KTRH GardenLine | 4-30-23

Skip Richter answers gardening questions while continuing Garden Line.

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Kat r H Garden Line does notnecessarily endorse any of the products or services
advertised on this program. Welcome toKTRH Garden Line with Skip Rictor, so
just watch him as a sign.Well, good, good Sunday morning.

(00:45):
We are happy to have you listeningto garden Line this morning, and we're
gonna do some garden and talk.I won't give you a phone number,
so you can give us a call, get you on the board so we
can talk about the things that youare interested in. That number is seven
one three, two, one twofive eight seven four seven one three two
one two fifty eight seventy four,and Josh, we'll get you on the

(01:08):
board and we can talk gardening.I'm still kind of dark outside, so
we're it's a good time to becurled up with a cup of coffee listening
to the radio and I don't know, maybe talking some gardening with us.
I'm gonna go over a bunch ofdifferent things as we go through the day
today. But before we before weget too far into it, we've got

(01:29):
Phil out here in Spring and wewant to go start off with him.
See what we're gonna talk about withPhil. Good morning, Phil Money,
Good morning, school. Yeah,I had two different questions. One had
to do with craig myrtles and leastfive feet. But I noticed this spring

(01:53):
and maybe it did this before andI didn't notice it. Look when it
leased out, it was late.Getting worried about it because other create mules
are leaked out side and will itworked itself? Well, I need to
come in where I'm getting you cuttingout on me a whole lot. Um.

(02:15):
I don't know if it's the whatI'm hearing is you're concerned that the
maybe the createmurdle leaked out late laterthan others. Is that the gist of
it? No, it was hardleaps out. It's fully leaps out now,
okay, and then it gradually overa period of more over about two

(02:38):
weeks, it gradually spread in aline north and south across the tree to
the west side. And it's fullyand so my listen normal. The thing
I didn't catching that again with thecutting out is um, what was it
that spread from north to outside?Me? Yeah, Phil phill up.

(03:09):
We have to get you to We'llhave to get your call back. Maybe
if you can get a landline orsomething, or try another call seat with
Josh pittsgog work. I'm just I'mnot gonna be able to hear enough to
be able to help. But pleasedo give us give it a try back.
Okay, appreciate that. Thank youvery much. We are let's see

(03:29):
our phone number this morning. Sevenone three two one two fifty eight seventy
four. Boy, yesterday was agreat, a great day out at K
and m Ace Hardwring Kingwood. Wewere out there, and for all of
those of you who came out yesterday, uh, it was it was great
to meet you. I mean,it was good to see so many different
folks that listen to the station.And I know those of you who came

(03:51):
out, Uh do you agree withme that? Wow, what a what
a hardware store they have out thereat K and MS in Kingwood. If
you didn't get to come out yesterday, you still you've got and just see
the place it is. You willbe very very surprising and impressed at just
what all they have. I mean, it's I could sit here all day

(04:12):
talking about I bet you didn't knowyou found you could get one of these
at a hardware store, right Well, remember the old days, you know,
growing up we had a little Acehardware store in our town and it
was the typical little hardware store kindof what you expect. Ace is evolving
in so many many good ways.I you know, like back in my

(04:33):
day there was in a big greenegg barbecue section with many other great brands.
There wasn't a gosh the k andm Ace even had a lady's shop
area where you could get all kindsof jewelry and purses and bling for the
house and bling for you and youknow what I'm talking about. It just
like, my goodness, this isuh, this is way beyond kind of

(04:56):
a one stop shop. But anyway, it was good to be out there.
Thank you guys for hosting me outat East and thank everybody that came
out got to visit with that day. All Right, we're gonna go back
and give one more shot here,Phil, Let's try it one more time
to see if we can get itto work this time. So I think
where we are as you've got acraig myrtle. It leaked out a little
late, but it did leaf out, and now something's going on from north

(05:17):
to south and what is that something? Okay? Is this a better line
by so far? Yes? Okay? What it did is It started on
the very east side and it leakedout beginning there there was nothing on the
west side. But over the courseof about the least two weeks, it
finally moved all the way over tothe west side, and it was kind

(05:41):
of in It traveled in the northsouth playing moving from east to west,
you know. And I'd never seena tree do that before. Okay,
now that is kind of unusual,and it is definitely one tree. It's
not multi stems coming out and eachstem is acting different. Yes, it's
just going to well, it looksgreat now. I don't know. I

