Not sure what to do about those bugs chewing up your flowers? Concerned about selecting the right plants for your yard? Wondering what kind of grass is the most drought tolerant?

Help is a phone call and click away at the Hillsborough County Extension Service.

The Master Gardener Help Desk is staffed Monday through Friday from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. with gardening pros ready to answer landscape-related questions for local residents.

“They can assist homeowners with lawn and pest problems, what to successfully grow in their landscape and vegetable gardens, and when and how to water effectively,” the extension’s website says.

These gardening experts don’t stop with over-the-phone advice either.

“Insect and plant samples may be taken to the Help Desk for identification and for solutions to problems,” the website says. “Soil samples can be tested for a nominal charge to determine pH.”

Have a question you need answered?

Just call 813-744-5519. Questions can also be emailed to: hillsmg@ad.ufl.edu.

For more information, visit the extension’s website. The extension office is located at 5339 County Road 579 in Seffner.

What’s the biggest challenge you’ve faced in your garden? How did you beat it? Tell us by commenting below!

Posted: Tuesday, May 21, 2013 10:28 am

May gardening tips

By Whit Weems

Stephenville Empire-Tribune

This week I wanted to share with you a few gardening tips for the month of May from Dr. William C. Welch, who is a Professor and Landscape Horticulturist with Texas AM AgriLife Extension Service office in College Station.

• Spring Flowering Shrubs – If you have any spring flowering shrubs, you can prune them after they bloom. Remember to keep the natural form of the shrub in tact and avoid excessive pruning.

• Roses – they have very high fertilizer requirements. For most soil types you can use a complete fertilizer on the first application, which can be applied when spring growth starts. Then, apply nitrogen only fertilizer every 4-6 weeks (usually after a flowering cycle). When selecting fertilizers, Nitrogen is the first number represented. For example, a 21-0-0 would mean there is 21 pounds of Nitrogen per 100 pounds of product, 0 pounds of Phosphorus and 0 pounds of Potassium. For organic sources of fertilizer, you could consider products such as cottonseed, composted manures, rotted manures and/or alfalfa pellets.

Many rose varieties are also susceptible to black spot fungus. If you are growing the susceptible varieties, spray with a rose fungicide every 7-10 days. Some of the old garden varieties and the newer varieties (especially KnockOut) are considerably resistant to the fungus and would not require fungicide applications.

As soon as climbing hybrid tea roses have completed their blooming cycle they can be pruned back.

• Trees – you may begin to see bag worms show up on junipers and narrow leafed evergreens. If so, you can use products like seven dust, or spray to control only if the insect and bags that are 1/2 inch in length or less. If they get much larger they become difficult to control.

Caterpillars may begin to attack live oak trees. When they do, they can be alarming, because they will be in large numbers and remove many leaves. There is not a good option for homeowners to control the caterpillars, but most healthy trees can regrow their leaves and return to normal after the cycle.

• Insects – Begin watching for aphids. These insects are very small and feed on many different plants. They secrete a sticky substance that leaves behind a residue on plants, sidewalks, vehicles, etc., depending upon the host plant and location. One of the most common aphid attacks each year is on Pecan trees. If they appear in large numbers, then control measures should be implemented. There are many insecticides available that can be used, but just washing them off with a strong spray of water can provide adequate control for the home landscape.

• Annual flowers – consider purchasing annual flowering plants to add instant color to the landscape. When planting, pinch off the flowers and buds to allow the plant to become better established. This will allow the plant to use its energy reserves to establish roots instead of supporting the blooms on the plant.

Whit Weems is an Erath County extension agent. His column appears weekly and online at yourstephenvilletx.com.

Sara Vanden Berge is the managing editor of the Empire-Tribune. She can be reached at sara.vandenberge@empiretribune.com. Follow her on Twitter @ETeditor.

• 
  Discuss
  
• Print
  
  
  

Posted in
Community

on

Tuesday, May 21, 2013 10:28 am.

| Tags:


Whit Weems

Related Stories and Links

• Close

  
  
  

  Video

  Victoria Day long weekend a busy one for garden centres

The Victoria Day weekend is often the traditional start of planting and gardening for many people here in Canada.

As the weather begins to warm up, many people take out their tools and start digging, trimming and planting, all of which can be hard work.

Before going for a run or hitting the gym you likely stretch and warm up, but how about before starting gardening?

Dr. Stacy Irvine, a chiropractor at Totum Life Science, says it’s important to do that, and also to break up your work.

