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Welcome to the Simple garden Life Podcast, a program dedicated to keeping the yard

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of gardening simple, fun and always
rewarding. Now Here are your hosts,

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Jim and Mary Competti. Hello and
welcome everybody to the Simple Garden Life Podcast.

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I'm your host, Jim Competti along
with my wife Mary. And Mary

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we're inside talking gardening today. It's
getting near the Christmas season and everybody loves

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them, and most people can say
it right. It's the point Settia plant.

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Yes, it's a very popular plant, indoor plant this time of year,

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and there's always a debate on how
to say it. In fact,

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we actually looked it up to make
sure that we're saying it correctly, and

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it's point setia. Yeah we have. There's ohio accents sometimes cool, but

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it is. It is, so
no matter how you say it really doesn't

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matter. The important thing we're talking
about today is how to care for them,

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and most importantly is how to get
them to stay blooming and blooming.

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We'll talk about that in a second. As long as they possibly can look,

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they're not an inexpensive plan anymore,
and they can come in a thousand

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different prizes. It's really cool how
many different points eddie as there are now

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you got variegated white, even salmon
red, yeah, the traditional red and

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all kinds of versions. But you
know, you spend all that money and

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to watch your plant die well before
Christmas Day or even not maybe a week

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or two before that. You want
to get as much as you can and

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you really should be able to,
right, And there are a popular gift

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this time of year. A lot
of people get them around Thanksgiving in early

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December, and you want them to
last at least to Christmas, if not

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longer. Yeah, and you know
it's a plant that you can keep as

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a house plant the entire year around
and get it to you know, push

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such colors out again next year.
But let's face it, most people end

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up purchasing these for one year.
They and they want to have a display.

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And there are some secrets, as
we're going to talk about today when

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it comes to a several factors.
So obviously light and heat and temperature,

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we're going to get into those.
But most importantly, and this is where

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the biggest probably the mistakes are made, it comes to how are you supposed

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to water your points eddios? Right, and that's true for all house plays,

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but point setti is actually require a
special technique that most people don't follow.

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No, that's right, and you
know what we know this water is

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important for every single living plant,
even though a cactus in the middle of

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the desert needs some amount of water
to survive. Obviously, when we do

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things with tomato plants in the garden
or flowers, they need their points Edtios

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are no different except it's how they
bloom, which is why water and how

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you give them the water is more
important than any other plant we talk about.

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And it's probably like you said,
you said it best. It's one

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of the things that is most misunderstood
about it and what we're going to talk

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about today. So one of the
most important things about a points eddia is

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to understand, at least when it
comes to watering and why it's so important

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it is to understand, and I
use this word again, bloom how it

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gets its color. It's not really
a bloom. There are actually blooms on

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a points eddia, but they're not
the red that you see or the other

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colors. Now, the red that
actually leaves the bloom is actually in the

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center of those which is a tiny
little yellow. Yeah, it's in the

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center and they're tiny. Yeah,
the flower is extremely tiny, and it's

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not impressive. And it's not why
people buy points eddie as they buy them

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for those big colorful leaves, which
are actually bracts. B are acts,

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and it's just a fancy word for
a leaf. And so when conditions are

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right, you know, when you
have a Christmas cactus, conditions have to

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be right. It has to have
so much cool weather, so much darkness,

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and then it forces it to bloom. For a points Eddia, it's

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the same exact thing. Has to
have so much darkness, have so much

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temperature change, and then these bracts
form. And when these bracts explode,

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they're actually a shell of these giant, you know, colorful flowers. And

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when I say red, it's because, let's face it, most people but

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you do have the white ones and
everything else. They are all bracts.

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And because they are leaves, and
leaves are made up mostly of moisture.