(06:03):
don't know on that one. Theyou know, the thing that cues the
plant wind to leaf out is inmany cases it's how many hours of cold
did they have before? But thatshould not vary within within one genetically similar
plant. On the other hand,it sometimes exposure to you know, certain

(06:23):
kinds of warming things like a reflectivewall or something else like that might have
an effect. I have noticed sometimeson different sides of a plant due to
like cold northern winds, you maysee a little bit of a difference,
but nothing like you're describing. SoI think we have to chalk it up
too well. I hope that doesn'thappen again. Yeah, well I had
affordable kind of affordable tree service cameout and tramps and trees for me,

(06:46):
and so I may give more ofthe call se see it. But the
attitude people I talked to you saidthey never yet before. Yeah, yeah,
it's you know, I'm just tryingto think horticulturally more from a sign
space, you know, what wouldcause that kind of development. And they're
like, I mentioned a couple ofthings that could, but I don't know
if and if it's not done itbefore. That's a good that's a good

(07:09):
question. But it's good you talkto Affordable tree though anybody knows, they'll
know. I have one of thequestions for you. It's good. This
has to do with blueberries. Iplan into some blueberriesis U in Sebruary and
two different species that I got outa right to this way, I don't
know. I'm sorry, arbor gateokay. And so the time is coming

(07:31):
when they're rockinging up. I thinkthey're riping up in June, don't they.
It depends on the kind of blueberry. But yes, that's a good
general. So what is a goodway to keep the birds from getting to
these things. I'll tell you whatwe are. We are seconds away from
me having to take a break.Do you mind holding and let me let
me enter that as we come back. Certainly, all right, he sounds

(07:54):
good. You're listening to garden Line. I am your host, Skip Richter,
and our phone number is seven onethree two one two five eight seven
four seven one three two one twofifty eight seventy four word. Well,

(08:24):
good morning. You are listening togarden Line and I'm your host, Skip
Rictor. We are here to answeryour gardening questions, and that's what we're
already up to this morning. Iwant to head back to Spring and we're
going to talk to Phil. Philwe were discussing blueberries and you mentioned you
had two species. Do you meantwo different varieties of blueberries or two separate

(08:46):
species of blueberries? Varieties? Twovarieties? Okay, good and tell me
your question now with the blueberries again, Well, they're they're getting right,
um. And my understanding is itas they ripen up, the birds are
going to get interested. Trying tofigure out a way to keep the birds
away from them, got you?Got you? Well, that's not an

(09:09):
easy task, um, the blueberries, because you've got little berries all over
the place. You can't bag thefruit, so about your only option would
be to have some sort of anetting that you would suspend over the bush.
If you just lay it on thebush the bush, the birds will
land on the netting and peck theberries right through the netting. So you
would need like like a PBC pipethat you know, arches over kind of

(09:31):
creates a maybe you think of likean igloo if it were covered with something
white, but you're you're you gota one pipe going north south, going
east west, and so it createsthe structure, and then it's easy to
get the netting up over that becauseit's hard to pull netting over a blueberry
bush with all the little shoots stickingout and everything everything else. So that

(09:52):
that would be about the best thingthat I can think of, because they're
just not going to be another goodsolution, you know, that is practical,
affordable, and you probably don't wantto spray certain kinds of things on
your berries anyway since you can eatthem right right, Well, what's up?
What does what size mess can youuse? I think you want to

(10:13):
let the bee the bees get inthe pollen at and everything, right,
Yeah, most of the meshes areabout I don't know inch, half inch
somewhere in there. I've actually neveractually looked at the exercise of the square,
but you know there's they're small.Think of something you know about with
your finger, maybe from the mostOkay, yeah, well I'm gonna try
that then I can. I sawsome mess you's hardware when I was there

(10:37):
the other day, so try toget some of that. Okay, well,
thanks a lot rick keeping it.Do you have a I feel do
you have a bunch of berries orjust a few bushes. It's quite a
few. I've got the Climax andthe Premier, and it seems like the
Climax is the one that's got themost on it right now. Okay,
yeah, well that's a good oldvariety. Premire is too, though,

(11:00):
if you have several and they're ina row. Another option is people will
put like a post at each end, and they will stretch a couple of
wires horizontally over the patch, andthen you your netting can just be kind
of hanging from those wires and youjust drag it across like you with a
shower curtain to accept there. Insteadof being a single sheet it's light goes