“Try to spend approximately fifteen minutes doing each task, which means that you’re going to be changing your body position while gardening,” Irvine said. “People get in trouble when they stay in one position for too long.”

Improper techniques can lead to back injuries as well as repetitive strain injuries to joints and muscles.

Beyond warming up and alternating tasks, it’s also important to lift right – bending your knees and keeping a straight back – as well as ensure you kneel when planting.

You should keep a straight back doing this as well, and you can ease the strain on your knees with knee pads or a kneeling mat.

Posted by Carol Stocker…

Regardless of the type of vegetable you plant, here are some general tips provided by the University of Illinois Extension for growing vegetable container gardens:

Choosing a Container

Anything that holds soil and has drainage holes in the bottom may be transformed into a container garden for terrestrial plants
For vibrant plant growth, the containers must provide adequate space for roots and soil media, allowing the plant to thrive.

Soil

When choosing what to use to fill containers, never use garden soil by itself no matter how good it looks or how well things grow in it out in the garden.
Container soils are often referred to as soilless or artificial media, because they contain no soil at all.
When these mixes are used, they should be moistened slightly before planting. Fill a tub with the media, add water and lightly fluff the media to dampen it.
When filling containers with media, don’t fill the pot to the top. Leave about a one inch space between the top of the soil and rim of the pot.
Soils for containers need to be well aerated and well drained while still being able to retain enough moisture for plant growth.

Fertilizer

A regular fertilizer program is needed to keep plants growing well and attractive all season.
The choice of fertilizer analysis will depend on the kinds of plants you are growing. High nitrogen sources would be good for plants grown for their foliage while flowering and vegetable crops would prefer lower nitrogen and higher phosphorous types.

Choosing Plants for Your Container Garden

Plants that thrive in like soil, watering, and light conditions make successful combinations. When combining plants, size, texture, proportion, color, setting, and lighting all play a role.

Taking Care of Your Vegetable Plants

Containers offer the advantage of being portable. As the seasons, temperature and light conditions change, you can move your containers to maintain the desired conditions for peak performance.
Most fruit bearing vegetables such as tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, squash, and eggplant require full sun.
Leafy vegetables such as lettuce, cabbage, collards, mustard greens, spinach, and parsley can tolerate more shady location compared to the root vegetables such as turnips, beets, radishes, carrots, and onions.
There are no hard and fast rules when it comes to watering. That is why you have to be watching your containers on a regular basis and understand the requirements of the plants you choose to put in the containers.
The best way to tell if a plant needs water is to feel the soil. And if the first inch or so of the soil is dry, water. Use enough water each time so water starts to drip out of the drainage holes.

FAVORITE NURSERIES
One of my favorite nurseries, Lake Street Garden Center, 37 Lake St., Salem, N.H. is opening for the season. Call 603-893-5858. The selection is so large and the quality is so good, it really is worth a trip. Great plants for containers…

The Victoria Day weekend is often the traditional start of planting and gardening for many people here in Canada.

As things begin to warm up, many people take out their tools and start digging, trimming and planting, all of which can be hard work.

Before going for a run or hitting the gym you likely stretch and warm up, but how about before starting gardening?

Dr. Stacy Irvine, a chiropractor at Totum Life Science, says it’s important to do that, and also to break up your work.

“Try to spend approximately fifteen minutes doing each task, which means that you’re going to be changing your body position while gardening,” Irvine said. “People get in trouble when they stay in one position for too long.”

Improper techniques can lead to back injuries as well as repetitive strain injuries to joints and muscles.

Beyond warming up and alternating tasks, it’s also important to lift right – bending your knees and keeping a straight back – as well as ensure you kneel when planting.

You should keep a straight back doing this as well, and you can ease the strain on your knees with knee pads or a kneeling mat.

With the long Memorial Day weekend just around the corner, chances are more than a few Land O’ Lakes residents are preparing to dig in and tackle a lawn or landscaping project.

Those with questions on how to proceed to make sure their efforts pay off with a look that can survive Central Florida’s drought-prone climate might want to check with the Pasco Cooperative Extension before getting started.

On its website, the extension office features a variety of resources for homeowners that want to make landscaping improvements that are environmentally friendly.

Some of those resources include:

• Principle of Florida-Friendly Landscaping
• Tips on lawn care and irrigation
• Information about pests that might be chewing up yards

To find out more, just visit the Pasco Cooperative Extension online.

What’s the biggest challenge you’ve faced in your garden? How did you beat it? Tell us by commenting below!