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It's why water becomes so more important
to a points Eddia than it does for

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any other plant. And when too
much or too little water it provides to

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the plant, the leaves are the
first to feel the damage. Yeah,

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And the funny thing is more times
than not. For people at home,

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it's too much water that causes the
problem and not underwatering, although they both

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have their issues. Let's talk about
it right now. So underwatering, let's

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think of vegetable plants hanging baskets in
the middle of summer. You come home,

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sure, yeah, it's a hot
day. You forgot to water that

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morning or even the night before.
And you look at them and it's exactly

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right, they're all But what's wilty
it's the leaves. The leaves all shrivel

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down and you put some water on
it and they come right back. The

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ballooms look kind of poor, but
it's the leaves that really show the first

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effect of water. Same thing in
the vegetable garden. A tomato plant it

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gets too dry soil, or a
cucumber plant, what happens. It's those

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leaves they shrivel up. So think
of a points eddie. It has these

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leaves and one doesn't have water,
or if it gets too much water,

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as Mary said, it's the first
thing to show up. So we talked

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about being dry. So what happens
if it's too wet. Well, points

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eddi is are tropical plant. Okay, so They're used to moisture, but

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not so much in their soil.
They're used to high humidity and nice temperatures,

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they're not used to being soggy.
So in a container, when that

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plant gets too moist all kinds of
problem happened there. Yeah, the roots

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get soggy. Exactly. What's the
first thing we tell people when they question,

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say, hey, my tomato plants
are turning yellow. The leaves are

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turning yellow. My cucumbers are turning
yellow. What our first knowledge is,

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Probably it's gonna be too much water. Yeah, too much water. So

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what happens when a points eddie it
gets too much water, same thing.

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Those leaves start to yellow. They
may even start to fall off or look

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really poor. And if it doesn't
get enough water, same thing, however,

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with the points eddie plant, Remember
this is that blooming period. I'm

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gonna use blooming talking about the leaves
here bracks. It's just too confusing to

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keep saying the word bracts. But
every time it goes through stress, whether

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it went too long without water or
it's sitting in water too long, it's

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going to shorten those blooms tremendously.
And I think we've all had to points

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any plants at our house where they
look beautiful. Then the next day or

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two you see crumble little leaves laying
around that you have to pick up and

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clean because the leaves are crumbling and
falling off. Yeah, and there's some

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natural process. You know, if
you're into January and that's starting to happen,

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it's called it's the end of the
blue season. But if you just

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bought your plane a week ago and
it just came out, or it's just

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starting to come out, and you're
starting to lose leaves and you know it's

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only December of the fifth or fifteenth
or something like that, it's usually one

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of three things. Water is the
biggest key, and like I said,

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we'll talk about it later, there's
some conditions in your house, light and

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heat that can also matter. So
we've talked about how important water it is.

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Watering is, and it is and
it's one of the questions that kind

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of set this podcast up for us. We got last week and Mary,

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I'll let you read that. It's
the question of the week and I love

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this one. This is one of
my favorites and it's a great question.

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It is. This comes from Christy
from Upstate New York Christy asked, I've

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heard it's best to water point setting
is from underneath, or even dip them

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in water in a bucket? Is
this true? I love this question.

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It is. It is incredible to
water points eddies from underneath. You can

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dip them in, the soil gets
wet, you pull them back out,

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you let all the water drain off, and you put it back in its

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pot. Yeah, it's incredible.
It's incredibly inconvenient. No one needs it.

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If you have ten points, no
one's going to do this. Is

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that the absolute best? Christie?
It is. But we've got a better

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way to keep your plant perfect without
having to go through that hassle. Who

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wants to dip their plants in a
bathtub every day or take them out to

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a bucket strain them out. So
I wanted to cover that question because it's

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it's kind of funny. It is
really one of the best ways, because

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you're watering from blow and you're bringing
it in what you don't want to water.

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And we'll cover this a little bit
more in a second. Is you

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know a lot of housepens your water
from the bottom of a saucer and let

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it soak out, not a good
idea for Points Eddie is what they're talking

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about here when they say water from
underneath, the dipping it down in the

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water, the getting the plant wet, they're pulling it back up, letting

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it drain off so that it's moist
to be good. And we'll get into

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this after the break. You really
want your your soil moisture level to be

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somewhere between fifty and seventy percent at
all times. Anything higher than that it's

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saturated and it can rot the roots
and cause early problems. Anything lower than

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fifty percent, it's gotten too dry, and then you're gonna have issues.

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So let's take a break. We're
gonna come back and tell you the two

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ways to water your plant that are
very simple and very easy. They're gonna

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let you get the most blooms for
your buck this year with your Points Eddia

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plant. And we are back and
talking about watering Points Eddias and how to

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extend that color time all through the
holidays and even into the first part of

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January. And of course watering is
our key here. So there are two

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ways that you should be watering,
and yes, you should be doing both

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if you want those maximum bloom color
time. To stay around. The first

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way is traditionally' that's at the base
of the plant, you know, with

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the old watering can or however,
you do it right at the soil level.