(11:22):
up across and down. You kindof picture what I'm talking about. And
that way it's easy to push itback, pull it open. You know,
you can take care of it.Yeah. Yeah, when you do
that is there you have to secureit somewhere down at the ground to keep
thanks from getting us under it.Yeah, there's some there's some species of
birds that will hop along go underneathit and jump up in the bush and

(11:45):
go to work. So you doneed to You need to secure it at
the ground and on both ends ofcourse. Okay, well I'm gonna try
that. Skip. Hi Phil,thanks for the call. Appreciate you being
on with us today. We arenow by the way, the phone number
is seven one three two one twofive eight seven four seven one three two

(12:05):
one two fifty eight seventy four.Let's head out to Fairfield now and we
are going to talk to Marty thismorning. Good morning, Marty, morning.
Skip. I have a question.Oh tell that guy kind of like
a tent. Like a tent thereyou go, yeah, and plug it
down on the flapping part whatever youcall it anyway, sake it down anyway.

(12:26):
I have a question about I needsome of the suggestions I pulled up
a bunch of azaleas out of myfront bed, and it's got shade and
it's dappled to medium shade two verylarge oak trees, and I'm looking for
some flowering plants to replace it.I want something flowering perennial. I don't

(12:52):
want too much here. I wantit to attract birds, bees, and
butterflies. Two to four feet highand whispy. I like in sun.
I like a broom plant, youknow, with the big yellow flowers,
or a fire carcer plant. ButI don't know what to put in this
in a shade. It's kind ofwhispy like those guys. Wow, I

(13:16):
know I don't want much to it. No, I'm not at all.
I'm gonna have to think about thatone a little bit. You know,
as you were talking, I keptthinking having some plants come to mind,
and then you would say the nextcharacteristic. It'd be like, okay,
I can't go that one. Okay, let's let's do the main part.
Shade, flowering perennial. Yeah,whispy. I think about some some that

(13:41):
would be good whispy perennials. Ihave had ranges and I those are a
little bit too formal. Um.I have cannas, I have all kinds
of ferns and iris and everything elseout there. But and I have ground
cover. Okay, so I wantsomething in the middle of the bed to

(14:03):
give it some two to four theheight. Okay, you gave me a
good a good shrub for like mto put up against a fence. That's
not what I'm looking for. Ijust want something in the middle that's gonna
be whispy and I attracting. AndI looked through Randy's book, and I

(14:28):
looked online, and I just I'mnot coming up with much. Yeah,
that's that is one, just tobe honest, that's one that I'm probably
gonna have to um think about fora while to try to pull together.
Because the whispy is the biggest challengeof it. I think when you when
you're adding all those things, youknow for further north you could do is
still be in there. But Ijust I don't. I've not found to
still be to be always dependable downin our yeah, and in our area.

(14:54):
Well, I even I got variegatedginger in the bad backyard. But
I you know, I thought aboutjust the leaves. I have also lots
of leopard dance that I'm looking forsomething more um with white or flowers of
some sort that attracts okay in theshade. Yeah, so I'm gonna for

(15:18):
just a minute, I'm gonna ignorethe whispy because that's thrown me off,
to be honest, Okay, ignorethat. One thing that does well in
the shade and has has a bloomlike structure on top is a shrimp plant.
Are you familiar with those? Whata shrimp? Yes? Okay,
so you can get those in thestandard type is kind of a rusty red
color or reddish orange. Yes.Then there's one that has pretty variegated foliage

(15:43):
with white and green, you know, splotch through the foliage, and then
has a redder bloom. So Ikind of like that one a lot,
okay, for one that would dowell in the shade. Of course,
Turk's cap does well in the shade, but it's much it's very far from
whispy. But no, I haveTurk's cap all over the all over the
yards. I don't want anymore.You've got enough, Okay, I have
enough. They're very invasive. Allright. Um, let's see what else

(16:07):
shade garden Agapanthus might be one.That's the clumps that come up, you
know, about maybe three feet high. Uh, and they're I have this
moment, yea, I have.I'm sorry, that's why I called early.
It's okay, that's okay. Well, well that's the problem with you
calling early. My brain is stilltrying to ask for one more cup of

(16:30):
coffee. Okay, what don't know. Floss flower is nice, but it's
down low. It's going to beabout a about a foot high. What
is a Japanese mahonia? Mahonia ismore of a holly like plant, but
it grows in a form like anandina wood where you have stalks coming up
out of the cover and it hasa holly like leaf and it has some

