Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
With Scott Berline. Who's back. I'm back. I'm Scott, and
Mark is back. You had me scared for a minute.
You laid down on the floor.
Speaker 2 (00:08):
Well after the last break when you were doing push ups.
I had to do some stuff.
Speaker 3 (00:11):
Yeah. We're doing sit ups or something over there.
Speaker 4 (00:14):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (00:14):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (00:15):
Anyway, you're with Gardens Alive, chief horticultureist, good guy, good good,
knowledgeable guy, expert, you know, and all kinds of things.
And I'm glad you're here.
Speaker 2 (00:23):
I'm happy to be here.
Speaker 1 (00:25):
In fifteen minutes, we're going to have doctor Paul Kapiella
join us from U Dell Gardens and Potanical Gardens down
in Louisville or Crestwood.
Speaker 2 (00:32):
He'll raise the class of this show a bit.
Speaker 3 (00:35):
Oh he will.
Speaker 4 (00:36):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (00:36):
He's a PhD.
Speaker 2 (00:37):
Yeah you knew that right, and fine human.
Speaker 3 (00:40):
He's one of my favorite people, honestly.
Speaker 1 (00:43):
And we are going to crown or debunk common garden wisdom, chestnuts.
Speaker 2 (00:50):
Or neither or yes, yeah, because we might not.
Speaker 1 (00:54):
Know sometimes we won't. We'll just discuss them anyway. We
want your calls for that. If you have experience with
trying things that are out there bits of information, the
common things that are mentioned all the time, what worked,
what didn't give us a call? We'll be taking those calls.
Eight hundred eight two three eighty two fifty five. Do
(01:16):
you want to mention that you can join in the
fun of in the garden on Facebook with Ron Rothis
and friends. And uh, we're going to go right to
things you should have done last week timely tasks. I
was prepared, you were not.
Speaker 2 (01:34):
Well. I don't like homeworks, Scott. This one really has
held me back in my everything pursuits.
Speaker 3 (01:42):
Yeah, I can.
Speaker 1 (01:43):
I can see the notes time here misers westle Mark
doesn't apply himself. Yeah, yeah it happened. Oh yeah yeah,
bes B minus C plus is if you only tried.
Speaker 2 (01:56):
Yeah, I could have got to see if I've tried.
Speaker 3 (01:59):
That there was a story of my grade school and
high school and college.
Speaker 2 (02:03):
Yeah yeah, but we've we've really made the success of ourselves.
Speaker 3 (02:07):
We were late bloomers, right, Yeah, that's what we can
tell ourselves. So what is your first timely task?
Speaker 2 (02:14):
Well, Scott, the slugs have been horrible because of all
the rain. Yeah, just off, I mean bad. And you
know there's the slug baits that with the iron posphates
and that you know, well, plus I'm just not sure
how much you can use if you will build up
(02:35):
too much phosphate and yes, oil and h so it
can only do so much. So in beer traps, that
has never worked.
Speaker 3 (02:42):
A total waste of beer. Yeah, yeah, beer.
Speaker 2 (02:45):
It's a good reason to open a beer.
Speaker 3 (02:48):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (02:48):
And that's the only reason I do fall into the
trap of alcoholics. Yeah yeah, but that's never worked. But
I I searched online and when I did my search
for slug bait, yeah trap, I put the pdf on
like Jared recommended.
Speaker 1 (03:06):
To a universe your question and then dot pdf which
will get you the like extension and yeah.
Speaker 2 (03:12):
And their university yeah answers and some university in the midwest, Wisconsin,
Ohio state someone they recommend it. There By far, the
best lure was basically a yeast bread dough flowers and
yeast and you just make a real liquidy slurry of
it and put it in your trap. And so I'm
(03:32):
going to try.
Speaker 1 (03:33):
That, and you get their blood sugar level up, they
get diabetes and die or where's the dying. They drowned,
They drown it.
Speaker 2 (03:39):
Or you can make a dough and you're supposed to
go out there and pick them off. I don't want
to pick off.
Speaker 3 (03:45):
That slime is on your hand from Yeah, it's.
Speaker 2 (03:47):
Hard, amazing, interesting substance, it is. So that's what I
wish I would have done a month ago.
Speaker 1 (03:52):
What about diatamacious earth, I've heard that is this. You know,
you put it down and you have no way of
knowing if it worked or nothing. That might be another
that might be a good one for the trope conversation. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,
I'm just going to reiterate, like I think I'm gonna
do every week.
Speaker 3 (04:08):
Weed. Your life as a gardener is so much better
if you keep weeding. You stay on top of the weeds.
Speaker 2 (04:18):
Oh, I know, you're right, Scott. It's hard to catch
up and yeah yeah yeah.
Speaker 1 (04:24):
And if you ever let those darn things go to seed,
you're just starting to cycle all over again.
Speaker 3 (04:30):
So stay on top. It's easy with I love a
scuffle hoe.
Speaker 1 (04:34):
You can go out in spotspray with you know, glyphysate
or whatever your product the choice is. And we'll talk
about vinegar and some of these other things during the
trope section of the show. But you know, if you
can stay on top, your life is going to be better.
Speaker 4 (04:50):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (04:50):
I just had this discussion with a coworker. But because
he lets some weeds get out of control in this
one area and this sea fired, we're putting them on
dis Yeah, probation.
Speaker 3 (05:04):
One more slip up.
Speaker 2 (05:07):
But there's this not weed, a little weedy polygonum, and
this thing it is so hard to pull.
Speaker 3 (05:13):
Out of the ground. They all are, I.
Speaker 2 (05:15):
Think, oh man, yeah, and so had it been weeded
a little earlier, life would be.
Speaker 3 (05:20):
A lot easier, exactly.
Speaker 1 (05:23):
I think it's a good time of year to mention this.
Observe trees for health because they're leafed out now, they're
as leafed out as they're going to be. So now's
the time to see if your tree is healthy. And
you can do that on the ground just looking at
it to some extent. Are the leaves off color? Should
(05:43):
the tree be deep green and it's kind of weak green? Yeah,
that's a good sign you might have a problem. If
it's yellow, that's another sign of another kind of problem.
Are the leaves smaller than they normally are? And it's
hard to notice that because it kind of happens insidiously
over year, But if you.
Speaker 3 (06:01):
Have a sugar maple, those should be big leaves.
Speaker 1 (06:03):
You know that by looking at sugar maples elsewhere and
comparing it to yours. And I know, for example, my
sugar maple has been stressing for years and the leaves
are just getting smaller and smaller and smaller. So that's
a good sign for the tree, though not for the tree. No,
it's a good indicator. I guess they should say, are
(06:23):
there a lot of dead branches?
Speaker 3 (06:26):
You know, just that.
Speaker 1 (06:29):
Sporadic dead branch at the top of the tree here
and there, more and more. That's a sign that's under
stressed and something.
Speaker 2 (06:36):
I'm watching that in our yard with a big old
wild black cherry. Oh you know, the development around us
took all of its buddies away, and that just stressed
that tree so much.
Speaker 1 (06:47):
Yeah, it's interesting that trees are codependent with the trees
around them. A lot of the time they root, graft,
and you know, they help each other with wind and
apparently signals when pests are around them. It's a whole
thing that's being studied. I don't know how much of
it it's true or not, but it's really interesting stuff
(07:09):
it is. Yeah, are lichens piling up in the bark
The lichens themselves are not a problem. They're not causing
any harm to the tree, but it could be an
indicator that the tree isn't growing much because they slough
off or tend to if the tree is expanding girth
through the years. Odd mushrooms around the root system, oh
(07:32):
bad sign.
Speaker 2 (07:32):
Yeah, those honey mushrooms are milarias. You see those?
Speaker 1 (07:36):
Yeah, Now, they can pop up all over the place.
They can and a lot of times are not a problem.
Speaker 3 (07:41):
For your tree.
Speaker 1 (07:41):
But if you see them, especially along the roots or
under the drip line, you know, then you start to
think about maybe I should call a good arborist in certified.
Is a certified arborists have a look at that, because
you know, a rotted root system is bad news.
Speaker 3 (08:00):
That's where a lot of trees fall.
Speaker 1 (08:02):
You know, not a problem if it's way and you're
back forty, but if it's up against your house or
along the sidewalk or any of those things, you want
to get it checked out. Sure, and get it checked
out before you just have the tree removed. A lot
of people go, I'm afraid it's gonna follow my house
and cut down perfectly healthy trees.
