The Know, Hoe, Sow, Grow and Show Guide | Volume # 5 | Aug 10/06

I was in California last week on a bit of a business holiday so the mailbox is waaaay backed up. I won’t be able to get to all the questions given the need to hit some deadlines in my real writing world. I’m working on it though. The gardening highlight of the trip for me was wandering around in Muir Wood with the giant redwoods. What fantastic trees! I’ll be blogging about these trees this week and including a few pictures but that was worth the trip. The non-gardening highlight (one of several) was whipping down the “Bullit” hill in San Francisco. For one all-too-brief brief moment of weightlessness, I was Steve McQueen. (insert big loopy grin here) Doug's Blog is at http://doug-greens-gardening.blogspot.com Doug's lens is at http://www.squidoo.com/beginning-gardening/ You can download Right now, there's one on "A Dictionary of Gardening", "Plant Thugs" and "Gardening with Children". Picture of the Week New Articles This Week Storing Dahlia bulbs http://www.flower-garden-bulbs.com/storing-dahlia-bulbs.html Planting Dahlia bulbs http://www.flower-garden-bulbs.com/planting-dahlias.html General Dahlia information http://www.flower-garden-bulbs.com/dahlia-bulbs.html The Butterfly Iris (and all the plants known with this name) http://www.gardening-tips-perennials.com/butterfly-iris.html Pondless Waterfall http://www.water-gardens-information.com/pondless-waterfalls.html Tomato Hornworm http://www.beginner-gardening.com/tomato-hornworm.html Kitchen Compost Container http://www.simplegiftsfarm.com/kitchen-compost-container.html Want To Ask a Question? Please do a search here. Search Here If you don't find what you're looking for - HIT REPLY ON THIS NEWSLETTER TO ASK YOUR QUESTION (that's easy isn't it) Your email address will get through my spam filters. Your Questions Answered *** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** *** * ** Hi, I never got around to de-thatching my grass in the spring. It is real need of it. Can it be done in August. Thanks Betty A: Sure, you “can” do it now. BUT what makes you think you have a thatch problem? I’ve written about thatch before and it really is a problem in southern gardens but rarely in northern ones. The lawn care industry has made a killing out of this so-called “problem”. The facts are that thatch is a symptom of lawn mismanagement. If you overfeed and water in the wrong way (too many tiny showers) then you can indeed produce thatch (where the roots grow up above the ground into the layer of non-decomposed material) If you’re not overfeeding and overwatering – then the odds of a northern gardener having “thatch” are pretty remote. What you might have is an accumulation of dead grass blades. Try raking the lawn – that will get rid of most problems (that are purely cosmetic right now). If you’re in the South – (you don’t say) then you might indeed have thatch. It would be better to wait until the season cools down a little bit to go in an clean out the problem. Dethatching will stress the plants. You “can” do it now but it will be better to wait. But then solve the problem next year by watering and feeding properly. You can get my ebook that describes all the proper organic techniques for lawn care right here. *** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** *** * ** I had never seen these round balls inside of a calla lily before. Should I save them or throw them away? A: I got this question several times this week in various forms. Those round balls in the middle of dying flowers are seeds. You can start them yourselves (see the seed starting articles on the sites) or toss them to a friendly neighbour. *** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** *** * ** Hi Doug, I'm probably commenting on the wrong forum but if you read this it's ok. I made up a mixture of vegetable oil, dish soap and about 2 Tbsp of rubbing alcohol added to half a watering can of water. Within a few minutes or less, the lily beetles which contacted the solution directly, were dead. A: Here’s a spray combining a ton of homemade kitchen ingredients that this reader says knocks down red-lily beetles. Each of these ingredients by itself has been shown to have some knock-down power on some pests. If this were my garden, I’d be spraying a little bit to test it on the leaves and see if it burns them before I went whole-hog and used it all over the place. I know that alcohol bothers some plants and vegetable oil bothers others. *** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** *** * ** I have a garden pest that has me confounded! Maybe you can help. I noticed that all my beautiful tomatoes, were never ripening and just disappeared! Then one day I happened across the culprit--my 80 pound lab puppy!!! I have threatened to string him up by his toes, but he just gives me his big goofy grin. What's a gardener to do? A: I had a lab that loved tomatoes – picked them off the vines. Also dug up the carrots. Taught an Old English Sheepdog to do the same. The cure is a tall fence. Labs are loveable – will eat anything not nailed down and are about as subtle as a bag of hammers. And if you're having trouble growing tomatoes, let me suggest you check out my tomato growing ebook. *** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** *** * ** Why do gladiola flower spikes grow crooked even though I planted them deep enough and used the hooped metal stakes to stake them? A: My understanding (I used to grow 10,000 glads a year for cut flowers) is that variations in both water and corm temperature and the relationship between them tend to produce the crooked neck. Deeper plantings are normally recommended so the corm stays the same temperature. Regular waterings are recommended to eliminate the swing in water availability. The seasonal variations in temperature and natural water will tend to produce tip crook in some years and not others with the same cultural care. So the trick then is to plant deep enough – water regularly and mulch to ensure both the moisture and the soil temperature swing are within acceptable bounds. Those hoopy things merely hold the heavy flower upright so the tips don’t do the bend-to-the-sun routine. Bending towards the sun is not the common cause of the tip crook problem. You’re likely going to need all three “solutions” if the problem is persistent in your