(16:52):
blooms on it, not just outstandingyou know blooms one that I like in
shade. But this is this isan annual slash perennial, and that's Hinckley's
columbine. It's going to get upa couple of feet high, but it's
primarily going to be there through thecool season and then as the weather really
heats up, it's it's not muchto look at. And so that would

(17:14):
be maybe another one that you wouldconsider in that kind of area. I
ran across that and I didn't stopand look close enough. All Right,
I'm gonna put you on hold,and I'm gonna have Josh I get your
give you some information to send mean email, and if you have an
email ready for you, okay,and if you would, if you would

(17:37):
send me some pictures of the opof the location, that would be helpful.
And it'll give me a reminder totry to try to dig in a
little further than is coming off thetop of my head this morning. Okay,
well I don't have pictures, butI'll do my best. All right,
thanks it all right, thank you, Marty, appreciate that. Okay,
Wow, you're listening to garden Lineand it's stumped the chump morning.

(18:00):
I believe that was a that wasa doozy, a good question in a
totally legit question too. It's just, you know, it's like a Nikki
if I said, I want youto go to the mall and I want
you to buy me some clothes,but I don't want pants, I don't
want shirts. I don't want anythingwith color or black and white, you
know, and it's like, okay, wait, and we're narrowing it down
pretty fast. But that's the realityof gardening is we have these situations where

(18:22):
it's a very demandable set of requirementsand I'm supposed to be here to help.
Maybe you can help with the newsstunt the jump. Oh goodness,

(18:55):
good morning on a good Sunday morningfor a great gardening day. I see
a blow in the horizon as thesun is about to come out and give
us a really really nice day forgetting outside, enjoying the garden, just
enjoying nature in general. You're listeningto Garden Line. I'm your host,
Skip Richter, and our phone numberis seven one three two one two five

(19:18):
eight seven four seven one three twoand two fifty eight seventy four. Let's
hit out now to Deer Park andwe're going to talk to Jay. Good
morning, Jay, Good morning Skip. First, before I get into my
question, I just want to sayhow much I appreciate everything you do and
you bring it. You've done agreat job. I appreciate all you bring
to the program. I'm a longtimelistener and was really anxious about the transition,

(19:45):
but it's been fantastic, and thankyou for all you do. Well,
that's very kind. Thank you Jaye. So my question is is that
we did a complete rework in myfront yard intu being the beds, got
them rebuilt up, everything stripped outstarting from ground, went out to Moss
and got some tips from them onplants to plant. So I've got a
couple of plants and I'm not reallysure how to what to do with them

(20:07):
as far as care for fertilization.Just your general tips to maximize their health
and production all right, specifically toothat I'm not familiar with it. The
chameleons shigashira that they're going to kindof produce over the winter and then peter
pan dwarf agapanthus, okay, summerover summer bloom. Just any idea on

(20:29):
when I need to be fertilizing,what I should be putting down focus feeding
just overall from there, Well,the communiers you're growing basically year round.
They're evergreen, and so you wantto feed them gradually over time. You
don't want to overdo it like you'rejust pushing them with too much nitrogen,
but they do need a regular,gradual supply, so you can use a
slower release product to achieve that,or you can take whatever fertilizer you have

(20:55):
that's not slow release and give itgradually over time. And you're going to
find that at your local garden centers. You mentioned moss. Wherever you shop,
they're going to have some products foracid loving plants, and that's the
kind you want to use on thecamillus. For example, I know that
Microlife has I believe it's a redor pinkish bag that is a six two

(21:15):
four. It's not the green bag, but it's like a red or pinkish
color that is for acid loving plants. And there are other examples of acid
loving plant fertilizers out there, andthat's what your chameleon needs. As far
as the agapanthus, you know,we're looking primarily there in a warm season
growth habit, and so you're goingto want to begin as spring comes in
and we're already there, and thensome to give them a gradual feed over

(21:40):
time as well. You want somethingthat has a blend of all the nutrients.
So if it's for blooming plants,then you're going to find that the
agapanthus are going to respond really reallywell to it. As a result,
would that be something on the agapanthIt's like my Nelson's color Star or something

(22:00):
like that, or more of aliquid. Yeah, color Star would be
excellent for that. Nelson's color Starwould do good for that. Nitrofile has
that color Express that would do goodfor that. And I mentioned I mentioned
the microlife types of products, butall of those are gonna are gonna provide
what you want. Just note whetherthere's something that releases gradually, and if