Speaker 2 (08:19):
Oh it drives me crazy. Yeah it does me too.
Speaker 3 (08:21):
Yeah, I'm gonna let uh just rote ride along the trunck.
You see.
Speaker 1 (08:25):
If you're seeing that, that's not a good sign either.
You have one more and then we'll go to Break
and then we'll bring in Paul.
Speaker 2 (08:31):
I wish i would have planned my winter squash by now,
but I'm going to really soon so much more organized.
I'm it's not an organization, that's time. I've been traveling
a lot, and I'm not in a hurry. There's plenty
of stuff to do. I still have time, but I
plan them planting them in July and they mature just fine.
Speaker 3 (08:50):
Yeah, but okay, Yeah, that's good. And you it's not
like you're short of vegetables to eat or anything.
Speaker 2 (08:55):
And if you plant a little later, you might avoid
the squash buying bores.
Speaker 3 (09:00):
Yeah, that's a big problem.
Speaker 2 (09:01):
They're flying right now. I saw one the other day.
Speaker 1 (09:03):
I hate those things. Yeah, they always wipe out mine. Anyway,
we're gonna go to Break. When we come back, we'll
have Paul Cappiello join us, and we'll start a whole
garden tropes factor fiction segment or pretty much the rest
of the show, which will be a lot of fun
and very interesting, maybe controversial. We'll probably have tears of sorrow,
(09:25):
tears of joy. We might get our death threats. I
don't know what's gonna happen.
Speaker 2 (09:30):
I hope we're speaking after this.
Speaker 3 (09:32):
We might not be, and I hope we're still friends
with Paul because I like him a lot.
Speaker 2 (09:36):
Yeah, he's a good guy.
Speaker 1 (09:37):
Anyway, you don't want him, no, so stay with us.
This break will be short and we'll come back with
all that fun. You're listening to Let's Garden with Scott Perline,
We'll be back at just short time. You're listening to
Let's Garden with Scott Perline. I'm here with my friend
Mark Wessel from Gardens Alive Great horticulture is good friend.
(09:58):
But even a better horticulturist, and.
Speaker 2 (10:01):
Even a better friend, and better dress and.
Speaker 1 (10:03):
Better dressed and just a classier guy is on your
line right now. Paul Kapiella, Doctor Paul Kapiella from Udell
Gardens or Botanical Gardens down in Prestwick, Kentucky, which is
just outside Louisville.
Speaker 3 (10:15):
Paul, are you there, I'm here. How are you doing
this morning?
Speaker 4 (10:20):
Nice to be with you. Yeah, I'm doing great. I
don't know if I'm best dressed this morning. I'm sitting
here in my garden and a T shirt and enjoying
the birds.
Speaker 3 (10:28):
Just a T shirt I do have short Oh good, Okay,
that's good.
Speaker 2 (10:33):
Well, Scott is top of us right now.
Speaker 3 (10:35):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (10:38):
Anyway, Paul, tell us a little bit about U del
Botanical Gardens.
Speaker 4 (10:44):
Oh Udell started about twenty four years ago. It was
the home and nursery and farm of Theodore and Martin
Lee Klein. That Theodore was a great horticulturist, as you
both know, and brilliant plantsmen and created craftsmen. And he
lived in it was nineties and was still planning oak
seedlings until just a few weeks before he passed away
(11:05):
at the age of ninety three, the eternal gardening optimist.
And after a few years a small group formed worked
with the family, bought the property from the family, originally
the original thirty four acres, and started turning it into
a botanic garden. When I started working there, I was
part time. We had another halftime office worker and I
(11:29):
think about three months of operating funds in the bank,
and today we're a staff of a over forty wow
and research and education and display gardens and public outreach
and all kinds of great stuff and lots of brilliant
people working there. You do.
Speaker 1 (11:46):
You have a great staff. I try to get there
every year. I think I've been successful at that. It
is really amazing to see what you've done, especially last
year with the big new garden that went in.
Speaker 4 (11:59):
Very coat a Castle Garden was. It was a huge
addition and upgrade and one of the nice things about you, Dell.
One of the benefits to our staff and how we
operate is just about every plant we put in the ground,
other than large trees that would take a long time
to produce, dark staff produce on site, so we don't
(12:19):
buy in plants. So that Castle Garden had about five
thousand perennials and shrubs that went into it, and pretty
much every one of them got produced from seed cutting
or plug right on our property, which is which is
a great luxury to have when you're designing a garden.
Speaker 1 (12:35):
Yeah, just the amount of extra plants that provides for you, you know,
the cheap abundance of plants that you've propagated and that
backlog of them that you have, it just gives you
so many chances to live up to opportunities.
Speaker 4 (12:54):
Yeah, we tell Dadie Heckman, who's our garden manager. She
can pretty much have any plant in the world as
long as it's not forbidden by international treaty. As long
as our nursery team can get a hold of a
seed or a cutting and getting you can have it
for the garden.
Speaker 3 (13:11):
You're getting really good support from the Louisville community.
Speaker 4 (13:15):
We are, and it's been amazing this year. Of course,
this spring was a little better than the spring of
twenty twenty five. I think twenty twenty five it rained
every Saturday in April May in the first half of June,
and you know in this business, you don't get those
days back. This year, the great weather is combined with
(13:36):
I think people just finally really understanding what that place
is and.
Speaker 3 (13:42):
What your plants offered. Yeah, the plant sales life.
Speaker 4 (13:45):
Yeah yeah, I mean we've just been we've been so busy.
Everything is through the roof this spring, which has been
great to see people are enjoying it.
Speaker 3 (13:54):
Now.
Speaker 1 (13:55):
I love the two U del mottos that you sent me.
I'm going to read them off U del motto. Part one,
if a plant solves one problem and doesn't create another,
it's a winner for us. And part two we are
equal opportunity exploiters of all plants, regardless of stature of
(14:15):
nature or geographical origin. There's a little attitude in that there, Paul.
Speaker 4 (14:21):
Yeah, there is. And you know there's a there's a
third motto and this one on the board of you
Dell doesn't really like me to use, but one of
these days I'm going to make up a whole stack
of T shirts and on it we're going to print
let us kill it first, because that's that's one of
our unofficial guiding mottos. You know. We try to bring
(14:42):
in as much plant material, as diverse as an array
of plants as we can, and we do our level
best to figure out what it takes to kill them
and if they can survive that and like as you said,
if they solve a problem and they don't create another,
then that is one we propagate can get out.
Speaker 1 (15:00):
Yeah, and that's one great use for botanical gardens is
to try out all those plants and report out to
the community, Hey that's a dog, don't even bother Or conversely,
these are the best ones. Come look at them, write
down their names, take a picture, and then you know,
do this at home.
Speaker 4 (15:20):
Yeah. Absolutely, so, I've been.
Speaker 1 (15:22):
Meaning to get you on the show for a little
while now, but I've been waiting for the right opportunity,
and I think this is the perfect one. The theme
here that we're about to launch into is garden tropes,
facts or fiction.
Speaker 3 (15:36):
So we're going to take on all the things.
Speaker 1 (15:38):
You read and hear that been passed down through the ages,
probably uttered one time when we were still in Togas
or you roaming the planes, and has been repeated ever
since without ever being questioned. So we're going to have
some fun. We're probably going to step on a few toes.
(15:59):
Who knows new ones are created every day too, and
new ones.
Speaker 3 (16:02):
Are created, Yes, absolutely, yeah.
Speaker 1 (16:05):
But this will be fun, and I do want our
listeners to call in, you know, if you have experience
with these things, what worked or what didn't, That would
be really great for us to hear those and also
tell you you're brilliant or you're wrong.
Speaker 2 (16:20):
What's the number they call in?
Speaker 3 (16:21):
They call in at eight hundred eighty two three eighty
two fifty five. Mark.
Speaker 1 (16:25):
Thank you're so much more professional than I am. Anyway,
let's get this started, and I wanted to start with
two of mine. We all put in some of these here.
Oh you know what, it's break time. We're going to
leave you hanging on what this brilliant next segment is
all about, because it's going to be fun. So we'll
(16:46):
start with all the tropes when we get back.
Speaker 3 (16:49):
Which will be in just a few minutes.