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But the second, and this is
the one that very few people do

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to their points Eddias andy at it
makes a huge difference. Is you should

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be missing them every few days.
So we're gonna go over both, and

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I think Mary is probably obvious to
start with the first one, which is

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watering at the base level. Absolutely. The key with watering your points ati

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at the base is to water it
enough to get the soil moist but not

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overly salgy. Like Jim mentioned earlier, points Seitia plants are tropical plants,

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so that means they like the moisture
and the humidity, but they don't want

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to sit in salty soil. No. No, And you said it best

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when you said you have to let
them dry out. So somewhere between fifty

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to seventy five percent, when it
gets down to fifty or forty five,

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you want to put the really at
fifty you want to put some water on

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to get it back up, but
not to the point where you're soaking it

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through. No, you want to
water the plant right at the base,

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right at the stem where the soil
is. You want to water it so

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that water trickles all the bottom and
stops. Yes, and I mean trickle

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and stop. Yeah, And if
it comes out to the bottom, it's

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okay. Think back when we talked
about soaking these down, how people do

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it? You know the official best
way to water the key was to get

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rid of that and shed that excess
water. Well, if you have a

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saucer or something at the bottom it's
collecting water, that's okay. You may

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have water. To just get rid
of that water and make sure no more

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is coming out. That means that
it's saturated through, but it's not,

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you know, overly wet. If
you leave that water in there, you

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risk something. You risk that coming
right back up to the root level or

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even worse sitting there and it's going
to start to swell those roots and not

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let them take up any nutrients whatsoever. Absolutely, so, after you water,

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let the water drain out, remove
the sauce or tray below, dump

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it out, put it back,
and if there's more sauce or water that

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comes down, you need to dump
it out. Absolutely, it's perfect.

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That's that's exactly perfect. So how
often should you water points out of a

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Plant's great question, million dollar question. There's there's a couple of factors that

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you know that matter. I mean, if it's in an extremely warm room,

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if it's near any kind of a
draft, where's gonna dry out of

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the quicker, If there's if your
home in the winter time and a lot

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of homes do this have trouble holding
humidity, you know it's going to be

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watered more often typically rule of thumb
here, you're going to want to water

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it in probably every couple of days. That's that's usually when they get to

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that seventy five percent high down to
the fifty percent level. But there's a

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way to cheat that is far better
than anything. We talk about this all

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the time. I don't think it's
cheating. I think it's being smart.

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Well, you know how you want
to call it. But I'm just saying

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that. You know, there are
all kinds of people that can stick their

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finger down in the soil where they
can look at the soil and they can

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see what's going on. But if
you really want to be accurate, get

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yourself an inexpensive soil meter. It's
it's a digital display. A lot of

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them will put a link on the
site here for that, but a lot

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of them actually have multiple things.
You know. Not only will they tell

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you the instant soil moisture content of
the soil as you probe down in it,

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they'll also tell you the temperature of
the soil. They'll tell you the

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pH of the soil. You can
use these everywhere for hanging baskets, for

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interior plants, for everywhere. They
are magical, and I want to say,

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anywhere from fifteen to twenty five dollars. You can pick yourself up a

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really good one. Some of them
are really fancy, but that's how you

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can tell. You put it in
there. And if that's reading somewhere down

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at the root level, don't just
stick it half in chin. Stick it

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about halfway down in the pot where
the roots are going to be. If

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it's registering between fifty and seventy five, if it gets down towards fifty,

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you're going to water. If it's
at sixty eight to seventy five to even

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you know, let's say it gets
to eighty, that's okay. Just let

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it come back down and you'll know
the water you're gonna get really good using

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one of these after a while looking
at your soil. But they really are

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a fail safe way to be able
to tell the moisture. And people ask

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me, how do I know when
the water my plant? There are so

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many varying conditions that matter that this
is really the only, when I say

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cheating method, it's the only way
to know for sure when you should be

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water right. And we've used the
finger test before where you stick your finger

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down in and actually, you know, you pull it back up and it's

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got a little bit of dirt moisture
on it. You know your your plants

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are okay if it's dry. But
you know, this is the only sure

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way to know wind of water and
you can use it for multiple plants,

