Speaker 1: Coming to you from Studio A here at Proven Winners
Speaker 1: Color Choice Shrubs. It's time for the Gardening Simplified Podcast,
Speaker 1: radio and YouTube show with Stacey Hervella, me, Rick Weist,
Speaker 1: and our engineer and producer Adrianna Robinson. Well Stacey. Around
Speaker 1: here in the North, it's felt like Groundhog Day every
Speaker 1: day for the last two months. Snow, snow, snow, and
Speaker 1: it makes you wonder when spring is going to arrive.
Speaker 1: I love following the adventure in Danville, Vermont, where they
Speaker 1: put a palette out on the ice on the lake.
Speaker 1: It's called Joe's Pond. They have an annual ice out.
Speaker 1: It has bricks on it. It's wired with a weather
Speaker 1: proof clock. And when that palette and bricks finally break
Speaker 1: through and sink to the bottom, you know it's spring.
Speaker 1: And they have people who pay a dollar each for
Speaker 1: a ticket. It's a big deal. But when that brick
Speaker 1: goes through the ice, you know at spring.
Speaker 2: Oh.
Speaker 3: I like that, that's a real symbol. We've had a
Speaker 3: lot of false spring here exactly in West Michigan. Not
Speaker 3: sure about the rest of our listeners. If I know,
Speaker 3: we have a lot of people in warm climates, so
Speaker 3: you're probably like, yeah, it's great.
Speaker 2: It has been less.
Speaker 3: Than great here in Michigan, and really no signs of
Speaker 3: it improving in the near forecast, at least that I've seen, And.
Speaker 1: So you start to question yourself when does spring start.
Speaker 1: So they're on Joe's pond, they know definitively when spring starts.
Speaker 1: But in the North and Midwest, we are anxious for spring,
Speaker 1: and most people will do a few things as spring starts.
Speaker 1: They'll fertilize their lawn and apply an annual crab grass control.
Speaker 1: They'll spray weeds, and in many cases they're winter annual
Speaker 1: weeds like hen bit or chick weed or my good
Speaker 1: friend Harry bittercress, who are going to die anyhow, That's
Speaker 1: always driven me crazy in the garden center industry, people
Speaker 1: need to understand the difference between annual and perennial weeds.
Speaker 1: Many people will have a massive pile of mulch dumped
Speaker 1: on their driveway and then in May they'll head to
Speaker 1: the garden center and try and get it all done
Speaker 1: at once. That's what I see.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's pretty accurate.
Speaker 3: You know, like maybe two weeks ago it was somewhat
Speaker 3: nice on the weekend. I'm speaking relatively like it wasn't
Speaker 3: like oh one of those days you just gotta get outside.
Speaker 4: You know. I saw the.
Speaker 3: People out there pulling up their leaves and you know,
Speaker 3: putting around here and there because it was a bit sunny.
Speaker 3: I don't know if most people are as organized as
Speaker 3: you make them out to be in that and that.
Speaker 3: I think that a lot of times what happens is
Speaker 3: people is people think, Okay, it's nice, I'm going to
Speaker 3: go outside do some ard work. And you know, they again,
Speaker 3: they start putting around, they get a rake, they pull
Speaker 3: some leaves out of the beds. You know, they go should.
Speaker 2: I cut this? Should I not?
Speaker 3: But then you know, maybe they listen to us, or
Speaker 3: they read an article or you know, see something on
Speaker 3: social media and they're like, oh, shoot, I should have
Speaker 3: been doing X, Y and Z right, and then it's all,
Speaker 3: you know, all hands on deck.
Speaker 1: Yeah that's true. And coming up in segment four it
Speaker 1: we'll talk to Mike Connor, he's a pollination and be expert.
Speaker 1: We'll talk about cleaning up the leaves, clean up in
Speaker 1: spring effect on native bees. That's coming up in segment four.
Speaker 1: But you know your garden in spring, it's an outdoor
Speaker 1: living room. And I guess my point what I'm trying
Speaker 1: to make, and I see people do this is uh,
Speaker 1: don't try and get it all done at once. I mean,
Speaker 1: spring is a little over ninety days long, plus garden
Speaker 1: centers greenhouses have gotten very good at the shoulder seasons.
Speaker 1: You know, we head well into June, July, into the fall.
Speaker 1: You have plenty of time, so peace yourself. Spring is
Speaker 1: not a weekend. This week's limb a rick. There once
Speaker 1: was a man from ocean whose plant choices weren't well chosen.
Speaker 1: The plants he had grown were outside of his own,
Speaker 1: and now his camellias are frozen. He learned winter over
Speaker 1: exposes and splits your left out new hoses. The azaleas
Speaker 1: are toast his flowers compost. Yes, life ain't a bed
Speaker 1: of roses. But let's get out there in the yard
Speaker 1: and let's kick off spring. So stacy, A lot of
Speaker 1: people do feeding. I want to say real shortly. I
Speaker 1: like to feed my shrubs, perennials and plants in spring.
Speaker 1: I like to use a slow release organic fertilizer. But
Speaker 1: a lot of people feed their lawns. And if you're
Speaker 1: going to do that, use a good quality slow release
Speaker 1: because that grass is going to grow like nuts anyhow.
Speaker 1: So if you just jump you dump a quick release
Speaker 1: nitrogen fertilizer on the lawn, it's gonna cause it to
Speaker 1: grow even faster. And I just think that feeding a
Speaker 1: lawn and fall is more important than feeding it in.
Speaker 3: S I couldn't speak to lawn fertilization, as you know,
Speaker 3: it is not my forte quite the opposite. But I
Speaker 3: do agree with you on fertilizing the trees and shrubs
Speaker 3: and perennials if you're going to do that. And you know,
Speaker 3: people always ask us if they should fertilize their shrubs,
Speaker 3: and you know my answer, and I'm not trying to
Speaker 3: be obtuse or whatever is if you want to, it
Speaker 3: is not necessary in most areas to fertilize landscape plants. Now,
Speaker 3: if you started with something small, you might want to
Speaker 3: fertilize to get because it does indeed boost growth, and
Speaker 3: that's why people fertilize their lawn and greens everything up.
Speaker 2: Or if you are trying to grow for.
Speaker 3: Privacy, so I have a privacy hedge of junipers. I'm
Speaker 3: trying to get established on the back line of my yard,
Speaker 3: and you better believe I went out and fertilized those
Speaker 3: last week when it was a somewhat nice day, because
Speaker 3: we're gonna get some rain. So that's like the ideal
Speaker 3: time to do this is if you have a day
Speaker 3: where it's nice enough for you to be out there.
Speaker 3: The ground should not be frozen. And whether you're doing
Speaker 3: your lawn or you know, perennials and shrubs and the like,
Speaker 3: try to pick a nice day ground's not frozen and
Speaker 3: it's gonna rain really good the next day to get
Speaker 3: that stuff, you know, working, because all of these slow
Speaker 3: release fertilizers, and when we talk about slow release fertilizers,
Speaker 3: we're not talking about like the little osma code or
Speaker 3: other things like that that you put in your in
Speaker 3: your annual containers that release fertilizer for them all summer.
Speaker 3: We're talking about a fertilizer that weathers due to rain
Speaker 3: and acidity and the soil and all of that and
Speaker 3: releases those nutrients slowly correct to their plants, rather than
Speaker 3: like here you go, you just got your boost.
Speaker 2: Now deal with it, you know.
Speaker 1: And that's exactly my point with the lawn. So I'm
Speaker 1: not saying don't feed your lawn, I'm saying, use a
Speaker 1: good quality slow release. My point is not all fertilizers
Speaker 1: are created the same well.
Speaker 3: That is for sure, and there's a lot of confusion.
Speaker 3: And I'm a big fan of granular fertilizers. Anyway, as
Speaker 3: we've talked about before, especially for this time of year.