Speaker 1 (16:50):
You're listening to Let's Guarden with Scott Berlin. All the
podcasts are available where podcasts can be found, you can
join uh sooner or later, we're going to have a
website where you can find all the links and information
and all the things we're talking about, pictures.
Speaker 3 (17:04):
Lists, and so stay tuned.
Speaker 1 (17:07):
Tropes, factor fiction coming up in just a couple of minutes.
Speaker 3 (17:11):
We'll be right back. You're with Mark.
Speaker 1 (17:13):
Wessell and doctor Paul Capiello, Director of Just Director of
You Dell.
Speaker 3 (17:18):
Do I have that right? Is that your title?
Speaker 4 (17:21):
Yeah? That's good enough for today.
Speaker 1 (17:23):
Yeah, all right, and you know, sad news, but good
news for you.
Speaker 3 (17:28):
I guess.
Speaker 1 (17:28):
Congratulations to you. You're retiring soon.
Speaker 4 (17:33):
Well yeah, a roughly end of the year, but not
going away, so you're not done with me yet. You
go to put up with me a little bit longer.
I'll be I'll be hanging around in some capacity we're
still working with that capacity is but you're not through
whipped me yet. You're stuck with me for a little
while long.
Speaker 1 (17:50):
That's what they always say. But then they're gone and
you never you never hear from them. You're like, you
remember Paul, anybody heard from him lately?
Speaker 2 (17:58):
Just invite us to the part. That's always Oh.
Speaker 1 (18:00):
Yeah, we do want to be invited to the party.
Hopefully Mariam throws a good one. I'm sure she will. Anyway,
we're going to take on garden tropes right now, factor fiction,
all those things you've heard down the line, question unquestioned,
We don't know. And I wanted to start somebody. You
mentioned new ones being started all the time, So I
(18:21):
was going to start with trends and uh, just these
things that pop up and the ideas that people have
for this reason or that. And first of all, I
wanted to talk take on no Mo.
Speaker 2 (18:33):
May, Okay, no Mo May. What do you think? What
do you think?
Speaker 3 (18:38):
Paul?
Speaker 4 (18:41):
No? Well, let's see, it depends on what you're mowing.
I mean, if you're if you're growing short fescue that
only grows six inches tall, it's a great idea. I
don't know, I don't know, anybody who's growing a short
rescue lawns, you know, lawns. Let me back up a
(19:01):
little bit with all these tropes, Scott, Yeah, I am
sure if my neurologist handed me a scalpel and said
just take a little bit off the hypothalmus, I'd probably
make some really big screw ups in their eyes and
they'd roll their eyes and do a radio show about
all the dopey things people do to their brain with
a scalpel. So, you know, with that said, you know
(19:24):
we all have those things. But you know, you just
go back to the very basics with a lawn. The
greater percentage of the leaf blade you cut off with
every mowing, the worst here loan performs, right, I mean,
more consistent mowing where you take a smaller percentage of
(19:48):
the grass blade off with each mowing, is much better
than taking ninety percent of the lawn off with a
single mowing. And if you're not mowing in May, I
don't know about Juba grass to grow about seventeen feet
in the month of mayeah in Kentucky, and I need
a bush hoog and a coombine. Yeah, you know, it's
(20:10):
one of those things that it sounds good. It's a
great sound bite. No no mo may make everybody, all
the bugs and the birds happy, right. You know. It
sort of reminds me of we have a little project
in downtown Louisville where these islands along one of the
streets were planted in native grasses, which was a great idea,
(20:32):
but when I looked at the documentation of why they
did that, they did it for the pollinators, except grasses
are all wind pollinated, so other than an occasional woodcock
nesting in you know, on Jefferson Street in downtown Louisville.
So you know, somebod these things sound great, they make
(20:52):
sound great sound bites, but I'd pass on no mo May.
Speaker 1 (20:57):
Yeah, I think the idea is to promote you know, pollinator,
and I you know, if that's your goal, why don't
we do less lawn may and turn more lawn into
garden bed.
Speaker 2 (21:08):
Well, let's just say you have a little wilder area
that doesn't need the constant attention. I think it should
be no mo may going into early June, because like,
if you do have nesting birds, they're not necessarily going
to be on the off the nests always.
Speaker 3 (21:24):
The devil's at advocate, aren't you, Martin.
Speaker 2 (21:26):
I'm just trying to just be supportive of those but
great ideas.
Speaker 1 (21:30):
The other one, the only other modern modern datrend is
leave the leaves, which again sounds so sweet, it sounds
it's a great sound bite, it's a great idea, But
it's not as simple as that.
Speaker 4 (21:44):
You know.
Speaker 1 (21:44):
You you can't just leave big piles of leaves in
your garden beds or on your lawn. You need to
mow them, compost them something. But you can't have just
mats of wet leaves all winter long and into the
summer or in your yard.
Speaker 4 (22:02):
You know. I live in a neighborhood in Louisville called
the Highlands. I live on an eleventh of an acre,
and our yard is surrounded by one hundred year old
oak trees. So if I don't rake up my leaves
sometime before Christmas, I've got about thirteen feet of leaves
(22:23):
piled over my entire yards.
Speaker 1 (22:26):
Grand filled grandkids in that you could grands Yeah and yeah.
Speaker 4 (22:33):
I mean, I'm a big proponent of organic matter in
all kinds of uses in the garden, but there's just
an order of magnitude more than you can use. I can't.
I don't even have enough room to compost all the
leaves on my that's the fall on my yard in
the fall. And I think last year, you know those
(22:55):
tall paper bags you can you can buy, you know,
to gather up all over your yard refuge. I think
I filled forty two of those last year.
Speaker 3 (23:04):
And you have a small yard, right, a tiny yard, yeah.
Speaker 4 (23:09):
I mean the lawn that I mow is only in
the front. And I've switched over to a tiny, little
one of those electric batteries rechargeable mowers a few years ago.
My wife refers to it as the little toy you know,
the little kid's toy mower with the little balls top.
But you know, I've reduced my lawn to I think
(23:29):
it takes me four minutes to cut my whole lawn.
Speaker 1 (23:34):
But you know, and you still need to you still
need a couple of beers after you're done.
Speaker 3 (23:42):
That's the excuse that is I've been mowing.
Speaker 2 (23:46):
Yeah, But I.
Speaker 4 (23:47):
Think that that that adds to Mark's comment about you know,
you have a big proponent of lawn. I mean, walking
across the lawn barefoot is one of the great pleasures
of owning a residential property. But I mean I don't
have much lawn. I like my little piece of lawn.
I like to go out and standing at bare foot
and water plants. But most of my garden is most
(24:10):
of my yard is not lawn. It's all turned over
back to plants. Yeah, other plants.
Speaker 1 (24:16):
And that's what that's what we should be fighting for.
That's what that's the end goal. And uh, Paul, one
of your tropes that you sent in was cut your
grass shorterer so you don't have to cut it as often.
Speaker 4 (24:31):
It sort of drives me crazy. You know, you see
people pushing their lawnmower in July, and you know they're
cutting their lawn even if you can't hear the mower
because you can see the clouds of dust everywhere because
they're scalping the ground and et cetera. You know. I
my lifelong goal is should be the CEO of every
(24:52):
company that manufactures lawnmowers and make three and a half
inches the lowest possible seven for your lawnmower. I mean
most lawnmowers. Yeah, most lawnmowers. As you know now that
you see now, I mean you can put the blade
down at like one inch. Yeah. I wrote an article
for the Louisville Courier Journal recently and related a story
(25:16):
and actually my wife read it and she said, you
never told me you got in trouble in the home depot.
But I was waiting, she was doing something. I was
in home depot and I went over to the lawnmower
section and I started adjusting all of the settings on
the display mowers to the highest height at four inches,
(25:37):
and I got accosted by the security guard.
Speaker 3 (25:41):
You were on video. They probably showed that video to
all new new hires. It's a training there's a training thing.
Speaker 1 (25:48):
Yeah, if you see this guy first and then you
need to escort him out.
Speaker 4 (25:53):
Longer you know, longer lawns. You know, cutting it at
three and a half four inches, you just shift the
balance in favor of the grass and away from the
broad leaf weeds that most people are trying to get
rid of. And so instead of spraying, you know, water deep,
cut high and enjoy it.
Speaker 2 (26:13):
You know, one of the most beautiful lawns I've ever seen.