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oh rot the year, and you
know to tell if your pH and the

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soil outside. Like I said,
if you get the multimeters, they're really

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good. So okay, So that's
watering traditionally. Now let's talk about the

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secret to watering and how you keep
those leaves looking perfect. We've talked about

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the tropical origins of this plant and
how it likes humidity. Think of a

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jungle, you know you're walking through
and it's moist and it's wet and there's

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a lot of moisture in the air, so you want to mimic that for

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your plant. Now, think of
homes in the winter time, which typically

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dry. If you have a wood
stove, the'or even dryer. If

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you have furnace that's blowing their it's
dry. If you have any static in

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your house, you know your home
is dry, exactly exactly. So what

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do you do to combat that and
extend those lives? And this is the

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one thing that will extend that color
longer than anything is to miss your plants

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every two days. And it's so
easy. It's just a water bottle and

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some water. And I guess mar
before we do that, I mean,

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let's talk about the water that you're
putting in it. Right. You got

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to be careful what type of water
that you use because a lot of water

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is treated and that can actually harm
your plants. Oh yeah, you have

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chlorine, You can have salts from
a water softener. So look, use

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distilled water, use you know,
purified water, use rain water. You

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can use your tap water as long
as you have an area of that tap

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that doesn't go through your water softener. If you have one of those,

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just trying not to use city water, municipal water. There's so many chemicals

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in those they will also do damage
to the leaves and shorten their life.

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So put the water in there.
You missed it. It can't be any

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00:14:18,399 --> 00:14:22,159
easier. You're just going to go
around and give it a sprits And I

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think the key here is lightly miss
Yeah. Yeah, you just want those

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leaves to glisten. That's exactly what
you want. And you want to do

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that. I mean, can you
do it every day? Sure, sure,

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but every two days is going to
give you that extension to get that

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full six weeks. And people ask
us all the time, like how many

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00:14:35,399 --> 00:14:39,480
weeks should they stay in color?
A properly cared for plant can easily handle

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four to six weeks and still look
pretty decent. So as long as are

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hydrated from the soil and from missing, you could get a full six weeks

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00:14:46,840 --> 00:14:50,120
out of these plants. That's right. So that's how you want to water.

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That's why it's so important. Now
let's just take a little bit of

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time before we wrap up today and
talk about those other factors we talked about

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that furnace and that wood stove.
You see the beautiful Christmas scenes of the

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points Eddie is on fireplaces there.
That's great when you like the fire,

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get them away, yeah, that
he could really hurt them and drive not

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00:15:09,639 --> 00:15:11,879
quickly. Yeah, and it's gonna
burn, you know it can it can.

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00:15:11,039 --> 00:15:15,720
That over heating of the leaves can
really take its toll. So great

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00:15:15,799 --> 00:15:20,600
for looks people away. Also keep
them away from furnace drafts, you know,

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00:15:20,679 --> 00:15:24,440
the vents cool drafts. If you
if you put your points Eddie is

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00:15:24,440 --> 00:15:28,200
in an area right by the front
door and people walk in and there's a

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00:15:28,240 --> 00:15:31,360
ton of cold air coming from the
outside once or twice, isn't gonna harm

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00:15:31,360 --> 00:15:33,639
it if it happens all day,
Yeah, it's gonna it's gonna take its

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00:15:33,639 --> 00:15:37,039
toll. Right, they can't handle
those extreme temperatures very well. No.

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And then last but not least,
this almost sounds strange, but you know

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we talk about the period of darkness
to force a points Eddie to come into

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00:15:43,039 --> 00:15:48,200
its blooming, but it actually needs
light once it gets to but the right

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00:15:48,279 --> 00:15:50,799
kind of light in direct light.
Yeah, you don't want to get them.

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00:15:50,879 --> 00:15:54,799
Put them in the sunlight directly into
a window that's getting the southern sun.

