Kat r H Garden Line does not necessarily endorse any of the products or services
advertised on this program. Welcome to kt r H Garden Line. With skip
rictor it's trim just watch him as maybe thanks to spy bowers not a sign.
Good morning, welcome to garden Line. We're glad to have you with
us this morning. I UH looking forward to visiting with you about the things
that are of interesting regarding gardening, vegetables or herbs, flowers or trees or
shru house plants. What what do you want to talk about? You would
like to give us a call our phone number. I want to write this
down seven to one three two one two fifty eight seventy four seven one three
two one two five eight seven four. Well, things are warming up outside
and that is just what happens around here this time of the year. We
got a good bit of summer to go, and it just reminds us how
important it is to take care of the plants that we have and to set
them up for success. And there's a there's a couple of things that we
need to be doing in order for our gardens to continue to thrive. You
know, if you put the right plants in they can take the heat and
the humidity that we have down here. They can take it. But they
do require certain kinds of care in order to be able to do well.
For example, they need to be watered adequately, and adequately is an important
word. We tend to overwater. We think, well, it's a hundred
degrees outside, so I'm going to water it three times today and drench it.
Well. You know, the actual fact is plant need moist soil so
they can take up water. They do not need to sit in submerged water
tables underground. When you dig a clay hole, it's like a underground bathtub.
You can fill it full of all of your composts and all the good
stuff that we want to put in the soil and whatnot. But when you
do that and you overwater, that hole holds water, and now you've got
submerged organic matter and roots that are being drowned. And that is a quick
recipe for success, whether it's a houseplant or a plant out there in the
landscape or the garden. You know. So our goal is to give it
a good soaking and then let it dry out, bring some oil or oil,
bring some air back into the soil and the roots can thrive because roots
need oxygen. So instead of a little squirt every day on your lawn or
on your flower beds, or you know, whatever area you're water instead of
a squirt a day that barely what's a surface, but does frequently wet the
foliage, increasing disease problems because you're watering so off. Instead of that a
good soaking with the soil about eight ten inches deep, and then don't water
and let it dry out and air will be pulled into the soil. And
how does that work? Well, if you ever drank a coke out of
a straw, for example, when you took your mouth off the straw,
the coke falls down in the straw, and what goes behind it? Air
pulls the air in behind it. When you have a full soil volume of
water and that water begins to evaporate take up by roots, drain away downward,
however it moves, air comes in behind it, and that helps roots
thrive. Good watering followed by a drying out period, that's the way to
do it. Now. Some plants like Azila's, for example, they're not
going to want to dry out as long as something else, like of course
in Agavi would be an example. But the idea is a good soaking followed
by a drying out period and that is the best way to have a lawn,
to have a vegetable garden, to have flower beds, whatever you would
like, as simple as that. That is one tip for success. Another
tip that I would give you for success during the hot summer season is maultch.
Maulching is so very important. You know, when we apply a malt
to the soil, we are blocking out sunlight, which helps weed seeds to
get established. Sunlight does so when we block the sunlight, a weed seed
germinates thinking okay, it's dark, shirt, it's dark, I'm underground.
It sproughts up. But if you can't get to sunlight, it dies because
it doesn't have the energy to keep going. And that's why a mulch works
so well. Some weeds are even stimulated to sprout by the presence of sunlight,
certain waves of sunlight hitting the soil. So a good thick mault is
just a no brainer. It's what nature does in every natural setting. It
drops organic matter on the soil and it creates a covering over the soil.
You can do that in your gardens as well. We do that by creating
a dense lawn to block light. We do that by returning our grass clippings
to fall down to the lawn surface. No matter what the garden area is,
you need to make sure that you keep the sunlight from hitting the soil
because wherever sunlight hits a soil, nature plants of weed. And when sunlight
hits the soil in the summer, it gets hot, hot, hot,
really hot, blistering hot, and that is just really difficult for roots.
Down deeper, the deeper you go, the less effect that surface heating has.
But even down three or four inches on a summer day, that soil
temperature can be up twenty degrees or more higher than it should be down deep
like that, and that is just not good for roots. Molt fixes that
too. There you got molts Moltz part of that brown stuff that we talk
about all the time being primary and the first thing we worry about, and
then the green stufe is the second thing we worry about. If you live
down in the League City area, League City Feed is your hometown feed store.
It is. It's just right there on Highway three, just a few
blocks south of Highway ninety six in League City. Now, this is one
of those great feed stores where you get the old time service. They carry
your bags out for you. But this is a place where you can go
and get quality products for your lawn, garden and landscape. Things to control
paster diseases or weeds, fertilizers to stimulate proper growth, healthy plants and production.
If you hear me mention a fertilizer on Guardline, you're going to find
it at League City Feed. They carry the things we talk about here.
Of course, they also have everything you need for feeds and feeders and waters
and bedding for your animals. Yeah, and of course chicken feed. A
lot of people are in the backyard chickens. Now, League City's got you
covered there Monday through Saturday nine to six pm, so to swing by after
work if you're busy during the day and then closed on Sunday. Here's a
phone number two eight one three three two sixteen twelve. Two eight one three
three two sixteen twelve. League City Feed, your own hometown feed store for
all of you. Done in dicketson San Leon, Lamark Baycliff, Webster,
Elkamina, Reale, Clear Lake, Santa Fe League City. Oh my gosh,
League City feed great place. We're going to take a little break here.
I want to mention that next Saturday, Next Saturday, I'm going to
be at Langham Creek Ace Hardware that's over in the Copperfield neighborhood West West Houston.
And I say in the copper Field, it's near the Copperfield neighborhood.
Langham Creek Ace Hardware is one of our great Ace hardware stores that just has
everything you might possibly need for anything you're doing regarding your garden and landscape,
and a lot more. But I'll be there from eleven thirty to one thirty.
I'll tell you more about it today as we go through the day.
I hope you will put it on your calendar. It's my last appearance of
the year, June twenty ninth, next Saturday, Langham Creek A for the
year the spring. I'll be back in the fall doing things like that.
Let's take a little break here our number seven one three, two, one,
two fifty eight seventy four. Welcome back to Garden Line. Good to
have you joining us today. We've got a lot of things to talk about
today. First of all, I want to remind you if you have not
done your summer fertilizing of your lawn, go ahead and get that done now.
Now is the time, and it's best if you will use a slow
release fertilizer that just takes care of fertilizing all the way through the summer season
and that way, the next time we talk about fertilizing for you would be
in the fall. Nitropos superturf, the silver bag that's an example of one
of those nitrofos superturf is a top quality. It was designed to provide the
chemistry balance of nutrients in the soil that helps our turf do very very well,
especially here along the Gulf coast. You know, we got this rising
summer heat on that demands are on our on our turf and we want to
provide a regular supply nutrients. Not too much though, and that's a nice
thing about superturf. It gradually releases them over time to nineteen percent nitrogen product.
But that nineteen percent is gradually released over time, and then we have
of course four percent phosphorus, ten percent potassium. Where can you find it.
You can find it at enchanted gardens out in the Richmond Rosenberg area at
Shades of Texas up in the woodlands. Easy to find Nitrofoss superturf Fishers hardware.
Both the one in South Houston on Southomore and the one in Laporte on
Broadway Street carry that as well. We're going to go to the phones now
and head out to Crosby to talk to Joe. Hello, Joe, good
mornings. Morning you do. You're doing a fine jobbs and she took over.
Thank you. I appreciate that. I drive all over the South and
you don't find a lot of dry humor in garden shows, but you managed
to inject it and I enjoy it all right. We try here and there,
Annie, are you talking about? Most brought up a question I've had
and ever spring. I go, oh, there's a big yard over here.
It's kind of close to that b place that you ever dose. And
of course the most expensive most on the yard is cedar, and I buy
that thinking that it termites won't live in it and maybe the smell repel mosquitos.
Am I am I wasting my money? Or should I keep going to
doing that's around the house or reb Foundation flower beds? Well? Cedar does
have a nice fragrance initially of course, as it ages, you know,
that kind of dissipates. Uh. It also is resistant to things like termites
and whatnot. But any mulch at some point in time is going to decompose
away. Uh. So it's a matter. It's a matter of personal preference,
both aesthetics. That was my thinking. It was lasts longer, termites
wouldn't live in it, and it would last longer. Is that true?
It could, Yeah, it could. It could last a little bit longer,
but it kind of depends on longer than what. There's a lot of
other mulches that are somewhat resistant to decay as well, But I would I
would say it's more of an aesthetics. And then the texture. You know,
you've got things like pine bark nuggets, those chunks all the way down
to really stringy shredded material reels, uh and and cedar has its own you
know, unique texture there. And so if you like that, then there's
no wrong nothing wrong with Yeah, I think, yeah, the aesthetics of
it is not important to me. Is not making a buffet for urmis to
make the way into my house? Okay, well, the termites they get
in our they're in nature. Everywhere there's wood, and especially wood touching the
ground, there's good likelihood done in this part of the country. We got
termites in it just because it's it's very uh, they're very prevalent. But
the problem is when they get in the wheepholes from the outside. So keeping
that multi level well below the wheepholes. If you have a brick sighting house
lab that way you can see the holes and anybody coming through to do an
inspection or you just checking it out as you walk around the house. Yeah,
they won't have a hidden way of getting in. You know that multipoly
over the week right that way, you can see that little tunnel that they
make to get up to your Yeah, if they do that, and because
they may be done in the soil, but you don't want them going up
in and that's how they get in. That's one of the main ways they
get in, not the only way. Yeah, I've already had a problem
for us. Why I'm paranoid about it. Hey, I want to I
appreciate you, and I want to tell you that that teach stores you advertise
in Mount bev Yeah, I'll drive past three feet stores to get to that
with those are the nicest people. They got the young kids that carry your
stuff out the truck for you because I'm old, I don't want to.
They're very very nice, very nice folks. Yes, they are good people.
Thank you, hey, Joe, thanks a lot. Appreciate your call.
Take care all right, our phone number seven one three two one two
five eight seven four. What do you want to talk about this morning?
Got a question we can help you with or something we can kind of guide
you on. I was at Wallbird's Unlimited, the Memorial store just oh gosh.
Actually I've been a Memorial store and I was several different Wallbirds Unlimited lately.
I just like going in and checking out the things that are going on,
you know, at the different stores, and what I'm always amazed at
just the range of products they have. You know, seed cylinders for example.
Now, if you've never done bird feeding before, a seed cylinder,
think of it like one of those large candles, the candles you know that
are as big around as your fist and taller, and it's all the seeds
and the mixes and everything glued in if you will, not with glue,
but put in together and to form. This cylinder looks just like a candle
to me. But you can get them with the heat in them so that
squirrels will leave it alone. You know, the pepper capsation that doesn't bother
birds, but it sure bothers mammals with lips like us and squirrels. And
it works really well, and it's one of the easiest, longest lasting,
convenient ways you can feed birds. And while Birds Unlimited has a wide range
of cylinders, many kinds of blends, and like I said, with or
without the added heat, if you want to go that route, it just
takes them a while. They got to kind of work on them because very
tightly packed in there in those seeds. Now they also have plenty of other
supplies. They've got the nesting super blend. I know we have some nesting
birds at our house. Every season turn around, there's something going on with
the birds. Well, the super blend is outstanding. It's got that protein,
it's got the calcium and things that the birds need in order to be
able to raise a good, strong nest of young. And then there's the
molting super blend. That's a good one. As birds begin to molt,
they most birds only molt once a year, some two or three times.
But as they shed old feathers and generate new ones, they kind of take
cover. They don't fly around as much because they don't have all the everything
in place yet with that transition of their feathers. So as a result,
having a pretty close by reliable food source is important and wabbirds unlimited six different
locations. Just go to WBU dot com forward slash Houston WBU dot com forward
slash Houston you can find out the wallbirds stores near you, and there are
a lot of good ones, a lot of good ones around here. This
past week done. Some of the activities I was doing was mulching in a
new flowerbed that we've been putting in in the front yard, and it's just
so nice, you know, you do all the work. I had a
lot of work to do in there, getting bad soil out. I just
had the stickiest worst clay you've ever seen, and it just I might as
well have made a farm pond out of it. It would hold water so
well. But we got some of that out of there, got some quality
material in, raised it up into a raised bed area so it drained super
well. And then you do that final touch of putting the mulch down and
it just looks so good. And you know, we're just visiting with Joe
about mulches, and you know cedar maybe being a little slower to decompose and
things like that. Well, you know, you can look at it either
way. The faster something decomposes, the less often you're having to replenish it.
Put it on Excuse me, I said that backwards. The faster it
decomposes, it more often you're having to replenish it. But in nature,
mulch is the surface covering that decomposes, a way to feed the soil,
to become soal, to improve soil quality in many many ways. And so
it doesn't rebother me to have to replenish it a little bit. But always
throw the new mulch on top and let the old stay there and decompose,
because what does nature do. Nature drops leaves in the forest and branches,
but leaves, and then they just sit there like dry leaves. You walk
through the forest, you see all the driver they're not decomposing hardly at all
at that stage. Then they get covered with next year's leaves. Now they're
staying wet, and now they're starting to decompose and as that happens year after
year, you just end up with the surface of the soil having a nice,
active, decomposing compost material of decomposed organic matter right there on the surface.
Can you imagine going in and raking everything out of the forest and then
putting fresh leaves on each year, and then raking those out and putting fresh
leaves on. There's no need to do that, of course, Just add
your new mulch on top of the old malt, and it just helps keep
the layer thick and it helps improve the soil gradually over time. You know,
if it's a flower bed, you're going to be when you take out
your winter flowers and put in spring flowers or whatever transition you're doing, you're
kind of working the bed. You're pulling up plants, you're mixing in some
fertilizers and whatnot, and then mulching. But when it's a perennial bed,
or whether it's perennials like the plants we typically call perennials they grow, dive
to the ground and come back each year, or a perennial like a shrub
a rose for example. Those you're not rototilling the bed and the soil because
they already have their permanent root systems in place. That's where that surface mulching
and continuing to do that just helps the soil in many many ways, many
many ways. You know, when where when we're wanting to improve and make
our beds look better, we can get out there and we can do that
kind of work. And I actually enjoy getting out and doing it. Not
necessarily when it's one hundred degrees outside, but I do enjoy doing it.
But if you're looking for a way to have your beds looking top notch and
you're not having to get out there and do it, you know, you
may think, I don't know what flowers to put in. That looks good.
