STERLING — — Guests at Northeastern Junior College didn’t let the cooler temperature keep them from enjoying the beautiful plants and trees around campus during the college’s third annual Botanical Walk on Thursday.
Kimberly Harford, a licensed landscape architect with Country Gardens Nursery who designed the various landscape plans on campus, conducted the tour.
The tour included a look at the newest beautification effort to be completed, the area between Phillips-Whyman and Poole halls. Funding for this part of the beautification project came from the Alumni Association. Vegetation in this area is similar to that at the belltower promenade, with skyline honeylocust trees, sunny igloo fall mums and Eldorado calamagrostis grass.
During the tour Harford provided some winterizing tips.
“After everything freezes is a great time to get in your garden and do some work,” she told the group.
One of her first tips is to always cut grasses back in the fall after they’ve gone dormant.
She also pointed out fall is a great time for planting, because then the plants don’t have to withstand the hot temperatures of the summer. However, one thing that should never be planted in the fall is evergreen trees; April to August is the best time to plant those.
Additionally, Harford gave some pruning tips. She pointed out that it’s important to consider the bloom time of the shrub you’re pruning, because if you prune it at the wrong time you won’t get any flowers. Pruning stimulates growth, which you don’t want to do if the plant is about to go dormant.
Hardford said the fall is the best time to prune any spring blooming shrubs. She suggested waiting until the plant is completely brown before pruning it.
She also talked about using liquid iron to help improve the health of plants. If a plant is yellow, Hartford recommended putting liquid iron on it once a week, from April 1 through Memorial Day.
Contact Journal-Advocate staff writer Callie Jones at 970-526-9286 or cjones@journal-advocate.com
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