a little bit more in a moment. Right now, I'm
going to go to the phones and we're heading to Cyprus and we're going to
talk to John. Good morning, John, Hey, Skip, how are
you going? I'm well, thank you, good hey. I've been usually
trying to follow Randy's fertilizer schedule, but this year I'm a little late.
I put the fifteen five ten down last weekend. Okay, I know I
should be putting what's that? I just said? Okay, I'm sorry in
a rust, And then I want to put the nineteen four ten down.
But would it be all right to put that down this weekend? I would
not do that. Go ahead and get it and have it, but give
that give that fifteen five ten about six weeks or so and then come back.
Otherwise you're just really loading the lawn up with nitrogen, because the fifteen
five ten is going to be a quick release and the other will be a
slower release over time, so I'd give them a little space. Both good
fertile. Yeah, so about six weeks then you say about six weeks.
Yeah, I watch your lawn and it'll tell you. I mean, if
you're if it's growing so fast you can't keep up mowing it, hold off,
give it a little more time. There's nothing wrong with fertilizing at other
times, but we fertilize to build lawn density and good lawn color. And
so look at your lawn and if it's like I'm not, really it's not
what I want it to be, well, then it's probably time to go
ahead and fertilize again as well as equent mowing, and just don't overdo the
watering and you can have a beautiful lawn. Okay, great now. My
other question I had was, for some reason we have a problem with moss
in my yard. Is there anything that attracts those things more than anything else.
Well, people in the Greater Houston area are very skittish because of the
side web worm that was so bad a few years ago. In fact,
it's been bad more than one year, but it's a very hit and miss.
And if you're seeing moths now, I do not think you're seeing sideweb
worms. That's going to come later in the summer. So there are a
million types of moths flying around. And just because we've become moths skittish since
the side web worm, Now every moth is a concern, but you don't
have to worry about that. I would not worry about the moths at all.
Right now, okay, all right, all right, hey John,
I appreciate that call. We're going to go to break, Linda. We
will come to you first thing after break. You were listening to garden Line.
I'm your host, skip Rictor. Give us a call seven one three
two one two fifty eight seventy four pocket. Well, good Saturday morning on
a good day for gardening. I'm your host, skip Rictor. This is
garden Line, and if you would like to give us a call, our
number is seven one three two one two five eight seven four. And let's
head right back out. We've got some calls on the board here. We're
gonna talk to Linda out in Dickinson. Hello, Linda, Hi, thank
you for taking a call. I replaced someone cors with regulars about two months
ago. The plants look very healthy. I have new growth this week.
I know this yellow leaves appearing home, and it's really odd because I have
some dwarf once planted in front of them and two regulars behind them, and
they don't have any yellow leaves. Okay, flow row. How long ago
were they planted? About two months? Two months? And are the yellow
leaves the new growth out at the end of the shoot or is it some
of the bigger leaves further back on the shoot? Do you know, some
further back to further back. Okay, that that is going to be some
sort of a root water or damage kind of situation. If they've been in
the ground two months, I'm sure they're rooting in pretty well. But the
whole plant root system is in that little cylinder you pulled out of the pod.
So any plant that's been in the ground a while has an extensive root
system and it gets a little dry, and it's okay because it can it
can reach out into more soil to get moisture from. But a new plant
for really the first six months or year is still developing that root system,
and I think that's what's happened. I think they got a little bit dry
and so they just need a little bit more regular water, especially in that
area where the cylinder of soil went into the ground, because the soil around
it may be moist, but the root system pumps that little cylinder of soil
dry, and until it gets roots established, you just need to give it
a little more pamprike. Okay, thank you so much. All right,
thank you, Linda. I appreciate that. And hey, by the way,
when you're when you're out and about down there, you are fortunate that
you have a league League City Feed because they're going to carry the products.
They're going to carry stuff for zaleas, that's for acid loving plant. They're
going to have if you need an iron key late, which on yours right
now it doesn't sound like it. They're gonna have stuff like that. And
they're so close by that you're really fortunate to not have to go far.
Yes, I do go there. Oh good good. We'll say hi.
Tell them folks that garden line said Hi. I thank you for the calling.
You look forward to talking to you again. Sometime in the meantime.
We're gonna go to Andy up in North Shore. Hey, Andy, good
morning, good morning, and thank you for taking my call. I wanted
to talk to you about my my friend yard my lawn. I have somewhat
of a situation happening where my lawn has you know, historically been uh,
Saint Augustine. But when we had the freeze a couple of years ago,
and then somewhat of a drought we had last year, we're dried things up
pretty much. Uh. Now in the wintertime, I have winter rized and
in early early March, I put the fertilizer down on the grass and it
brings it up nice and pretty. But however, there's a new grass that
has has kind of infiltrated in the lawn and it's I don't know what kind
of the grass it is, but it's very thin, very spring like,
very light. It's bluffy, but it's not Saint Augustine. So I have
someone of a battle going on in my front yard. Okay, I wanted
to see what could that possible be? How can I really? All Right,
Well, Andy, we've got a real rough connection with you. So
I'm gone, I'm gonna do that's okay. I'm gonna close down and I'm
gonna just answer your question then off off the conversation with you. So what
I would like to see is a sample a picture of that grass, and
if you can get up close to it, maybe pull one up the kind
of grass you're talking about that's invading and put it down on a table or
sidewalk where we can get good quality close up photos. I'd like to look
at it and see what it is. I think you're looking at a winter
grass that's left over and like rye. One of the types of rye,
for example, is a possibility. You said it was fine textured, so
it may be annual bluegrass that you're looking at. But depending on which of
those two you have, what I'm gonna recommend it's gonna be a little bit
different. And so I'm going to put you on hold. It looks like
we lost him there, so if you want to call back, and when
you talk to Josh, he will get you information on how to get that
picture to me and be glad to take a look at it. I suspect,
based on what you're describing, that this is a grass that's going to
go away as it gets warm, but I want to be sure about that.
Well, you're listening to garden Line. I'm your host skip rictor,
and we're here to answer your gardening questions. It's a good day for gardening,
and there ought to be a lot of different activities that you can do
when you're out and about in the garden. Our phone number, if you'd
like to give us a call is seven one three two one two five eight
seven four seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy four. I was
talking about some new vegetables that I was trying out a little bit earlier.