I know good when I see it, but I don't know how to
make that happen. Well, call the folks at Peerscapes. Peerscapes does a
quarterly maintenance of beds. Now, what they'll do is they'll come out and
they'll do trimming and weeding and fertilizing. They'll check your irrigation system, make
sure things are functioning, because you definitely want that working right in the summer.
They'll do air rating if needed, they'll do the seasonal color changes and
the mult additions in your bed, so no matter what month of the year
it is, you can have somebody who knows what they're doing come in and
take care of it make it look top notch. Now, fear Scapes does
a lot. They do landscape installations. They do incredible work when it comes
to landscape lighting and hard escapes and all kinds of things that turn the outdoors
into the polace you most want to be. But Pierscapes many services, including
that quarterly maintenance. You can go to pierscapes dot com. That's your website,
piercescapes dot com, or you can give them a call two eight one
three seven oh fifty sixty two eight one three seven oh five zero six zero
check it out. I go to the website Peers Scapestart. Look at the
kind of work they can do. I mean, you're going to just be
really really impressed. They are professionals, but I don't care whether you have
a taj mahal or a double wide, it is going to be. They're
the kind of company that can turn a landscape into something really really special and
also keep your bets in order with their quarterly maintenance. I was busying with
someone the other day about Microlife fertilizer. Microlife is our hometown Houston organic fertilizer,
bent born and raised. I guess if you will hear Microlife Humates is
the purple bag that contains concentrated composts in a bag. I mean, if
you were to take a big bunch of bags at compost and take them down
to their final stage, that's humus and humus. Humus holds nutrients, it
holds moisture, It helps bacteria and other beneficial credits of the soil to thrive.
Now, the green bag is the standard fertilizer from Microlife. It's the
one we think of as a lawn fertilizer. It's a six x two four
outstanding. As it decomposes, it releases all of its nutrients back into the
soil. Go to Microlife fertilizers dot com and find out about all of the
many, many fertilizers that you can get both liquid and dry from Microlife and
they work with nature to help you have a more beautiful landscape. Take a
little break here, it's time for the news. Seven fifty eight seventy four.
Welcome back to guard Line. Glad to have you with us. Today.
I have a nice little day to day. I'm looking forward to getting
out this afternoon, getting a couple things done about town that I need to
take care of. Right now, we're going to just head straight to the
phone, so talk to Kathy in Houston. Hello, Cathy, Hello,
good morning. Yes, as you were talking about soil and dirt, they're
the same thing. I don't think a lot of people understand that soil can
be amended or dirt can be amended. Dirt is dried out, defecated,
uh and no nutrients. Soil is the opposite. You add the nutrients through
the compost with the microbes in it and everything. And I don't think people
really understand when you say soil and dirt. And then you have the manufacturer
type which you call top soil well understanding that yeah, actually, well the
terms are used interchangeably. But if you talk to soil scientists, they'll tell
you that dirt is soil out of place. Dirt is what you sweep off
the floor in the house because it ain't supposed to be there. That that's
how they distinguish between soil and dirt. But soil is you know, with
a lot of things in gardening we have terms that aren't always technically correct,
but we go with it anyway. Calling insects bugs only only certain types of
insects or bugs. The rest aren't bugs. And but we see bugs.
Anybody knows what we're talking about. And so that's kind of how it is.
With the soil and dirt. I don't worry about it a whole lot.
But yeah, truetop soil is a natural product, I mean is it
is made by nature. Over time we can create some wonderful blends. We
often call those media soil lists, media or media that contains soil. But
that's what we often talk about here, you know, like a veggiean herb
mix or a rose soil, those kinds of things. That basically is just
talking about a highly compost content media that we're growing things, kind of like
with your introduction, where sunlight hits soil, nature plants the weed, right,
Well, yeah, it's all connected, it all off one another,
you go, and so the seed needs the sun to wake up and start
growing. There we go, Hey, Kathy covers it no light, it
doesn't grow. Yeah, hey, I appreciate you calling in, and because
you know how much I like to talk about the brown stuff, the dirt.
So thanks a lot. You have a good rest of your day.
I appreciate that. Thank you, thank you very much. Yeah, you
know it. I've sitt here actually looking on my computer at a picture of
flowers in a garden center, and I'm just looking at it, and I'm
thinking, when I walk into a place like that, I am just going
like a kidney candy shop. It's like, yeah, I need one of
everything. This is gorgeous. But if you look at a pile of dirt
or soil or media, whatever whatever it specifically is, it's hard to get
so excited about it. But some people do. I do. You know
some people dirt is just soil is just yeah, the stuff you got to
do so you can have vegetable and flowers. But I see it as even
an end. Compost is an end in itself, I think. But of
course, I'm a guy that would probably be laying out there making compost angels,
laying on my back, waving my hands around, because I think so
much of the fact that that drives the entire process of our lives. Do
you know that if it wasn't for a six inch layer atop soil and the
fact that it rains. As a civilization, we could not exist. Our
food comes from there. It is part of the whole cycle of the cycle
of water as rainfalls, and it percolates through the soil, and whether it
runs off into streams or whatnot, whether it goes into an aquifer through other
means, soil is just it's just the blanket over the surface of the earth
that makes life happen. It really is. And so I think right now
it would be appropriate I'll pause for just a moment for us all to go
outside. Let's grab a handful of soil and hug it and thanks soil for
being there, and apologize for the way we just take advantage of it,
call it dirt and stomp on it for crying out loud. All right,
that's enough sillyness about all that. But I am totally serious when I come
to the fact that it is absolutely something that we depend on for our entire
lives, to our lives if you have. One time I was discussing this
with somebody, that our entire existence is centered around to six inch of our
top soil and the fact that it rains. And by the way, if
you had six inches as the topsail, that would be very rare and pretty
much too rare, but they were. I was just saying, think about
that everything that we enjoy, our way of life comes from plants, because
plants are one of the few things that can capture sunlight and make food out
of it. All the rest of us eat, all the rest of us
creatures eat plants to get that energy, and maybe we eat you know,
you go, well, I like steak. Well, okay, the only
reason you have a steak is because a cow was able to feed on grass,
grass that grew in soil, and grass that captured sunlight to make food
for the cow. And so we get leather and meat and milk and cheese
and everything like that. And if you think about it long enough, I'm
getting philosophical here, but I think this is a good cause for pause.
If you think about it long enough, all aspects of life are just centered
around that one and dependent upon in so many ways that one simple little fact.
I was talking to this person. I go, even even the house
you live in, you know, the two bay fours, even the the
clothes on your back, And they go, well, you know what if
I wear polyester? Say, well, where does polyester come from? Petroleum.
Okay, where where did petroleum come from? And you see where we're
going at one point in time. Even the gas in your car, in
some ways it is its existence to a six inch of or top saw on
the fact that it rains. So if you start thinking about this enough,
I mean we could go on. I could go on and on about it,
because I have thought about it a lot, and it really is an
amazing thing, this fact that we got this burning ball in the sky called
the sun, and we got these green things here on earth that know how
to use the sun that drives so much that we have so much that we
enjoy. All right, Well, there you go. There was a little
soapbox for you. Ace Hardware stores, you know there the place to go.
Ace is the place, And that would be true if anything really that
you need around your home, garden landscape the whole nine yards. ACE carries
the fertilizers that I talk about on garden Line. They carry the products to
control pest weeds and diseases. They carry things that you need right now,
like mosquito dunks to stop the mosquitos and that are out there because we have
rain and water stands. They carry the fire ant control that we need to
be putting out as a bait. Bait is the best way to control fire
ants. Our number one goal is to try to get as many as we
can with bait because we use very little. Chemical scattered out very sparsely is
not an environmentally less toxic way. You can go about something other than using
the bait as opposed to just the direct mound treatments. They also have the
fertilizers as I mentioned, but Ace also has things to make that backyard patio,
that sitting area, that enjoyable area where you can go out and just
really enjoy yourself. They may get a better place. Ace Hardware stores all
over the Houston area about forty stores in this area. You can go to
Acehardware dot com and when you go to the store locator, it says,
hey can I use your location? Just say yes, you can use it
this time, and there you go. You get a map of every place
you need to go to get everything that you need from Ace. Ace Hardware
stores. I always love going into an ACE. And on Saturday, this
coming Saturday, that would be the June twenty ninth, I'll do my last
appearance of the spring and that is at Langham Creek Ace Hardware. Langham Creek
Ace Hardware. You probably have heard me talk about ACE on many, many
times. Langham Creek is over in kind of the Copperfield neighborhood, just south
of Cypress there on FM five twenty nine. Kind of It's easy to get
to by the way, and if you haven't been there, you need to
come by and see me. Even if you have any you can bring me
samples and plants there right there on Bark or Cypress Road, So easy to
go. Langham Creek Ace Hardware. Let's let's talk next Saturday. It's the
last chance we have to wait until fall to have another chance to get out
and meet folks. So looking forward to that, we're going to take a
little break right now. Our phone number is seven one three two one two
fifty eight seventy four. Welcome back to guard Line. Good morning on a
beautiful Saturday morning. Looking outside, it's pretty inviting. You know. It's
good to get out early in the morning and get our work done while it's
still cool. We can get a whole lot of things done. It's out
downright pleasant to be outside right now. That's why I always tell people if
you don't listen to guard line, just do it on your phone to get
your iHeart Media app or whatever app you use, and iHeart Media, just
look for garden line. I listened the different things like that on my phone
all the time when I'm out in the garden. Just turn upside down.
You got the sound there? You're working? Who knows you may be run
across something you want to give us squad call just to ask about while you're
out and about, But don't let these wonderful hours get away. If nothing
else, a cup of coffee and a walk around just to see what's going
on in your landscape. Let's go to Spring Branch now and we're going to
talk to Carrie. Hello, Carrie, hi there, what's up? Well?
Would you please talk about as dahlias undergrowing under oak tree's very difficult spotty
sunlight, sporadic feeding. The free really did a number. I cut some
back, but I have found when you cut his values back, they just
don't grow back. I don't know what to do. I need help,
Okay, Well, as elias, you know they like to be in shade,
of course, but they do need light and so dapple sun or you
know, just a kind of a partial sun provides that solar energy for them,
that provides the vigor that helps them grow and be denser and whatnot.
And so when you cut them back, if they're not growing back, either
the light levels are just very very low and the plants are weak from that
or something else is going on. Usually with the zelias it's down in the
root system soggy conditions they hate. Of course they hate drying out as well.
When a true wet they can get root rots, which also add to
problems. So I don't know what all you're seeing going on, but you
know, we have a lot of zoias growing around live oaks here in the
Greater Houston area, and I think it's just gonna be a matter of light
intensity and then adequate water and nutrition. Hello, yes, can you hear
me? Yeah, you could speak up a little bit more. Okay,
what is it seems like if I don't keep them watered all the time,
I mean, they just they turn limp, and it seems like the more
water they get, the better they are. Okay, So you know,
then in that case, you must have good drainage carry for sure, And
that's kind of a sign that they probably need to be watered a little more.
Azilias are interesting. They have hair like roots. If you ever dig
up an azalea, the roots are just like a wat of hair, but
they don't have what's called root hairs, which is what other plants have that
makes them much more efficient in taking up water and nutrients and things. So
with azilias, we do have to pamper them a little bit by a little
more frequent watering than we would some of the other plants that we have.
And can you recommend a fertilizer. A lot of good ones you might want
to consider. I was talking earlier about the Microlife fertilizer, and they have
a one that's kind of a pinkish colored bag. I'm somewhat colored challenge,
so you have to use take the word pink with the color with a grain
of salt, but it's like that color and it's for acid loving plants.
So azalea's, camellias, blueberries, those are all acid loving plants. That
and how often should I feed them with the Microlife for acid loving plants,
it's it's not a salt based fertilizer, and so you're not going to hurt
the plants by overdoing it, so I but I would give them a feeding
about four times during the growing season with that to continue to provide a release
of nutrients. Uh. So you might do that and coming out of in
the spring as you begin to see new growth occurring. Uh, and then
probably about three more times I would space them out, probably two months apart
something like that. Uh. And then just feed them again and watch your
plants. If you're getting really good vigor and whatnot on them, then you
can hold off just a little bit, okay, And then when I you
know, they have gotten real and then when I cut them back, U
don't do well. I mean, I just I don't ever come back.
I mean, is there a secret to make them come back. No,
it's just a matter of the plant having the energy. You know, any
plant and Azalia's just as an example, but when you cut it back below
where you cut it, there's buds that you don't know are there that suddenly
pop out and now you have all these new branches growing. And if you're
not seeing that, it just sounds to me like the plant is just lacking
the stored energy it needs to provide that regrowth. That goes again back to
the amount of life that they're getting. Probably, probably, But there's no
secret to here's how you cut a plant back when it comes to an azelia.
It's to make it re sprout. Okay, well it's probably I'm probably
not feeding them benet. That's probably what I'm doing wrong. Okay, I
don't know they've gotten when they get real leg yeah, will I mean when
I get real luggy, they just don't. I don't blow any leaves on
those long stalks that are leggy. Yeah. Is their secret to make them
bloom lanes? Or did they just not do that? You know? It
should be that you cut them back and they re sprout and they do.
Okay, So I like I said, that takes us back to why are
they lacking the energy to do that? Uh? Okay, okay, yeah,
so all right, it may mean leaving them uncut for now. I
know that leggy is not what you want. I guess you can get some
more energy in those plants with some light and get them They may be a
little stress. You know what you described about watering, Maybe they just need
maybe they just need to be water a little bit more and fertilized a little
bit more, and we would see a change in how they respond to pruning.
Okay, all right, well, thank you so much. All right,
Kerry, thank you very much. I appreciate appreciate your call very much.
Uh you were talking about Azelia's and shade and trees and whatnot. We
have so many beauty trees here in the Greater Houston area. It's just it
is just a wonderful, wonderful place in terms of being able to get away
from that summer heat. You know, when you have a high quality tree
that is the right species, so it does well and it's been taken care
of right and when it comes to that, all aspects really of that.
Martin Spoon more to Affordable Tree Service, He's got your number. I mean,
he knows how to do it. Martin has been the Affordable Tree I
believe they're bott in their twenty fifth year, all right, I'll be close
to the twenty fifth anniversary time for them here in Greater Houston. Of course,
Martin's been doing this for almost fifty years himself. You can give him
a call seven to one three six nine nine twenty six sixty three seven one
three six nine nine two six six three, or go to his website.