Speaker 3: You know you're fertilizing your annuals, your veget a little
Speaker 3: bit later in the season by all means, mix up
Speaker 3: that liquid stuff. But when we're talking about more of
Speaker 3: this long term sustained growth, I really like a good stony,
Speaker 3: granular slow release for life.
Speaker 1: You too, I agree. So here's a few things that
Speaker 1: you can do. Of course, I love in viral weather.
Speaker 1: I'm a meteorologist wannabe. So if you're north of let's
Speaker 1: say a line between Kentucky and Virginia, and you're north
Speaker 1: of that area, get to know soil temperatures because it matters.
Speaker 1: It makes a difference on how quickly things emerge. Insects emerge.
Speaker 1: Also GDD growing degree day accumulation. Don't have time to
Speaker 1: explain it right now, but get to know that, and
Speaker 1: there are great tools on the internet where you can
Speaker 1: track that. I do that all the time. Then get
Speaker 1: edging out of the way. Early springs a great time
Speaker 1: to get edging work done. Clean out your shed. I
Speaker 1: say that, but I won't do it. Sharpen your pruners
Speaker 1: and shovels, divide and move some perennials like ornamental grass yep,
Speaker 1: good time for that for sure, and when you plant
Speaker 1: them in spring, they won't heave out of the ground
Speaker 1: like they might in fall. Stacy, I like to give
Speaker 1: my mulch beds a stir. I joke about the people
Speaker 1: who put a big pile of mulch in their driveway
Speaker 1: and pile it on too deep. By the way, don't
Speaker 1: pile it on to old mulch and pile mulch too
Speaker 1: deep just because you feel that's something you gotta do
Speaker 1: at the outset of the spring. Appropriate amounts of mulch
Speaker 1: are important for plants, and the old mulch I like
Speaker 1: to stir it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, break up that surface tension. I mean the wood
Speaker 3: as it sits does the waxes prevent water from wetting it.
Speaker 3: So it is a good idea to kind of stir
Speaker 3: that around and get some air under there, and you
Speaker 3: keep it from looking too flat.
Speaker 1: Absolutely, you have a strategic functional advantage when you understand pruning.
Speaker 1: And we'll talk about pruning throughout the spring, but it
Speaker 1: makes a world of difference to know what you're doing.
Speaker 1: It's a perfect time to set up your irrigation system
Speaker 1: and your needs for the season. In other words, I'm
Speaker 1: talking about we're in spring here. Before you can set
Speaker 1: out annuals, we're still going to get some hard frosts.
Speaker 1: I like the HHH approach that means inspect heads on
Speaker 1: irrigation hoses and hardware in early spring, put soil in
Speaker 1: your containers so they're ready to go when you do
Speaker 1: buy those annuals. And maybe this is one of those
Speaker 1: years where you upsize your hanging baskets. I often recommend
Speaker 1: to people who buy the ten inch hanging baskets upsize
Speaker 1: them into a twelve or fourteen inch basket. They're readily
Speaker 1: available right now in stores. If you go looking for
Speaker 1: them in June, you might not be able to go.
Speaker 2: Oh, that's for sure, the hanging baskets will sell out.
Speaker 1: Well, there's an idea of some things on your list
Speaker 1: when you're just raring to go.
Speaker 3: In Yeah, I'd say if you're out there inspecting your
Speaker 3: heads in hardware and organizing your shed, I would say
Speaker 3: you indeed have a case of spring fever, and that
Speaker 3: would probably be the way this season appears to be going,
Speaker 3: although I did see that they're predicting a very warm April.
Speaker 3: So we'll see what happens. Because March has been, you know,
Speaker 3: a little little less time outside than I had been
Speaker 3: hoping for.
Speaker 1: March hasn't been a lion or a land, it's just
Speaker 1: been awful. Yes, we'll see what Stacy has in mind.
Speaker 1: And plants on trial coming up next here on the
Speaker 1: Gardening Simplified Show.
Speaker 3: Beautify your home and community with proven Winner's Color Choice
Speaker 3: Shrubs with over three hundred and twenty five unique varieties
Speaker 3: to choose from. There's a flowering shrub or evergreen for
Speaker 3: every taste and every space. Just look for the distinctive
Speaker 3: white container your local garden center or learn more at
Speaker 3: proven Winner's Color Choice dot com. Greetings, gardening friends, and
Speaker 3: welcome back to the Gardening Simplified Show, where we are
Speaker 3: talking about springtime tasks. And you know, if you're in
Speaker 3: one of the areas that are nice right now, your
Speaker 3: tasks may look a little bit different than us here
Speaker 3: in Michigan, just trying to pass the time until we
Speaker 3: can get outside and do something meaningful. But I did,
Speaker 3: before I launch into today's plan on trial, want to
Speaker 3: just bring up two really important facts. And number one,
Speaker 3: Ricky mentioned pruning a bit. Pruning is obviously a massive topic.
Speaker 3: I mean, we could do multiple shows about pruning, but
Speaker 3: as you have hopefully heard me say before, the thing
Speaker 3: to remember about pruning in spring is when in doubt,
Speaker 3: don't just don't. So if you're out there, you got
Speaker 3: the pruners, you're getting a little you know, over excited
Speaker 3: about everything, and you're clearing it out, and you're wondering,
Speaker 3: should I have cut that back? Should I be cutting this?
Speaker 3: Where should I cut this? This is the best thing
Speaker 3: to do is to take that moment to RECOGNI that
Speaker 3: you don't know what to do, and you should just
Speaker 3: walk away because it's much easier to fix something that
Speaker 3: you didn't prune than to fix something that you did.
Speaker 1: And stay tuned to the Gardening Simplified show as we
Speaker 1: advance into spring, because we're going to have to continue
Speaker 1: to address this time.
Speaker 3: Oh yes, for sure. But I did also want to
Speaker 3: tell you that you know, with perennials, so a perennials
Speaker 3: and our baceous plant that died back to the ground.
Speaker 3: So you've got plants parts that are above ground if
Speaker 3: unless you cut them all back and fall that are
Speaker 3: going to be cut back. And if you don't cut
Speaker 3: back a perennial like that, the worst thing that's going
Speaker 3: to happen is you're just going to have all of
Speaker 3: the old brown foliage and the green foliage mixed together
Speaker 3: and it doesn't look great, but the plant will be fine.
Speaker 3: And with shrubs, of course, if you cut them at
Speaker 3: the wrong time, you could be removing flowers and that's,
Speaker 3: you know, something that you can live with, but it's disappointing,
Speaker 3: Like we don't want you to be disappointed, but you know,
Speaker 3: we do have information on every Prooven Winner's Color Choice shrub,
Speaker 3: how to prune it, when to prune it on our
Speaker 3: website at Proven Winner's Color Choice doch, So that is
Speaker 3: a great place to start finding out whether you can
Speaker 3: or should prune. And then as far as cutting back
Speaker 3: perennials go, you know, I've said it before and we're
Speaker 3: going to get into it much more with Mike and
Speaker 3: segment four. But I am a big believer in not
Speaker 3: over cleaning the garden in spring, letting all of that
Speaker 3: stuff emerge. But on the other hand, I also don't
Speaker 3: like to have to pick through all that fresh new
Speaker 3: growth while I'm trying to pull out all of the
Speaker 3: dead stuff. So my solution, of course is just to
Speaker 3: pile it up somewhere and let it sit. So that's
Speaker 3: just something to keep in mind if you have the
Speaker 3: real estate, which I don't actually have the real estate anymore,
Speaker 3: but I'm going to figure it out somehow or another.
Speaker 3: So anyway, plants on trial, if there is one shrub
Speaker 3: that you think of when it comes to spring, what
Speaker 3: is it, Well.
Speaker 1: I can tell you, but I looked at your notes here,
Speaker 1: so that's not fair for even if I'm stealing.