There is there is just an unbelievable amount of new varieties every year, and
in some cases new species that come in. I mentioned a few of the
Asian vegetables that and I've been working my way through a bunch of different Asian
vegetables which are predominantly cool season, but not all. There's some that can
go in the heat too. But one of the interests that I've had lately
is is summer gardening options. You know, if I were to tell you
name five greens for the garden, I bet all five you name. If
you can think of five would be cool season greens. You might think about
collars or kale, or lettuce, or spinach or arugula. You get the
idea. There are summer greens that also do well. If you've not tried
malibar before. People call it malibar spinach. It's not spinach, but malibar
is a good one for that. There's one that's called mulochia, and it
is very popular in throughout the Middle Eastern region, but other areas as well.
It's absolutely summer proof. There is summer amaranth, the vegetable amaranth.
It's wild version is the pigweed that grows in the farmer's fields. But this
is a type with big green, succulent leaves. It's good and it can
take the summer. And I can name others. There's a lot of good,
warm season greens to keep you producing good, healthy food all through the
summertime. When you might think, well, if it's not oak or black
eyed peas or sweep potatoes, there's nothing to grow. Well, there is,
and so get out there and try out some new things this year.
We'll be right back seven one three, two, one two fifty eight seventy
four KTRH Garden Line. It's not necessarily endorse any of the products or services
advertised on this program. Welcome to KTRH Garden Line with skin Ricord. Just
watch you well. Good Saturday morning on a good day for gardening, not
necessarily a good day for my throat. I tell you, I don't know
what's going on back there, but we're gonna we're gonna try to keep it
going long enough. We got another two hours of garden line this morning,
so give us a call. Let's talk about what you're interested in. That
would be seven one three two one two five eight seven four seven one three
two one two. Katrh and Josh will get you on the board and we
can talk gardening with the topics that are of interest to you. I have
been mentioning some things I'm doing out in the lawn, in the landscape and
in the garden. This time of year, we know, with the passing
of leaf season. A leaf seasons one my favorite seasons of the year because
it's when I can get lots of good material for mulching and composting and making
all weather pathways through my garden beds and things like that. But it's about
gone, so I've got my stuff stockpiled now. Generally when I will gather
leaves, well, first of all, I let my neighbors gather leaves.
Typically mine, I either just you know, use a mower to kind of
gather them in a bag and then go put them immediately in a garden,
in a garden bed, a shrub bed, or some of the place where
I'm using them, or just with a multing more multim right back into the
lawn. I mean, you can do that too. But my neighbors they
are so kind, and yours are too. You may have noticed this,
but when you drive out of your driveway and you're heading to work or someplace
out there on the curb, they have been thinking about you, and they
put their bags and leaves they gather it. You don't even have to rake
them. They raked them for you. They put them on a bag at
the curb for you to enjoy. Now that's being a little facetious, but
it's it's a point to be made that the leaves that fall off your trees,
the leaves that you clip off your lawn, are stocked with nutrients.
About seventy percent of the nutrients that a tree takes up during the year or
in its leaves. Now the wood, you know, it's got a lot
of carbon in it, and it's got some mineral and nutrient in it.
But most of the nutrients in a tree or in the new growth, the
twigs and the leaves of the green stuff basically, and it's packed with that.
So when that falls to the ground, here's what's happened. Your soil
has given the tree nutrients, the tree has grown leaves with those nutrients,
and now the tree is dropping organic free slow release mulchion fertilizer in your lawn.
And I've talked about this back, you know, during leaf season,
a little bit more toward the end of it, but I just want to
stress that don't let that go, don't let that get away, don't pay
somebody to haul it away. And now we're in mowings season. So what's
going on there. You put quality fertilizers down on the ground to grow a
deep green, beautiful, dense lawn, and then you mow those leaves off.
You could collect them in a bagger and put the bag at the curb,
but then you're renting fertilizer. You've bought a quality fertilizer product, You've
watched the grass plant move those nutrients into grass blades, and now you're going
to clip off free organics low release fertilizer and put it in a bag and
pay somebody to haul it off. Don't do that. Return your grass clippings
to the lawn. Now, if it's rained for eight days and you haven't
been able to get out there and the grasses near high, of course,
no, you gotta bag that and get it out of there. But when
you mow regularly and you're only cutting off about one third of the leaf blade,
that can easily drop down in your lawn and they decompose fast. And
if you're worried about thatch, here, don't worry about that. Here is
what causes that. That is caused by excessive amounts of nitrogen that cause a
lot of runner growth. And the runners break down slowly and not fast enough
for us. That's why we do corroboration and compost top dressings. But the
leaves they break down fast. So we'll come back to that maybe a little
bit later. Right now, I want to head out and we're gonna talk.
Let's see who do we got it. We're gonna talk to Charlie out
in spring. Hello Charlie, good morning. He can we help my wife?
I had bought her a lemon tree and it had fruit the size of
grapefruits. Okay, many people came to the house and thought we had a
grapefruit tree. Now it was destroyed in the flood of Harvey. It died,
and I'd like to replace it. I don't know watch it particular tree
I had, and I was hoping you could tell me. You call the
right place. And thanks for that question, because other people may have it
too. That is a ponderosa lemon. Ponderosa lemons are grapefruit size. They're
huge, and they're not the heartiest of trees. They have some decent heartiness,
but not with the kind of weather we can have. But you just
need to go looking for a ponder rosa lemon tree, and you are up
in the Cleveland area, would I would call Kingwood Garden Center or Warren Southern
Gardens in Kingwood, that's pretty close to you and see if they have a
ponderosa that is not a variety that is normally just carried widespread, but it
can be found locally. But that's the one you're looking for, if you
want that kind of lemon. Okay, I will follow up then. Thank
you all right, Bruce, thank you or Steven me Charlie, thank you
very much for the call. Bruce. Let's see we've got just a little
bit of time here, and if you want to start the question, we
may have to finish it after break. That's okay. My question is about
aeroponics. There's a couple of companies around that make these hydroponics and aeroponic grow
towers, one of which is Eden. What are you te knew much about
about the aeroponics and you know it tends to grow tubers better because it won't
rods well. Like any system, there are quality products and they're not quality
products. And I haven't studied all the different systems of aeroponics, but if
it's if they did it right, you can grow things that way. You
just need to make sure you've got lots of light and a quality light.