Afftree Service dot com. Aff Tree Service dot com. You need to get
those trees looked at, if they need any pruning, if they need any
training, removal of dead but whatever you need to get done to him.
As we enter the summer season and the what we referred to as hurricane season
June through November here, you need to have your trees that are ready for
that. And Martin is the guy to get it done. He knows what
he's doing, he does things right. Aff Tree Service dot Com. Here's
the number one more time seven one three six nine nine twenty six sixty three.
Well, we are about to hit a break here. When we come
back, Jerry, you will be our first up. And I just want
to remind you that I'm going to be at while the Langham Creek Ace Hardware
almost said Wildbird' unlimited in bel Air. That's where I was just the other
day. Langham Creek Ace Hardware in bel Air, Langa Creek Hardware. If
you haven't been there and you live in that area, you need to come
by and see me. You need to see the hardware store. It's it
is a really really special place. They just they are doing some major work.
They got a lot more things they're going to be doing to enhance it
even further as we go through this summer season coming up here, if they
have all the supplies you're going to need, and I'll be there answering your
questions. I'm going to get there at about eleven thirty and I'll be there
until one thirty next Saturday and again, so last chance for an appearance.
They get a chance to kind of look eye to eye and look at your
photos and your samples and healthier things until we get back into the follow season
much later on Numbye a fine Barker Sarpush Road. Kat Rh Garden Line does
not necessarily endorse any of the products or services advertised on this program. Welcome
to kat Rh Garden Line with scamp Rictor. It's so crazy just watch him
as so many good things to see. Welcome back to the guard Line.
Take a look outside. It is a good day for gardening. I'm telling
you. The sun is shining, the sky is clear. Uh, temperature
is not too bad out there. Right now. We're going to enjoy ourselves
as the temperatures heat up a little bit through the day. I've kind of
gotten to where I'm doing most of my gardening work now before noon. Got
a lot of things I'm trying to get done, so as a result,
I'm staying out a little longer than i'd like to, but I can get
most done by late late morning, by about lunch, and then work on
things inside after that. Take a little break from being out in that heat.
I want to head out. We're going to go straight out to the
phones to Spring and we're gonna talk to Jerry. Hello, Jerry, Hi
Skip. I really love your show, and I find that you have a
very enjoyable calming plant side manner that I think it's great. Anyway, I'm
made it two and I've always done my own yard. I've kind of developed
some back issues and decided to retire my mower. And I know, I
know when I say the word bagging that you are cringing, because I've heard
your your feelings on bagging versus mulching, and I appreciate them. But I've
always bagged the clippings due to something I heard Randy say years ago. A
guy said he he was he started melting and now he's got this thatch build
up and he wonders if he's going to have to rake it out and Randy
said, well, of course you're going to have to rake it out,
you know, and that kind of defeats my purpose. And I was wondering
if you could kind of expand on this. Yeah. So, first of
all, nature never bags. Not any grassland, native grassland or anywhere in
the world bags so and Saint Augustine is native somewhere in the world. So
it's just native somewhere. You see what I'm saying. I mean, evergrass
is not. Now here's the way that I like to put it. Grass
clippings are not what causes that. Over fertilizing and in some cases overwatering causes
that. So here here's what that means. Grass clippings are like a let
us leave. You throw it out there on the ground, and I mean
it just trivels and rots away pretty fast. But when you get into the
runners of the grass and the roots those are they're not woody, but they're
well on the way toward woody, if you will, compared to a grass
clipping. So when you push that grass to grow really asked and to keep
growing and keep growing, then you end up with a lot of runners that
are all mixed in and entangled. And when they die, they will be
there for a while. That is the primary component of thatch or those higher
and lignin type materials that don't decompose very well. So that's where we get
into doing core eration and accompo stop dressings and other things to help those decomposable
faster. But if you are watering properly, and if your mow fertilizing very
moderately, appropriately following the label but not overdoing it, then you should not
have enough grass clippings to be a concern. The exception is when we get
a long rainy period when it's going to be you know, just days and
days before you can get back into mow. That's where I would probably bag
the clippings unless you just have one heck of a chop them up mower,
which mine is not mine multi is, but not well, and so that's
where I would back, and I did. In fact, I've bagged several
times recently because of that reason. But all those clippings in the bag then
went into a flower bed about an inch or too deep to just be a
mulch on top of it, because that's they're rich and nutrients and I don't
want to pay somebody to haul them away. Yeah, well I had done
yesterday for the first time. That gentleman was zipping around on one of these
zero turned tanks, you know, and not not bagging. Not got my
attention. But I do follow your schedule, of your organic schedule, and
try to water once or twice deep watering and so well, and that maybe
I won't have the problem. The laune's looking good now except for having the
spot treat a few dollars week here and there. But yeah, anyway,
well, just good. Just know that, you know, in nature,
grass is growing at a moderate rate. We don't have a lot of foot
traffic on it. Nobody's mowing it other than the occasional wandering deer, sheep
or goat or cow or whatever it's chew in the grass at that moment.
But in our lawns are higher maintenance. So that's just where we we have
to be careful. One last thing about it, Jerry, is if you
were to take all the clippings from your lawn over the course of a year,
you would have more nutrients in those dried clippings than you put on when
you fertilize through the year. So I've heard you say that you are recycling
nutrients. Yeah, we're recycling, and so that you know, maybe it's
like, well, fertilizer costs is not an issue for me, and you
know, well that's fine. But I'm just saying, if you are doing
things at all organically, nature's clippings or nature's own natural slow release fertilizer,
not that you wouldn't also fertilize. But what I'm saying is close the loop.
Instead of coming in in a bag, going onto the ground growing grass
clippings, putting them in a bag to head back out down the street,
keep that loop in your yard. That that would be my recommendation. Okay,
No, I said, I'm following your organic schedule. You said maybe
you can overfertilizer or overfertilizer. I would. I would still follow the schedule
as published. Yes, follow it, follow it as published. There's there's
some sometimes, you know, we we have fertilizations that are optional, the
one in early early spring. That one is very optional, very aesthetic optional,
early on. Uh. And I would on an organic schedule, I
don't even have that spring fertilization on in March. I have it. I
have the first one in April when our grass is growing. Okay, okay,
well, thank you, thank you so much again. Skip. I
just think you are the greatest show. I just really thank joy. I
appreciate that. Tell your family friends, especially that guy that won't take care
of his property. Maybe. Okay, all right, thank you, Skip,
All right, take care, Jersey. I appreciate the call very much.
Uh it is. It's always good to kind of clarify some things.
And I hope that did that little kind of spiel about nutrients and cycling and
whatnot. A lot of times, you know, people get to thinking,
well, if I have a lot of if I have clippings, then I'm
they're going to be sitting there and they just get thicker and thicker and thatch.
And just remember that if clippings were part of that, that definitely means
you're way overwatering and overfertilizing. Probably not mowing often enough. That's another thing.
Every time you the more frequently you mow, the shorter the clipping you're
creating, and the easier it is to mulch and chop up inside the housing
of your mulching mower. It makes it much easier to go down in the
ground. But you know, I understand, there's like two times when I
would not return the clippings. One is when it's been too long, the
grass has gotten big and it's going to look like a hayfield if you don't
pick those clippings up. That's one. The second time is if weeds got
ahead of you, and the weeds bloomed and had seeds on them, then
I would bag that to get as much of the seeds as I could out
and out of the lawn. But that is those are two very special situations,
and other than that, why not recycle them. I have a T
shirt effect I almost wore it today. It's a shirt I had made years
ago when I was up in Conro, and it's a picture of a meadow
and a forest. They're kind of side by side, but it looks like
a Gary Larson cartoon. And it's got a whole seene cows that are riding
lawnmowers across the pasture with bagging, and they're setting their little black plastic bags
out at the roadside across the fence, and there's a deer in the forest
raking up leaves into a bag to put out at the curb as well.
And it says nature recycles naturally you can too, don't bag it. And
I like that visual picture, but I need to make those, make those
shirts and make them available to folks. I think it's a really fun shirt.
Anyway, Point made, Point made our phone number if you'd like to
give a skull seven one three two one two five eight seven four seven one
three two one two fifty eight seventy four. Hey, have you been down
to Jose's Hidden Gardens Josees Orges good night or hey. I was talking to
Jegey a while back and we were just you know, I was there.
We were walking through looking at the different kinds of things that they had on
hand, and I was just really impressed with how they just keep stalking up
and essentially growing growing. The place Horace Hidden Gardens is in Alvin, Texas.
It's it's on Elizabeth in Alvin, Texas. And when you go there,
you're going to find seasonally the different things you're looking for, from vegetables
to herbs to whatnot. They're they fruit trees right now, they got roses
right now, really nice selection of citrus as well. But in general,
do you need small trees and shrubs like a crape merle for example, they've
got those the different kinds of roses, beautiful roses that they had a little
spaliers a while back that I was impressed with. They carry that three sixty
tree stabilizer, which I highly recommend. They have those on hand there,
and they're open on Friday from nine to three, nine am to three on
Friday, today, Saturdays eight to four, and tomorrow Sunday eight to four.
So Friday, Saturday and Sunday nine to three, Friday eight to four
and eight to four. That's how to know where they are, just south
of Highway six. So all of those of you out there are now go
on Arcadia and Alta Loma, Dickinson Hillcrest, Santa Fe Alvin. This is
your backyard garden center. You need to go by and check them out.
Sanpristy quick break, I'll be right back, all right, Welcome back to
garden Line. Who can tell me who the guy was and who the girls
were singing in that song right there? I'll be curious. Everybody knows that
well, so I'll just wait. That was maybe one of my callers knows.
We're gonna go now to talk to Elizabeth. Hello, Elizabeth, Hello,
I'm well I'm well, how are you doing good? And I just
broke the cardinal rule asking how you are? I know it's okay, time
listen. I've been listening to this show since I was a tiny tot and
it was Dewey Compton. Oh boy, wow, a third generation as Aliat
grower here, Yeah, wow, I was. I wanted to address the
collar about the reazillion and I'll just say what I have to say and then
leave you. But I just appreciate you so much, all right, go
for it, all right. I believe it's soiled sunlight and the oak leaves,
the oak trees. Okay, half those five had five yards myself with
the valias. And the worst experience I've had was a similar situation. So
much shade, too much, too many oak leaves, so wreaked out the
oak leaves, replace them with pine mulch or pine needles, and they need
more acids. And the only trim only cut them back after they bloom,
and you can cut them back very severely. But they need a little bit
of water, sorry, sunlight, a little bit of staffled dabbled. I
think they're reaching for sunlight and they are struggling in the soil. That's overdone
with oak. All right, that sounds good, and I agree about the
especially the sunlight part is uh, you've got to have energy. Even even
plants that grow in the shade have got sunlight to grow, and so there
is too much I have. I've inherited my mom's house and there's fifty year
old civilios that were just stunning but died in the last few years, well
almost died. I've put them back down to a flot and I'm whirling them
back there, coming back. It takes a few years, and I root
them all the time. It's super easy, and he can make it work.
There you go. There, that's an encouraging word. Thank you,
Elizabeth. Appreciate that. Appreciate you providing that encouraging word out there. Yeah,
that is true. That is certainly true. Let's go to the woodlands
now. We're going to talk to Mike. Hello, Mike, Hello,
Skip. I talked to you last year at Margueriteville about I think it's called
chamber bitter in my lawn and I put a bone eyed wheat beter on it
yesterday morning. We had a pretty good ring last night. So I don't
know if I need to reapply that. Oh boy. Uh, you know,
I hate I hate to re I hate to double up on any kind
of a pesticide application. Uh. When you put the the weed beater out,
were you using the granular form or the liquid form? Yeah? It
was a a a handsprayer, hand sprayer. Okay. Uh. How much
rain did you get last night? And how how many hours did it have
from when you sprayed it, or how many days or hours sprayed until six
thirty in the morning. The rain was around four it was. It was
a hard rain, but it wasn't very long. Yeah. I think I
would wait and watch and you know, after about five days, you should
be seeing something going on with that chamber better certainly by seven. Uh.
And if you don't, then I would hit it again. I just want
to be really careful. Some of these products, you get them over applied,
you get them down in a root system, or your lawn itself just
can get overdosed. And so I just want to be careful. And we're
If it were mine, I would give it about five seven days just looking
at it, and then I would do it again. Great, thank you.
And you may find that that product isn't working as well. That is
one of the weeds that Celsius is very good to control, so you may
want to consider switching if you don't get good, good results. Where can
I find selfish? I look it up on Amazon and think myself, big
amounts of that stores or yeah, you should find it. You should find
it up in maybe feedstore. Mic carried a really really good feed store not
too far from you is spring Creek Feed on twenty nine to twenty. But
I would call them first. I know they can get it for you,
but call them, just make sure they have it for you. Run down
there you might find it. I don't know how far it is for you
to get out to Montgomery. Over to Montgomery. That may be a little
bit too much of a dry but A and A may may have that as
well. And again I would call before I head that way. Okay,
thank you. Yeah, And a lot of our ace hardware stores are going
to carry it. Great. Thanks all right, good luck, good luck
with that, Mike, thanks for the call. Yeah. Chamber bitter is
an interesting little weed. It looks like a little I don't know, mimosa
tree or whatever, but it has a little seed or a little flowers which
then turn into seeds. That are underneath the leaves of the along the little
the petiole that's holding the leaves themselves. Very unusual looking flower. You just
have to kind of see it to understand what I'm talking about. But it
can be a problem, and it loves hot weather, and it's sprouting up
right now, So little mimosa looking thing coming up out of the ground.
That's probably chamber bitter at this season. At least our phone number is nine
seven or nine seven eight. Let me try one more time. How about
this? How many times have I said this number? Seven one three two
one two fifty eight seventy four seven one three two one two five eight seven
four. Right now is hurricane season. We're in it. We're there.