They cut their grass at five inches and you know yea,
and they had a lawn care service and that was
a pain for hard to even adjust that gets that
it was actually too high. It was kind of hard
to walk through that lawn. And these are old folks,
(26:34):
so you know they're just shuffing along.
Speaker 3 (26:35):
They're just watching from the window.
Speaker 2 (26:36):
Oh yeah, that's what it was. It was a beautiful
one lawn.
Speaker 4 (26:41):
Yeah. One of the best organic and naturally maintain lawns
I've ever seen is at Glenstone Museum in Potomac, Maryland.
I think you both know Paul Tucky who was there
for a long time as the sustainability chief, and they
maintained acres of the most beautiful lawn. They have not
(27:02):
sprayed anything on it in fifteen years. They mow it
that as high a height as they can get on
the equipment, and it's just beautiful.
Speaker 3 (27:11):
Yeah. I've been shifting mine higher and higher and I've
been kind of pleased with it.
Speaker 1 (27:18):
You know, it kind of flops over sometimes, so you're
not really cutting it evenly, but it still looks good
and it does seem to be winning over the creeping
Charlie a little bit, which is my main main problem.
Let's go to one here that is one of mine.
Clay is the worst kind of soil. I don't think
(27:42):
that's true. I think like if you have a very
heavy sandy or very sandy soil. But that way, that's
much harder to work with than clay, where if you
can add organic matter, it starts to open up and
it's full of nutrients and it can become a pretty
good garden soil.
Speaker 2 (28:03):
Yeah, we have to love clay here in Cincinnati.
Speaker 3 (28:05):
We have no choice.
Speaker 2 (28:06):
Yeah, that's what we have.
Speaker 4 (28:09):
What do you think, Paul, You know, well, there's two
things that are universal in the garden world. It's I've
traveled around the country lecturing. I always ask people these questions.
Every gardener in the world assumes that they have the
worst soil and the hardest gardening climate. It doesn't matter
if you're in Wyoming or New Jersey. The nice thing
(28:30):
is whether you're on you know, the whether you're at
the beach in New Jersey or you're in Cincinnati or Louisville.
Clay the answer is the same. It's very easy. It's
organic matter, So it doesn't matter whether you have sand.
This is one you don't really have to hurt your
brain a whole lot about add organic matter. Add organic matter.
(28:52):
Add organic matter. It helps hold hold more moisture in
the soil. If it's sandy, it helps improve drainage. It's clay.
It adds a slow release nutrient source, so hard to
go wrong, right.
Speaker 1 (29:08):
I think with sandy it's you have to even add
more because it tends to burn.
Speaker 3 (29:13):
Through it, so you need to continually add organic matter,
you know, to keep it.
Speaker 4 (29:20):
One of the things, one of the differences I noticed
when I moved from living near the coast of Maine
to gardening in Kentucky. In Maine, if you add organic
matter to your soil, it lasts about four hundred years
because the soil temperature never gets above the mid sixties
down about four four inches.
Speaker 3 (29:42):
I never really thought of that.
Speaker 4 (29:43):
Yeah, cooler here in Kentucky. You you can kill yourself
all winter long adding organic matter, and by the fourth
of July most of it's been eaten up by microbes
because the microbial activity is so much higher because of
the higher soil temperatures. So it's it's very different, but
it's still the same answer.
Speaker 3 (30:05):
Yep, yep.
Speaker 1 (30:06):
Here's another one. Uh pH can be adjusted in your soil.
I think you know on that one short term, maybe
a little if you had sulfur or aluminum, maybe yeah,
limestone you had like wine.
Speaker 3 (30:26):
Well, if you want to adjust it up.
Speaker 2 (30:27):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (30:27):
Yeah, but ultimately the the underlying bedrock is is going
to determine what your pH is.
Speaker 3 (30:36):
Do you agree with that, Paul?
Speaker 2 (30:39):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (30:39):
And also the other thing people forget is the pH
of my water here is about eight point two.
Speaker 3 (30:44):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (30:45):
So if you're trying to grow as zaleas in a
limestone soil and you're watering it with with alkaline water,
you know, yes, you can alter the pH of your soil,
but it's a little bit like trying to hold back
to the ocean. Get a soup spoon. You know, it's
just a constant, constant, and it's just so much easier.
(31:06):
You know, if you really want to grow acid loving blueberries,
just do a raised bed and grow them all and
pine fines that are naturally acidic. But yeah, trying to
change that soil pH is it's a tough road to home.
Speaker 2 (31:19):
And I think it's harder to bring down the pH
than it is to raise the pH. Yes, you know,
our carious soils or clay soils are very hard to
get down and keep down. But the key is, if
you're going to do it, you have to base it
(31:39):
on soil test and be consistent and follow through over
the years.
Speaker 1 (31:44):
I agree. Yeah, so what about adding line to your soil?
You know that's been recommended for years for grass. Oh yeah,
Danny just jumped in reminded me we need to take
a break. I've been so enthralled by this conversation i
forgot about our break. We'll go take that break and
we'll be back with more of this when we return. Singer,
(32:05):
Let's garden with Scott Berlin. Let me repeat that at
a slower pace. Eight hundred eight two three eighty two
fifty five. I'm talking with Mark Wessel and doctor Paul Capiella.
We're talking about garden tropes, and when we left, I
had brought up the one that you hear a lot
add line to your soil, usually in terms of like improving.
Speaker 3 (32:27):
Your lawn, and Mark, you hit a thought on.
Speaker 2 (32:29):
That well, and I get tired of saying this. Whenever
you're going to add any nutrient or mineral, you really
should base it on your soil test because the problem is,
especially with your bigger nutrients, like you know, magnesium and lime,
this goes to the EPSOM salt trope. If you add
that willy nilly, what usually happens is you get an
(32:51):
excess of that, and that limits other nutrients and micro nutrients.
Speaker 3 (32:56):
Like a whack them old thing with nutrients.
Speaker 2 (32:58):
Yeah, there's only so many pieces of the pie to
go around, and if you take too much of that
pie with one mineral, you're going to another and then
you're going to have other issues.
Speaker 1 (33:09):
And then there's the whole ad gypsum to your soil.
I think that came out of it'll break up clay,
and I know that's been debarked. I don't know the details, Paul,
Do you know the details on that.
Speaker 4 (33:21):
Yeah, it's just a bad idea to turn your soil
into into a large slab of dry wall basically. But
actually I'll take us back a little bit to the
clay and organic matter because it matches up with this,
and that is you know a lot of people, if
they have clay, want to add sand to their soil
(33:42):
to improve drainage and aeration. But you know, there's there's
this thing in soil and so management called the threshold proportion,
and it's the amount of an amendment you have to
add to a soil before you start to improve drainage
and aeration. And adding sand to clay, basically you have
(34:05):
to get to the point where you almost have ninety
percent or more of that soil made up of the
sand before you start to see an improvement. You actually,
if you add thirty percent sand to a heavy clay soil,
you actually decrease variation and drainage. And if you think
about it, it's sort of if you have a great
big you know, you've got to pick up bed full
(34:27):
of softballs that are what five inches in diameter, and
you add a bunch of bebes to it, the BB's
or the clay, the fine particles. The sand is the
large softballs. The small pieces infiltrate in among the big pieces,
and they just clog up the soil. So sand actually
(34:47):
is the wrong way to go unless you're really planning
to do it big time, because you need to get
over about ninety percent of that course amendment.
Speaker 2 (34:55):
Yeah, not only that, I remember this from a garden
talk when I was just a kid. Sand and clay
equals concrete.
Speaker 3 (35:04):
Really can you can bind it up?
Speaker 2 (35:06):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (35:06):
Yeah, and just yeah, especially with limestone soil, you know, right, Yeah,
let's just tackle a few things on moult real quick. One,
wood chips deplete nitrogen. You hear that a lot you
know again. We're running right up on this break, so
we'll get to that when we come back. I'm here
(35:27):
with Mark Wessel from Gardens Alive and doctor Paul Capiello
from U del Botanical Gardens in Crestwood, Kentucky, right outside
of Louisville, a must see plete place for all of
our listeners. You are listening to. That's Garden with Scott Berline.
All the podcasts can be found wherever podcasts can be found.
Speaker 3 (35:47):
We're really glad you're with us. Give us a call.
Speaker 1 (35:49):
We'll talk about your tropes or what work has worked
for you, what hasn't.