garden. *** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** *** * ** What are beetle bag traps and where could I find them? My lilies are decimated from Japanese Beetles and need help! Sue A: I received a firestorm of notes about Japanese beetles. Some excellent notes that I’m trying to include in the next few issues. A trap is a chemical lure with sex-hormones in it. You hang this bag (usually available from better garden shops or some big box stores) in an area and the beetles flock to it thinking that there’s a “good time” to be had there because it smells so sexy. They enter the trap and can’t get out. You do want to put it somewhere where you don’t have great plants because it will attract beetles from a goodly distance away. In other words, don’t put the trap on your prize rose bush but rather in the back of the yard somewhere. Or, put it over on the non-gardening neighbour’s place (insert wicked grin here). And yes, according to all the mail I received this week –they work really well. Some of you tried not using them one year and got eaten to the ground and would never be without them. I’ll be writing another article on Japanese beetles updating the info that’s out there and incorporating some of your thoughts on this pest. But for now – find one of those traps and hang it if you’re having problems. (As an aside – I don’t track local sources of supply so I can’t tell you which garden shop in your area carries these – you’ll have to live on the telephone to find one) From My Garden To Yours The gardens are at their summer peak as I write this note and I’m pleased with the first year of growth in the main flowerbed. There are a few weak plants yet and a ton of moving around to do this fall to get better combinations and correct a few of the problems from the spring but for the most part, I’m happy with this year. The mulch has been doing a good job of holding down the majority of weeds and I’m still moving mulch into these beds, pulling weeds and thickening up the mulch to the three to four inches I like to see on my perennial beds. The fertilizer I used, (acti-sol) has made an incredible difference to growth rates where I applied it and you can see a clear difference between the areas that were fed and those that were ignored. Need some good water garden construction pictures? Naturally, there are a few problems in the flowerbeds and my column about blasting bugs off with water seems to have ignited a bit of a storm of questions about pests and problems in the garden. I was swamped with emails after this article ran; so much so that I want to introduce you to my main concept in insect control in the garden. I want to introduce you to the 15-foot garden. The 15-foot garden is a concept I borrowed from the wooden boat world – where we sometimes refer to boats as 30-foot boats. That is, the boat looks really good from 30 feet away and the imperfections in varnishing and painting only become apparent when you get up close and personal with the boat. The 15-foot garden is the same thing. At 15-feet in distance away from a plant, most plants look pretty good. It is only when you get closer that you’ll be able to see the small marks from a bite here and there or a tad of slug damage or any other problem. I have a 15-foot garden. It looks good as you walk down the pathway or drive by in a slow-moving car. It is only when you get right down and close to plants that you see insects are at work. In my case, I ignore them unless they are eating more than their share. In the case of the caterpillars chomping down on the roses, it was clear they were out of control. The water spray did the job and I haven’t seen them return. In the case of a bit of slug or earwig damage, I figure fair is fair. I get the flowers from 15 feet away and the insects get to eat a few leaves. When I decide not to control pests, I allow a natural balance to begin to establish itself in the garden. There will be predators arrive to eat the plant-eaters and the damage on my plants will be kept to a dull minimum. It is only when gardeners get too close to the plants and decide to have a zero-tolerance approach to insects that there is a problem. Zero tolerance has no place in our gardens. A problem for many gardeners is they can’t appreciate a little damage. We’ve been taught to think of perfect gardens and perfect homes with no tolerance for insects. So we want our plants to be as perfect as ourselves. Mine are. (insert wry grin) When there are things to be fixed (with the plants – not the perfect author) some beginner gardeners have difficulty recognizing what is or is not a pest. They have difficulty recognizing threshold damage (the damage below which you don’t need to control a pest) and they don’t know what the pest is. They get some noxious chemical that is guaranteed to knock down an army and slather it on their plants and lives. You Can Keep Roses Alive All Winter With No Protection Let me suggest a rather more benign approach. I know you won’t want to ignore garden pests, so if you have to control pests in your garden and you don’t know what you’re controlling, use diatomaceous earth. If you can’t see the pest on the underside of the leaf, then the odds are the pest is crawling up the plant or hiding somewhere on the plant. Check all leaf axils, in buds and under the leaves. Diatomaceous earth is harmless to humans (including the childhood types) and animals. When dusted around the base of the plant, it will kill most insects that crawl over top of it. If you have to dust around the tops of the plants, this is fine as well. It is far better to use an environmentally benign product than a toxic wipeout product if your objective is to kill off all moving insects. Do not breathe this dust (it is an excellent idea to use a dust mask). It is available at most garden shops under a wide variety of names. Do take the noxious stuff to the appropriate recycling depot to remove temptation. The 15-foot garden works really well for me. I don’t get too excited about a little damage and I don’t go for the gardening equivalent of a personal nuclear device if there is damage. I lose a few leaves and even a flower or two here and there but really – at 15 feet, I have a perfect garden.

Parting Words “What a man needs in gardening is a cast-iron back, with a hinge in it.” Charles Dudley Warner My Summer in a Garden, 1871 Do You Want to Grow Lavender?