Okay, if you'd like to follow up with any questions on that, Bruce,
just hang on. We're about to go to break. Our number seven
one three, two one two fifty eight seventy four. One of those two
six and two is eight Come home, Josh. I don't know who that
is, but when I hear that music, I picture, and it's not
Chuck Berry, but a picture like Chuck Berry bent over with his knees bent
kind of skipping across the stage, jamming on a guitar. It just sort
of has that that feel and oh the Blues Brothers, Man, how did
okay? I'm gonna have to hand in my man music card because if I
don't know the Blues Brothers when I hear it, oh gosh, we take
you back in time. Sometimes you're on Garden Line our phone number if you'd
like to give us a call and be on the air. Seven one three
two one two five eight seven four seven one three two one two fifty eight
seventy four. We were what was I talking about a minute ago? Returning
your clippings to the lawn and taking care of your lawn, and I just
just know this. I wanted to add some more information to that. They
did a study up at Texas and Research Center in Dallas many years ago and
they looked at the content of grass clippings. So, in other words,
you mow a lawn, you send those clippings to the lab and say what's
in this? And number one, you find out that they're about a three
one two or four one two ratio of nutrients. That's that's the ratio that
the grass needs and takes it up in it's a little more nitrogen and nitrogen
a little more often. But when they totaled it, When you think of
how many times you mow your lawn over the course of the year, and
you add up the content of the clippings the weight of the clippings for the
whole year, you put more nutrient on with your lawn more than you do
your fertilizer spreader. So can you bag clippings, Absolutely, you can bag
clippings. You can do it all day. We did it for years.
But when you do that, you're given away free nutrients and you have to
up your fertilization to make up for it. Also, the clippings, when
they fall to the surface and they start to decompose, they're blocking a little
bit of light from the surface, and whenever sunlight hits the surface, nature
plants of weeds. So I'm not saying you return your clippings and you don't
have weeds by any means, but it does help. It does help,
and so it just makes sense to return those clippings. And now returning clippings
does not mean you don't need to fertilize. You still do need to fertilize,
but at least you're stopping a lot of the nutrient from leaving your property
when you do so, don't bag it. I remember years ago when Aggerlife
Extension created the Don't Bag it lawn care plan and a guy named doctor Noop
Canoop in Dallas area. He designed that plan along. I believe Bob Whitney
was part of that problem. He was a kind of extension agent at the
time that designed that plan for not bagging the clippings. And after that we
created a don't bag at composting and a don't bag at leaf management plan.
I helped. I helped with the Don't bag it leaf management plan to design
that. But as you know, I'm really into returning leaves, so think
of it as a way of recycling like nature does. Well, let's head
out to clear Lake. We're going to talk to Mark this morning. Hello
Mark, good morning, Sir. Said to hear that your throat is given
you trouble. Thank you. Do you having to have any manua lossenges?
They're really good for that. I don't. I have some lukewarm coffee that's
getting me by, but I'll have to try your maluca idea. It's manuka
and uka Manuka okay, yeah, Manuka honey is some real expensive honey.
And they formed him minute. Some lossenges. I'm calling on behalf of my
sign if it canother. She doesn't usually like to call on things. She's
got some tomatoes where the new growth leaves are curling. About an hour ago,
I sent you a picture. I don't expect that you've seen it yet,
but it's there. Okay, I'm seeing if I can find the photo
as we talk here. Is it primarily on the new growth or is it
These are determinants and it's on new growth. Okay. So when new growth
starts twisting up, okay, curling and curling, okay. When you see
that, it usually is related. Oh yeah, see the picture. It's
related to either a herbicide contamination or a virus. And this is definitely one
of those two. It's it's difficult from a photo to be able to tell
if it is one or the other. But well, I can tell you
it's not herbicide. So you have strictly organic Okay, So nothing was used
in the lawn nearby? Let me know, law, And it's her back
hard. It's small, it's the townhouse and lush with growth. All right.
I don't think there's a blade of grass. Let me keep playing Sherlock
Holmes share with you. Did you mulch them with any hay or straw?
Neither of the above mulches. But I think she tries us the hardwood.
All right, final question, any cow or horse based manure on them?
She used the black cow. I don't know exactly what's in there. I
don't think it's horse based, all right, I'm gonna eliminate. I'm gonna
eliminate the herbicide. Then, and this is a virus, and so what
happens is the virus goes to the new growth and as it develops, it
doesn't let it develop normally. That's why your old leaves look good because they're
already developed. The new growth is where you see the virus, and you
need to You don't want to hear this, but grab him and pull them
out because there is no curing it. It will not get better. And
if an insect feeds on that affected plant, it will get the virus.
Just like a mosquito that carries malaria from one person to another, it will
carry the virus to the next tomato. And so you need to rogue it
out, get rid of the ones that are affected as soon as you can.
Well are you talking about cutting the leaves that are bad or pulling the
whole plant out. I'm sorry to say pulling the whole plant. It's a
man that's going to hurt because I've already got some tomatoes on them, I
know, I mean, you know, and if ever plants affected, I
guess you could leave them and just see if you can get some tomatoes out
of it. But this is going to shut down all the new bloom development,
the new growth and everything. And I hate to be the bearer of
bad news, but I have to be the bearer of truth and that that
is exactly what's happening with those tomato plants. Well, you know, it's
a good thing that they've out lauged shooting the messenger, because I think she'd
can find you. Yeah, oh my gosh, I would have a lot
of bullet holes if that was over the shirts or something. Yeah, there's
there's nothing you can spray on them. I mean, you know, it's
a viruses. Uh. Viruses are a problem because they they typically exist with
a living host. Uh. They seem to understand that it behooves them not
to kill. To kill the host, the virus has to be in that
host. But it just it just ruins things, and there's there's no cure
in it. We get viruses on a lot of other kinds of plants.
All right, Mark, Well it's not all right, but I mean I
appreciate you're being honest with us. Well, I don't know if you,
being the secondary messenger is also free from bullets, but you might want to
bear that news out a little bit carefully as you go. Yeah, I
think we're gonna communication today will be via text and phone. There, there
you go, there you go. Well, as a married man, I
can tell you that is a wise approach. Thank you very much for the
call. Oh my gosh, you're listening to garden Line and I'm your host,
Skip Richter and our phone number. Write this down, put it on
the refrigerator door. Maybe put it in speed dial on your phone. How
about that in case you have a plan emergency between six am and ten am
on Saturday and Sunday mornings seven one three two one two five eight seven four
seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy four. You know, that's
a nice thing about occasionally seeing photos of things, because you know, had
Mark just called and described it to me and I'm sitting here trying to picture
what he's saying. But well, when I saw the photo, it's like,
oh yeah, I got it. I got it just right. By
the way. Another way that you can get me a photo is to come
next Saturday, Kay and m Ace Hardware and Kingwood. I'll be there from
one thirty or excuse me, from eleven thirty. I'll head out right after
the show to one thirty PM, and I'll be there at a table.
You can bring me stamples of plants and bags. You can bring me photos
on the phone, maybe just a photo of the landscape. You don't talk
about. Hey, what kind of flower might go good here? That K
and m Ace Hardware in Kingwood. That is the place to be next Saturday.