But you don't have to have hurricane season to lose your power. Anybody who
was around what three weeks four weeks ago whenever it hit, you know what
I'm talking about. That was serious stuff around the greater Houston area. Lots
of people without power for a very long time. When you got a refrigerator
full of food, that food can go bad and that's a significant cost,
not to mention the work. And I've had to do that kind of thing
before it is a mess, or maybe you work from home and you need
dependable power. Well. Quality Home Products of Texas has generaic generators, but
I would say is as great as a generaic generator? Is it? And
it is? I mean, this is a very good generator. As great
as that is. When you get one from Quality Home, you are buying
customer service, and you're buying the fact that you've got somebody there who's helping
you to number one, make the right to purchase decision, to get the
right one for what you need. Number Two to get all the things you
need to jump through, all the hoops that you got to jump through to
get it all set up. And that comes down to even coming out and
pouring a little slab on the ground to set it on. Because these things
sit there and they the minute the power goes off, they are ready to
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got three hundred and fifty dollars off all the generators, plus free tenure warrant
you on the air cooled units. Now's the time to get that process rolling
so you end up with the protection you need. So life goes on as
we want it to, even when the power goes out. Take a little
break here for the news. Seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy
four. I'll be right back. Welcome back to Guardline Live from Houston this
morning. We're looking forward to visiting with you about the things that interest you.
Seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy four. If you'd like
to give me a call, please do that. Hey, uh, we
are starting to dry out a little bit and as the temperature goes up and
gets hotter and hotter month by month. This summer, it's going to get
drier on us. You know, we get rain, but there's so much
of a demand that the soil just dries out in those hot temperatures. And
what happens when the soil dries out. We had a wet spring, and
when we did, the soil swells up. That's what happens to wet soil,
clay soil. When it gets dry, it shrinks, and that's why
you get the cracks. In fact, I was just looking on the side
of my house and I already saw some cracks in an area where I've got
some pretty crummy clay soil, which I'm about to do something too. But
those big cracks put pressure on sidewalks, on driveways, on foundations. And
if you see cracks in the brick or inside in the sheet rock, if
you got a door that's sticking, that's a sign things are shifting and that's
not a good thing for your slab. Fix my Slab foundation Repair. They've
been doing this Tai Strickland for twenty three years now. Fix my Slab is
a very professional, very dependable. It's the old fashioned service and quality that
we many of us grew up with and have come to expect. But it's
not a common thing unfortunately in this day and time. I'm talking about somebody
who shows up when they say they're going to show up. That's Tie Strickland.
It fixed my slab. Somebody who prices it fair, that's Tie Strickland.
Fix my slab. And somebody get this fix. Is it right?
That's what all. That's what we're asking for. Right, show up when
you tell me, give me a fair price, and do it right.
Do it once, do it right, Tie Strickland, fix my slab,
foundation repair twenty three years now. Here's the website. Fixmyslab dot com.
Can't get easier than that. Fix myslab dot com. Here's the phone number
you want to write this down. Two eight one, two five five forty
nine, forty nine. If you start to see signs of this, have
them come out and take a look. Tell them you're a garden line listeners,
free estimates for you. If you're a guardline listener, just tell them
that. Have them come out and take a look. Don't wait. It's
not going to get better. It will get worse, and you need to
take care of these things soon. Even though we don't want to see them.
It's better to just have Tie come out, take a look, and
let's let's see where we go from there. I'm going to head now to
Seabrook, Texas and talk to Lisa. Hello, Lisa, good morning.
Do you know anything about a heat tolerant tomato called the Phoenix. I have
heard of the Phoenix, but I don't know anything about it, and I
haven't grown it. Phoenix. That's the cult of our name variety name Phoenix,
right right right? Where did you hear about that? I just saw
it in a nursery. I was traveling and we saw a couple and it
just said they were heat tolerance. So I got a couple. I mean,
okay, I'll see how they do that. I was just curious.
Yeah, that's interesting. I'd have to go look into it. In fact,
I was trying to pull it up right here, just to see if
I could see something that told more about it. If it's brand new,
that that would be one reason why I haven't seen it or grown it before.
Okay, it's supposed to be. Yeah, they claim it's heat tolerant.
I wonder where this was, you know, heat tolerant in Ohio and
heat tolerant in Houston is a little bit different thing. Yea. My other
question is the nursery you mentioned it, Alvin. We tried to look up
the number. It's Can you tell me the name of it again? Yes,
Jorges Hidden Gardens A J. O. L. G. E.
Hoorce Hidden Gardens. Yeah, I think that. Give give that a try
and see, uh see if you can. If you see anything by looking
for Horace Hidden Gardens, you can also go to tell you what do this?
Do you do Facebook? Facebook? No? But I just I'll google
it. I did see Es, I didn't. I didn't understand that that
was what you were saying. Yeah. Yeah, it's a Hoores and it's
his his. The other company has called Texas grounds Keepers. We don't we
talk about the garden center. But if you look for Texas grounds Keepers down
there, that's the same place. It's it's on U seventeen seventy one Elizabeth
Road. Thank you, all right, Thank you appreciate it. Well,
tell me call us back sometime when you find out how that Phoenix tomato does
and let me know my hesitation. I had something pull up about it is.
It is a long time to harvest like ninety two days is what the
thing I pulled up said, which is incredibly long, so you may not
see some yels until much later. But actually that would that would actually be
okay at this point in the season because it started getting hot. Thank you,
all right, thanks a lot, take care. Good to visit with
you. Let's see here now, let's go to Matt in Victoria, Texas.
Hello, Matt, hey, skip, good morning. I am in
Victoria, Texas. We've got a lot of black dirt over there, and
I am wanting to give my landscaping more of a tropical tropical feel with you
know, something like birds of Paradise, some banana trees, something, you
know, a real tropical look. Okay, what advice would you give me
on plants for that, you know, South Texas area, And what do
I need to do to the soil to maybe make it more conducive for a
tropical type of plant? Right, well, for for any kind of plant.
The tropical itself is not a distinction that changes the soil recommendations I would
give you, but good drainage so that when it rains too much for too
long, the access has somewhere to go, you know it drains away.
It could be that could be a raised bed, that could be anything you
do to improve the drainage. But certainly bringing if you've got a heavy clay.
The expanded shale is a kiddy letter looking material that you mix down in
the soil and it helps hold that clay open you need it. You need
two or three inches of expanded shale in a bed to get its full effect,
but it will do that and it lasts a very very long time.
Of course, compost itself is always good to add. Any kind of a
bed mix is always good to add. And then just making sure you provide
adequate moisture through the summer heat. We have a lot of good heat tolerant
plants, but they have to have water to survive in the heat. So
you know one thing to think about too, Matt, as you're doing that.
You certainly bringing in tropicals is fun and a good idea, but think
about things that may not actually be tropicals, but may look like tropicals.
And an example I would use would be like cannas. For example, the
beautiful multicolored phasion or tropic cana. It's called the Bengal tiger with yellow and
green stripe leaves. Those are big, bold, tropical looking leaves, and
that plant is so hardy it never gets too cold for cannas here. So
think about things that look tropical in addition to things that actually are truly tropical,
meaning it can't take down. That's a good idea, that's a really
great idea. Yeah yeah, all right, all right, well we'll get
that taken care of and give you a shout back. Thank you very much,
you bet, and I always remember Matt too. In summertime, big
bold, colorful foliage is a great way to have that beautiful color even when
the number of things that bloom are more limited than they would be in spring.
All right, I appreciate you Colin very much. Good luck. Hey,
while you're out there, have you ever been out to the Extension office
in Victoria and the master gardeners have a little demonstration garden out there. No,
I can't say that I have. You should. It's out there as
you're coming in from Houston. It's turn right, it's kind of close.
It's a little airport, I believe out there. It's been a while since
I've been out there. Okay, I know exactly wh I think that's that's
anyway, if you just look it up County Extension Office. Matt, there's
another map that's the countyag agent out there, so Matt will get y'all set
up. But the master gardeners have a nice little demo. You can go
by and pick their brains too, see what kinds of things they got growing.
You sure, all right, we'll look them up, all right,
sir, Thank you very much for the thank you, Bye bye bye,
all right, time for another little break here, we'll be back. Seven
one three two one two fifty eight seventy four is our number. If you'd
like to give Chris a call, get on the boards and we'll talk to
you when we come back. And there's a blast from the past. Hey,
you're listening to garden Line. I am your host, Skip Richtor,
and we're here to answer your gardening questions. Feel free to give us a
call if you got one seven one three two one two k t r H
seven one three two one two k t r H makes it easy if you
are looking for an organic type fertilizer, a natural based fertilizer that is high
end nitrogen. Sweet green is one that I think you need to take a
real close look at Sweet Green is made with a molasses based which means it's
got lots of carbon sugary material that makes microbes really happy. That's organic Gardeners
add molasses to the soil because of the benefits that it has through a biological
process with microbial activity, that Sweet Green is releasing the nitrogen to your lawn.
And it's an eleven percent nitrogen product. So if you're just wanting to
add some little boosts along the way, it's an excellent product for doing that.
You can do it a little here, a little there. It doesn't
just have to be used in lawn. You can use it anywhere you want
to use it. But it is from Nitrofoss and it's widely available as a
result of that. For example, you got to Katie to the A's Hardware
store out there, the Ace Hardware City in Memorial They've got it there as
well, Stanton Shopping Center down and Alvin's got it Lake Hardware in Lake Jackson's
called Lake Hardware Clute on Dixie Drive. You're going to find Nitrofoss products many
places, including this Sweet Green. Sweet Green is one that I would put
out and do if I were going to use Sweet green for the summer.
I would do. I would go ahead and do it now, and in
a moderate amount, don't don't go full fledged on it, just a modern
amount, and then come back in about let's say six eight, maybe ten
weeks somewhere in there and do it again, and in the meantime return those
clippings and that should carry you on into the fall season. As far as
the nutrients that you might find that you need. Uh, well, let's
see here. We're gonna head out to the phones now and talk to Greg.
Hello, Greg, Hey, how you doing this morning? I'm good,
sir. What's up? Well? I walk these bulbs and I can't
think of the name exactly kuatia coasha there. They're like elephant ears. They
get really lost. They set bulbs. Yes, huh? Can I plan
them in a pot now? Or do I need to wait till next year?
Do I need to put them in a freezer? No? No,
no, no, put them in now. They are summer bulbs. And
the name you're hunting for there is called Colocasia col o, like you're gonna
say Colorado colo and then casia colocacias or elephantears. They got the big old
When people think of elephantaires. They're usually thinking of colocacious. Yeah, I'm
gonna try a couple of bulbs in a pot and a couple in the ground.
Just see what that gets me. They will give them plenty of water.
They like a lot of water. Make sure they get good, good
light. They need good light to do their best. Good lighting. They
don't have to be in full sun, but they need light and keep the
soul moist. They are not one that's set up to just be treated like
a drought plant. They need to get moisture so you get more growth,
bigger leaves. The clump gets bigger, and by the end of the season
you should have a nice little, nice little clump of them. Now those
are rhizome. It's more colocasia. It's not a bulb. I would say
a tuber might be a better term for it. But I need to go
look that. I need to go look that up and see technically, what
is that underneath the colocasia. My guest is gonna be to They could spread
well, yeah, gradually over time. It's not like bermuda grass that pops
up everywhere around them, you know it. But but the clump gets bigger,
all right, Hey, Thanks for your help. I enjoyed the show,
you bet, thanks for the call. Appreciate that. Greg. All
right, we're just gonna keep moving here. We got some other callers on
hold here. I think next we're going to Spring to talk to Bill.
Hello. Bill, Hey, yep, got a couple of questions for you.
I've got some couple of live oaks in the yard. About one of
them is a seventeen inch calibrat there's toelve and they have a lot of surface
roots that are on top of the ground. Uh, what do I do
about it? And how can I what causes it and how do I correct
them? What did you say was the size of the of the oak the
trunk diam or maybe one of them is seventeen and one of them is twelve
seventeen twelve? Okay, technically you can remove a route a year if you
need to, but I would save that more for Hey, it's about to
go under a sidewalk here or something like that. As far as the roots
just been up high, you can add a little bit of soil around them
over time, maybe put an inch and a half or so at any one
time, and then just continue maybe six eight months later do it again,
and you can bring the soil up around them a little bit, or you
could decide, you know, with live oaks, not much grows underneath the
live oak when especially as it gets bigger, and so maybe make that area
into a bed where you would either just have mulch only, or where you
may plant some things that are very shade tenlerant, like a bunch of ferns,
for example, or something else that could take the live oak shade underneath.
There. It's in the middle of my yard, so it's you know
it not conduce it to a flower bed. Okay, well, yeah,
it's just your grass is just gonna go downhill in time. But I would
say adding some soil then, or just create that round mulched better around it.
Either way, whatever esthetically you want to look at. Hey, thank
you very much. I appreciate having all right, thank you appreciate. I
appreciate your call very much. Let's see here, we've got a few callers.
I'm gonna go quick here, Edward, I've got a little bit of
time. Let's see if we can get your answer before we have to go
to break. Yes, with all this rain, the grass is taken over
my garden, and I was going, and there's something I can use that
will kill the grass but not harm the okre. Is it annual grasses or
is it like bermuda grass or what's moving in whatever the wind blew in.
Whatever the wind blew in. There are grass only weed killers. You're gonna
have to look at labels to see if they're labeled for use in a vegetable
garden. They are two different ingredients that kill grass but not broad leaf plants,
And if you can find one that's labeled for the okra patch, then
it's allowed to be used in that setting. The alternative to that would be
to cut it down to the ground with mower weed eater, be careful not
to hit your okra, and then to put a real big thick mulch over
it. Sometimes I'll use like six sheets of newspaper and throw some grass on
top of it, or chips or whatever. So that would be more of
a physical way of blocking it out, mulching it out and gets you through
this season at least. Other than that, your only option would be to
wipe a herbicide on the grass, not spray it. That way, you
don't get it on the okra, You just get it on the grass,
and there are wiper applicators for doing that. It. Okay, yeah,
that's that's it. Ocre is pretty tolerant, though I don't know how big
the how big is your ochre patch? How figure I got like two rows
out there out one long? Yeah, I think I'd be inclined to try
to cut it down as much as I could and just throw a whole bunch
of mulch over at leaves and things. But any of those three ways I
mentioned should should be your better options. All right, thank you, thank
you, appreciate that very much. All right, Well, as you'all here,
there's music going on. So when we come back, we're going to
talk to Anne, we're gonna talk to Lee, and we're gonna talk to
Anthony. Y'all hang on. I'll be right back. Kt r H Garden
Line does not necessarily endorse any of the products or services advertised on this program.