Speaker 3 (35:54):
Give us a call. Eight hundred eight two three eight
two five five We'll be right back
With Scott Berline. Who's back. I'm back. I'm Scott, and
Mark is back. You had me scared for a minute.
You laid down on the floor.
Speaker 2 (00:08):
Well after the last break when you were doing push ups.
I had to do some stuff.
Speaker 3 (00:11):
Yeah. We're doing sit ups or something over there.
Speaker 4 (00:14):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (00:14):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (00:15):
Anyway, you're with Gardens Alive, chief horticultureist, good guy, good good,
knowledgeable guy, expert, you know, and all kinds of things.
And I'm glad you're here.
Speaker 2 (00:23):
I'm happy to be here.
Speaker 1 (00:25):
In fifteen minutes, we're going to have doctor Paul Kapiella
join us from U Dell Gardens and Potanical Gardens down
in Louisville or Crestwood.
Speaker 2 (00:32):
He'll raise the class of this show a bit.
Speaker 3 (00:35):
Oh he will.
Speaker 4 (00:36):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (00:36):
He's a PhD.
Speaker 2 (00:37):
Yeah you knew that right, and fine human.
Speaker 3 (00:40):
He's one of my favorite people, honestly.
Speaker 1 (00:43):
And we are going to crown or debunk common garden wisdom, chestnuts.
Speaker 2 (00:50):
Or neither or yes, yeah, because we might not.
Speaker 1 (00:54):
Know sometimes we won't. We'll just discuss them anyway. We
want your calls for that. If you have experience with
trying things that are out there bits of information, the
common things that are mentioned all the time, what worked,
what didn't give us a call? We'll be taking those calls.
Eight hundred eight two three eighty two fifty five. Do
(01:16):
you want to mention that you can join in the
fun of in the garden on Facebook with Ron Rothis
and friends. And uh, we're going to go right to
things you should have done last week timely tasks. I
was prepared, you were not.
Speaker 2 (01:34):
Well. I don't like homeworks, Scott. This one really has
held me back in my everything pursuits.
Speaker 3 (01:42):
Yeah, I can.
Speaker 1 (01:43):
I can see the notes time here misers westle Mark
doesn't apply himself. Yeah, yeah it happened. Oh yeah yeah,
bes B minus C plus is if you only tried.
Speaker 2 (01:56):
Yeah, I could have got to see if I've tried.
Speaker 3 (01:59):
That there was a story of my grade school and
high school and college.
Speaker 2 (02:03):
Yeah yeah, but we've we've really made the success of ourselves.
Speaker 3 (02:07):
We were late bloomers, right, Yeah, that's what we can
tell ourselves. So what is your first timely task?
Speaker 2 (02:14):
Well, Scott, the slugs have been horrible because of all
the rain. Yeah, just off, I mean bad. And you
know there's the slug baits that with the iron posphates
and that you know, well, plus I'm just not sure
how much you can use if you will build up
(02:35):
too much phosphate and yes, oil and h so it
can only do so much. So in beer traps, that
has never worked.
Speaker 3 (02:42):
A total waste of beer. Yeah, yeah, beer.
Speaker 2 (02:45):
It's a good reason to open a beer.
Speaker 3 (02:48):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (02:48):
And that's the only reason I do fall into the
trap of alcoholics. Yeah yeah, but that's never worked. But
I I searched online and when I did my search
for slug bait, yeah trap, I put the pdf on
like Jared recommended.
Speaker 1 (03:06):
To a universe your question and then dot pdf which
will get you the like extension and yeah.
Speaker 2 (03:12):
And their university yeah answers and some university in the midwest, Wisconsin,
Ohio state someone they recommend it. There By far, the
best lure was basically a yeast bread dough flowers and
yeast and you just make a real liquidy slurry of
it and put it in your trap. And so I'm
(03:32):
going to try.
Speaker 1 (03:33):
That, and you get their blood sugar level up, they
get diabetes and die or where's the dying. They drowned,
They drown it.
Speaker 2 (03:39):
Or you can make a dough and you're supposed to
go out there and pick them off. I don't want
to pick off.
Speaker 3 (03:45):
That slime is on your hand from Yeah, it's.
Speaker 2 (03:47):
Hard, amazing, interesting substance, it is. So that's what I
wish I would have done a month ago.
Speaker 1 (03:52):
What about diatamacious earth, I've heard that is this. You know,
you put it down and you have no way of
knowing if it worked or nothing. That might be another
that might be a good one for the trope conversation. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,
I'm just going to reiterate, like I think I'm gonna
do every week.
Speaker 3 (04:08):
Weed. Your life as a gardener is so much better
if you keep weeding. You stay on top of the weeds.
Speaker 2 (04:18):
Oh, I know, you're right, Scott. It's hard to catch
up and yeah yeah yeah.
Speaker 1 (04:24):
And if you ever let those darn things go to seed,
you're just starting to cycle all over again.
Speaker 3 (04:30):
So stay on top. It's easy with I love a
scuffle hoe.
Speaker 1 (04:34):
You can go out in spotspray with you know, glyphysate
or whatever your product the choice is. And we'll talk
about vinegar and some of these other things during the
trope section of the show. But you know, if you
can stay on top, your life is going to be better.
Speaker 4 (04:50):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (04:50):
I just had this discussion with a coworker. But because
he lets some weeds get out of control in this
one area and this sea fired, we're putting them on
dis Yeah, probation.
Speaker 3 (05:04):
One more slip up.
Speaker 2 (05:07):
But there's this not weed, a little weedy polygonum, and
this thing it is so hard to pull.
Speaker 3 (05:13):
Out of the ground. They all are, I.
Speaker 2 (05:15):
Think, oh man, yeah, and so had it been weeded
a little earlier, life would be.
Speaker 3 (05:20):
A lot easier, exactly.
Speaker 1 (05:23):
I think it's a good time of year to mention this.
Observe trees for health because they're leafed out now, they're
as leafed out as they're going to be. So now's
the time to see if your tree is healthy. And
you can do that on the ground just looking at
it to some extent. Are the leaves off color? Should
(05:43):
the tree be deep green and it's kind of weak green? Yeah,
that's a good sign you might have a problem. If
it's yellow, that's another sign of another kind of problem.
Are the leaves smaller than they normally are? And it's
hard to notice that because it kind of happens insidiously
over year, But if you.
Speaker 3 (06:01):
Have a sugar maple, those should be big leaves.
Speaker 1 (06:03):
You know that by looking at sugar maples elsewhere and
comparing it to yours. And I know, for example, my
sugar maple has been stressing for years and the leaves
are just getting smaller and smaller and smaller. So that's
a good sign for the tree, though not for the tree. No,
it's a good indicator. I guess they should say, are
(06:23):
there a lot of dead branches?
Speaker 3 (06:26):
You know, just that.
Speaker 1 (06:29):
Sporadic dead branch at the top of the tree here
and there, more and more. That's a sign that's under
stressed and something.
Speaker 2 (06:36):
I'm watching that in our yard with a big old
wild black cherry. Oh you know, the development around us
took all of its buddies away, and that just stressed
that tree so much.
Speaker 1 (06:47):
Yeah, it's interesting that trees are codependent with the trees
around them. A lot of the time they root, graft,
and you know, they help each other with wind and
apparently signals when pests are around them. It's a whole
thing that's being studied. I don't know how much of
it it's true or not, but it's really interesting stuff
(07:09):
it is. Yeah, are lichens piling up in the bark
The lichens themselves are not a problem. They're not causing
any harm to the tree, but it could be an
indicator that the tree isn't growing much because they slough
off or tend to if the tree is expanding girth
through the years. Odd mushrooms around the root system, oh
(07:32):
bad sign.
Speaker 2 (07:32):
Yeah, those honey mushrooms are milarias. You see those?
Speaker 1 (07:36):
Yeah, Now, they can pop up all over the place.
They can and a lot of times are not a problem.
Speaker 3 (07:41):
For your tree.
Speaker 1 (07:41):
But if you see them, especially along the roots or
under the drip line, you know, then you start to
think about maybe I should call a good arborist in certified.
Is a certified arborists have a look at that, because
you know, a rotted root system is bad news.
Speaker 3 (08:00):
That's where a lot of trees fall.
Speaker 1 (08:02):
You know, not a problem if it's way and you're
back forty, but if it's up against your house or
along the sidewalk or any of those things, you want
to get it checked out. Sure, and get it checked
out before you just have the tree removed. A lot
of people go, I'm afraid it's gonna follow my house
and cut down perfectly healthy trees.