So I hope you'll come out. We're really looking forward to being out
there. I have not been. It's been a while since I was back
out in the Kingwood area. I was out We're in Southern Gardens a good
while back. But I'm looking forward to getting out and seeing K and m
Ace out in the Kingwood area. This is a I like to say that
this way, but you know, a on a garden day, a garden
line morning You've got me for four hours, but a lot of other people
are calling. When you come out to a live appearance, we're eye to
eye and we can talk and go back and forth, and I have all
kinds of fun out there a live appearance. Well, you're listening to Garden
Line. I am your host, Skip Richter. We're going to come back
from break, Jonathan, I see you, and I see some other people
hopping up on the boards, So we will get to you after break.
And Nick, I don't know you have a fan club. You want to
have T shirts made. I had another call today, hello Nikki, and
it's like Nikki just comes in with bad news and the traffic and stuff.
Why not you know, I'm kidding, No, not everybody. I have
to tell you that what I did. We were talking last week. What
was it called soak and cycle? Yes, so I took a bath and
first um BEV from arbor Gate had given me a candle. There you go.
So then I soaked and I cycled, took another bask had some green
tea and I soaked an I cycled. Boy, I'm in a good mood
today. I'm happy to hear that, and I'm sorry about telling you you
bring bad news. It is that seems to be what makes the news right.
It's so often does That's what I sit down. Well, good morning
on a good Saturday morning for gardening. You are listening to garden Line.
Garden Line is a show that's here, so you can call in and we
can talk about gardening. Seven one three two one two five eight seven four
if you want Josh to get you on the boards. Right now, we
are going to go out here and start taking some calls, beginning with Jonathan
in Cyprus. Hello Jonathan, good morning, Good morning Skip, thanks for
taking my call. Yes, sir, um, I'm calling about uh freshly
laid sod M. We have to replace a couple of patches in our backyard,
had a tree removed and just some other things that have happened that's killed
off all the grass. Not police, the witches, two large puppies.
Um, so I gotta blocked off. We got the grass laid in nicely.
My question is when is it? When do you mow it? I
mean it's starting to get pretty, it looks pretty thick, nice and green
and plush. When do you mow it? When is it okay to mow
it? And fertilize it. Now. Now is a good time. Yes,
Now if once when you lay new side, I'm saying, now is
it time to mow the lawn? When you lay new side, I would
give it at least two or three weeks before you would mow it, because
you want it to get some roots down. So those pieces, you know,
are sticking to the ground good, and you need to give it a
little bit of time for that. So don't worry about that thing. I
say, where a mow you know, every week, cut off a third
of the blade initially. Let's just let that side get some roots down.
And depending on the season when you lay the side, you know, that
could be pretty quickly, or it could if you do it in a cool
season, it can take quite a while to get those roots down in the
ground. Right. Well, yeah, we just laid it about three weeks
ago. Yeah, well you probably are okay to mow it. You know,
if you want to check, you could go out and kind of put
a little bit on one of the pieces and just see it is it pegged
down real good or not? Okay? All right, thanks, thank you,
all right, appreciate it, you bet, thank you. I appreciate
the call. We're gonna now head out to Baytown and talk to Misty.
Hello Misty, Hey, guys, thanks for having me, you beat.
How can we help? Well? I planned a rose bush in my backyard
years ago now, and it's been giving me these velvety, beautiful red aromatic
roses just like long stem like. They're beautiful, all right, And the
other dick came out here and my little rosebush has produced some pink roses with
white that are like barrigaated, I think it is. I've never seen those
before ever. They are coming straight off the stock of one of the red
ones, okay, And I'm like, where are these and what's happening?
All right? So, based on what you've said, assuming that is one
plant and not another one coming up beside it, there's a thing called sports
spoort, and that's when a plant genetically changes and that new shoot is genetically
different than the other one, And so I think that's what you're seeing.
We have varieties. There's an old antique rows called Marie Pavier, and fellow
named Greg Grant found a sport that's very pink compared to Marie Pavier, and
he named it Marie Daily. And that happens a lot on roses, and
I think that's what you see. I'm going to put you on hold,
though, Misty, I would like you to talk to Josh and let me
see he'll tell you how to get some pictures to me, because I would
like to see that, just to make sure what I'm telling you is what
is correct. Well, let's see, we've got Tommy out there and Jim
out there. Guys. I'm gonna have to take a break, but I
will put you guys first up. When I come back, we'll talk to
you Tommy and then Jim. Let's see you're talking. You're talking this Prictor
and you're listening to Garden Line. Here's a number. Write it down.
Seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy four. We look forward to
talking to you. We got one more segment left in this hour and we're
gonna be here till ten am today. But we're looking forward to visiting with
you about your questions. Maybe crazy, but it's just baby y'all shown down
the line, good Saturday morning, on a good morning for gardening. We
are looking forward to talking to a couple of collars we got on the board.
If you would like to get on the board seven one three, two
one two fifty eight seventy four. Well, let's start off. We're gonna
go out to northwest Houston and we're gonna talk to Tommy. Good morning,
Tommy, good morning, thank you. My first question, I've got two
of them. My first one is we've got what I'm calling a rather big
front yard area and the past two freezes did its damage on it, and
it wasn't great as far as the Saint Augustine before that, I don't have
a lot of money to spend on it. It would there be a good
weed and feed that we could apply to that. There is grass throughout the
area, but it's not very thick. It's it's very low in spots.
Okay, well, I tell you in your situation there, I'm gonna say,
do not do the weed and feed combo. I would What I would
suggest is do a good quality fertilizer. And we talk about a lot of
them. Here. Do it at the right rate, which is about up
one pound of nitrogen per thousand square feet. And here's how you know how
much to apply. Whatever fertilizer you buy, take the first number on the
bag and divide it into one hundred, and that's how many pounds you apply
per thousand square feet. So here's just an example that's easy. If the
first number was twenty, twenty goes into one hundred five times. So for
a twenty percent nitrogen product, you put on five pounds per thousand square feet.
And you can do that with the different you know, different types of
fertilizers. Take that first number. As far as weed control, I'd say,
let's find out what the weeds are and go after them. If it's
a broad leaf weed, then you can use a post emergent broad leaf product
separately. And there's a number of good products out there. But rather than
trying to combine these two and get the timing right for feeding and the timing
right and the right product and the weed and feed for weeding. Some are
pre emergent, some are post emergent, let's separate those two out and buy
the two different products. And I think that will work. Now, if
you want to save some money and you're trying to get your loan back going,
you can just do good mowing, watering, and fertilizing. Let the
weeds be in there for a while. Let's get your lawn good and downs.