Speaker 2: Here, even if I hadn't told you.
Speaker 3: Of course, it's for city, of course, you know and
Speaker 3: every and I'm sure I've said this on the show before,
Speaker 3: but it amazes me that Forsythia is one of these
Speaker 3: plants that nobody thinks even for a moment about outside
Speaker 3: of its bloom.
Speaker 2: Time, paying no attention, and then when it's in bloom,
Speaker 2: it is just so unignorable.
Speaker 1: And everybody comes to the garden center wanting to buy.
Speaker 3: It exactly, and it's just it's a It's a wild
Speaker 3: thing to go from not thinking about forcythia at all
Speaker 3: to seeing Forsythia literally everywhere. It seems like everyone has
Speaker 3: a forcythia, and I think that's a great testament to
Speaker 3: how tough and durable and easy to grow this plant is.
Speaker 1: But isn't it something when it's in bloom with daffodils
Speaker 1: at the ceme?
Speaker 2: Oh, it's perfection. I love it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, you know, I mean, I'm you know, I do
Speaker 3: have a Forsythia in my yard. It was there when
Speaker 3: we moved in. I'm actually going to cut it back
Speaker 3: to kill it this year. I'm going to kill it. Yeah.
Speaker 3: But we didn't want to pull it out entirely because
Speaker 3: we don't want to disturb all the soil. But I
Speaker 3: am after I'm gonna give it one last balloon. But
Speaker 3: you know, it's just for me. It's too big. This
Speaker 3: is this is one of the old fashioned varieties. So
Speaker 3: our plant and a trial today show off sugar baby
Speaker 3: Forcythia is going to change all of that. But let
Speaker 3: me just finish my point here about the massive forcythia
Speaker 3: that I have in my yard that is every bit
Speaker 3: of six feet tall and wide. And you know, for me,
Speaker 3: it's just not my yard, and my garden is too
Speaker 3: small for something that doesn't do a little bit more,
Speaker 3: you know.
Speaker 1: What I mean, I understand.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so it's coming out. I don't know exactly what
Speaker 3: I'm gonna plant in its place, probably give some room
Speaker 3: to some other things that are already kind of muscling
Speaker 3: it out. But I do love the golden color of Forsythia,
Speaker 3: and for me, it's kind of like I can I
Speaker 3: get my fill from everybody else who's got the forcythia.
Speaker 3: I don't necessarily need it in.
Speaker 2: My own yard.
Speaker 3: Okay, I borrowed, borrowed sceener. The borrowed scenery is sufficient.
Speaker 3: But if I did want to continue to grow for
Speaker 3: Scythia in my yard, I would indeed pick today's plan
Speaker 3: on trial show off sugar Baby forcythia. Why it is
Speaker 3: hands down the smallest forcythia on the market. It reaches
Speaker 3: just one and a half to two and a half
Speaker 3: feet tall and wide.
Speaker 1: That's amazing.
Speaker 2: That is very tiny.
Speaker 1: That's small.
Speaker 3: I mean for most forsythias are gigantic, right, and you know,
Speaker 3: people make room for them. They still make a great
Speaker 3: privacy heads. There's still a place for those larger ones.
Speaker 3: But I think as a lot of us find ourselves
Speaker 3: either as gardeners with more and more plants that we
Speaker 3: want to accommodate and plants that give us maybe longer
Speaker 3: seasons of interest compared to Forsythia, or we move to
Speaker 3: smaller areas and we just love forsythia with like a
Speaker 3: condo or apartment or something like that. This is a
Speaker 3: great choice for you. And because it is so small,
Speaker 3: it is a plant that can grow in places where
Speaker 3: other forcythia can't.
Speaker 1: Yeah, instead of using it as a fountain dation plant
Speaker 1: against your house, how about putting it in a perennial guard.
Speaker 3: It's great in a perennial gardener. It can be grown
Speaker 3: in containers. And I would also encourage you, if you're
Speaker 3: the kind of gardener who just likes to create really
Speaker 3: pretty containers. Check out show off sugar Baby at your
Speaker 3: garden center. Go ahead and plant it temporarily in a
Speaker 3: container with pansies and bulbs and all of that fun stuff,
Speaker 3: and then just plant it in your garden when you're
Speaker 3: ready to change that container over for summer.
Speaker 1: I saw Forcythia's in containers at corkin Hoff in the
Speaker 1: Netherlands with bulb plants. Wow.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's such a great combination. And then you know, yes,
Speaker 3: you're investing a bit into the forcythia, but you're going
Speaker 3: to plant it out in your yard, so it's a
Speaker 3: really great choice. You can also plant it. This is
Speaker 3: an interesting choice for planting, say on either side of
Speaker 3: your steps, because also, unlike those larger forcythia's, a show
Speaker 3: of sugar Baby has a very tidy habit, so regular
Speaker 3: forcythia's kind of can be a little bit messy, no rangey.
Speaker 3: I like that about them because I like things to
Speaker 3: look a little bit while and sometimes when I see
Speaker 3: a forcythia that's really been you know, super meatebald, I'm
Speaker 3: a little like ouch that looks like it hurts.
Speaker 2: Or it hurts. In the right setting, it can work
Speaker 2: really really well.
Speaker 3: But the nice thing about show off sugar Baby is
Speaker 3: you don't have to worry about that because it does
Speaker 3: just naturally grow as this very dense, little kind of
Speaker 3: column of golden flowers. So it has the structure that
Speaker 3: you need for these more formal applications, like I said,
Speaker 3: going up to your front door on either side of
Speaker 3: your garage. Of course, in perennial gardens, You can also
Speaker 3: even plant this as kind of a low hedge around
Speaker 3: the front of landscape.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: So the size is a great way to get everything
Speaker 3: you love about Forcythia two areas that you normally wouldn't
Speaker 3: have grown it. Now, there's another big advantage of a
Speaker 3: small Forcythia like show off sugar Baby, that I wanted
Speaker 3: to share with our listeners, and that is it is
Speaker 3: hardy to USDA Zone five, but we have heard reports
Speaker 3: of people in colder climates being successful with it because
Speaker 3: it is so small that it's usually covered by snow
Speaker 3: in those colder you know, zone four areas. If you
Speaker 3: live in a zone four that usually has reliable snow cover,
Speaker 3: it is a Forcythia that you can actually potentially grow
Speaker 3: because the snow provides all that insulation during the coldest
Speaker 3: part of the winter when those buds would potentially be
Speaker 3: susceptible to cold damage. It's got that nice fluffy white
Speaker 3: coat on and it's able to bloom and survive. And
Speaker 3: I have heard this even in places as cold and
Speaker 3: exposed as Edmonton.
Speaker 2: Alberta is. Yeah, so love it another word.
Speaker 3: Way to kind of use plant sizes and these unique
Speaker 3: features of plants in your favor and to experiment with
Speaker 3: that a little bit. These heat tolerant through usda is
Speaker 3: own eight. I think it's funny that people tend to
Speaker 3: think of Forsythia as more of a hardy plant, but
Speaker 3: it's actually more heat tolerant than it is hardy. It's
Speaker 3: I don't think a lot of people realize. Did you
Speaker 3: know that, botanically speaking, for Scythia is related to olives.
Speaker 1: I did know that, and I find that interest.
Speaker 3: It is interesting because you know, again we're talking about
Speaker 3: heartiness and heat tolerance, and of course olives are not
Speaker 3: the least bit heat tolerant, and for Cynthia looks nothing
Speaker 3: really like an olive, but it is in the oly
Speaker 3: ace the or the olive family, and so it's not
Speaker 3: only unlike olives, but it's also unlike other plants that
Speaker 3: are in the oly ace that we grow in our
Speaker 3: gardens that are grown for fragrance. So Lilac is in
Speaker 3: the oly ac jasmine privet fringe tree, Osmanthus ke and
Speaker 3: othis or yeah, ke and othis the fringe tree. Adriana
Speaker 3: sorry was looking at me like trying to trying to
Speaker 3: place the plant, and so I wanted to get that
Speaker 3: in their beautiful plant. It's such an amazing fragrance on
Speaker 3: that I love it.