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00:15:56,120 --> 00:16:00,080
But put them in a well written, well lit room, excuse me,

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and it should be getting six to
eight hours of that every day of

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light. So again, if you
have these points Eddie is on a display

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in a darker room, that's fine, but get them out somewhere, you

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know, four to five six hours
a day that they can get some light

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00:16:14,279 --> 00:16:17,840
in a room where they can get
that ability to keep that color a little

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00:16:17,840 --> 00:16:19,639
bit longer. Yeah, that's one
of the most important things that you can

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00:16:19,679 --> 00:16:22,039
do is to let them have a
little bit of light, and it has

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00:16:22,039 --> 00:16:25,960
to be indirect, that's right,
and then keep them you know, temperature

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00:16:26,000 --> 00:16:30,159
matters as well. If they're in
a room that's around seventy two degrees,

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00:16:30,240 --> 00:16:33,679
that's gonna be like perfect, But
don't set thermostat up. If your thermostat

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00:16:33,759 --> 00:16:37,639
set to sixty seven, keep it
at sixty seven. And what we're talking

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about here is avoid basements or cold
rooms that get down to fifty five or

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00:16:41,240 --> 00:16:45,519
sixty at night, and avoid rooms
that might be tropical you know that get

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to ninety if you're really hot and
you have a fireplace in there, it's

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gonna again not going to kill the
plant, but it's going to really drop

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those leaves much sooner than you need
to, right, and a lot of

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00:16:55,360 --> 00:16:59,120
points Eddie plants come with a foil
wrapper that looks so pretty this time of

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00:16:59,200 --> 00:17:03,360
year. There's an important tip that
we need to give you about those wrappers.

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00:17:03,440 --> 00:17:04,759
Yeah, that's probably the last thing
that we really need to cover,

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00:17:04,880 --> 00:17:08,200
and it's so important. So you
know, they look beautiful, but that

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00:17:08,359 --> 00:17:15,599
all that silver aluminum tile types,
yeah, holds water at the bottom of

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00:17:15,599 --> 00:17:18,680
the plant. So you really need
to take those off. You really really

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00:17:18,680 --> 00:17:22,880
do. Accept If you want the
look of it, just take a nice

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00:17:22,920 --> 00:17:26,599
sharp pair of scissors and cut the
bottom out so that water can drain out

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00:17:26,640 --> 00:17:30,759
of your plant. If it doesn't, it's going to cause problems. Those

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00:17:30,799 --> 00:17:33,400
things make plants, They might make
them look beautiful, but they really cost

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00:17:33,440 --> 00:17:37,160
them on their life, especially with
Points Eddi, is because the water will

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00:17:37,200 --> 00:17:40,960
sit in the bottom of that foil
and the soil will absorb that moisture again

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00:17:41,000 --> 00:17:44,160
and again, causing them to be
overly watered. That's right, So I

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think we've covered everything today. Go
on to Simple Garden Life type in the

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search bar up top if you need
to. There are always on the episodes,

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00:17:51,200 --> 00:17:52,440
of course, but you can also
type in points Eddie. We have

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00:17:52,440 --> 00:17:56,480
a couple of articles on there,
how to keep blooms going, how to

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00:17:56,880 --> 00:17:59,119
you know, water them? Have
them on all of our sites, but

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00:17:59,400 --> 00:18:00,680
we just thought it's a great time. We get a lot of questions on

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00:18:00,720 --> 00:18:03,960
it this year to cover the topic, and certainly happy too, and certainly

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00:18:03,960 --> 00:18:07,759
happy that we're getting into the festive
season now right and in fact we have

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00:18:07,799 --> 00:18:11,920
some articles on Christmas cactus and Thanksgiving
cactus plants too. That's right, we

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00:18:11,960 --> 00:18:15,200
really do. So thanks for joining
us today, Mary, I think it's

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time. It's time and remember,
whatever you do, find the fun and

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00:18:18,039 --> 00:18:22,240
gardening and grow something beautiful, happy
guarding, and so long everyone. We

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00:18:22,319 --> 00:18:26,200
hope you've enjoyed this episode. Subscribe
to the Simple Garden podcast on iTunes,

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00:18:26,240 --> 00:18:30,319
Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or most
of your favorite podcast apps. You can

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00:18:30,319 --> 00:18:34,079
also head over to simplegardenlife dot com
where you can listen and read all of

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00:18:34,079 --> 00:18:37,839
the show notes to every episode.
And if you have any questions, any

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00:18:37,880 --> 00:18:41,200
ideas for show topics, or if
you want to share your favorite garden tip,

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00:18:41,480 --> 00:18:47,000
email us at the farm at ow
garden dot com. Until next time,

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00:18:47,079 --> 00:18:47,759
Thanks everyone,