Garden Questions of the Week
“What plants can I still be planting in my veggie garden?” -Buying transplants this time of the year may be hard to find, but many are sown from seed. Consider veggies that take 60 days or so to mature, or that enjoy cooler weather. Examples include cilantro, dill, beets, most greens, peas, garlic (for next year), turnips, cauliflower, cabbage, spinach, lettuce, broccoli, kale, radishes, onions, herbs you can pot up and take inside for the winter, etc. And with a quick addition of a low hoop house or straw bale walls with plastic across the top, you can extend the fall growing season even longer.
“Is it too late to treat the lawn with a weed and feed?” -I wouldn’t. As a matter of fact, I’m not a big one to use a weed and feed period. With the September seeding season coming up, I’d concentrate on getting the grass recovered from the summer, getting new grass growing, and then possibly look at a weed killer to be applied in mid to late October if needed. That’s a great time to go after many weeds in the lawn. If you do seed in early September, make sure the new grass has been mowed 3 times before applying a weed killer to the lawn. Again, mid to late October is one of the best times for broadleaf weed control – and use a water soluble weed killer to spot treat the weeds! Be sure to check out our Success Tip of the Week on evaluating your lawn.
“When is the best time to lime my lawn?” -Spring or fall and make sure that it’s not hot weather. Now, the real question here is whether or not your lawn needs to be limed? Personally I would never add lime to the lawn or garden (unless around tomatoes to add calcium) unless the soil was tested and required lime. There are a lot of soils out there that do not need to be limed. Was once an old habit to ‘sweeten the soil’, but now we know to ‘sweeten the soil’ if the soil test says we need sweetening. J
“Is it too late to plant things like roses, azaleas, and spruce trees?” -Actually, our landscape crews are planting new plants every day. As long as you can water regularly, go ahead and plant. Don’t forget that fall is the best time to plant just about everything, but if it’s available now and you can water, go for it.
“Do you have a cure for pesky raccoons?” -Not really. If they get into the trash cans, pouring bleach on the cans has worked for me. I have heard some folks soaking corncobs in vinegar, then placing those soaked cobs around the garden or where you don’t want the raccoons. You may want to try that! For corn patches, I have heard good results from growers who planted around the corn with squash, cucumbers, etc. I guess the raccoons don’t like the sharp edges of the leaves and hesitate going through it to get to the corn. And, of course, low electric fences or using the electronic motion detector of the ‘ScareCrow’ from ConTech may help.
“Ron, you mentioned getting several reports of in ground bee, wasp or yellow jacket nests. What should we do if they are a problem?” Well, here’s a quote from our good friend The Bug Dog – “I’ve forced myself to be very unafraid of wasps buzzing around me or even landing on my arm or clothing. In most cases, they are simply inspecting me to determine if I’m food or not! On the other hand, if one strikes me or persists in buzzing loudly in front of me, I must assume that I may be close to a nest and this worker is giving me a warning to move away. Honey bees, bumble bees and many wasps do give “warnings” if you are willing to listen! Stinging is really the last resort and the behavior can be very risky for the bee or wasp. Honey bees actually die after stinging because their barbed stinger gets stuck and pulls off the tip of the abdomen when the bee departs. My general recommendation about social bees and wasps is to try and avoid getting near their nests. They’ll be gone after the first hard frost. However, if you happen to find a nest that has been built under the mulch in a flower bed, a hole in the lawn, or other place where you may regularly need to perform maintenance, control may be necessary. There are all kinds of wasp and hornet aerosol sprays on the market, but these are generally inadequate for control of bees and wasps that nest in the ground or in wall voids. Only the umbrella wasps, Polistes, can be easily hit with these sprays. If you can locate, during the day, where the yellowjackets or bumble bees are entering their nests, try to determine where the wasps or bees land before crawling into the nest chamber. Make a mental note of this. Your strategy will be to dust this area with an insecticide, AT NIGHT, when the bees and wasps are unlikely to fly or be disturbed. My favorite insecticide to use is Sevin 5% or 10% garden dust, but you can find other garden dusts with pyrethroids. Thoroughly dust the landing spot with the dust so that the next day most of the bees or wasps will walk through the material. Once they walk through the insecticide dust, the insects will carry the material into the nest. There, the bees and wasps will groom themselves and each other, distributing the insecticide throughout the colony. I’ve been pretty successful at knocking out a colony with one application, but sometimes a rain or irrigation can wash away the insecticide dust, so another application may be necessary in a few days.” –Dr. Dave Shetlar (The Bug Doc)
“Do you know of a recipe for making a leaf shine for indoor plants?” -Yes, many. But they aren’t recommended any more. The best thing for your plants is to wash them off in the shower or tub and wipe down the leaves. Don’t use leaf shines.
“My lantana had flowers, but now has small purple berries and no flowers. Any ideas?” -Yes, it went to seed. Cut off those seed heads, and clip back tips of the plant. Hopefully we’ll get it to re-grow and keep flowering.
“I have tomato hornworms on my tomatoes which are in planters up on a deck area. How did the hornworms find my tomatoes?” The adult moth finds the plants (tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, and potatoes) and then lays eggs on the undersides of the leaves. By the way, it could be tomato or tobacco hornworms, as they both feed on the same plants. To tell the difference, the tobacco hornworm has 7 diagonal white stripes and a red horn / tomato has V-shaped markings and the horn is black).
“My Autumn Joy Sedum always flops over this time of the year. What can I do to prevent this?” - Place a grow ring or peony ring over them before they start to grow in the spring (for support), or cut them in half late May/early June. This delays flowering by a couple weeks, but keeps them shorter, stockier, and less apt to flop over.