Speaker 1: Stacy. I mentioned in the first segment pruning, and you
Speaker 1: have a strategic advantage when you know when to prune.
Speaker 1: You see the old and Forcythia's out there, this is
Speaker 1: one that where people will take a little off the
Speaker 1: top and then you have the naked branches below and
Speaker 1: the tuft on the top. Yeah, so pruning's key. Also,
Speaker 1: pruning is.
Speaker 3: Key especially with those older varieties that do tend to
Speaker 3: be a little rangy. Now because for Cynthia blooms so
Speaker 3: early in spring, you have to think about this logically
Speaker 3: and know that means it blooms on old wood.
Speaker 2: It's set.
Speaker 3: It's flower buds that you're about to see last summer,
Speaker 3: because otherwise when would I have a chance to create
Speaker 3: flower buds when it's still kind of cold and crummy. Right,
Speaker 3: So if you want to prune Forcythia, you're going to
Speaker 3: do that immediately after it flowers in spring, when the
Speaker 3: last bloom falls there. You can do it a little
Speaker 3: earlier if you don't mind missing out on a couple
Speaker 3: and that will give it the whole summer to recover.
Speaker 3: And if you have one of those older ones, those
Speaker 3: big rangy ones that is kind of bare at the
Speaker 3: bottom with just the flowers on the top. Consider giving
Speaker 3: it a rejuvenation pruning cutting it back to just stumps hard.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it'll be fine.
Speaker 3: Pune it back to just stumps and get a freshly
Speaker 3: sun life and start to appreciate your Scythia again like
Speaker 3: it deserves.
Speaker 4: So.
Speaker 3: We're gonna have all of this in the YouTube version,
Speaker 3: or of course in the show notes at Gardening Simplified
Speaker 3: on air dot com. So check it out there if
Speaker 3: you want more information about show off sugar Baby for Cythia.
Speaker 3: We're gonna take a little break.
Speaker 2: When we come back.
Speaker 3: We've got the mail bags of stay tuned. At Proven
Speaker 3: Winner's Color Choice Shrubs, we know that a better landscape
Speaker 3: starts with a better shrub. Our team of experts tests
Speaker 3: and evaluates all of our flowering shrubs in evergreens for
Speaker 3: eight to ten years to ensure they outperform what's already
Speaker 3: on the market. For easycare, reliable, beautiful shrubs to accentuate
Speaker 3: your home and express your personal style, look for Proven
Speaker 3: Winner's Shrubs in the distinctive white container at your local
Speaker 3: garden center or learn more at proven Winner's Color Choice
Speaker 3: dot Com. Greetings gardening friends, and welcome back to the
Speaker 3: Gardening Simplified Show, where it is our pleasure to help
Speaker 3: you solve your garden questions, quandaries and conundrums, which I'm
Speaker 3: sure sure you have.
Speaker 2: But let me just go.
Speaker 3: Back to how I started the previous segment, which is
Speaker 3: the thing I want you to keep in mind as
Speaker 3: you're doing your spring chores and clean up. When in doubt,
Speaker 3: don't you can ask us a question. No, but I
Speaker 3: feel like I kind of should need a T shirt. Yes,
Speaker 3: I mean it's it's kind of It's somewhat good life
Speaker 3: advice anyway, so even if it's not in the context
Speaker 3: of gardening. You know, there's certain cases where when in doubt,
Speaker 3: you should, but there's a lot of cases where when
Speaker 3: in doubt don't.
Speaker 1: It's a good point because my nature has been to
Speaker 1: jump in with both feet and then figure it out
Speaker 1: as I go.
Speaker 2: Oh, me too.
Speaker 3: This is why I'm giving this advice well ground well
Speaker 3: and also like it's fine. Here's the other corollary I
Speaker 3: think to that, which is like, it's fine to ignore
Speaker 3: that advice if you're willing to live with a consequence
Speaker 3: but I've definitely dealt with so many gardeners over the
Speaker 3: years who have prune something wrong and they just cannot
Speaker 3: stop beating themselves up over it. And you know that's
Speaker 3: hard because it's like, Okay, well, you've learned a great lesson.
Speaker 3: You're obviously not gonna let this happen again. But if
Speaker 3: you're like, hey, I don't know what's gonna happen, but
Speaker 3: I'm willing to accept the consequences of this not blooming
Speaker 3: or you know, having its growth scented or whatever, then
Speaker 3: by all.
Speaker 1: Means, do Isn't it fair to say you want to
Speaker 1: use as a general rule of green thumb if you're
Speaker 1: going to prune it, prune it right after it's done.
Speaker 3: Blooming as a general guideline, especially for spring, especially for
Speaker 3: stuff that blooms in spring.
Speaker 2: For sure.
Speaker 3: Okay, but speaking of pruning, uh, you know, we talk
Speaker 3: a lot. I think when most people talk about pruning
Speaker 3: the immediately like hyde rangees, you know, like, do I
Speaker 3: prune my headrange? Don't I prune my hydrange it didn't bloom.
Speaker 3: I prove my hydrange it did bloom. What's going on?
Speaker 2: People get real confused.
Speaker 3: That's why we have so very many resources on pruning
Speaker 3: hydrangees and when to prune them and how to know
Speaker 3: if and when you should prune them. And one of
Speaker 3: the hydrangs that we generally recommend having regular pruning on
Speaker 3: is panicle hydrangers. Right, beautiful, easy to grow a plant,
Speaker 3: not imperative to prune them, but you will find generally
Speaker 3: that you kind of improve the overall habit of the
Speaker 3: plant and the blooming if they are prune regularly. And
Speaker 3: we just put a video on on this so I
Speaker 3: can link that in YouTube and the show notes. But
Speaker 3: I had a listener writ in a listener named Margaret,
Speaker 3: I believe she is in Pennsylvania, and she says, I'm
Speaker 3: watching your Limelight hydrange' show again, and I felt the
Speaker 3: need to show mine. It is planted at the top
Speaker 3: of a huge raised bed and has two offsprings that
Speaker 3: I made to make a cave like structure in a
Speaker 3: secret garden. This was purchased as a quart size plant,
Speaker 3: so a four and a half inch container four and
Speaker 3: a half inches twenty four years ago. Now, if you
Speaker 3: are listening to us on podcasts or on radio, you
Speaker 3: need to get over to YouTube or the show notes
Speaker 3: and see a picture of Margaret and her Winmelight Hydrangea
Speaker 3: it is.
Speaker 2: I mean, I'll paint a.
Speaker 3: Quick picture for you here. It's probably what you say,
Speaker 3: twenty five feet tall. I'm going to say that about
Speaker 3: twenty five feet tall and about is wide.
Speaker 1: Twenty five feet tall, twenty five feet why, twenty five
Speaker 1: years old, twenty five years old, quarter of a century.
Speaker 3: And I mean it must have thousands and thousands of
Speaker 3: blooms on it. I've seen a lot of limelights that
Speaker 3: haven't regularly been pruned. Not everyone has a space that
Speaker 3: Margaret does, but wow, what an absolutely stunning specimen.
Speaker 1: Man, it's a kick in the plants. Yes, so Margaret's
Speaker 1: a baby bloomer just like me.
Speaker 3: So you definitely want to take a look at that.
Speaker 3: And that's just something too, you know, kind of bear
Speaker 3: in mind as you think about if you're planting, you know, pruning,
Speaker 3: what's it going to look like in the long term?
Speaker 3: Do you have the space to let this thing go unpruned?