Welcome to kt r H Garden Line with scip Rickard. Just watch him
as word. Hey, welcome back to guard Line. Good to have you
with us today. We're gonna head out and talk to Lee right now.
Hello, Lee, Hi, I have Virginia button weed in my yard and
I don't know what to do with it. I keep pulling it, and
I've been fighting this for years, but I don't know what to do with
it. All Right, here's the quick answer to Virginia button weed. It
loves wet, So the first thing is anything you can do to reduce soil
being oversaturated for longer periods of time is helpful. It thrives when it stays
too wet, so watch that irrigation. You can't control the rainfall, but
you can't control the irrigation. Watch that. As far as a product,
there's one that I generally recommend called Celsius, like the temperature Celsius. Celsius
is a little packet that you mix in water, and you need to get
it on the Virginia button weed, preferably a little earlier than now. But
go ahead and do it now. You may want to reapply it again in
six to eight weeks. Virginia button weed is not something we kill with one
spray application, and so just stay on it. But Celsius I recommend it
for this time of year because it can be a little bit warmer and not
damage your lawn like some of the products that will kill or at least work
pretty well against Virginia button weeed. When it gets hot, those products are
too hard on your grass, so spray it. ACE Hardware stores should have
it Southwest Fertilizer. What part of town are you in, I'm in Umble,
te oh and Humble. Okay, you got some ACE hardware stores out
in that area, I would probably, you know, go talk to them
and see if they have it there. You might call Worren Southern Gardens in
Kingwood. I think I saw it there, but I'm not sure, but
but give them a call and see. Uh. You ought to be able
to you ought to be able to find it. You know, it's not
that hard to find. You know, it's not just anywhere, but in
general, it's not that hard to come up with. Well, thank you,
yeah, appreciate So just as a direct example, like the ACE and
on Timber Forest Drive and Humble, that probably be the closest one to you.
Yes, all righty, good luck with it, you bet, take
care? All right, let's see here. We're gonna go now and talk
to Anthony. Hello, Anthony, why are you doing? I'm well,
sir, how can we help? Okay? And it's not about a plant,
it's about nets, Okay, all of a sudden last week, I
see one or two and now there's nets in the house. How do I
get rid of it? You know? There did the home bring? Yeah?
I put the apple cider dishworks in plate. Okay, plates, that's
doing something. But where are they coming from? They could be coming from
the drain. There's something called a drain fly that will actually live in that
gooey mess down in your drain there. That's a possibility, so you may
want to deal with that. They some types of nats, fungus gnats come
out of soil and when you keep your houseplants too wet on the surface,
the fungus gnats they eat that decomposing organic matter and you'll have them around the
house from that. And let's see what other kind of gnats do we have
indoors there? There's fruit flies that that are going to be attracted to the
vinegar, for example. They're a little gnat like creature. There's gonna be
one of those things. So what can I get rid of the drain fly
or whatever? Yeah, I would I have put really really hot water down
or drain before to kind of flush and get it out of there. You
don't have to spray a pesticide in your sink. Just know that wherever there
is some food decomposing and sitting, that that kind of environment is going to
attract one or more of those kind of gnat like creatures. Okay, now
that they're here, I can boil some water, put it down the sink.
What do I do after that? You shouldn't have to do anything after
that. Just make sure it really rents a sink out real good periodically.
Okay, yeah, sometimes here right around my kitchen sink. Okay, well
that's that's probably it. I think your little trap is fine and it'll catch
some, but it's not going to eradicate him. I appreciate you, all
right, I enjoy your shoot. Yes, sir, thank you appreciate that,
Anthony. I tell what we're going to do right now. I'm going
to head out and I'm going to bring a fellow in here that I would
like you. I want to pick his brain. I want you guys to
be able to be part of this. Bill stay go. Bill is the
fellow who is our connection to the mosquito dunks you hear me talk about all
the time. Remember how we always say you got to you got standing water
you got to use Mosquito dunks. Well, we're going to get the guy
himself here. Bill, are you there, I am here, Welcome to
Garden Line. Good to have you with us. Well, thank you,
Skip, it's good to be here. Okay. Well, I am looking
forward to kind of picking your brain about the Mosquito dunks and or the granules
and the different things that you guys provide and how they work. So why
don't you just tell us a little bit about about the product and the company.
Sure. So the company is Summer Chemical and we're actually celebrating our sixty
fifth anniversary this year. Oh wowrats. Yeah, and Mosquito Dunks is our
flagship product. Okay. And for those people that haven't seen it, don't
know what it is, don't don't know what it looks like. It looks
like a small doughnut. It's got a hole in the center. It's it's
a whitish beige color. About the size of those little little Debbie donuts that
are white powdered that we have those stories down here about that size donut.
Not a big donut, No, not a big donut. Yeah. And
it's designed to be placed in standing water because standing water is where mosquitoes breed.
Mosquitoes lay their eggs in standing water, the eggs hatch out to become
adult mosquitoes. But in that process they go through four different stages, and
one of those stages is the larval stage. So mosquito larvae in standing water
they look like just little think of the letter S. I mean, that's
the kind of shape. They are swimming around. And as they're swimming in
that water, they are feeding. They're they're filter feeders. They're sucking in
everything they possibly can because they like stagnant water. They liked the food source
of stagnant water. And they'll swim around and they'll suck this stuff up until
they eventually become a pupa stage and then after that they turn into a wonderfully
biting, yeah, deadly mosquito adult. Boy, that's the truth. I
posted something to our garden line facebook page a couple of weeks ago, I
guess. And it was a bird bath that was stagnant and had not been
cleaned out or anything, and you know, you see the algae in it,
and boy, and we call those we call those larva wrigglers because they
wiggle. They really, oh they did that's kind of their way of swimming,
and the video showed them in it, and so that's that's exactly what
you're talking about, you know right now, Bill, I saw just the
other day the Houston Chronicle. We have an increase in our number of West
now cases already this summer. But we have other things like the Zeka virus,
and you know, mosquitoes are They're an annoyance for sure, but potentially
there are a lot more of a problem than just an annoyance because of the
diseases that they carry well throughout the world. They are actually the deadliest animal
in the world. Well, that's something worth observing right there. Yeah,
oh yeah, and that's due primarily to malaria, the anophilies. Mosquito carries
malaria. Fortunately, malaria in the US is virtually unheard of, but in
some of the African countries it runs rampant and it just kills so many people.
Yeah. You know, if you were to ask people what is the
most dangerous animal in the world, Yeah, I believe you could ask a
thousand and no one would say mosquito, that's right, But it is the
most deadly Yeah, the most deaths. Wow, Well, that's good information.
To know now that when you toss a dunk out there, it lasts
about a month, right, Yeah, it'll last yeah, thirty forty days.
You know. It slowly, slowly dissolves, and as it dissolves,
it's releasing a bacteria into the water, and it's a naturally occurring bacteria.
So it's so it's it's not something somebody dreamed up in a chemical lab,
right. It was actually discovered back back in the in in a desert in
Israel. So you know, a scientist saw that there was a pool of
water that had mosquito activity in it, and then close by was another pool
of water that had no mosquito activity, and you know, he was he
took samples and determined that this bacteria that he named basil terensiensis is really ensis,
was actually killing the mosquito larvae that was in that one pool, and
that bacteria was not present in the other pool of water. I think that's
a great thing, you know, just the idea that I would be tossing
the bubonic plague out there on mosquitoes makes me really happy deep inside. Now,
we get a lot of people that I say a lot I have collars
from time to time that are like, is this safe to use? And
I'm going to let you answer that. We tell them yes, but we
explain to folks why these are so incredibly safe to use in any water,
no matter what's going to drink that water. So it is very interesting.
It was discovered that this particular bacteria only affects a specific insect class called Diptera,
and in that class are mosquitos, fungus n black fly, drain fly.
Uh. It's it's a very small class of insect and for that particular
insect, they must ingest it and it reacts to the alkalinity of their stomach,
becomes a gut disruptor. It actually puts a hole in the in the
gut of the mosquito larva or fungus net larva or black fly larva. It
only affects the larval stage and so it kills them. But it is absolutely
harmless to everything else, you know. It's it's it's harmless to people,
pets, dish, birds, bees, that covers anything else. Yeah,
anything else in the water it's harmless too. So it's really really a miracle
bacteria. Yeah, it really is kind of cool. And you know,
BT gardeners know about BT. We talk about spray beat on your plants to
kill caterpillars. That's a that's not the same BT, but it is the
same genus and species as this product mosquitoes. And they keep finding new strains
of b T. There's a strain of BET that just works on leaf feeding
beetles. It's a San Diego strain. And this this israeli Ensis, is
as you pointed out the history of it, that just works on this small
group of in the fly in the of the flies. And a minute ago
before you came on, I had Anthony called in and he had some little
gnats around the house and we were trying to determine those fruit flies or those
drain flies or whatever. I think we may need a version of this to
squirt down the drain occasionally whenever, whenever those are popping up. But I
wouldn't drop a dunk down there. But it just made me think about your
product because it's kind of going after a similar type insect. Oh, yes,
absolutely, that's cool. Now those dunks are gonna float and last for
about a month, and they cover about one hundred square feet per dunk.
Is that what you each duncle corrupt to one hundred square feet. So you
mentioned earlier about a bird bath, and we get calls from people all the
time, Wow, you know my bird's not one hundred square feet. Well,
just just break the dunk into smaller pieces and it works just fine.
There you go, you can it's okay to break the doughnuts. Yeah.
I talked to somebody the other day that had rainwater barrels that he was capturing
rainwater in and he didn't have me sealed upright to keep the mosquitoes out.
But he just said, yeah, I just got there about once a month
and throw some mosquito stuff in there, mosquito dunks in there, and that's
how he keeps them out of his rainwater, which is a smart idea.
Oh definitely. And for people that use that rainwater to irrigate their vegetables,
there's no issues. I mean, mosquito dunks are proof for use inorganic production,
so okay, if you're watering your plants with it, have no fear.
Well there you go. Well that that. I don't know what else
to say. It works, it's easy, it's safe. Uh, and
we you know mosquito I don't you probably know this but Houston is the number
one city in the entire world for mosquitoes to vacation. They get on they
come here just to hang out in vacation because of our climate, our humidity,
our rainfall, all that kind of stuff. And were joking, are
they aren't they aren't they building some mosquito condos in Houston. I think they
probably probably are. Yeah, they're mosquitos in Calcutta that say we got to
get out of here and go to Houston someplace more hospitable for us. So
unfortunately we have to live with them. And boy, I've had them in
my backyard and I know all it takes. You know, they say that
even in a bottle capful of water, a mosquito can produce lay an egg
through the larvae and come out. And then you think about our rain gutters
that are up there and sometime they sag or they definitely have leaves that get
in them and start to decay and just create mosquito heaven. Oh yeah,
exactly. And that's probably one of the primary places where mosquitoes are breeding because
people aren't really looking up and the gutter. Just as you said, you
get a few leaves in the gutter a few pine needles in the gutter,
anything that's stopping that water from completely flowing down the dawn spout. Yeah,
and it only takes a symbol full Yeah. Yeah, that's a breeding ground
for mosquitos. All right, Hey, Bill, I've gotten so excited talking
to you about mosquitos. I have gone past a break, So we're gonna
take a little break here. Can you hang around and come back for one
more segment at least? Yeah, I'd love to. All right, hang
on, We'll be right back. Folks. By the way, if you
have questions about Mosquitos, give us a call. Welcome back to the garden
Line back with a little bit of smash mouth there. Well, you are
listening to Guardline our phone number. If you'd like to give us a call
and talk about mosquitos, we are. We got Bill Stingle here with us
today. Uh talking. He's fella from Mosquito Dunks. You heard me talk
about them all the time, and uh, he's gonna We're just picking his
brain basically, is what we're doing. I want to take a moment just
to go out here and grab a phone call. Uh, and you've been
waiting none. I wanted to see if we could assist you with your question.
Ah, Yes, we built a home and the pad that they put
it on as hard as rock. Okay, And I need to I want
to put in a flower garden. And uh a few colors ago, you
had mentioned expanded shale, yes, and so I was wondering if that was
something that I should uh kill up into the into the soil that's tear along
with some other quality soil. Right, if your soil is a heavy clay,
expanded shale helps with that. Yeah, I'm not I'm guessing that's what.
Okay. So if you get a little bit of that based soil that
is not great, and you pick it up and wet it and then it
kind of mash it around in your hand. If it's of course, sand,
it just crumbles apart. And if it's a loam, it's kind of
in between. And then a clay it's like you can take your thumb and
forefinger just squeeze a ribbon of it out. You know. It's just it's
a very sticky, stuck together kind of soil. That kind of soil.
About three inches of expanded shale mixed in deeply as is practical would help.
Otherwise your main thing is going to be to bring in a quality bed mix,
a rose blend something for like a rose soil type mix, and that
would be my recommendation for that for a flower. Okay, alrighty, all
right. And then yes, and then also where we're going to put grass,
if I just put in maybe an inch of enriched top soil, would
that be good? Very yeah, A nice loamy soil mixed in with it
would be good. I mean, it doesn't hurt to have a little bit
of a compost mixed in as well. So if you haven't planted the grass
yet, and you can, you can rototill it. Usually there's so many
roots around that it's hard to mix anything into the soil. But if you
can then mix in a little bit of a composted material as well in that,
okay, okay, alrighty get it. I might even put a bit
of a little little bit of Microlife's purple bag, the the humate material purple
bag. Go a little extra heavy on it as you're preparing the soil and
get those hum mates down in the soil and they'll really benefit there. Okay,
Okay, thanks a lot, thank you. Better take care. I'm
going to bring Bill back here now. If you have a question about mosquitoes
or the product or how it's used or anything like that, feel free to
give us a call. Seven one three two one two KTRH seven one three
two and two kt r H. Bill, welcome back. I would like
to have you talk a little bit more about, you know, the mosquito
management with the dunks and some of the some of the things that you think
are important for people to know. Oh, definitely, thank you for that.
You know, what we recommend to people all the time is before you
start treating an area, if you think you have mosquitoes, or you know
you have mosquitoes, walk around your yard and take an inventory of what's laying
around your yard that could possibly be holding water. Because, as we as
we talked earlier, a symbol full of water that sits around for a week
is a prime mosquito breeding area. Okay, So so look for places where
there are water. Bill. You know, I I hate to have to
do this, but I talked along in that first segment. I got to
take the quick break. You can you hold off, we pay the bills
around here, and go ahead. I know what's important, Okay, hold
that thought in the meantime, while you're waiting, go out and check for
water around your property. We're going to pick that up in just a moment.