Most of the weeds are going to get choked out by that over the
course of the season. With good mow water fertilized, and then the persistent
weeds we could go in later and kind of take those out individually based on
what the weed is. Yes, sir, okay, thank you very much.
I appreciate that. Now. My second question is we've got a really
good garden going. We went to arbur Gate and got a ton of their
compost. But anyway we're having a problem with I'm thinking it's birds pecking holes
in our tomatoes and they've gotten to them before we can grab them off the
bush. And also they've been flying around the bean of plants. What can
we do. I don't know what to think about the beans and the birds
there, but the tomato pecking. The thing I would suggest is you need
to go online and buy something called an Organza draw string bag. These are
used, as you know, brides will buy them as little favors for the
bridesmaids at the party or whatever. But it's it's a it's a mesh type
bag Organza or ga n Za and it has a draw string. You buy
them in different sizes. Get a size for your tomatoes. Slip them over
the new tomatoes and pull them tight, and that will keep the birds from
pecking on them. Now, if you have eight hundred acres of tomatoes,
it's not practical. But for a home garden, I think you can get
you a bunch of good tomatoes and keep those dead gum mocking birds, our
state bird and whoever else is doing it from doing that damage. Tommy,
I appreciate that question. Let's see Jim out in Montgomery. Let's see what's
going on. I've got just little time here, but we'll see if we
can get you done before break. Okay, soil, I do a lot
of cuttings and seed germination and find really decent soil. It's real smooth,
didn't have wood chips in and all that kind of stuff. Yeah, and
I use it just to germinate and once they develop a good root system and
I transplant them into a road soil. But I was wondering where I could
get something. I live in Montgomery, but I'm kind of closer to magnolia,
the old magnolia. All right. Well, there's a number of good
products out there, but I would suggest you consider jungle land. Jungle Land
is made by Nitrofoss. They have quality soil for out on the patio,
but they also have the type with crystals inside that you can use on your
houseplants. It's got the micro rhizal fungi in it and aged organic matter in
it. It would be a good place to start. And you're going to
find jungle land pretty much everywhere because nitrofoss is everywhere. Okay, tract and
a regular oil for your throat that works real well. Hey, thank you,
I appreciate that. Man. I'm getting a lot of good advice here
in addition to hopefully giving out some good advice myself. Paula, we see
you on the board and when we come back from break, I will put
you as first in line for the rest of you. Seven one three two
one two five eight seven four. Just another reminder, I'm going to be
a K and MS Hardware in Kingwood. That is forty five forty Kingwood Drive
next Saturday. Next Saturday, eleven thirty in the morning to one thirty.
Come out and see me. I'd love to meet you. And if you've
got plans to bring, if you've got photos of the yard and you want
to ask questions about it just good quality focused photos. We'll have some time
to talk and have a good time. And while you're there, they're gonna
have every product you might need. KTRH Garden Line does not necessarily endorse any
of the products or services advertised on this program. Welcome to KTRH Garden Line
with Skip rictor just watch Good Morning on a good morning for gardening. There,
good Saturday morning, great weather out there. For now, it's a
good time to be inside. We got an hour left to garden Line today.
That means we have an hour we can take your gardening questions if you
will write down our number seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy four.
Do you have a little piece of property that maybe an acre or even
more a lot more if you want where you just need some power equipment to
be able to get things done well, I would suggest you go check out
the folks at lands Down Muty Moody. Lansdown Moody has the Caboda line of
tractors and there are some really good spring deals available. You can perhaps consider
the Caboda L twenty five O one with hydrostatic transmission. That's that means no
more mind in your gears. Trying to go from one gear to another.
You can throw a front end loader on it, perhaps a rotary cutter behind
it, a box blade in front of it. You see what I'm talking
about. I mean, you know, when you order malt, you got
to be able to move that stuff around, right, You got to mow
a big area, bigger than your lawn. There you go the Caboda products
or quality in their their design for hard working Texans. Now you can also
get this zero down, zero percent APR for seventy two months. In fact,
you know what, they have increased that to eighty months. I've never
heard of such a thing. Zero down zero APR for eighty months. All
you gotta do LM tractor dot com at Lansdown Moody folks, and this is
going to go on through June thirtieth, but don't delay. You can also
go to Cuboda USA dot com to get more information Lansdown Moody, Caboda Tractors.
I used to have a little farm up in the Willis area, and
I loved getting out and messing around on the tractor. You know when I
say farm, it's small farm, right, But my old tractor I can
relate to the grinding years this year, and I can relate to having to
squirt stuff up in there trying to get the thing to start, you know.
And and it's so nice to have a quality new product. And those
cabodas come in all sizes. I mean, there is all the way down
to you know, just a bigger and a lawnmower size, to all the
way up to you name it. And so there's a caboda for you.
And it is a lot of fun to get out there and to get your
work done. Plus it saves you a lot of time and money. You're
listening to garden Line. I'm your host, Skip Richter, and we are
here to talk to you. Our number is seven one three two one two
five eight seven four and we're going to start off by going to Charlie in
Friendswood. Hello, Charlie, good morning. Question for you here. Okay,
we have a little right escape area in the front yard, maybe four
or five hundred square feet, about a half dozen tall trees, primarily pines,
and its kind of what my wife calls English ivy, which is thick
and full and it's growing up the trees. Is that detrimental to them and
shall I get rid of it? And if so, householo. Okay.
So it's detrimental when it gets up in the tree and the ivy covers over
the foliage of the tree, meaning it's like putting an umbrella shade cover over
your tree. That will kill trees, okay, because they can't get light
and the ivy grows at such a fast rate. If you just that it's
on the tree is no problem. And I know some people that will come
up, you know, head higher or whatever and just trim off the ivy
and kind of keep it as a green tree trunk covering down low, or
you can just get rid of the whole thing, keep it off the trunk.
But those are your options. Okay, Well that sounds pretty good because
it's no where near the trees are tall, probably fifty seven to seventy five.
They're pine trees. Yeah, totally. Well that that English ivy has
great aspirations and so probably better to deal with it before it starts to become
a problem. You know, keep it whatever level you want, whether it's
not on the trunk at all, or whether it's let's have a green trunk
up six feet high and it stops there. That's your call. Just just
cutting its mottom or just pull it off as where you can reach it.
You can cut it off at the bottom and then you know, pull it
off special. You can just gone dry and leave. You're gonna fall off
anyway. But again that aesthetically that that's a call for you to make.
I appreciate, appreciate that gig. I'm charting good, Thanks so much for
the call. Let's now go to John in southwest Houston. Hello, John,
Hey, how are you. I'm a longtime listener, first time caller.