Speaker 2 (08:19):
Oh it drives me crazy. Yeah it does me too.
Speaker 3 (08:21):
Yeah, I'm gonna let uh just rote ride along the trunck.
You see.
Speaker 1 (08:25):
If you're seeing that, that's not a good sign either.
You have one more and then we'll go to Break
and then we'll bring in Paul.
Speaker 2 (08:31):
I wish i would have planned my winter squash by now,
but I'm going to really soon so much more organized.
I'm it's not an organization, that's time. I've been traveling
a lot, and I'm not in a hurry. There's plenty
of stuff to do. I still have time, but I
plan them planting them in July and they mature just fine.
Speaker 3 (08:50):
Yeah, but okay, Yeah, that's good. And you it's not
like you're short of vegetables to eat or anything.
Speaker 2 (08:55):
And if you plant a little later, you might avoid
the squash buying bores.
Speaker 3 (09:00):
Yeah, that's a big problem.
Speaker 2 (09:01):
They're flying right now. I saw one the other day.
Speaker 1 (09:03):
I hate those things. Yeah, they always wipe out mine. Anyway,
we're gonna go to Break. When we come back, we'll
have Paul Cappiello join us, and we'll start a whole
garden tropes factor fiction segment or pretty much the rest
of the show, which will be a lot of fun
and very interesting, maybe controversial. We'll probably have tears of sorrow,
(09:25):
tears of joy. We might get our death threats. I
don't know what's gonna happen.
Speaker 2 (09:30):
I hope we're speaking after this.
Speaker 3 (09:32):
We might not be, and I hope we're still friends
with Paul because I like him a lot.
Speaker 2 (09:36):
Yeah, he's a good guy.
Speaker 1 (09:37):
Anyway, you don't want him, no, so stay with us.
This break will be short and we'll come back with
all that fun. You're listening to Let's Garden with Scott Perline,
We'll be back at just short time. You're listening to
Let's Garden with Scott Perline. I'm here with my friend
Mark Wessel from Gardens Alive Great horticulture is good friend.
(09:58):
But even a better horticulturist, and.
Speaker 2 (10:01):
Even a better friend, and better dress and.
Speaker 1 (10:03):
Better dressed and just a classier guy is on your
line right now. Paul Kapiella, Doctor Paul Kapiella from Udell
Gardens or Botanical Gardens down in Prestwick, Kentucky, which is
just outside Louisville.
Speaker 3 (10:15):
Paul, are you there, I'm here. How are you doing
this morning?
Speaker 4 (10:20):
Nice to be with you. Yeah, I'm doing great. I
don't know if I'm best dressed this morning. I'm sitting
here in my garden and a T shirt and enjoying
the birds.
Speaker 3 (10:28):
Just a T shirt I do have short Oh good, Okay,
that's good.
Speaker 2 (10:33):
Well, Scott is top of us right now.
Speaker 3 (10:35):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (10:38):
Anyway, Paul, tell us a little bit about U del
Botanical Gardens.
Speaker 4 (10:44):
Oh Udell started about twenty four years ago. It was
the home and nursery and farm of Theodore and Martin
Lee Klein. That Theodore was a great horticulturist, as you
both know, and brilliant plantsmen and created craftsmen. And he
lived in it was nineties and was still planning oak
seedlings until just a few weeks before he passed away
(11:05):
at the age of ninety three, the eternal gardening optimist.
And after a few years a small group formed worked
with the family, bought the property from the family, originally
the original thirty four acres, and started turning it into
a botanic garden. When I started working there, I was
part time. We had another halftime office worker and I
(11:29):
think about three months of operating funds in the bank,
and today we're a staff of a over forty wow
and research and education and display gardens and public outreach
and all kinds of great stuff and lots of brilliant
people working there. You do.
Speaker 1 (11:46):
You have a great staff. I try to get there
every year. I think I've been successful at that. It
is really amazing to see what you've done, especially last
year with the big new garden that went in.
Speaker 4 (11:59):
Very coat a Castle Garden was. It was a huge
addition and upgrade and one of the nice things about you, Dell.
One of the benefits to our staff and how we
operate is just about every plant we put in the ground,
other than large trees that would take a long time
to produce, dark staff produce on site, so we don't
(12:19):
buy in plants. So that Castle Garden had about five
thousand perennials and shrubs that went into it, and pretty
much every one of them got produced from seed cutting
or plug right on our property, which is which is
a great luxury to have when you're designing a garden.
Speaker 1 (12:35):
Yeah, just the amount of extra plants that provides for you, you know,
the cheap abundance of plants that you've propagated and that
backlog of them that you have, it just gives you
so many chances to live up to opportunities.
Speaker 4 (12:54):
Yeah, we tell Dadie Heckman, who's our garden manager. She
can pretty much have any plant in the world as
long as it's not forbidden by international treaty. As long
as our nursery team can get a hold of a
seed or a cutting and getting you can have it
for the garden.
Speaker 3 (13:11):
You're getting really good support from the Louisville community.
Speaker 4 (13:15):
We are, and it's been amazing this year. Of course,
this spring was a little better than the spring of
twenty twenty five. I think twenty twenty five it rained
every Saturday in April May in the first half of June,
and you know in this business, you don't get those
days back. This year, the great weather is combined with
(13:36):
I think people just finally really understanding what that place
is and.
Speaker 3 (13:42):
What your plants offered. Yeah, the plant sales life.
Speaker 4 (13:45):
Yeah yeah, I mean we've just been we've been so busy.
Everything is through the roof this spring, which has been
great to see people are enjoying it.
Speaker 3 (13:54):
Now.
Speaker 1 (13:55):
I love the two U del mottos that you sent me.
I'm going to read them off U del motto. Part one,
if a plant solves one problem and doesn't create another,
it's a winner for us. And part two we are
equal opportunity exploiters of all plants, regardless of stature of
(14:15):
nature or geographical origin. There's a little attitude in that there, Paul.
Speaker 4 (14:21):
Yeah, there is. And you know there's a there's a
third motto and this one on the board of you
Dell doesn't really like me to use, but one of
these days I'm going to make up a whole stack
of T shirts and on it we're going to print
let us kill it first, because that's that's one of
our unofficial guiding mottos. You know. We try to bring
(14:42):
in as much plant material, as diverse as an array
of plants as we can, and we do our level
best to figure out what it takes to kill them
and if they can survive that and like as you said,
if they solve a problem and they don't create another,
then that is one we propagate can get out.
Speaker 1 (15:00):
Yeah, and that's one great use for botanical gardens is
to try out all those plants and report out to
the community, Hey that's a dog, don't even bother Or conversely,
these are the best ones. Come look at them, write
down their names, take a picture, and then you know,
do this at home.
Speaker 4 (15:20):
Yeah. Absolutely, so, I've been.
Speaker 1 (15:22):
Meaning to get you on the show for a little
while now, but I've been waiting for the right opportunity,
and I think this is the perfect one. The theme
here that we're about to launch into is garden tropes,
facts or fiction.
Speaker 3 (15:36):
So we're going to take on all the things.
Speaker 1 (15:38):
You read and hear that been passed down through the ages,
probably uttered one time when we were still in Togas
or you roaming the planes, and has been repeated ever
since without ever being questioned. So we're going to have
some fun. We're probably going to step on a few toes.
(15:59):
Who knows new ones are created every day too, and
new ones.
Speaker 3 (16:02):
Are created, Yes, absolutely, yeah.
Speaker 1 (16:05):
But this will be fun, and I do want our
listeners to call in, you know, if you have experience
with these things, what worked or what didn't, That would
be really great for us to hear those and also
tell you you're brilliant or you're wrong.
Speaker 2 (16:20):
What's the number they call in?
Speaker 3 (16:21):
They call in at eight hundred eighty two three eighty
two fifty five. Mark.
Speaker 1 (16:25):
Thank you're so much more professional than I am. Anyway,
let's get this started, and I wanted to start with
two of mine. We all put in some of these here.
Oh you know what, it's break time. We're going to
leave you hanging on what this brilliant next segment is
all about, because it's going to be fun. So we'll
(16:46):
start with all the tropes when we get back.
Speaker 3 (16:49):
Which will be in just a few minutes.