Welcome back to your garden life. Good to have you with us.
And we are visiting today with Bill Stingle from the Mosquito Dunks some responsible solutions.
They are the ones that create the Mosquito Dunks. And Bill, this
time I actually have some time to actually let you talk. Sorry about that
you were talking. We were talking about the fact that you kind of got
to go on a mosquito safari to walk around looking where in my yard could
these things be breeding? Right? Oh, definitely. And again it's anywhere
where water stands for more than a few days of the time, and it
does have to be much so. If you have some kids toys laying outside,
if you have a wheelbarrow sitting in the cornerard, I mean, any
anything that can hold water, you want to look and dump it. Just
get rid of it as soon as you can. And and and some of
the places that you may not even think of. We talked about your roof
gutters. If you have trees on the property, chances are there in one
of those trees, there's a tree hole, or some of the trees have
crotches where water is gonna sit for a while. So you look at those
kind of areas drain pipes, those corrugated drain pipes that you see all the
time. Those corrugations hold water and it's just enough where those mosquitoes move in,
and you know that's their little homestead. That's true. I boy knows,
you know, like an old tire sitting out there. First of all,
it's almost impossible to get the water out of an old tire, picking
them up and throwing them around trying to get all the water out. You
know, something I had not really thought about before, But I was in
my garden a good while back, and I had some bags of leaves and
I was emptying the leaves and spreading them as a mulch and as walkway materials.
And one of the bags, I guess I just kind of threw off
to the side and it was just laying there and it was kind of around
behind a bush. I didn't re see it. Two weeks ago, I
was walking through the garden. I looked and there was that bag, and
went had rained and every there were like four or five little pockets where there
was water now to breed mosquitos in. And that's something that I wouldn't that
wasn't on the top of my list. I know, to look at the
gutters and the you know, the bird water and devices and things. Well
that that's all all good information. I think you guys have some other products
that are helpful when it comes to mosquitalm with mosquitos, Well we do.
We have another product called mischie Quito bits, and mosquito bits the same active
ingredient as the dunks, but it's a granular form that it won't it won't
last a month. But what it does it can be broadcast over areas that
are difficult to treat with the dunks. So if you have a low lying
area that collects a lot of water, it's great to spread it out in
that area. You can scatter it and yeah, yes, yes, And
and for all of your listeners that have house plants, and I heard you
talk about gnats earlier today, So the mosquito bits, because as I mentioned
before, they're in the same family fungus. Gnats and mosquitoes are actually in
the same family and house plants you get that moist soil and all of a
sudden you have these gnats flying everywhere. You can. You can make a
tea with the mosquito bit a tablespoon per cord of water. Let it sit
for a little bit, and then what are your plants with it? So
the material, the bacteria gets down into the plant in soil and the fungusnat
larva, which you're down there. You fungusnts fly around, they lay the
eggs on the soil, eggs hatch out into larva and they're down in the
soil. So it will h those gnats in the soil will ingest the bacteria
and it'll be lethal to them. So you will end up breaking that fungus
nat life cycle. Yeah, because they're eating that organic matter and you've just
soaked the organic matter with a disease that wipes out. That's cool. Yeah.
Now now give that amount again, the amount of bits and the amount
of water that you recommend what one tablespoon per cort tablespoon and a quart,
and you let it sait a while. You get all those naturally occurring microbes,
the bt I the celisther In gensis is really ins. You get them
down in that water and then you just go to town that's that's a great
yea great idea. Yeah, all right, well, and uh yeah,
on the package it says here, just do it every uh repeat every three
weeks or is needed. And to be honest with you, my wife,
who has more houseplants than I can count, she just religiously waters houseplants all
the time with this, she said, Nope, not worrying about it,
not having any more nats, just be done watering with this. There you
go. Not a bad idea, not a bad idea at all. Uh
yeah. I know Summit has a number of different kinds of products and things,
and so I just kind of wanted to while I got you on,
just keep picking your brain on any other kinds of things that you think folks
ought to be aware of that that will be helpful, especially with mosquito as
well, but in general. Yeah, Well, something new that we have
fairly new. We have a product. It's an insect repellent, but it's
not the insect repellent that you put on your skin. You can go out
and you can get deep or prepared in or some other nice insect repellants to
put on your skin so that your exposed skin doesn't get bitten but if mosquitoes
can bite through clothing, and certainly ticks, tiggers and other insects are going
to bite through clothing. So we have a repellent that gets applied to clothing.
It stays in your clothing for up to six weeks, even after washing.
Okay, after washing, so okay, yeah, and is that about
the barrier. No, that's not the barrier. What is that? No?
No, this this this is called Green Armor Insect Repellant for clothing and
gear. Okay, So if you're if you're a hiker, a hunter,
a tamper, a gardener, a landscaper, if you're outside and you want
to keep these insects off of you, get the repellent for your skin.
This one's not for your skin. It specifically says do not apply to skin,
but apply to and gear. So you treat your skin with the one
repellent, you treat your clothing and gear with this repellent, and you will
have a bug free time and green armor right, yes, okay, let's
let's be looking for that one that's pretty persistent. If you can wash clothing
and it's still you know, it's still present and working for you a little
bit. Yeah, it actually binds to the fabric fibers. Now, the
more you wash, the less effective it's going to be. But it will
last up to six weeks even after wondering green armor insect repellent. All right,
very good. Well, As someone who works in the art a lot,
that is very interesting to me, I think that also helps with chiggers
and ticks as well. Right, yes, yes, you got some.
You have some tiggers down in your neck of the woods. We do,
I'm telling you, yeah, And that that make you miserable. Those are
nasty. They are they are, yeah, But but any tiggers that get
on your clothing then it will kill them. Alrighty well, good well,
Bill, thank you so much for taking time out and uh answering those questions
kind of giving us some insight. And I learned about a new product today,
So that's a that is a it's a good thing. I really appreciate
it. I know your product is so widely available all our good garden centers
we talk about on guarden line, the feed stores we talk about on guardline.
Yeah, yeah, Southwest fertilized all the East hardware stores. We got
almost forty ACE hardware stores in the Greater Houston area that carry your products,
so uh, they would have to try really hard not to find your products
wherever they go to shop. Because it's all right, Thanks a bill again,
thanks for taking the time out. I appreciate it, giving a chance,
giving us a chance to kind of pick your brain here a little bit
that. It was great, Skip, it was fun being here, all
right. Well you heard it. The mosquito dunks. You hear me talk
about them all the time. Now you also got a way to take the
mosquito bits. A quart of water, a tablespoon of mosquito bits, let
them soak a while, and you have got some good stuff to spray for
fungus nats on your houseplant surfaces, or I say, spray just watered in
and it works. All right, guy. Well I'm going to run off
and talk to some gardening callers here, but thanks one last time. Appreciate
it. Oh, thank you very much. Skip. It was great,
all right, take care, all right, Well there you go. Certainly
mosquitos are a timely topic when it comes to the Greater Houston area. Like
we were joking about, this is where mosquitos loves to love to come in
vacation. We're going to take a break right now, Greg and Dayton,
you'll be our first up for the rest of you if you'd like to get
on the board. One three two one two KTRH. Welcome back to garden
Line. Good to have you with us. Yeah, we were just talking
about Bill Stengle from a mosquito dunks from Summit Solutions, who are the makers
of mosquito dunks, and UH learned a lot about the things we need to
be doing to manage mosquitoes. You know, I mentioned you're going to find
these dunks in a lot of places like Ace Hardware. Ace Hardware has got
everything you need for whatever season you're in. When it's time to fertilize your
lawn, they've got every fertilizer I talk about on garden Line. When it
is time to control weeds, whether it's a pre emergent or a post emergent,
you're going to find it at Ace Hardware. If it's insects in your
lawn that you're dealing with, diseases the whole nine yards, Ace Hardware's got
you covered when it comes to mosquito dunks, for example, Ace Hardware's got
mosquito foggers too. If you're getting out there and you want to, you
know, just kind of control the whole general area because you're gonna get out
on the patio. They can provide that as well. They got the fire
ants supplies. It's time to manage fire ants. Always a good time.
Now's a good time to put a bait out. And by the way,
real quick tip on fire ant bait. Go outside if you're not sure if
fire inch are actively foraging, and when it's blazing hot in the middle of
the day, they often are not actively foraging. Throw a potato chip on
the ground, anything oily. I knew a guy who would take a hot
dog winers and cut them up and put them on a little one of those
little pin flags, the flags that they used to mark like a power line
underground or something. They'd stick a hot dog on it, stick it in
the ground, and the flag told you were to go look for the hot
dog and walk back up there fifteen minutes. If they're fire ant's on it,
it's a good time to bait because you want them to find that bait
and to pick it up quickly. Ace Hardware's got the bait. They can
get you set up on that while you're there you got to check out the
barbecue. The barbecue section is so cool on ACE. From Webers to Traggers
to Big Green Eggs, you name it. All the stuff you need to
go along with barbecue, and ACE Hardware has got you cut. Like I
said, no matter what the season or what you need, ACE is the
place forty ACE Hardware stores, Acehardware dot Com find the store locator and the
ones near you. We're gonna head out and out of Dayton, Texas and
talk to Greg. Hello. Greg, Yes, sir, good morning.
I was calling about I have some crape myrtles and this a couple of them
in a particular corner in my yard, and they have a black fungus on
them, and it's actually getting on the plants underneath, and I think the
grass underneath that is also affected. Can you help me with that. Describe
the fungus if you would for me again. Oh, it just looks like
a black coating almost covering all the leaves and most of the trunk. Okay,
So what that is, Greg, is that is sooty mold, and
city mold grows on sugary water, and so what happens is aphids will drink
sap and They basically are peeing out a sugar substance and the mold grows on
that scale. Crate myrtle bark scale is probably the number one insect on crape
myrtles that also produces a sugary substance. We call that honeydew. It falls
down and sticks to the trunks, to the leaves. If you got a
picnic table underneath, you'll find city mold on the picnic table from that sugary
substance. So we got to figure out which insect it is. My best
guess is it's going to be crepe myrtle bark scale, which shows up as
a little tiny white things up and down the trunk here and there. It
could also be aphids, and then you've got to control that insect and that
stops the city mold. The city mold it. You know, in the
insects themselves are not killing crp myrtles, but they sure make things look ugly.
Right, So how do I do that? Well, if you see
take some leaves, turn the leaves over, especially new growth, and look
for little aphids underneath the leaf, that would be the way to That's where
you're going to find aphids on a crape. If they're doing it as far
as the other look for little white flex, small white flex on the trunk
and branches of the crape. And if you see those, that is the
bark scale. There is not a great way to control them that doesn't have
secondary problems. If you put a systemic on the ground for the tree to
take up, it ends up in the foliage and you end up hurting bees.
And so we try to avoid that unless we just absolutely have to treat
that way. Otherwise, we do oil treatments of the trunk. We can
do sprays of insecticide on the trunk and the branches. In the springtime,
those scale are crawling out as little tiny babies, and that's a good time
to hit them. Other than that, you know, we kind of tend
to just live with it. Some I've known people that got out there with
a soft brush and just kind of scrub the trunk up. It's a lot
of work, and I don't know that's something most people don't want to do.
Your name will be one if it's on the scale. If it's on
the trunk, name pretty much it is. It's okay. Oils are okay
on the scale, especially if you catch the scale when they're in the young
stage, the unprotected stage. Once you get these things honkering down and they've
got their protective coating on them, the knem oil and the other oils just
aren't working as effective as they do on a lot of other types of scale.
But it doesn't hurt to try. Okay, even if it's there,
it's a little benefit that's helpful, But it's not like here's a silver bullet.
Okay, And what about it? If it was the apid's underneath the
leave, I would spray with an insecticidal soap spray upward from underneath the foliage
and just blast them with an insect sitle soap spray. Do it early in
the morning before the sun comes out and starts baking down. Uh. And
that usually is enough one application. You may have to come back and a
week or two later do it again. Just any any insects you don't hit
with that insect dicidle soap are gonna not be killed. It's not a poison.
It literally washes the waxy coating off their bodies. Okay, all right,
Okay, Well you have a great day, and thank you for your
help. Thank you, Greg. Appreciate, appreciate that call very much.
Let's see here, Wow we are we are already time for the end of
the hour again. Okay, we've got a lot of folks up there on
the lines. Hang on, guys, I will get to you. We
just got to take it one at a time. Here, it's about time
for us to take a little break for the top of the hour news.
Don't forget that. On next Saturday, I'll do my final appearance of the
spring season, and it'll be at Langam Creek Ace Hardware. Langam Creek Ace
Hardware is just south of Cyprus. It's over in the Copperfield area. For
those of you who are familiar with that area. If you just think of
FM five twenty nine where FM five twenty nine comes in to Barker Cypress,
zoom zim endo the map and you'll see Marker Cypress Road FM five point I
have which also called Spencer Road up there, just west to Copperfield. All
right, well, we're going to have all kinds of things you are given
away. I know they're talking about. They got ups from nitrofoss and micro
Life that are coming giving away fertilizers out there. We'll be doing a lot
of question answering and just a chance to pick my brain. Look forward to
it. I hope you can be there next Saturday, eleven thirty to one
thirty. Kat r H Garden Line does not necessarily endorse any of the products
or services advertised on this program. Welcome to kt r H Garden Line with
Skip Rict It's crazy. Just watch him as well. Hey, welcome back,
Welcome back to the Garden Line. Good to have you with us.
We're here to help you have a more bountiful garden, a more beautiful landscape.
That is our goal, and part of the wonder of gardening is being
able to just enjoy nature itself. You know we I guess maybe you grew
up this way, but you looked at it like there's the plant, there's
the pest here, I am. I can spray and kill the pest,
you know what. It's kind of like me versus the world. And then
you start to learn about things like beneficial insects that eat other insects, and
you realize when I spray and kill something, I'm probably killing something else.
When I was a kid, there was a poem that was I know an
old lady who swallowed a fly. I don't know why she swallowed the fly.
I think she'll die. Then she swallowed a spider to catch the fly.