Good. Hey, I've got a problem. I'm so tired of my
trees freezing. And so what I did is, I've decided that you know,
put for simmons in some things that won't freeze. But one tree that
I'd like to have some help with is on a papia tree. Okay,
I've kind of you know, I've done really well with self pollinating dwarf papayas,
and I usually would get them from a nursery from that brought them in
from you know, somewhere's in Asia, and they were phenomenal. I can't
seem find anybody that might have a good tree that I could purchase. You
know, I wanted a dwarf self pollinating small fruit, okay, and could
you give me a suggestion on where I can purchase one ant? And second
of all, you know this, I think I had probably about forty fruit
on mine before the last freeze came in and I tried to save the tree,
and uh, you know, in this year, I'm going to build
a temporary greenhouse around it and try to eat it. But I got to
find a tree first. All right, Well, you're in Southwest I would
suggest you consider enchanted gardens or enchanted forest. Call the folks out there towards
Richard Rosenberg. They carry a wide variety of things, and I would start
with a phone call out there. I mean, you could drive out.
It's always worth coming out and seeing what they have, but make sure that
they have it you might find. And this is a little bit of a
drive for you, but arbour Gate does a pretty good job of carrying a
lot of different fruit trees through the season. I was out there recently.
I didn't see papaya, but it's worth calling them to see if they have
it. If that strikes out again. Not exactly your area, but Moss
Nursery down south has always carried a good variety of fruit as well, and
so moss moss in Seabrook. So the other thing is if you start a
papaya seed inside, let's say in the late wintertime, and you start it
in a four inch pot. This is a seed that came out of a
papaya you bought at the store. You can grow those and by the end
of the season you probably will have a papaya that's fruiting. So you can
grow your own trees. Now with that, you've got some papayas or male,
some papayas or female, and some papayas have both male and female,
and you just don't know until it starts to flour what you got, right.
And see that was my problem last year. My kid came back from
Hawaii and had some great seeds. I grew them, the plants for about
four or five foot tall, and to find out, they never, never,
you know, brewed any fruit. So I would assume that they were,
you know, a male or female, and I couldn't figure it out.
There you go, all right. Now, one last thing is that
I have a papaya that I brought in the spring and because of the water
that we had earlier because whatever they it just didn't take. Okay, if
a papaya right now, I'm looking at it and it's a stem which just
maybe a little growth on the top. Is it possible as long as it's
still, you know, looking alive, Is it still possible that I could
stimulate it enough to come back? All right, I'm going to have to
go to break, Tom, But the answer is yes, give it some
time, don't give up on it just yet, and it may well sprouting.
So thank you for that call. I'm going to head to break.
You're listening to garden line seven one three two one two five eight seven four
speak you see dance for me? Maybe? Don't you know? I love
you? So you feel it when we touch? Well. Good morning on
a good Saturday morning for gardenings. It's a good Saturday morning to talk about
gardening. Two. And we're gonna be doing that for the next forty minutes.
We've got a little bit of an hour left, a little less than
an hour left, and the first thing we're gonna do. And by the
way, the phone number seven one three two one two five eight seven four
seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy four. We're gonna go out
to Cyprus and talk to Tom. Tom, thanks for patiently hanging on.
How can we help? Hey, it's a good morning. So we've had
this above ground pool for about fifteen years. We took it down last year
and it's decomposed granted underneath. Now I want to throw some Saint Augustine sade
over it. Um, what would you recommend I do on top of that
decomposed grantit. Well, if there's any way to get that granite out,
I know that's probably some work, but that stuff can really pack down and
be basically at concrete underneath there, and you don't your side. If you
put it right on that, it is going to have a very hard time
rooting in. In my opinion, you could put enough soil over it to
bring the level up to get a good, uh you know, root zone
for your side. If there's a way to either do it or have someone
do it, or come in and you know, listen it up and get
it out of there, I would do that first. That would be my
suggestion. Okay, So number one would be removed it. Number two would
be maybe to put two or three inches some some top soil on top of
it. Now, I'm thinking about six inches or so or more. Yeah,
and six inches would be minimum grass roots. You know, we think
about grass me and shallow root, isn't it is? But I mean you're
gonna find Saint Augustine roots, you know, a foot down or more.
I mean, in a good quality soil, they will be so yeah,
all right, all right. I would rather not see you set yourself up
for ongoing issues, you know, with that turf area, so that that's
hate to be the bear of bad news. I've been doing that a little
bit today. But yeah, well I was afraid of that, but I'm
glad. I'm glad I heard it from you. So that's what's going to
have to happen. I'll just steal it up and shovel it up. Now.
As an alternative, you could build an arbor over that area and have
a nice place to put your lawn chairs and sit out and enjoy the landscape.
Maybe just throw some stamp concrete on it. All right, Thank you
appreciate your time. Thank you, sir. I appreciate that call very much.
Oh my goodness, you know, I was I was talking earlier about
jungle land and jungle Land is the kind of product that you and put in
your containers and believe that you're going to have good growth, good plant growth.
If you on a beautiful patio outdoor potted plants jungle lound specifically blended Canadian
blonde peete with four sources of aged organic material and micro rhizal fungi, you
will have beautiful color all year long. If you water those containers, give
me a little extra fertilizer as we go. This is the quality substrate for
success on indoors. They've got the jungle land with water saving crystals make it's
a little easier to water indoors. Now everywhere that you find nitro FoST you're
gonna find things like jungle Land, such as a Taska Ceda Ace hardware,
Lake Hardware and Anglet or Gym's hardware. Out in Montgomery, you are listening
to garden Line. We are here to answer your gardening questions and so if
you would like to call in, we got about half an hour left or
so seven one three two one two five eight seven four seven one three two
one two five eight seven four and Josh will get you on the boards and
you will be able to talk about whatever you're interested in with me. We're
going to go out to Spring Branch though right now, and we're going to
visit with Hurta. Good morning, Hurta. Oh I think I lost Hurta
there. Well, if we can't get her back up, hurt To,
please call in. We give us a call back and we will we will
get you on the air. This is the kind of weather where our plants
start growing like crazy. And when plants are growing like crazy, you need
to be able to supply them with what they need. And one of the
things that plants need, especially if it's a lawn, would be high quality
nutrients and something like Nitrofoss Super Turf nineteen four ten. That's one that I've
talked about before and you will hear me talk about it again. It is
a quality product, and here's some things I like about it. First of
all, it's the premium grass fertilizer that's triple guaranteed. That means a they
guarantee that it will keep it greener longer, that it will require less mowing.