Speaker 3: And wow, a limelight can be just spectacular unpruned. So
Speaker 3: it's kind of one of those things where is that
Speaker 3: strictly necessary maybe nice to have in most situations, but
Speaker 3: you make your own decisions based on what you need.
Speaker 1: Great job, Margaret. Linda writes to us, have just come
Speaker 1: across your on air show today and I'm hooked. Thank
Speaker 1: you very much, Linda. I do have a question. Two
Speaker 1: years ago I had four crape myrtles removed stumps, grounded,
Speaker 1: way too close to my house and hard to maintain.
Speaker 1: The following spring, they began creeping back up. Strangely, the
Speaker 1: new shoots grow in a circle and very thick at
Speaker 1: each remaining soil mound. I have sprinkled, sprayed two four
Speaker 1: D charcoal starter fluid burning them, salt vinegar roundup. Wow,
Speaker 1: they keep coming back.
Speaker 2: He's trying it all, i'd think. Yeah.
Speaker 1: My question is if I plant something in that spot,
Speaker 1: do you think all of the chemicals I've sprayed has
Speaker 1: damaged the soil so that it will kill anything I
Speaker 1: plant there? And do you have suggestions as to what
Speaker 1: might finally do a way with these shoots? Thanks?
Speaker 3: Love your show, Right, okay, so you know take it away, right,
Speaker 3: So crape myrtles and I feel like we've been talking
Speaker 3: about crape myrtle quite a bit lately for a variety
Speaker 3: of reasons, and crape myrtles are definitely a Southern plant,
Speaker 3: but they are hardy and then people expected. And one
Speaker 3: of the reasons that we are able to grow them
Speaker 3: successfully up here in USDA Zone six, especially shrubby varieties
Speaker 3: like our center Stage series, is because they can grow
Speaker 3: from their roots. They can grow from the ground. So
Speaker 3: if we have a very harsh winter here, they grow
Speaker 3: up from the roots. Now, what that means for you
Speaker 3: as a Southern gardener is that they can grow up
Speaker 3: from the roots.
Speaker 2: And I'm not.
Speaker 3: Sure if your tree service there didn't do a great
Speaker 3: job grinding the stumps, because normally, when a stump is
Speaker 3: properly ground, everything should be gone to the point where
Speaker 3: this would not happen.
Speaker 1: I'm just still sitting here shell shocked. I wanted to
Speaker 1: make sure I read this right. Using charcoal starter.
Speaker 3: Yeah, she was burning it, trying to burn them barbecued
Speaker 3: close to the house too. So so okay, a couple
Speaker 3: of things there. So the the shoes that you're seeing
Speaker 3: are coming from roots that are still in the ground.
Speaker 3: And when I say roots, I don't mean like little
Speaker 3: tiny hair roots like a running perennial. I mean there
Speaker 3: is a portion of the woody plant, like the trunk
Speaker 3: or something still in the ground. Yeah, yeah, and so
Speaker 3: you need to dig back to that and you can
Speaker 3: take a little hatchet and try to ax that out.
Speaker 3: You could also, you know, trying to use an herbicide
Speaker 3: on this, I think is going to be really difficult
Speaker 3: because the shoots that are coming out are not big
Speaker 3: enough to absorb enough chemical to translocate into the remaining
Speaker 3: part of the plant and actually, you know, kill the plant.
Speaker 3: So I'm not sure that's going to help. I will
Speaker 3: say I have heard that if you cut backsuckers like
Speaker 3: these in late summer that will stop them because the
Speaker 3: hormone levels in the plant are such that it won't
Speaker 3: keep trying to grow back. If you can try waiting
Speaker 3: until summer. Otherwise, I think you're gonna have to, like
Speaker 3: I said, get a little hatchet and start trying to
Speaker 3: hatch it out whatever part they're coming from. So don't
Speaker 3: just cut them back when you see them, trace it back,
Speaker 3: you know, dig away the soil, trace it back to
Speaker 3: whatever part of the plant is in there. I wouldn't
Speaker 3: be surprised if it's the whole stump, especially since these
Speaker 3: are coming up in a circle. It sounds like the
Speaker 3: tree was cut off and the stuff that's left is
Speaker 3: all is where it's coming up.
Speaker 1: And if you were to apply some sort of herbicide,
Speaker 1: remember it's taken in systemically by the plants, so you're
Speaker 1: not let's call it poisoning the soil. What you're doing
Speaker 1: is the plants taking it in systemically, meaning if you
Speaker 1: do try this again in the future, falls the best
Speaker 1: time to do it.
Speaker 3: Yes, fall is a good time to do it, so
Speaker 3: you don't have to worry about the herbicides that you
Speaker 3: applied making the soil unhospitable for something else, the salt potentially,
Speaker 3: because of course salt is not a friend to the soil.
Speaker 3: But the good thing about salt and soil is that
Speaker 3: it leaches out very, very easily and quickly. So if
Speaker 3: you live in a rainy climate and or you have irrigation,
Speaker 3: unless you went absolutely bonkers crazy with the salt, it
Speaker 3: will already be leached out. So I don't think you
Speaker 3: need to worry about that vinegar. I don't know same
Speaker 3: kind of thing. I would think that any moisture, you know,
Speaker 3: regular irrigation or rainfall is going to take care of that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think so. I just have never heard charcoal starter,
Speaker 1: lighter fluid.
Speaker 3: Well, I wouldn't recommend that, especially being so close to
Speaker 3: your house. But you know, eventually you can exhaust the plant,
Speaker 3: but it is going to take some work. But like
Speaker 3: I said, I think if it were me, I would
Speaker 3: sharpen up that hatchet, try to trace it down, and
Speaker 3: just get all your aggressions out trying to chop up
Speaker 3: whatever's left in the soil there.
Speaker 1: I could go for a good burger right now. I
Speaker 1: guess I'm hungry. I didn't need lunch.
Speaker 4: Okay.
Speaker 1: David asks, I want to plant Miscanthus gigantis grass as
Speaker 1: screening the spring. What should I do to my unworked
Speaker 1: soil for the rhizomes very aggressive plant? I grow them
Speaker 1: in beach sand I would say, you know, David doesn't
Speaker 1: tell us what kind of soil he has. If it's
Speaker 1: a heavy clay soil, that can be a little bit
Speaker 1: of a problem because the roots are too wet and
Speaker 1: it can kind of keep the plant from not growing
Speaker 1: as aggressively as you want it to. So just work
Speaker 1: in organic matter into the soil and you're going to
Speaker 1: be fine.
Speaker 3: Well, you know what I wanted to say about David's question,
Speaker 3: and to a lot of people in Michigan, who have
Speaker 3: clay soil, which is just wild that you know, grow
Speaker 3: gardening out here on the lake shore sand all day
Speaker 3: long and you just go a little bit inland and
Speaker 3: it's clay city. But I have a tip for people
Speaker 3: who have clay soil that is difficult to dig in,
Speaker 3: and then is start with a smaller plant. You know,
Speaker 3: if you can get smaller plants like mail order or
Speaker 3: perhaps your garden center sells them. If you have clay soil,
Speaker 3: and especially if you're trying to plant something big with
Speaker 3: a dense root system like an ornamental grass and especially Misscanthus,
Speaker 3: there is no forgiveness. You're going to need to make
Speaker 3: that hole every bit as deep as it needs to be,
Speaker 3: which can make because you can't squish it down like
Speaker 3: some things you can kind of collapse the route and
Speaker 3: you know, get it in there. Not so with them
Speaker 3: as canthus. So start with a smaller plant so you
Speaker 3: don't have to dig as big of a hole. But overall,
Speaker 3: I don't think you need to really do too much
Speaker 3: at all. They'll be fine.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I say, just prepare the area, the general area
Speaker 1: work in organic matter. We've always said, Stacey, don't dig
Speaker 1: a hole and put some soil in it, plant in it.
Speaker 1: You're creating a bathtub. Yes, spare the general.