(22:21):
not, then make divide that amountyou're going to put down into two applications.
Put them about four weeks apart,and I think you're going to see
really good results. And Agapanthus likesit moist, not saggy, but moist.
So don't let them, don't letthem dry out too much. Got
it? And it can ask afew few more clarification questions. I've got
a minute, So why don't wetry to start on one and then we'll

(22:45):
come back after break and finish it. Yeah, that's that's perfect time.
This is regarding the SOD that weput down. I'm patient, and I've
put down some of just some thatliquid organics and stuff. But but as
far as it filling in, there'ssome areas it's got some thatched build up
and I don't know if I shouldleave that to pull it out to keep

(23:06):
it healthy and off to get startall right, Well on that one,
you want to if you're gonna layside on top, you need to get
that dead organic material off the surfacebecause that's just gonna hold your sod soil
up above your your your ground soil, and you don't want that, Okay,
So rake it out a little lightroto till in there to get it
out. But that would be theway to go. If you have some
other questions, just hang on.I'm gonna put you on hold. If

(23:26):
not, thank you very much forthe call. We're gonna go to break
our phone number seven one three twoone two five eight seven four seven one
three two and two fifty eight seventyfour. Well, good morning on a

(24:15):
good Sunday morning for gardening. Herecomes the sun. It's going to be
a beautiful day to day. Iwas just out in the countryside the other
day. I'd heading up to GrimesCounty to the feed store up in that
direction and driving through the country sidelook at all the people's little pieces of
property, and it just reminded meof something. If you have a piece
of property and you've been thinking aboutgetting some kind of equipment to manage it

(24:38):
a tractor. Now is the timeto do it. And here's why.
Lansdowne Moody they're your choice for Cabotahere in Houston. Lansdowne Moody has our
Texas Edition L twenty five O one. It has a automatic hydrostatic type transmission
and it is therefore not one thatyou're going to be grinding the gears on.
I used to have this old tractorwhen we had our peach orchard,

(25:00):
and every time you shift, it'slike, you know, you're fighting and
grinding the gears. Not with usone, not with this one. Here's
the main reason I'm saying you needto think about this now. Kubota has
their best deal. I've seen moreaffordable than ever, zero down, zero
interest for eighty four months. Thatis a long time. Seven months,

(25:25):
I mean seven years without interest.You're not going to do better than that
now, lansdown Moody and Cuboda.There that is a pair that goes together.
You can go to LM tractor dotcom. LM tractor dot Com.
By the way, this deal isonly good through June thirtieth, so don't
delay. If you're looking. Ifyou know you're on the fence, maybe

(25:47):
I'm I really want to get atractor. This ought to be the thing
that puts you over the edge.And you can just step out to one
of the many Lansdowne Moody stores herein our area and learn all about it.
LM tractor dot com. You knowthe the well. The springtime is
the time when I love to getout and just work in the soil.

(26:07):
And when we had our little peachcharger and I would love to get out,
even though we had an old clunkertractor that I had to jump start
about every time I ran it.It was just good getting out and enjoying
that. And you know, ifyou if you've trying to get some work
done and you need a rotary cutter, you need you know, a box
plate or a front end loader,you can put that all together in a
package with one of these comboders fromLensdowne Moody at Fortune. Unfortunately, at

(26:30):
that time, I did not havea front endloader, and I can tell
you I really wished I had,because those are so handy, so cool
for the kinds of things you wantto do. You're listening to Garden line.
I'm your host, Skip Richter,and we are here to answer your
gardening questions. Our phone number I'vegot a little bit of time for we
have to take our next big breakof it. It's seven one three two

(26:51):
one two fifty eight seventy four.If you want a call, we can
perhaps get started on the question.If not, Josh, we'll get you
on the board and we can talkto you when we come out of our
break. Looking at the kind ofsky we have today and the kind of
weather we have today just reminds methat you know, if it rained,
I know a lot of the areasthat are here in this show. We

(27:14):
had a little bit of rain comingthrough this weekend, and you want to
get out, and you want tocheck your rain gutters, make sure they're
not drooping and holding water. Youwant to check the bird baths and any
other thing that holds water from anold tire still left somewhere in the back,
to the catch basins underneath your pottedplants on the patio, because wherever

(27:34):
water stands for a very short periodof time, mosquitoes can do their life
cycle. And now you're enjoyable sitout on the patio in the evening becomes
a battle against the blood suckers flyingeverywhere after you, and you know,
dump those out those, get thosecleaned out and get rid of them.
Don't give them a chance. Imean, all it does is just check

(27:56):
it once or twice a week.Just make sure you don't have that.
If you do have standing water andyou need to do you know something about
it. You can always do themosquito dunks. We talk about those before.
They work very well. You putthem in there and they just they
do the work that they're doing.But in general, just be a good
I guess patroller of your landscape andlook for those those kinds of things.