Then she swallowed a bird to catch the spider. And it's a kid
point. It goes on and on. It ends with a horse, and
of course that's the end of the lady. But we find out we've got
a lot of beneficials. They help us pollinate, they help us in terms
of controlling other pests. And I've asked Zach A Buchanan for Buchanan's Nursery to
sit in here with me a little bit today and kind of pick his brain
and hear a little bit about some of the different kinds of plants that they
find are very helpful and attracting and supporting pollinators specifically, but other beneficials as
well. Zach, welcome to guard Line. Yeah, good to have you
here. Definitely good to have you here. Well, tell us a little
bit about for people that haven't been to Buchanans, where are you and what
do you guys do there? So we're a garden center located in the Heights
on eleven Street, and we've been around since nineteen eighty six. My mom
started it. Then and me and my wife have taken over and we focus
primarily on native plants. We like to promote those as much as we can,
and as well as organic gardening. So promoting those is a kind of
a passion of ours. We do carry other things, but that's definitely where
we want to steer customers is towards native plants, beneficial plants, and organic
gardening. Good. Oh, very good. Well, this is the end
of Pollinator Week and we've been celebrating it all week. And I know you
guys, I've seen a lot of your stuff online. You really are promoting
some of the pollinator plants that you have and some of the options, especially
the native ones. And I think having native plants as a pollinator source,
it just kind of makes sense. And I'm gonna let you tell a little
bit about why why would a native plant be something especially important for a pollinator
garden. Well, I think it's you know, native plants. What that
means is it is native to our area, grows naturally, it's best suited
for our area. Some of the plants we carry, we have a table
dedicated to Harris County Natives. That. Yeah, but the benefits of native
plants is that they cater to native insects and wildlife. They grew up together,
Yes, exactly, they and they have a kind of a symbiotic relationship
where bringing in a plant that's native to like China, that's gonna cater to
different insects, insects that might come into our area and then explode in population
or so really it's it's catering to our native wildlife and then those benefits,
like you were talking about beneficial insects. There's this balance that you strike with
native plants where native insects are feeding on those plants, which is an okay
thing because they're not destroying the plant. They're they're working together, and then
native birds might come and eat those native and because that's what their diet consists
of mainly. Yeah, when I first read Doug Talmy's book Bringing Nature Home,
it was an eye opener for me because you have all these oak trees
and you don't know this, but up in the oaks, I say you
people don't know. They walk out in the yard, there's an oak tree.
They don't realize there's caterpillars up there. Right. They're feeding on the
oaks, but they're not doing enough damage to even think about. And yet
when birds are looking for a high protein, high fat source for food to
raise young, that is critical. It is. And you're right, a
lot of our staples of the landscape over decades now, from red to petinias
to pit a sporum to the peach trees and the orchard are all from Asia.
Yeah, and so they came here separate from all the bugs they grew
up with over there, right. No, Doug Tellomy's one of his favorite
examples is like the the ever blooming pear or the pear trees and bringing them
over and that they were seen as this like this solution to all our tree
problem. Yeah. The Bradford Yeah, the Bradford pear. Yeah. I
have a special printing regimen for Bradford pear. It's about one inch off the
ground. That's the best place to print in Bradford. Right, we won't
get it. That's a whole nother discussion. Hey, I need to run
out here. We got Glenn out here on the phones. Hey, Glenn,
welcome to garden Line. How can we help? Good morning Skip.
Hey, I've got a crabgrass problem. Now, I've used different products and
they're pretty big, you know, circles of crabgrass, and I put this
crab gas killer down where you wet it and sprinkle the powder on them.
Now, where the powder was sprinkled, it killed it, but it didn't
kill you. Know, it still comes back. Was that the cinnamon cinnamon
product? I can't remember the name. It was a white powder and it
just said crab grass on it. I guess that's all it was for.
Yeah, well the contact killer. Now is this in your lawn the crabgrass
or where's it? Yes, it is, it is in my lawn.
Well, well, there's a couple of ways to approach it. It's hard
to kill grass and grass. In other words, the grass killers that will
kill crabgrass, almost all of them are going to also hurt your lawn grass.
I'll give you my way of doing it, and it's very very laid
back. You can use a pre emergent to prevent it from coming up in
the first place, but once you have it, I'm mow mine and just
ignore it and just work on building a dense lawn through proper mowing, watering,
and fertilizing, which is all on my schedule, which you can get
those online, print them out for free, and as you build the lawn
density, it goes away. And I have a friend in Mississippi who says
the way he gets rid of all of his weeds is to take off his
glasses. And so, if you think about it, mode crab grass in
Saint Augustine is a beautiful lawn without your grasses glasses on. So I'm sort
of saying that tongue in cheek, but not totally it. Just grow your
way out of it. Now, you can go in, you can dust
with like the cinnamon based product. There are some others products that you can
use, but I think the best ways in this situation grow yourself out of
it. And then don't forget. I've got that other schedule online for weeds
diseases, and you know I did use your schedule for my lawn. This
is a strip between two houses, between two driveways that I kind of you
know, I ran out. I said, I'm not going to get another
bag, but that's coming back to bite me. So and then yeah,
that's what I'll do. Yeahb has a different tolerance to weeds. Some people's
like one weed in the lawn and we call a napalm flyover. It's time
to shut this down other people. It's kind of like I said, take
off your glasses and let's grow our way out of it. And so wherever
you land on that spectrum, we want to help you with that. But
just know this, wherever sunlight hits a soil, nature plants of weed.
So crabgrass is a sign that your lawn's not real dense. And so if
you focus on building density, you're going to grow yourself out of a crabgrass
problem over time. But don't be afraid to wish the pre emergent if you
need to. Would it help to get that? That's an area I don't
do it, but I was going to put some leaf mole compost in that
a full area and air rate it. That would be fine. That does
a couple of things. Number one, it decomposes and releases nutrients. But
it also is, in a very small way, a mulch over your lawn.
You know, you put the leaf mole compost. Even though you're not
putting it thick, it is blocking some sunlight and so it's like lawn density.
It's helping a little bit with some of the weed germination. So yes,
it's always a good time to do that. Okay, Well, thank
you, Skip, I appreciate it. I'll take off my glasses all right.
I always hesitate to say that because I saw people that would irritate the
heck out of me. It's a lot just taking glasses off of Don't worry,
okay, ma take it easy, take care well, Zach. I
want to get back on the beneficial the pollinators and things. I think that
a lot of times, especially in a city, you've got a lot of
neighbors and they're probably using products that may be killing bees on their flowers and
things. Our landscapes oftentimes are a sea of green, and Saint Augustine does
not provide any beneficial insect with any benefit, you know what I'm saying.
And so when you've got green grass, green ground cover, green shrubs,
and ninety percent of it is not from here, you just we got to
step in and do some things to help those that we have. I'm there
telling me I'm hitting a break here in my ear, So we're going to
take a break. But when we come back, I'd like you to comment
a little bit about some of the plants that you might suggest for beginning to
build that pollinator garden out, and we can discuss those absolutely, Thanks a
lot. I appreciate that. We'll be right back. Welcome back to the
guard Line. Good to have you with us today. We are visiting with
Zagbie Cannon about some pollinators because this is pollinator Week, uh, and a
lot of the different kinds of pollinator plants and whatnot that they have. Let's
go out and grab a quick call here from Kim in Parland. Hey Kim,
how can we help today? Hellot skip, I got a question.
I put a new bonn down for bermuda this winter, and I'm gotten a
I can't remember the name of the weed, but I know you got to
use that sledgehammer type. Okay, Is it okay to put that down with
a new bermuda that's coming up? Uh? This is a sodded bermuda,
not a seated bermuda. Right, it is seeded. Oh it's seated.
How how long has it been in? How long has it been growing?
Three months or so? I would say it ought to be okay, I
bet. I would grab the sedge hammer. The name of the product you're
looking for, I would grab the label and read it carefully, because that's
the that's the bottom line. As we say, the labels the law,
and it'll tell you if they're restrictions, you know, don't use something when
the temperatures above the mid eighties or those kinds of things will be on the
label. I would think three months from seed. I can't imagine that would
be a problem, but again, the product label is what is the final
word on that. Great. I appreciate that you bet, take care,
Thanks for the thank you for the call. I'm grab another quick call out
here, Ron from Cleveland. Hey, Ron, good morning, skit morning.
Hey. I'm calling you because I want to make sure I make my
investment before I go screwing up and doing something wrong. I have a spot
that I had a three year old Drummond red maple die out last year and
it was probably about a two inch time. I'm thinking about putting three crape
myrtles in this area, kind of close together, but not too close,
like a red, a pink, and a white one. Yeah, And
I didn't know if that'd be a good thing a bad thing, or would
they compete. But I'm trying to keep them all over. They'll stay nice
tall and the same size, so they all kind of boom out into multi
colors. I think that's a great plan. I was just driving through some
neighborhoods this past week looking at people that had done combo colors of great myrtles,
and I think it's fine. Yeah, they do compete, but so
do ever tree in the forest. It's growing side by side, trying to
use the same moisture and whatnot. I don't think that would be a problem
at all. I think it's a good ideah like a red dynamite, a
white the natus, But I'm not sure about the pink one. Is there
a like because I know those will grow like fifteen or twenty to thirty foot
high. Is there a pink one? Yeah? And that was the first
thought I had, is the natches is going to be huge and dynamite is
not that big, and so really, yeah, you just need to realize
that you don't want one overgrowing the other, because then that defends the purpose.
So if you go online, it's an old listing that I did a
long time ago, but you can still see it. And if you if
you search for crape myrtle and skip Richter in a like a Google search,
there's a chart that I did and it's got crape myrtles from three feet to
thirty five feet, not just being thirty five uh, And it's got all
the colors in there. It tells whether they're resistant to the powdery mildew or
not, which is an important factor. And then most importantly, I think
the height. I even comment on the color of the exfoliating bark and whatnot.
And I would make sure you pick three that are going to be the
same stature, just so that long term, you know, natchez hasn't shaded
out some such I was looking for. Okay, so your name and crate
myrtle. Yeah, that's that's That's one place. I mean, there's a
lot of good crape information online. That's just a chart. A while back,
I did I need to redo it, but it's a lot of work.
I just haven't gotten back to everything I see online. Someone are saying
there this one was fifteen to twenty foot. Then another place say, oh,
this will grow to thirty foot, you know, like all in the
same variant. You know. So I'm not sure, but I trust you.
So I'm gonna go ahead, and I'll do that before I go out
and purchase. Okay, all right, Well, certainly the growing conditions affect
any plants performance I've got full sun, big open area. Okay, so
I think it's a good area for I'm nice, tall and i'd like that
multi color. So all right, all right, all right, Ron,
thanks a lot, appreciate the call. Well, we're here visiting. Was
Zach bcinnon planning on talking about some pollinators. We were kind of sidetracking on
some other topics. But why don't you tell us some of the plants that
you would be Like someone walks in and goes, you know what, I
do want to transition my garden over to one that makes pollinators really happy.
I want them to hang out at my place. What would you say,
here's a handful that might be good places to start. So one of the
things we kind of try to talk to customers about when they're doing a pollinator
garden is you might set aside a quarter of your plant selection and for host
plants and making that a variety of host plants. So these are plants that
that attract butterflies, moths, skippers, those those butterflies lay their eggs on
these plants. The plants are eaten by the caterpillar. But that's that's attracting
those those insects. That's the food source exactly, and you want a variety
of them. You don't want just exclusively milkweed for monarchs, because that makes
them an easy target for predators. I was talking with one of our salespeople,
where you wanna you want to attract different ones, different butterflies, because
then that makes it harder for predators to kind of like target them and and
pick them off, and you get you get kind of a greater chance of
survival. So a quarter of your plants are are host plants, then the
rest three quarters are going to be nectar plants. But you wanna you want
to vary those nectar plants with bloom times, so kind of you want I
don't want everything to bloom at once, even though that would be really pretty.
Uh, you wanna you wanna even consider blooming into fall. We were
talking about setting these this wildlife up for success going into winter. So really,
uh, fall blooming stuff is really important as a food source to get
ready for the winter and the cold weather when most things aren't blooming and there's
not a lot of food sources out there. So these are things to consider
when when making a pollinator garden. But some of my favorites I like We
really like frog fruit, which talking about lawns, frog fruit is an excellent,
excellent lawn replacement plant. It's a native, it is indestructible. I
have mine planted along my driveway where it like is growing out onto the hot
pavement and there it goes and it's just blooming like crazy. It's a great
nectar source for pollinators. Yeah. And it is gonna. It's gonna take
over an area in a good way. And it's not gonna, it's it's
easily manageable. Yeah. Finding a native, tough, drob tolerant groundcover that
is just kind of bulletproof but stays so low the snake can't hide in frog
fruit. Yeah, you know what I'm saying. But yeah, that's a
good one. Yeah. And and I'm a big proponent of bringing herbs out
of the herb garden and into the landscape, so things like basil. We
were talking about African blue basil earlier, oregano time. All these herbs are
useful. You can still cook with them while also letting them bloom, and
those flowers are great sources of nectar for pollinators. That's a good point.
Yeah, you know, And we're kind of wandering our way through from butterfly
gardening to bees to beneficial insects. But it's all kind of part of the
big package. But all of them are pollinators, but they are. Yeah.
But the first time that I ever discovered the potter wasp that makes a
little marble sized mud houses puts caterpillars in there. It's a preditor. First
time I saw one, I was taking pictures of time and there were time
blooms and there was this wasp going in and out and I followed it and
it went over a chain link fence and some foliage and it was building those
little nests. I broke the nest open. I found all these looper caterpillars,
and it was like revelation right there. But time is good. The
rosemaries that trail seemed to bloom better than the upright ones in many cases.
And boy, the honey bees love those things. Yeah, yeah, And
I think honey bees are great. And I was talking to another employee about
how this year they seemed to be doing better than they have in previous years,
which is I think a great testament to I think people getting wise to
the importance of them. But I think it's important also to think about native
bee population that kind of gets overlooked and under publicized in favor of honey bees,
and I understand it, but the native bee population is just as important,
if not more important, to kind of the general ecosystem. Yeah,
there are so many bee Everybody knows bumble bees because they're big and hard to
miss. That. We've got the bees that like the leaf cutter bee that
does almost no damage at all to plants, but it is a beneficial And
we have other solitary bees that well, a lot of people wouldn't even recognize
it, Right, that's a good idea. Yeah, And plants that attract
those, Boy, it's easy. You mentioned African blue basil. I mean
that is like a graphic jam on that plant. You get toward the end
of summer and it's big, and it's blooming, and it just loaded with
might we might as well be an ornamental plant. It's so beautiful and bloom
so much. I'm pretty sure it's an entomological crackhouse. That's my opinion of
it. But we're going to take a little break here, get some news
here. We'll be right back talking to Zach about pollinators seven one three two
one two Kat r H. If you'd like to ask a question, pick
his brain, ask some pollinator type information, we'll be happy to help.