Speaker 3: Area and starting small is just I think a great
Speaker 3: way to deal with gray soil so you don't have
Speaker 3: to dig quite so much, or you know, move out
Speaker 3: to the lake shore. That's a great solution as well.
Speaker 3: All Right, we're going to take a little break. When
Speaker 3: we come back, we've got Mike Connor talking about pollinators
Speaker 3: and sprinkling up, so please stay tuned. Thanks for listening
Speaker 3: to the Gardens Amplified podcasts brought to you by Proven
Speaker 3: Winners Color Choice Shrubs. Our award winning flowering shrubs and
Speaker 3: evergreens are trialed and tested by experts with your success
Speaker 3: in mind. Learn more at Proven Winners color Choice dot com.
Speaker 1: Welcome back to the Gardening Simplified Show today for segment four,
Speaker 1: branching news and interview with Mike Connor, honey Tree Arborus Services,
Speaker 1: former grower of pollinator friendly trees. But Mike is an arborist,
Speaker 1: a certified arborist, a beekeeper. I know he's a speaker,
Speaker 1: much sought after and soon to be an author. Mike
Speaker 1: is well, I'm gonna say Honey Tree Nursery has this
Speaker 1: goal of basically getting people to plant pollinator trees and
Speaker 1: care for trees. I think, Mike, your motto always was
Speaker 1: plant a tree, save a bee, or something like that, Right, Mike, that's.
Speaker 4: My t shirt. That's right there, you go, and a tree,
Speaker 4: save a bee.
Speaker 1: You know, it's a good reminder for all of us, Mike,
Speaker 1: as we enter spring and trees start to bloom, just
Speaker 1: how important trees are. Many people think clover and other plants,
Speaker 1: but boy, a tree is a pretty effective way of
Speaker 1: providing pollen. Correct.
Speaker 4: I was just reading to report put out at Kentucky
Speaker 4: State University several years ago where they said that the
Speaker 4: most important spring plant for pollinators is red maple. Oh
Speaker 4: by far, it produces more flowers per cubic meter than
Speaker 4: almost any other plant in the springtime, and it's actively
Speaker 4: visited by honey bees, by native bees. I recently saw
Speaker 4: them being visited by what are called cellophane bees from
Speaker 4: one of our native bees. They're already out, they're already
Speaker 4: building up beehives, and they're so important for our early
Speaker 4: spring build up.
Speaker 1: You know, Mike. That makes sense to me because in
Speaker 1: the morning when I get up, I just kind of
Speaker 1: I'm groggy and I kind of just wander off to
Speaker 1: the the coffee pot. I have one thing in mind,
Speaker 1: a cup of coffee. And I would think that bees
Speaker 1: as they wake up in spring, they're they're looking for
Speaker 1: some flowers. And if red maple is gone to work
Speaker 1: early in spring, wow, it's a great resource.
Speaker 4: It really is. Rick and red maples are of a
Speaker 4: range that consists from Maine to Florida and all the
Speaker 4: way over to the Mississippi River, and then the cultivarts
Speaker 4: go beyond that, so it's ubiquitous. It's a really important tree.
Speaker 3: And you know, it's a shame because red maple is
Speaker 3: so beautiful. It's native and has much better fall color
Speaker 3: than any of the maples that are more widely planted.
Speaker 3: Silver maple and norm maple. I'm looking at you, but
Speaker 3: how do those compare? I mean, do they still have
Speaker 3: some value? Like you know, I have a massive silver
Speaker 3: maple in the eastman Or Parkway in front of my house.
Speaker 3: I didn't plant it, of course, it was there for
Speaker 3: some reason. All of the trees, every single tree that
Speaker 3: was ever planted in my yard was the worst possible choice.
Speaker 3: I don't know what the previous owners were thinking, but
Speaker 3: there is a massive silver maple, and of course it's
Speaker 3: covered in flowers. So does that still have some benefit,
Speaker 3: just not as beneficial as a native species.
Speaker 4: Well, actually, silver maple is very beneficial to the early
Speaker 4: pollinators because it's the very first tree to bloom in
Speaker 4: the spring. It comes out before the red maple. You know,
Speaker 4: the red maple depends on the gree days. It has
Speaker 4: to have a few degree days under its felt before
Speaker 4: it opens up, but the silver maple does not. It
Speaker 4: just has to have a chilling period. Once that chilling
Speaker 4: period has been accomplished, then the very first or second
Speaker 4: warm day above fifty five, those flowers open, and the
Speaker 4: flowers at the top of the tree open first, and
Speaker 4: then the side of the tree, and then the bottom
Speaker 4: of the tree. And the pollinators are out there as
Speaker 4: early as late February gathering nectar and pollen from those
Speaker 4: silver maples. And little note, the silver maples don't really
Speaker 4: care about the bees. They're not insect pollinated, pollinated by
Speaker 4: the wind. But the silver maples and the red maples
Speaker 4: produce nectar because it's are you ready for this, it's
Speaker 4: an ana freeze and it keeps that ana freeze around
Speaker 4: the ovaries, so they don't freeze, and they're able to
Speaker 4: be fertilized, they're able to develop, and the honeybees are
Speaker 4: taking advantage of that pollen and nectar as their own resource.
Speaker 4: It's a great relationship.
Speaker 2: That's amazing. I had no idea. I never heard that before.
Speaker 1: That is interesting, very interesting. So, Mike, in our first
Speaker 1: segment I mentioned GDD growing degree day accumulation a good
Speaker 1: thing for people to understand, and it's interesting you talk
Speaker 1: about the silver maples and the red maples along that line.
Speaker 1: As far as emergence of these native insects is concerned,
Speaker 1: there's a lot of confusion on how we should clean
Speaker 1: up our yards. Should we rank up to leave, should
Speaker 1: we prune everything back? How much disturbance should there be?
Speaker 1: As a pollinator and be expert, what's your advice on that?
Speaker 4: My absolute advice is be lazy, hold off. Don't get
Speaker 4: excited about cleaning up your perennial gardens early in the spring.
Speaker 4: It's very important that we leave those perennial gardens intact
Speaker 4: because those stems that are two years old are serving
Speaker 4: as a nursery and they're holding area for our overwintering
Speaker 4: native bees. Sixty percent of all the native bees that
Speaker 4: we have in the United States are ground dwelling, and
Speaker 4: when you rake that up and you kill that up
Speaker 4: before those bees get a chance to emerge, you can
Speaker 4: kill those pollinators in your perennial garden, and during really
Speaker 4: cold weather, those bees will return to some of those
Speaker 4: locations and escape the wind and escape the rain and
Speaker 4: the freezing temperatures. So my advice to people, and I
Speaker 4: know a lot of people will appreciate this, is don't
Speaker 4: clean up your perennial garden. Don't be anxious to do that.
Speaker 4: The later you can wait, the better. The very first
Speaker 4: ones to come out of our native bees are what
Speaker 4: we call the cellophane bees, and they're out gathering pollen
Speaker 4: and nectar right now and they are taking that back
Speaker 4: to the holes in the ground and they are feeding
Speaker 4: their larvae, and they'll be gone in two weeks. So
Speaker 4: I would recommend that we wait at least until the
Speaker 4: vinka the vinca in our area are in bloom before
Speaker 4: we start to rake and destroy those natural nesting areas
Speaker 4: for the bees.
Speaker 1: So I was right in the first segment, Stacy Mike.
Speaker 1: I told people to clean out their shed and work
Speaker 1: on their or hoses, and irrigation equipment.
Speaker 4: First, sit out, drink another cup of coffee. Yeah, don't
Speaker 4: be so anxious. And it's not just the bees, but
Speaker 4: it's the chrystmases. I'm sorry, Yeah, the chrystmases and the
Speaker 4: cocoons that are out there for our other pollinators. When
Speaker 4: they take those up too early, then we're destroying those
Speaker 4: native natural pollinators that we have in the garden.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and you know they're so well camouflaged. I know,
Speaker 3: a couple of years ago we found a cocoon here
Speaker 3: on the grounds at the nursery, and you know, it
Speaker 3: looked it would be easy for someone who wasn't looking
Speaker 3: for it to have just you know, tossed it out.