Speaker 1 (16:50):
You're listening to Let's Guarden with Scott Berlin. All the
podcasts are available where podcasts can be found, you can
join uh sooner or later, we're going to have a
website where you can find all the links and information
and all the things we're talking about, pictures.
Speaker 3 (17:04):
Lists, and so stay tuned.
Speaker 1 (17:07):
Tropes, factor fiction coming up in just a couple of minutes.
Speaker 3 (17:11):
We'll be right back. You're with Mark.
Speaker 1 (17:13):
Wessell and doctor Paul Capiello, Director of Just Director of
You Dell.
Speaker 3 (17:18):
Do I have that right? Is that your title?
Speaker 4 (17:21):
Yeah? That's good enough for today.
Speaker 1 (17:23):
Yeah, all right, and you know, sad news, but good
news for you.
Speaker 3 (17:28):
I guess.
Speaker 1 (17:28):
Congratulations to you. You're retiring soon.
Speaker 4 (17:33):
Well yeah, a roughly end of the year, but not
going away, so you're not done with me yet. You
go to put up with me a little bit longer.
I'll be I'll be hanging around in some capacity we're
still working with that capacity is but you're not through
whipped me yet. You're stuck with me for a little
while long.
Speaker 1 (17:50):
That's what they always say. But then they're gone and
you never you never hear from them. You're like, you
remember Paul, anybody heard from him lately?
Speaker 2 (17:58):
Just invite us to the part. That's always Oh.
Speaker 1 (18:00):
Yeah, we do want to be invited to the party.
Hopefully Mariam throws a good one. I'm sure she will. Anyway,
we're going to take on garden tropes right now, factor fiction,
all those things you've heard down the line, question unquestioned,
We don't know. And I wanted to start somebody. You
mentioned new ones being started all the time, So I
(18:21):
was going to start with trends and uh, just these
things that pop up and the ideas that people have
for this reason or that. And first of all, I
wanted to talk take on no Mo.
Speaker 2 (18:33):
May, Okay, no Mo May. What do you think? What
do you think?
Speaker 3 (18:38):
Paul?
Speaker 4 (18:41):
No? Well, let's see, it depends on what you're mowing.
I mean, if you're if you're growing short fescue that
only grows six inches tall, it's a great idea. I
don't know, I don't know, anybody who's growing a short
rescue lawns, you know, lawns. Let me back up a
(19:01):
little bit with all these tropes, Scott, Yeah, I am
sure if my neurologist handed me a scalpel and said
just take a little bit off the hypothalmus, I'd probably
make some really big screw ups in their eyes and
they'd roll their eyes and do a radio show about
all the dopey things people do to their brain with
a scalpel. So, you know, with that said, you know
(19:24):
we all have those things. But you know, you just
go back to the very basics with a lawn. The
greater percentage of the leaf blade you cut off with
every mowing, the worst here loan performs, right, I mean,
more consistent mowing where you take a smaller percentage of
(19:48):
the grass blade off with each mowing, is much better
than taking ninety percent of the lawn off with a
single mowing. And if you're not mowing in May, I
don't know about Juba grass to grow about seventeen feet
in the month of mayeah in Kentucky, and I need
a bush hoog and a coombine. Yeah, you know, it's
(20:10):
one of those things that it sounds good. It's a
great sound bite. No no mo may make everybody, all
the bugs and the birds happy, right. You know. It
sort of reminds me of we have a little project
in downtown Louisville where these islands along one of the
streets were planted in native grasses, which was a great idea,
(20:32):
but when I looked at the documentation of why they
did that, they did it for the pollinators, except grasses
are all wind pollinated, so other than an occasional woodcock
nesting in you know, on Jefferson Street in downtown Louisville.
So you know, somebod these things sound great, they make
(20:52):
sound great sound bites, but I'd pass on no mo May.
Speaker 1 (20:57):
Yeah, I think the idea is to promote you know, pollinator,
and I you know, if that's your goal, why don't
we do less lawn may and turn more lawn into
garden bed.
Speaker 2 (21:08):
Well, let's just say you have a little wilder area
that doesn't need the constant attention. I think it should
be no mo may going into early June, because like,
if you do have nesting birds, they're not necessarily going
to be on the off the nests always.
Speaker 3 (21:24):
The devil's at advocate, aren't you, Martin.
Speaker 2 (21:26):
I'm just trying to just be supportive of those but
great ideas.
Speaker 1 (21:30):
The other one, the only other modern modern datrend is
leave the leaves, which again sounds so sweet, it sounds
it's a great sound bite, it's a great idea, But
it's not as simple as that.
Speaker 4 (21:44):
You know.
Speaker 1 (21:44):
You you can't just leave big piles of leaves in
your garden beds or on your lawn. You need to
mow them, compost them something. But you can't have just
mats of wet leaves all winter long and into the
summer or in your yard.
Speaker 4 (22:02):
You know. I live in a neighborhood in Louisville called
the Highlands. I live on an eleventh of an acre,
and our yard is surrounded by one hundred year old
oak trees. So if I don't rake up my leaves
sometime before Christmas, I've got about thirteen feet of leaves
(22:23):
piled over my entire yards.
Speaker 1 (22:26):
Grand filled grandkids in that you could grands Yeah and yeah.
Speaker 4 (22:33):
I mean, I'm a big proponent of organic matter in
all kinds of uses in the garden, but there's just
an order of magnitude more than you can use. I can't.
I don't even have enough room to compost all the
leaves on my that's the fall on my yard in
the fall. And I think last year, you know those
(22:55):
tall paper bags you can you can buy, you know,
to gather up all over your yard refuge. I think
I filled forty two of those last year.
Speaker 3 (23:04):
And you have a small yard, right, a tiny yard, yeah.
Speaker 4 (23:09):
I mean the lawn that I mow is only in
the front. And I've switched over to a tiny, little
one of those electric batteries rechargeable mowers a few years ago.
My wife refers to it as the little toy you know,
the little kid's toy mower with the little balls top.
But you know, I've reduced my lawn to I think
(23:29):
it takes me four minutes to cut my whole lawn.
Speaker 1 (23:34):
But you know, and you still need to you still
need a couple of beers after you're done.
Speaker 3 (23:42):
That's the excuse that is I've been mowing.
Speaker 2 (23:46):
Yeah, But I.
Speaker 4 (23:47):
Think that that that adds to Mark's comment about you know,
you have a big proponent of lawn. I mean, walking
across the lawn barefoot is one of the great pleasures
of owning a residential property. But I mean I don't
have much lawn. I like my little piece of lawn.
I like to go out and standing at bare foot
and water plants. But most of my garden is most
(24:10):
of my yard is not lawn. It's all turned over
back to plants. Yeah, other plants.
Speaker 1 (24:16):
And that's what that's what we should be fighting for.
That's what that's the end goal. And uh, Paul, one
of your tropes that you sent in was cut your
grass shorterer so you don't have to cut it as often.
Speaker 4 (24:31):
It sort of drives me crazy. You know, you see
people pushing their lawnmower in July, and you know they're
cutting their lawn even if you can't hear the mower
because you can see the clouds of dust everywhere because
they're scalping the ground and et cetera. You know. I
my lifelong goal is should be the CEO of every
(24:52):
company that manufactures lawnmowers and make three and a half
inches the lowest possible seven for your lawnmower. I mean
most lawnmowers. Yeah, most lawnmowers. As you know now that
you see now, I mean you can put the blade
down at like one inch. Yeah. I wrote an article
for the Louisville Courier Journal recently and related a story
(25:16):
and actually my wife read it and she said, you
never told me you got in trouble in the home depot.
But I was waiting, she was doing something. I was
in home depot and I went over to the lawnmower
section and I started adjusting all of the settings on
the display mowers to the highest height at four inches,
(25:37):
and I got accosted by the security guard.
Speaker 3 (25:41):
You were on video. They probably showed that video to
all new new hires. It's a training there's a training thing.
Speaker 1 (25:48):
Yeah, if you see this guy first and then you
need to escort him out.
Speaker 4 (25:53):
Longer you know, longer lawns. You know, cutting it at
three and a half four inches, you just shift the
balance in favor of the grass and away from the
broad leaf weeds that most people are trying to get
rid of. And so instead of spraying, you know, water deep,
cut high and enjoy it.
Speaker 2 (26:13):
You know, one of the most beautiful lawns I've ever seen.