Welcome back to garden Line on a beautiful day for gardening. Listen, we
have talked to the weather man. They're going to try to hold it to
ninety degrees today. Here's your chance. Get out there and get you some
plants. Let's turn that landscape into something beautiful you can enjoy all summer.
One of the ways that we keep our landscapes beautiful is by keeping the soil
mult Remember wherever sunlight hits the soil nature plants of weed. The folks at
Louisiana Pacific are Nicia Pacific, Lanscaper's Pride. I had the lp right last
Caper's Pride. I don't know where that came from. They've got a black
velvet multch that is naturally black. It's not dyed. You know, I
hate dyed mult But they have a black velvet molt. It is just beautiful,
very velvety and dense. And when you put that over the soil,
it does two things. Number One, it keeps the soil temperatures down.
The difference in soil temperature an inch deep even three or four inches deep and
unmultched versus molt soil is huge and it gets so hot. Roots have a
hard time when you have absolutely no mulch and the sun is just bearing down
on that bere soil. Black velvet will do that. Plus it looks beautiful,
very beautiful. I like the hardwood malts a shredded hardwood. Now LP's
shredded hardwoodmultch is not made from paletts. It's truly shredded hardwood materials. They've
got their pine bark molts probably the most popular one. They have, very
very beautiful, locally sourced pine marked decomposes a little slower than some mulches,
which is a good thing, as well as mulches from cedar made from Cyprus.
All from Louis Escaper's Pride. You know, landscapers Pride products are widely
available. You can go to Landscaperspride dot com and you can find all the
places that you can get their products. Here in the Greater Houston area.
Won't be hard to find one. But I guarantee you this, of like
twenty something different products they carry, all of them are going to benefit your
soil and benefit your plants and the success that you have out there. Being
summer season, now is the time when we focus a lot on our lawns,
wanting them to look good, wanting to be beautiful. If you've got
compacted soil areas where either foot traffic or just really poor soil conditions have caused
the grass not to do well, you ought to consider doing a core aeration
followed by a compost top dressing. And BnB turf Pros is a company for
all of you living kind of down south into the west. So we're talking
about an area that goes from sugar Land and Missouri City all the way across
to Pearland on the east end of their range, and then down Fresno's Sienna
Arcola, Iowa colony Manville, that whole region down there. BnB turf Pros
is your family owned service. They provide honest, quality work. That is
what they focus on. They only use products that I talk about here on
guarden Line, for example Cnamultch down in that area, super quality products.
They use those cnmultch products in BMB turf Pros. You can go to the
website BnB turf Prosbbturfpros dot com or give them a call seven one three,
two, three, four, fifty five ninety eight. Check out the website.
They really go above and beyond to make that personal connection with their clients
and to make sure that you're satisfied with the work they do. That is
what they're all about. That's why we're more than happy to talk about them
as a quality provider. They can take a lawn, maybe it's struggled from
last summer's drought and heat and it's just not looking that great. Have them
come out do a good quality aeration and a good quality compost top dressing.
That's what they use, and I think you will be very pleased with the
difference that you see. We're talking with Zich Buchanan from Buchanna's Nursery because there's
Pollinator Week. It's the end of Pollinator Week. We're talking about plants that
attract pollinators. We've kind of gone through a bunch of different types of plants
and things. I think there's a few others, you know. I've noticed
even things like the Mexican heather, which I never thought of as a big
blooming plant. It's got the little bitty blooms on it. But I see
bees working those. I just see bees being very resourceful and finding ways to
find a meal. I think, Yeah, Mexican Heather's one that I recommend
as a great kind of border plant. But yeah, it is it's always
covered with bees. Whenever we have it in the nursery, which is pretty
much all the time and it's blooming, bees are all over it. Sometimes
that can turn customers off to it. Unfortunately, we try to kind of
assuage their fears that this is what this is what all flowers should be doing,
is attracting pollinators and that they're not something to be scared of. Yeah,
if you don't grab the bee and squeeze it in your hand or something.
They they will give their life to protect their babies, but not to
protect a flower. No, they're not out there to go, hey,
leave my plant alone, right and they and they're they're working, uh,
and they don't want to be bothered. If we don't bother them, they're
just going to keep working. That's it. I think. I think another
great one that that we love is kind of any missflower. So Greg's blue
mist is a great option. We've got like some blue mist ageratum. These
these things are huge nectar sources that just produce so much nectar and can get
covered with butterflies, bees, anything. Looking for next And Greg's this flower,
those beautiful light blue blossoms are beautiful. The uh, it's kind of
almost like a tall ground covered the way it just sort of spreads out and
covers. Is it the queen or the monarch or both? That something that
looks like a monarch is always loaded up on those Greg's miss flower. I
think it may be queen too. I think you know, I was talking
with with one of our salespeople about this blue mystadgeratum that that specifically attracts monarchs
because it like kind of makes this smell that where the male thinks there's going
to be female monarchs on this plant. Oh really, because the plant is
producing this this fragrance. Well, we could really get my garden line ratings
up if I pursued that a little bit further. But we're going to let
that one go. Yeah, but that's unfair. That's that's the great thing
about about these plants is again like they're they want to attract native insects.
They're not They know that they're not going to be harmed by these insects,
so they want them to come to them. Pollinate them and create more more
plants. That is, it's all. It's all part of the way nature
works, it is. Yeah, and if we if we just kind of
like don't interfere as much, it'll it'll kind of get by on its own.
Yeah, do what it's supposed to do. Yeah. I have a
I have a talk I do on attracting beneficial insects. And it's like all
these key points and the first point is don't kill them. So you know
number one's first yea, how you spray it, don't kill them. Well,
that's that's all cool stuff. And I know I could probably have you
here for ten weeks just talking about all the plants you guys carry because you
have such a good list of natives and non natives. Yeah, that that
attract the beneficials. So I would say, probably to people listening, thanks
first of all for hanging around this long, Oh my pleasure, Thank you
for having me. But I would say go buy there and just start simple
start. I mean, if you do nothing other than plants and basil and
let it bloom, that's a step forward. But maybe you need some perennials,
or maybe you need some shrubs and talk to folks that know, like
Zach, find out what is the next thing I can plant and the next
thing and grow your way into it. You know, you don't need to
buildoze everything and turn it all into a garden overnight for pollinators. But little
by little you can transform your landscape into a place that birds, butterflies,
bees, beneficial insects in general just want to come hang out. And it
really works. It's like the Baseball movie. If you build it, they
will come. Yeah. I pride our organization on not shaming anybody and trying
and not being gatekeepers to this the native world. Like, we want to
help people, and we want to help people at any level, whether they're
beginning or experts. I think there's always room to learn, and that's what's
exciting about this is learning new things and coming to new realisms. And when
those realizations hit about natives or pollinators, it's it's really eye opening and it
can change your whole worldview. Really. Yeah, A planet a time?
Yeah? Is that well? Zach? For those of you who weren't here
at the very beginning, we're talking to Zach Buchanan from Buchinish Nursery six eleven,
six eleven Eleventh Street, Eleventh Street in the Heights. You got to
go by there and check it out. It's always like wandering around and chopping
and seeing what's around the next corner there. Yeah, thank you very much,
thanks for hanging out. All right. Well, happy pollinator week for
all of you. But just because this was the official pollinator week. Now
next week's time to get out there and start actually doing what we've been talking
about. So I hope you take advantage of that this weekend. Zach,
thanks a lot. I might have to go to another break, but appreciate
having you on. Yeah, thank you for having me. All right,
take care, we'll be right back. All right, we're back on garden
line on a perfect day for gardening. Look, it's sunny outside, it's
beautiful. I think the temp's only going to hit about ninety to day.
So here's our excuse. We got to get out there and beautify and just
enjoy ourselves. You know, it's not just work in the garden. It's
enjoying yourself and using a quality product to help your plants have good nutrition.
That is key, That is important. Nelson plant Food has a wide variety
of those products you've heard me talk about. Turf Star Slow and easy.
That's the one for summer months and months and months of feeding all the way
up to the fall fertilization that you're going to do in your lawn. Nelson
Slow and Easy, the turf Star product, Nelson plant food Slow and easy.
Excellent product for the lawn. What about flowering plants like plumeria and tropicals,
Well, nutral Star Plumeria is excellent for all kinds of tropicals. You
know, maybe you've got even things like a plumbago, which is you know,
cold hearty here, but it does very well when you provide even the
plumeria food for that ground orchids, etcea fried Japanese you know, desert roses.
Lots of good plants you can use that Plumeria product on. If you've
got rose, is the nutri Star rows an excellent product for that, The
nutri Star Booginvilla. Just think of it this way, booga and villa.
Think of it as a flowering vine. Anything that's a flowering vine. Boogain
Villa by neutral Star or Nutristar Boogainvilla by Nelson is an excellent product to do
for that. I would use it on crossvines or Virginia creeper, if you've
got that with steria, passion vines, trumpet vines, butterfly vines, Carolina
adjustment, all of those flowering vine think about the boogainvillia. And of course
if you've got a crape myrtle or any flowering tree, nutri star crape myrtle
from Nelson. All great products and you can find them all over the place.
For example, Southwest Fertilizer. Southwest Fertilizer carries each of these products and
as well as anything you hear me talk about on guardline. If I talk
about any fertilizer, it's at Southwest. If I tell you go buy this
to kill a bug, or stop a disease or stop a weed, it's
at Southwest Fertilizer. They have the best selection of all kinds of products,
both syntheta types and organic types that you're going to find in town. Southwest
Fertilizers on the corner of Bissinett and Renwick and it's just Southwest Houston, real
easy to get to. Southwest Fertilizer dot Com. That's the that's the website,
Southwest Fertilizer dot Com. Anything you need in the way of a tool
or a product to apply to your lawn, your garden, your herbs,
your flowerbeds, whatever it is, you're going to find it there at Southwest
Fertilizer. I always love going into there, and I always learn about new
products because they always stay up to date on what the latest products are that
we have. After I'm done with the shutter down or run up to Arbrogate,
I've got some visiting to do up there with Beverly. But Arburgate Nursery
outside of Tomball on the West Sides on twenty nine to twenty has just continued
to get better and better over the years. And you think that was hard
to do. If you saw it even ten years ago, it's like,
whoa, we've arrived here. But no, they just keep going more new
things, exciting things that you want to try to grow. Uh. They've
got the new parking lot around back. Wow, that is wonderful. Just
turn down Trishel Road before or after Arborgate, pull around the back and it's
easy access and I don't care if it's rained eight inches. You can drive
in there. You can walk in there from there from where you park,
and no mud on your feet. It's easy, easy to do while you're
there, grab their one two three completely easy system. That's a soil for
anything with roots. That is a compost product that contains expanded shale in it,
and that is a fertilizer. Also, by the way, the soil
also has expanded shale. And then a fertilizer for anything that you have that
has roots, an organic fertilizer from Arburgate part of the one two three easy
system. Remember brown stuff comes before green stuff, right you go to Arburgate
to buy green stuff, make sure and take home the one two three,
which is the brown stuff to make your plants thrive. That's important. Someone
was out asking me about dealing with chinchbugs in their lawn. They thought they
may have had chinchbugs in the lawn this past week, and we're talking about
a little bit. It's a little early for chinchbugs, but they can pop
up at any point in time. They have more than one generation a year
as well, and nitrofoss bug Out Max is a great way to shut them
down. Nitrofoss bug Out Max is an insecticide that goes to work right away.
Within forty eight hours, it is killed whatever is out there that is
in that lawn that is bugging you, whether it's a sod web worm,
or whether it's a chinchbug, or whether maybe it's fleas and ticks from your
pets. They do live in the thatch as well, and you can shut
them down right there as well as ants. Bugout Max available, lots of
places. Ace Hardware, CITYO Memorial Drive has got it. Hiding and Feed
up on I forty five North Stubernor Airline. They've got RCW Nursery. You're
gonna find bug out Max plans for all seasons. Lots of places that you
can find nitrofoss products, including the bug out Max product itself works very well.
If you're looking for your hometown feed store up there in Tomboil, you're
looking at D and D Feed. D and D Feed is out on twenty
nine to twenty just west of town. They have got all the different fertilizers
I talk about on guardline. You're going to find the age leaf, mold,
compost, heirlooms, the new rose soil blends that they have there from
heirloom soils, fruit berry, citrus, the veggie and herb. All those
soils are there at D and D Feed. Of course it's a feed store.
I mean, you're going to get all the feed you need, high
quality ones at that, but you're going to find every other kind of product
to make your lawn more beautiful in terms of protecting against pests and problems and
providing those kinds of nutrient additions or perhaps in this case, compost additions that
are needed in it. Medina Supergrow Plus that's an example of one of those.
The Medina Supergrow Plus is a sixteen zero two fertilizer sixteen zero two easy,
easy to use. You attach it to a hose, covers four thousand
square feet and provides the nitrogen that you need for your lawn and garden to
be successful. Last week, I was out at Nelson Nursery and Watergardens,
which is out in Katie, picking up some plants. They had a certain
kinds of things out there that I was looking for. By the way,
their plants selections outstanding out there. At Nelson's. You just set out to
Katie on Iten you go north, so it's like Houston's. It's like the
West Houston Nursery here for garden line and their selection is unbelievable. The fountains
is unbelievable. If you go to the website Nelsonwatergardens dot com, you'll see
what I'm talking about. Nelson watergarden dot Com. Out there in the Katie
area. Of course they got fish and stuff. When you go out there,
by the way, take a friend because it is inspiring to walk through
all the water. They ought to charge people to just go sit among all
the water splashing and the water sounds. That'd be be better therapy than just
about anything that you could do out there. Yeah, well you've been listening
to guard line. We had a full day with some nice guests and things.
Don't forget. Next Saturday, on the twenty ninth of June, my
last public appearance of the year Langham Creek Ace Hardware out in West Houston where
Barker Cypress and Spencer Road, which is five twenty nine come together. I
hope you'll make plans to come see me.