Speaker 3: But instead we got to watch this amazing moth emerge.
Speaker 4: You know, when I was a kid, we were big
Speaker 4: into bugs, and when we found those cocoons, we would
Speaker 4: put those behind the screen in the house, and so
Speaker 4: when those hatched out, the females would attract males by
Speaker 4: the dozen, and at kids, we could see those those
Speaker 4: male bees all fluttering around to come to visit the female,
Speaker 4: and then of course we let the female go. But
Speaker 4: what a great science experiment, what a great introduction to
Speaker 4: nature for kids. You find those cocoons, put them in
Speaker 4: a screen cage, and when they hatch, that protect them
Speaker 4: from birds. And when they hatch them the males and
Speaker 4: hopefully you've got a female, we'll come around to visit
Speaker 4: and say hi and let them all go and we
Speaker 4: can perpetuate that generation for another year.
Speaker 3: Well, you know, I think everything that you're saying is,
Speaker 3: you know, people here all the time now with social
Speaker 3: media and everything, you know, leave the leaves and blah
Speaker 3: blah blah, and and the bees, and they think that
Speaker 3: they're helping honey bees because of course most people when
Speaker 3: they think bees, they're thinking of honey bees. And you know,
Speaker 3: you're talking about all of these you know, vital and
Speaker 3: really interesting you know ecologies that exists, you know, right
Speaker 3: in our own backyards, and so many of us just
Speaker 3: kind of plow them over without thinking. And you know,
Speaker 3: for all of these catchy phrases like leave the leaves,
Speaker 3: there's not a whole lot of information there as to
Speaker 3: why and what's the you know, what's the joy and
Speaker 3: what's in it for us as homeowners and gardeners. And
Speaker 3: so I think it's so good to hear about all
Speaker 3: of these interesting things that you enable when you just
Speaker 3: give everything a little bit more time and space before
Speaker 3: you you know, humanize it.
Speaker 4: That's right, that's right. I'm a firm believer of that.
Speaker 4: Hold off a little while on cleaning up your spring debris,
Speaker 4: because that's what's best for the native pollinators. Now for
Speaker 4: our honey bees, now that's another topic, because honey bees,
Speaker 4: of course, they're the ones that are out there doing
Speaker 4: the bulk of the pollination. They're the ones that are
Speaker 4: coming through the winter as a colony of five thousand
Speaker 4: or more bees ready to get out there and pollinate,
Speaker 4: as opposed to our native bees which are emerging as
Speaker 4: a colony of one, and our queen bees and our
Speaker 4: honey bee hives will be producing right now maybe a
Speaker 4: thousand new babies a day, and they're all going to
Speaker 4: mature and then get out there to pollinate our gardens
Speaker 4: and our crops. But they are the major force for pollination.
Speaker 4: But we need to preserve all of our pollinators, not
Speaker 4: just the honey bees, but also our native bees, butterflies
Speaker 4: and of course hummingbirds and things like that. I find
Speaker 4: promoting the planting of trees for bees because most of
Speaker 4: our trees that we promote our good for our native
Speaker 4: beast and our honey bees. Some of our native trees
Speaker 4: are not good for honey bees, they're good for our
Speaker 4: native bees. So I like to promote trees that are
Speaker 4: beneficial to both natives and honey bees. That would be
Speaker 4: things like our lindens and our pulip trees and cornisimonum,
Speaker 4: and those types of things are so productive for both species.
Speaker 4: So we don't have to be exclusive and say I
Speaker 4: like one more than the other. Let's provide enough forage
Speaker 4: for both of those.
Speaker 1: That's fantastic. We're talking to Mike Connor Honey Tree Arborist Services,
Speaker 1: and Mike is a beekeeper, a certified arborist, a speaker,
Speaker 1: soon to be author. And I'd love to talk to
Speaker 1: you about that book at some point, Mike, because I
Speaker 1: think a lot of people are going to be very
Speaker 1: interested in this book. You write with your experience. I mean,
Speaker 1: you've been doing this be thing for I'm going to
Speaker 1: call you out here because I'm in the same group
Speaker 1: with you. How long have you been doing this, Mike.
Speaker 4: Well, I'll let you do the math. I've got my
Speaker 4: first hive of bees in nineteen sixty six. Wow, I
Speaker 4: was twelve years old and I ordered it through Sears catalog.
Speaker 2: Oh my gosh, I've got.
Speaker 4: Bees ever since. And at my peak I had about
Speaker 4: two hundred hives of bees. And now it's more back
Speaker 4: to a hobbyist observational status. And two of my daughters
Speaker 4: are interested in carrying on bees now, and I'm really
Speaker 4: excited about that.
Speaker 2: Love that is great.
Speaker 3: Now, so I have heard, and you know, maybe you
Speaker 3: can reassure our listeners because you know, even as much
Speaker 3: as people hear about bees being beneficial, most people think
Speaker 3: bees stinging. Don't want to encourage them.
Speaker 2: Now, is it.
Speaker 3: True that most of our native bees, like the celphane
Speaker 3: bees that you mentioned, et cetera, are not singing.
Speaker 4: They rarely, rarely sting, and if they do sting, it's
Speaker 4: almost negligible, it's a small pinch. I think that the
Speaker 4: many times I run into cellophane bees, you can take
Speaker 4: them with your hands. I'm not recommending you do this.
Speaker 4: You can get them in your hands, you can them
Speaker 4: out of the air, you can look at them, examine them.
Speaker 4: And I've never been stung. I even think if you
Speaker 4: stood on one barefoot, that it would be rare to
Speaker 4: be stung by a sellof ae B or one of
Speaker 4: these early native bees. It just is not a major factor.
Speaker 4: Most of these large bumble bees that we have flying around,
Speaker 4: they don't want to sting you. If you grab one
Speaker 4: in your hand, well then that could be the exception.
Speaker 4: But rarely will you be stung by a native bee. Rarely.
Speaker 2: So that's you know, it's win win.
Speaker 3: So you're helping these creatures that need our help, that
Speaker 3: are really being you know, their populations are being damaged
Speaker 3: by our own practices, and you don't even like they're
Speaker 3: all benefit, no harm, They're all beneficial.
Speaker 4: I don't see any harmful sides to these native bees
Speaker 4: at all. Mike.
Speaker 1: I wanted to quickly ask you something that I'm passionate about,
Speaker 1: and that is diversity in the landscape. We're talking about
Speaker 1: early spring things like red maple, but it's important to
Speaker 1: have diversity in the landscape because this bee thing, so
Speaker 1: to speak, is a season long thing. It's not just
Speaker 1: early spring.
Speaker 4: Oh, Rick, I'm so glad you asked that. There's a
Speaker 4: springboard for me to jump onto a new topic. Springboard
Speaker 4: that is that, Oh boy, our native bees rarely fly
Speaker 4: more than a thousand feet in their entire life.
Speaker 2: Think about that.
Speaker 4: They have got to have the diversity within a thousand feet.
Speaker 4: There are exceptions to that. Some of our bumblebees, for instance,
Speaker 4: a native bee will fly further than that, but most
Speaker 4: of our native beasts will fly less than a thousand
Speaker 4: feet in their entire life. That means you need a
Speaker 4: diversity of flowers from spring until fall to hit most
Speaker 4: of those major groups of native bees. Our native bees
Speaker 4: usually only live about two weeks, that you know, and
Speaker 4: then they're replaced by another native fee and then another
Speaker 4: native different species, a different genus. But if we don't
Speaker 4: provide a continuous supply of food for these bees, then
Speaker 4: we're going to miss out on some of the genuses
Speaker 4: and species that are available in our area. So I
Speaker 4: recommend the diversity always continuous bloom if we can do that.