They cut their grass at five inches and you know yea,
and they had a lawn care service and that was
a pain for hard to even adjust that gets that
it was actually too high. It was kind of hard
to walk through that lawn. And these are old folks,
(26:34):
so you know they're just shuffing along.
Speaker 3 (26:35):
They're just watching from the window.
Speaker 2 (26:36):
Oh yeah, that's what it was. It was a beautiful
one lawn.
Speaker 4 (26:41):
Yeah. One of the best organic and naturally maintain lawns
I've ever seen is at Glenstone Museum in Potomac, Maryland.
I think you both know Paul Tucky who was there
for a long time as the sustainability chief, and they
maintained acres of the most beautiful lawn. They have not
(27:02):
sprayed anything on it in fifteen years. They mow it
that as high a height as they can get on
the equipment, and it's just beautiful.
Speaker 3 (27:11):
Yeah. I've been shifting mine higher and higher and I've
been kind of pleased with it.
Speaker 1 (27:18):
You know, it kind of flops over sometimes, so you're
not really cutting it evenly, but it still looks good
and it does seem to be winning over the creeping
Charlie a little bit, which is my main main problem.
Let's go to one here that is one of mine.
Clay is the worst kind of soil. I don't think
(27:42):
that's true. I think like if you have a very
heavy sandy or very sandy soil. But that way, that's
much harder to work with than clay, where if you
can add organic matter, it starts to open up and
it's full of nutrients and it can become a pretty
good garden soil.
Speaker 2 (28:03):
Yeah, we have to love clay here in Cincinnati.
Speaker 3 (28:05):
We have no choice.
Speaker 2 (28:06):
Yeah, that's what we have.
Speaker 4 (28:09):
What do you think, Paul, You know, well, there's two
things that are universal in the garden world. It's I've
traveled around the country lecturing. I always ask people these questions.
Every gardener in the world assumes that they have the
worst soil and the hardest gardening climate. It doesn't matter
if you're in Wyoming or New Jersey. The nice thing
(28:30):
is whether you're on you know, the whether you're at
the beach in New Jersey or you're in Cincinnati or Louisville.
Clay the answer is the same. It's very easy. It's
organic matter, So it doesn't matter whether you have sand.
This is one you don't really have to hurt your
brain a whole lot about add organic matter. Add organic matter.
(28:52):
Add organic matter. It helps hold hold more moisture in
the soil. If it's sandy, it helps improve drainage. It's clay.
It adds a slow release nutrient source, so hard to
go wrong, right.
Speaker 1 (29:08):
I think with sandy it's you have to even add
more because it tends to burn.
Speaker 3 (29:13):
Through it, so you need to continually add organic matter,
you know, to keep it.
Speaker 4 (29:20):
One of the things, one of the differences I noticed
when I moved from living near the coast of Maine
to gardening in Kentucky. In Maine, if you add organic
matter to your soil, it lasts about four hundred years
because the soil temperature never gets above the mid sixties
down about four four inches.
Speaker 3 (29:42):
I never really thought of that.
Speaker 4 (29:43):
Yeah, cooler here in Kentucky. You you can kill yourself
all winter long adding organic matter, and by the fourth
of July most of it's been eaten up by microbes
because the microbial activity is so much higher because of
the higher soil temperatures. So it's it's very different, but
it's still the same answer.
Speaker 3 (30:05):
Yep, yep.
Speaker 1 (30:06):
Here's another one. Uh pH can be adjusted in your soil.
I think you know on that one short term, maybe
a little if you had sulfur or aluminum, maybe yeah,
limestone you had like wine.
Speaker 3 (30:26):
Well, if you want to adjust it up.
Speaker 2 (30:27):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (30:27):
Yeah, but ultimately the the underlying bedrock is is going
to determine what your pH is.
Speaker 3 (30:36):
Do you agree with that, Paul?
Speaker 2 (30:39):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (30:39):
And also the other thing people forget is the pH
of my water here is about eight point two.
Speaker 3 (30:44):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (30:45):
So if you're trying to grow as zaleas in a
limestone soil and you're watering it with with alkaline water,
you know, yes, you can alter the pH of your soil,
but it's a little bit like trying to hold back
to the ocean. Get a soup spoon. You know, it's
just a constant, constant, and it's just so much easier.
(31:06):
You know, if you really want to grow acid loving blueberries,
just do a raised bed and grow them all and
pine fines that are naturally acidic. But yeah, trying to
change that soil pH is it's a tough road to home.
Speaker 2 (31:19):
And I think it's harder to bring down the pH
than it is to raise the pH. Yes, you know,
our carious soils or clay soils are very hard to
get down and keep down. But the key is, if
you're going to do it, you have to base it
(31:39):
on soil test and be consistent and follow through over
the years.
Speaker 1 (31:44):
I agree. Yeah, so what about adding line to your soil?
You know that's been recommended for years for grass. Oh yeah,
Danny just jumped in reminded me we need to take
a break. I've been so enthralled by this conversation i
forgot about our break. We'll go take that break and
we'll be back with more of this when we return. Singer,
(32:05):
Let's garden with Scott Berlin. Let me repeat that at
a slower pace. Eight hundred eight two three eighty two
fifty five. I'm talking with Mark Wessel and doctor Paul Capiella.
We're talking about garden tropes, and when we left, I
had brought up the one that you hear a lot
add line to your soil, usually in terms of like improving.
Speaker 3 (32:27):
Your lawn, and Mark, you hit a thought on.
Speaker 2 (32:29):
That well, and I get tired of saying this. Whenever
you're going to add any nutrient or mineral, you really
should base it on your soil test because the problem is,
especially with your bigger nutrients, like you know, magnesium and lime,
this goes to the EPSOM salt trope. If you add
that willy nilly, what usually happens is you get an
(32:51):
excess of that, and that limits other nutrients and micro nutrients.
Speaker 3 (32:56):
Like a whack them old thing with nutrients.
Speaker 2 (32:58):
Yeah, there's only so many pieces of the pie to
go around, and if you take too much of that
pie with one mineral, you're going to another and then
you're going to have other issues.
Speaker 1 (33:09):
And then there's the whole ad gypsum to your soil.
I think that came out of it'll break up clay,
and I know that's been debarked. I don't know the details, Paul,
Do you know the details on that.
Speaker 4 (33:21):
Yeah, it's just a bad idea to turn your soil
into into a large slab of dry wall basically. But
actually I'll take us back a little bit to the
clay and organic matter because it matches up with this,
and that is you know a lot of people, if
they have clay, want to add sand to their soil
(33:42):
to improve drainage and aeration. But you know, there's there's
this thing in soil and so management called the threshold proportion,
and it's the amount of an amendment you have to
add to a soil before you start to improve drainage
and aeration. And adding sand to clay, basically you have
(34:05):
to get to the point where you almost have ninety
percent or more of that soil made up of the
sand before you start to see an improvement. You actually,
if you add thirty percent sand to a heavy clay soil,
you actually decrease variation and drainage. And if you think
about it, it's sort of if you have a great
big you know, you've got to pick up bed full
(34:27):
of softballs that are what five inches in diameter, and
you add a bunch of bebes to it, the BB's
or the clay, the fine particles. The sand is the
large softballs. The small pieces infiltrate in among the big pieces,
and they just clog up the soil. So sand actually
(34:47):
is the wrong way to go unless you're really planning
to do it big time, because you need to get
over about ninety percent of that course amendment.
Speaker 2 (34:55):
Yeah, not only that, I remember this from a garden
talk when I was just a kid. Sand and clay
equals concrete.
Speaker 3 (35:04):
Really can you can bind it up?
Speaker 2 (35:06):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (35:06):
Yeah, and just yeah, especially with limestone soil, you know, right, Yeah,
let's just tackle a few things on moult real quick. One,
wood chips deplete nitrogen. You hear that a lot you
know again. We're running right up on this break, so
we'll get to that when we come back. I'm here
(35:27):
with Mark Wessel from Gardens Alive and doctor Paul Capiello
from U del Botanical Gardens in Crestwood, Kentucky, right outside
of Louisville, a must see plete place for all of
our listeners. You are listening to. That's Garden with Scott Berline.
All the podcasts can be found wherever podcasts can be found.
Speaker 3 (35:47):
We're really glad you're with us. Give us a call.
Speaker 1 (35:49):
We'll talk about your tropes or what work has worked
for you, what hasn't.
Speaker 3 (35:54):
Give us a call. Eight hundred eight two three eight
two five five We'll be right back
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