Planting the garden on the May long weekend is a rite of spring for many Manitobans, but with cooler than usual temperatures earlier this season, should gardeners wait?

Some garden experts say those with itchy green thumbs should hold off on putting some plants in the ground, especially those that came from a greenhouse, in order to avoid damage from spring frost.

But for those itching to get into the garden — even with rain in the forecast for much of the weekend — there are at least six things that can be done right now, according to David Hanson, founder of Sage Garden Herbs in Winnipeg:

1. Weed your garden.
2. Clean up your perennials. Trimming out the old growth would allow more room for them to grow.
3. Plant seeds for vegetables that can withstand cooler ground temperatures, such as beets, carrots, potatoes, peas and lettuces. Raised beds are great for these.
4. Plant seeds for flowers like calendula sunflowers and poppies.
5. Get your planters and pots done. A smaller amount of mud warms up faster. And since it’s not in the ground, you don’t need to worry about frost.
6. Pick up trees and shrubs from the greenhouse that have wintered outside. These can be put into the ground now.

As for whether to plant now or wait, Hanson is in favour of waiting.

“The farmers’ tradition would be to wait until the first new moon in June, which can actually be up to the second week of June. The reason for this is there’s still cold coming up out of the ground,” he said.

“If you take those nice greenhouse-grown plants and you put them into the somewhat chilly ground, even if the air temperatures have gotten beautiful, they resent it a little bit.”

Nicole Bent of Shelmerdine Garden Centre is also urging impatient gardeners to wait, especially if they want to plant annuals or perennials.

“You do not want to plant your tender annuals into the ground, or any planter that’s difficult to move,” she said.

“Spring frost is going to do serious damage to any annuals or even perennials…. Most of the perennials that you find in your garden centres are greenhouse-grown, so they are just not ready for the outdoors just yet.”

Bent estimated that spring frost in June occurs about once every four years.

Home, garden stores will be busy

Meanwhile, garden and home stores are expected to be packed this weekend with customers keen to work on their homes, yards or cabins.

Ron Borthistle, one of the owners of the Home Hardware in Selkirk, Man., said it’ll be one of the busiest weekends of the year at his store.

“There’s a lot of basics going on there, from yard cleanup, patching roofs, fixing that plumbing that maybe failed over the course of the winter, raking lawns, staining decks,” he said.

Borthistle said despite the long lines, customers are generally pretty cheerful because it’s a holiday weekend.

What is your long weekend plan?

Yes there are a number of options available, you can set your browser either to reject all cookies, to allow only “trusted” sites to set them, or to only accept them from the site you are currently on.

However, please note – if you block/delete all cookies, some features of our websites, such as remembering your login details, or the site branding for your local newspaper may not function as a result.

<!– –>
• 
  Tweet
  
• 
  –
  A
  A
  A
  +
  

<!–

–>

KUSA – Warmer days and especially warming soil conditions make this a prime weekend for planting warm season vegetables.

Because of the drought, we are using a new planting technique this year in the 9News Kitchen Garden called the “waffle garden.” Instead of planting veggies in long rows, plant seeds and starter plants of the same kind within squares that are dug out to be slightly lower than the rest of the garden.

Within each square, lower the soil about 1-2 inches and then rim the edge of the square with a mound of soil about 3-4 inches high. This technique essentially creates a square saucer that holds water and prevents run-off after watering.

This technique also makes plants slightly denser than row planting. This tighter form of planting shades the soil more than row planting which helps hold in moisture. The shade also deters weeds.

Other tips for a water-wise edible garden:
• After planting, apply mulch around the bases of plants. Bark or even grass clippings from mowing the lawn are good mulches.
• Use drip irrigation. It is the most efficient method of watering all plants other than lawns. It is also gardener friendly because you can simply schedule automatic watering via the irrigation system’s timer.

What to plant
Once the danger of frost has past, get warm season crops in the ground. This year, de-emphasize the more ornamental plants, like pumpkins, and plant more serious edibles such as:
• Tomatoes
• Tomatillos
• Peppers
• Squash varieties
• Brussels sprouts
• Beans and peas
• Rhubarb
• Berries, such as raspberries and strawberries

Growing edibles is a sustainable use of resources when we use water wisely in the process.

Information courtesy Associated Landscape Contractors of Colorado – sponsors of the 9News Water Wise Garden and the 9News Kitchen Garden. www.alcc.com

(KUSA-TV © 2013 Multimedia Holdings Corporation)