Now, why would a fertilizer require less mowing? Because it spreads and
nutrients out over time. You don't get that peak of growth of immediate release
and then a valley following it. You get a gradual feed over time,
which is how grass eats, if you will, and how your fertilizer should
feed. And Nitrofoss superturf nineteen four ten does that also reduced brown patch in
the Saint Augustine. Again, a good part of that is due to the
spreading hour spreading out of the growth over time. You know, nitro Fosh
products are sold all over town. I mean, you can't find a place
here where there's not Nitrofoss near you. But maybe you're up I have forty
five North and you're looking at ourcwor plants for all seasons, or hide and
feed and supply out on Stubner Airline, or K and m ace down in
Kingwood, and on and on the list goes Nitrofoss Super ten nineteen four ten.
You're listening to garden Line. I'm your host, Skip Richter, and
we're here to talk about gardening. So let's do that. Our number seven
one three, two, one two five eight seven four. We're going to
go to West University and talk to Mark. Hello, Mark, say good
morning, good Morning's doing well? I'm doing well today, what's happening in
your neck of the woods. The kind of questions I got, Well,
I've noticed that the Italian cypress trees wherever I go seem to be dying.
And about my neighbor one last year and I noticed that it's almost gone.
So they're turning brown, you know, from the top down and really patches
a brown. So it's just trying to figure out what's going on. Well,
you're an observant person, and yes, it's true that's happening, and
that is why I do not recommend Italian cypress. They create that beautiful Mediterranean
villa. Look, these long, tall, skinny trees. Inevitably, what's
going to happen is disease, cold damage, spider mites, bagworms one of
those. And in this case we had damage from the December freeze. They
were not ready for it and it really burned a bunch of them back.
Also, a lot of them are being infected by a foliage blight and that's
causing big brown areas also that you see in those. So it's gonna be
one of those two things. But you know, nobody is going to get
out there in spray an Italian cypress every week to keep with a fun decide
to try to keep the blight off, so I just go with something else.
Go to a good quality of nursery. They can give you a thin
upright plant that's an alternative, but no plant those Okay, that makes sense.
Appreciate it. And then just a quick comment. I was heading over
to Tom Bass Park to try and pick up a tree. You know,
they're given away a free tree whoever comes up there today. And there is
a lot of gridlock, looks like about a couple of miles of traffic just
standstill. So planning, I'm getting getting a tree today. It just you
want to plan your your day out, all right, all right, appreciate
I appreciate that. I appreciate that very much. Mark, thanks for the
information there. Let's head now out to Spring Branch and we're gonna talk to
Hurta. Hello, Hurta, I'm glad to have you back. Oh,
good morning. Thank you for being there. You're doing a great job.
My question is, um I have a call them sport. I have about
two foot or three foot a day is who have grown out of the roots
of the parent plant. They're about four feet away from the parent plant.
Now I want to transplant them, but I want to divide them. I
don't want the whole plump at one time would hurt them. The stands are
maybe four inches apart. One is about six inches away. Early you can
dig those. Now you got to be extra careful to keep them extra moist.
I don't think they're sports from the roots. I don't think in azalea
can do that way out from the plant. So I don't know how to
describe how they got there, but they're there, and so I would dig
them. If you can wait until November and do it, then you'll have
a much better chance of success. And I'm sorry we're just flat running out
of time today, but I hope that is helpful for you. Just remember
if you move them, water them in really, really well, and then
small amounts of water regularly until they have a chance to really get established.
Because we're fixing to get hot around here and it's gonna put a lot of
demands on those plants. So hopefully that'll help. You're listening to garden Line.
I'm your host, Skip Richter seven one three two one two fifty eight
seventy four. When we come back out break, we will talk to Doug
and Kevin and whoever else calls in in the meantime. My well, good
morning on a good Saturday morning for gardening. You're listening to garden Line.
I'm your host, Skip Richter, and we are entering our last segment of
the morning. By the way, I'll be back tomorrow morning six am to
ten pm. Every Saturday and Sunday six am to ten pm. You want
to listen to garden Line, Tell your friends and family about it. That
neighbor that won't take care of their yard, just give them a huddle,
subtle hint that maybe garden Line would be a fun thing to listen to.
How's that well, let's go out to the phones now, the number seven
one three, two one two five eight seven four, and we're gonna go
out to Brenham and talk to Doug. Good morning, Doug, eld Skip.
How can we help it? Skip? Uh? When's the best time
to plant petunias? April or May? April would be better? Uh.
Petunias are some of our new varieties of petunias are pretty summer hardy. Some
of the old types. We thought of them as a spring flower and once
it heats up in June, certainly in July, they're going to be whimping
out. Some of the new types are pretty good. If you if you
are up, you know, and shopping for petunias, if you can find
one called bubble gum, it's a pink flowered one and it makes bubble gum,
just like remember the old super bubble bubble gum. That's the that's the
color of the flowers and it will bloom and bloom and keep going. For
you, what common color is It's it's pink, right, bright pink.
Thanks Skip, you bet, thank you for the call, Doug. I
appreciate that very much. Let's now go to Pearland and we're gonna talk to
Kevin. Hello, Kevin, Kay, good morning, Skip. So I've
got a tree. It's an oak tree I'm gonna established for probably about ten
years, Keith sprouting off the root system, you know, little trees.
Had my guide take everything down, scraped everything down, scrape the roots down.
We re saw it or not saught it, but putting new h compost
down and then remulched it. Three weeks later they're sprouting up again. I've
deep water root fed it. I mean, I just don't know what else
I can do. The other tree is not doing anything like that, and
they're fifteen feet apart. Any ideas you know, you say it was a
live oak, yes, sir, okay, live oaks they come from different
let's just say natural genetic lines. The ones along the Gulf coast tend to
not create clumps or root sprout. Is bad. When you get over in
the hill country, the live oaks over that direction they form mots. When
you drive through the hill country, you'll see just a whole bunch of tree
trunks coming out of the pasture in one place, and that's a mot of
live oaks. If your source is genetically from that area, then you're going
to just have problems with the root sprouting period. But the other thing that
makes root sprout is disturbing the soil. You go around a live oak,
there aren't he really root sprouts. You start rototilling, putting in a flower
bed, watering it a lot, and now you've got an ongoing battle.
And having them dig down like they did and cut them as close to the
root as they can is in your control. Other than that, there is
there's not a lot you can do. And now there are things you can
spray on them. There's a product I think it's called sucker stopper, and
those when those suckers come out, it's a growth hormone that causes them to
shut down. You need to catch them real early, but you're gonna have
to do that on and on through time. To keep them down. You
can put a really dense, high quality landscape fabric, not a cheapo type,
but one that is going to last and do well, and that will
also work for you. But on top of that, you're gonna want to
set something with a little weight, like maybe some river rocks or something like
that, as as sort of a multure on the base of the tree because
the sprouts you're going to come up, but that'll just keep them from pushing
up too high. But you gotta have a weight on it to work that
way. All right, appreciate it, all right, thank you, Kevin.