Speaker 4: And then we get into things like the honeybee, which
Speaker 4: is you know, they just have to have a lot
Speaker 4: of resources because they're raising a lot of babies, and
Speaker 4: so no one plant provides all of the essential amino
Speaker 4: acids they need for the protein to raise those babies,
Speaker 4: but combinations do, such as red maple and pussy wallow.
Speaker 4: Those two provide a balanced diet. A lot of our
Speaker 4: fruit trees will provide a balanced diet, but not one individually.
Speaker 4: So we need to have that diversity not only in
Speaker 4: the trees, but in our forbes and then are smaller.
Speaker 4: What are ornamentals that we plant in our landscape because
Speaker 4: we need that we need that diversity of pollen for
Speaker 4: the essential amino acids.
Speaker 1: What a great sales pitch for plants on trials?
Speaker 3: Yes, indeed, yeah, And I'm absolutely I'm wondering, you know
Speaker 3: how So I think you know, what you're saying can
Speaker 3: resonate with a lot of people, but they kind of
Speaker 3: don't know where to start. And you know, Rick and
Speaker 3: I have talked about many times how certain plants in
Speaker 3: the garden center industry end up getting prioritized simply because
Speaker 3: they look great when people are in the garden center.
Speaker 3: So you know, a lot of landscapes kind of end
Speaker 3: up really just centering these plants that look great in
Speaker 3: that spring moment when they're in the garden center. So
Speaker 3: what are you know, some of the things that people
Speaker 3: can look for. Is is it a matter of bloom time,
Speaker 3: is it bloom shape, is it shrubs, perennials, Is it
Speaker 3: just kind of trying to combine all of these. Is
Speaker 3: there some sort of you know, secret recipe so to speak,
Speaker 3: that we can be working towards.
Speaker 4: You know, you can buy list You can get lists online. Unfortunately,
Speaker 4: and I mean this with all of sincerity, most of
Speaker 4: those lists are not accurate. And I'm not trying to
Speaker 4: be a know it all here, but most of those
Speaker 4: lists are based on somebody else's list or on somebody
Speaker 4: else's personal opinion on what's valuable for pollinators. I think
Speaker 4: that if you plant plants with a diversity of color, shape,
Speaker 4: and blooming time, that you generally match what those bees need. Now,
Speaker 4: that doesn't mean you only have to plant natives. And
Speaker 4: I know I'm going to get in trouble here. I'm
Speaker 4: sorry for that. But there are a lot of good
Speaker 4: native oars and cultivars and even non invasive plants that
Speaker 4: we can put into our gardens that help fill those
Speaker 4: gaps here here.
Speaker 1: I appreciate that, Mike, you're preaching to the choir there.
Speaker 4: Buddy, all right, we need to fill those gaps. So
Speaker 4: there's nothing else that's native filling those gaps such as
Speaker 4: early spring and late fall and early spring in late fall,
Speaker 4: you know, I promote the trees. There aren't a lot
Speaker 4: of plants out there that are providing large quantities of
Speaker 4: nectar or pollen in the spring, but we can plant
Speaker 4: things trees shrubs that do that. We can plant trees
Speaker 4: and shrubs in the fall that help fill that gap.
Speaker 4: Of course, one of my favorites is seven Sons, but
Speaker 4: I think that's my personal preference there. I love those
Speaker 4: trees we can do. In terms of cultivars. When we
Speaker 4: look at butterfly bush, I think that proven winners not
Speaker 4: giving you a plug here, But you guys have some
Speaker 4: varieties of butterfly plants that are even more productive than
Speaker 4: the native plants, and I think we should embrace that.
Speaker 4: We should plant those, We should acknowledge that that there
Speaker 4: are some things that are better than just the native plants,
Speaker 4: and they're better for our pollinators, and they're better for
Speaker 4: our environment and for our gardens, and they're pretty as
Speaker 4: long as they don't become invasive, and they're not invasive.
Speaker 4: That's what I tell people. I'm not necessarily a native person,
Speaker 4: gets me in trouble, but our honeybees are not native.
Speaker 4: Our honey bees aren't native, and they need to have
Speaker 4: some of the resources from our non native plants as
Speaker 4: long as they're not invasive.
Speaker 1: I agree. I mean, what is it people? Do you
Speaker 1: know in meetings they pound on the table or whatever.
Speaker 1: I mean, Mike thumbs up to you, buddy, I agree, well.
Speaker 2: Thank you. I agree to you.
Speaker 3: And what's interesting is that it sounds you know, you
Speaker 3: can frame this in a way that insects like their
Speaker 3: gardens very much like we do. Colorful and with lots
Speaker 3: of flowers. And so if a garden is looking good
Speaker 3: to you as a gardener, you know, for a long
Speaker 3: period during the season from spring until fall, with a
Speaker 3: good diversity of flowers and different things coming and going,
Speaker 3: than chances are that's also going to look pretty good
Speaker 3: to our native insects as well.
Speaker 4: Yes, yes, you've got it, you understand it. That's correct,
Speaker 4: and that's for our native bees. And then again, put
Speaker 4: on my other hand as a beekeeper, in that is
Speaker 4: that our honey bees need large resources of flowers that
Speaker 4: are all blooming at once, such as a flowering tree
Speaker 4: or a large metal, not a small metal. Honey Bees
Speaker 4: don't profit from a small pot of flowers. Their needs
Speaker 4: are too large. They need to gather a large quantity
Speaker 4: of nectar over the season and a lot of pollen.
Speaker 4: We need to have plants they're out there, or meadows
Speaker 4: they're outer there that are providing large quantities of nectro
Speaker 4: and pollen at one time. And that's what I push.
Speaker 4: And that's what a tree is. A tree is a
Speaker 4: meadow in the sky. And if we have a tree
Speaker 4: that's in bloom, a flowering crab apple, or a flowering
Speaker 4: maple that's in bloom, or Sepphora japonica or seven sons.
Speaker 4: Now we have a medal that's sitting in your yard
Speaker 4: that has a very small footprint, maybe only a couple
Speaker 4: square feet, but it's a metal going up and that
Speaker 4: metal going up can be planted next to a metal
Speaker 4: on the ground and we get double the flowers available
Speaker 4: for our pollinators.
Speaker 1: His name is Mike Connor. He's a certified arborist and beekeeper,
Speaker 1: a speaker, and Mike, I'm always inspired after talking to you,
Speaker 1: I sincerely mean that I can see why you're all
Speaker 1: the buzz. Can you share with people your website?
Speaker 4: Well, my website is Honeytree Nursery dot com and I
Speaker 4: don't even mind if you a personal question contact me
Speaker 4: via email, which is Honeytree nursery at Yahoo dot com.
Speaker 4: I'm happy to answer questions, love to do it, and
Speaker 4: I'll even take some flack from people. That's fine. I
Speaker 4: have broad but if you give me flack, give me
Speaker 4: facts like it.
Speaker 2: I like it.
Speaker 1: I like that a lot. Mike, you are a joy,
Speaker 1: I tell you what. Thanks so much for joining us
Speaker 1: on the Gardening Simplified Show today.
Speaker 4: Thank you for the invitation. I do appreciate it.
Speaker 2: It was a pleasure, Mike.
Speaker 4: Thanks, thank you.
Speaker 3: Wow, I am so inspired to get out there. If
Speaker 3: only it were warm enough to see an insect.
Speaker 1: He does that to me every time I'm fired up.
Speaker 3: I am too, so thank you so much to Mike
Speaker 3: from Honeytree Nursery. Thank you, Rick, thank you, thank you Adriana,
Speaker 3: and thanks so much to all of you for listening.
Speaker 2: We hope you have a wonderful week ahead.