Appreciate the call. You are listening to garden Line. I'm your host,
Skip Rector. We will be back after the break if you'd like to
be on the board. Seven one three, two, one two five eight
seven four got any base any rollers fans out there? You're listening to one.
You're listening to garden Line and we are going to get right to the
calls. We've got a little time left in the segment, and I'm gonna
see how many we can get off the board here and help with the gardening
questions. Let's start by going to Jay in Chambers County. Hello, Jay,
Yes, sir, how can we have a question? What? What?
What herbicide would I use to spray on ornamental fruit trees to kill liking?
You wouldn't use a herbicide and you really don't need to spray it.
If you've got liking on a fruit tree, it's a sign that they're not
growing really actively. The liking doesn't hurt the tree, but it's a sign
that the tree is not doing well, and so I would I would go
that approach. There are some moss type killers that will work on lichen.
Off the top of my head, I won't say. I'm not gonna say
it online because I'm not certain, but we go to a good garden center
and tell them you need something that'll that will kill lichens and mosses, and
that probably is going to be the way to deal with it. But again,
the problem is not to kill the lichen. The problem is to get
the tree growing better and I think I think that'll be fine. I've got
lichens on some of my trees and I just ignore them. It just means
it's just a humid place or getting pretty decent sunlight in there. Yes,
so we live close to the coast and this tree is completely covered with it
and it just barely started blooming, okay, and it looks like the likings
like choking it to death. So you're saying that I need to fertilize the
tree. Yeah, fertilized tree, get good growth, get those lichens shaded
where they're not going to be getting as much sunlight, and they'll decline from
that. But again, you know a good garden center, i'd in you
know, the Chambers County area there. You've got some good folks that you
don't have to go over far, you know, to get to a good
good gardens there, like a quality feed places like that. Yes, sorry,
all right, good luck with that. Appreciate the call. Now let's
go to the woodlands and talk to Tim. Good morning, Tim, good
morning, thanks for taking my call. I put it. I replaced my
lawn about months ago. My Saint Augustine grass that dies last year, and
so I piled it up and I'm ended the soil with some composts and put
down some Empire zoysia thoughts okay, And I wandered it pretty heavily for the
first three weeks and then kind of cut back a little bit after that.
And it's a bit about four weeks now, and I've noticed that some of
the there are a number of spots that are turning brown. So a lot
of it is doing well, but some spots of turning brown. I want
to see if you have any advice for that. Well, you know,
the generic brown areas here and there is kind of hard to diagnose. The
empires are good. It's a good choice. It'll do well for you.
It probably is disease related, so I would minimize the watering. I know
it's fairly new side, but you can still give it us soaking and then
let it dry out really well. And I think it's going to crawl back
in and get established, especially as the weather heats up a little bit.
Provide adequate fertilizer, don't overdo the nitrogen that can predispose plants to problems.
To have way too much nitrogen, but an adequate amount to keep it healthy.
I think I'd wait and watch on that. If you'd like to send
me some pictures of it, I can put you on hold, but I'm
telling you from a picture, I'm probably not going to be able to diagnose
that very well. Okay, Well, I think you may be right about
the overwatering. I think I think I did too much. So look,
how often would you recommend watering at this point? At this point once a
week with a decent king, if you can apply about a half inch to
an inch once a week when it heats up, definitely an inch, but
it's it's a good deep soaking and frequently so if you have to have it
come on for a while in water, and if it's going to start to
run off your lawn, which it's hard to put an inch down at one
time and most soils, then you may have to have it go off for
like forty five minutes to an hour and then cycle back on again and get
that one inch down. So you soak it deep and then let it dry
out, let it bring oxygen back into the soil, don't constantly keep that
surface soggy. And I think you're going to grow your way out of this
one, Tim. I appreciate your call very much. We're going to run
now over to Kingwood and talk to Kenneth. Hello, Kenneth, good morning.
How are you doing. I'm well, what's up today? Okay?
I just got a question too. Oh we lost our za is on a
little cold snap. We head going through here, okay, and all my
question is between the rebloom versus the encore a Ziah. What's the big difference
between the two or what is there a more difference? All right, I'm
gonna be honest with you, Kenneth. I don't I wouldn't plan an encore
azalia And I realize they have that promise of blooming again, you know,
on them, but over time I'm just not seeing good performance on them here
in the greater Houston area. Now, maybe there's some people out there listening.
God, I've had mine five years and they're great. Well, good
for you, you did well, But in general I would go as standard
types of azaleas, and I think long term you're going to be happiest with
that. Now you might talk to you know, wherever you do your shopping.
You're in Kingwood, so you're super lucky. You've got Kingwood Garden Center
and Warren's right there. Down the street and they won't steer you wrong,
but go in and tell them you've had some problems or you're trying to get
an Azalia established and you want them to direct you to the good varieties that
they carry. And I think that'll be the best you can do. But
then they need to replant about ten of them. Okay, yeah, that's
right. Well, zilies are normally hardy, but December through them for a
curve, and there may be something else going on out there with them.
But I think I think that what I've advised you on there is probably the
best, the best way forward. By the way, I'm gonna be at
Kingwood Ace K and m Ace Hardware in Kingwood on forty ft Kingwood Drive.
If you've got some that are still alive but they're not dead, dig them
up, put them in a trash bag and bring them. Let me take
a look at them. I may see something else on them. I'd be
happy to take a look. That's next Saturday from eleven thirty to one thirty
eleven thirty to one thirty k and m acety Kingwood Drive. And I'd love
to meet you anyway, But if you've got some other questions, you want
to bring them in. Maybe some photos on the phone. Let's bring them
and look at them. You take care. I appreciate the call, Kenneth,
and I wish a really good week of gardening between now and next Saturday.
You've been listening to garden Line. We are here to answer your gardening
questions and guess what. We're going to be back tomorrow morning at six a
m. By the way, just a little tip. Six am on Sunday
is a good time to call. The boards are not full. First thing,
I can't imagine, why can you. Anyway, that's a good time
to call and get on the boards and we can visit with you. Of
course, when I say that, and tomorrow i'll be one of those Sundays
where you know it's all lit up. First thing, but in general,
that's good advice. I appreciate you listening to garden Line. I hope you're
enjoying it. We are certainly having a good time here doing it. We
got a great day for gardening. Hey, get out there, visit a
garden center, get out on the lawn and garden. Take care of your
place. We're setting you up for a great boubtable beautiful summer.