(28:19):
They say a stitch in time savesnine. That old adage you've heard before,
Well, when it comes to gardening, that's really true. You know,
if you're looking at weeds to getin with malt before the weed seeds
sprout, or even when they're alittle bitty weed seeds, throw the mulch
over them and they can't get lightand they're gonna die. That's a stitch
in time. If you've got youngweeds and you're gonna have to hand pull

(28:42):
or hoe or whatever, I justget a little hof slice into the surface
and knock them out once they getestablished. Number one, they're already stealing
water, nutrienturer plants. They're alreadyshading your plants. In many cases,
they're harboring viruses that insects will thencarry to your plants. So get them
out ahead of time. It isdifficult to pull out a well established weed,

(29:04):
and when you do that, youmay damage some of the roots system
of the plant that you like thatthe weed is growing by next maybe it's
a flower or vegetable. A stitchin time saves nine. Get in ahead
of the problem and it's so mucheasier. One other example of it.
If you're trying to kill insects andyou want to do it organically, the

(29:25):
products that you have available work bestwhen the insect is youngest, so don't
wait. A stitch in time savesnine. We'll be back after the break.
KTRH Garden Line does not necessarily endorseany of the products or services advertised
on this program. Welcome to KTRHGarden Line with scarre Rictor just watch well

(30:07):
good Sunday morning on a good dayfor gardening. Oop I see the sunlight
coming across the buildings and the treetops. It is going to be an
house standing day to get outside.Weather is perfect. Oh my gosh,
you just can't do better than that. You're listening to garden Line. I'm
your host, Skip Richter and ourphone number. You want to write this

(30:27):
down seven one three two one twofive eight seven four seven one three two
one two fifty eight seventy four,give Josh a call. Let's get you
on the boards and talk about thethings that you are interested in. And
we had we had some discussion earlierabout m plants for shady areas. And

(30:48):
you know, shade is a challengein our landscape. If you look for
sun, you know, if you'veyou've got a spot that's Sunday and well
drained, you can grow just aboutanything, right. But when we start
having poured rainage, then that limitsour abilities are our options rather in terms
of plants we can plant, well, shade does the same thing. But
that doesn't mean there's nothing we canplant in shade. There are many things

(31:11):
that we can plant in shade.We just have to kind of back up
and you know, kind of takea different look at it and come up
with some other options. And whenwe're looking into the shade. One of
the best options we have are ourfoliage plants. We have a lot of
the really nice foliage type materials likeaspadistro, a cast iron plant, I
mean, my gosh, that growsin deep shade, and its name is

(31:34):
well chosen cast iron. It isan extremely tough plant. Colladiums are a
good foliage plant. They bring color, they'll carry you through the season.
Occasionally you can get another season outof them, but in general, if
you want the big leaves, abig, giant, beautiful leaves, that's
primarily going to happen in the bulbsor the tubers that you purchased to put

(31:56):
in the ground. Kali lilies dowell here too. Killa lilies have you
probably have seen them as a floristplant. They've got an unusual little bloom
that is almost shaped kind of likea chalice or a vase or something like
that, if you can imagine that, and typically in white, but there's
some other versions of that light yellow, for example, pink. But they

(32:19):
like a rich organic matter soil.But they are a beautiful and dependable perennial
if you provide them some of thosecombinations of the enough light but not direct
sun and good moist soil. They'lldo really well for you. And we
have a lot of others. I'lltalk about some others as we go through.
One of the ones that we oftenoverlook are the ferns. I was

(32:42):
at Arbigate the other day looking throughsome of the shade loving area that they
have and just examining the different speciesof ferns that they have, and our
home independent garden centers do such agood job of this kind of thing.
But there's ferns like cinnamon fern,the leatherly fern. There's a little maiden
hair fern. By the way,we have a maiden hair that's that's native
to the Texas hill country. Yougo out there and you see a little

(33:06):
like a spring or a seep comingout of a rock in a little shady
area, and there's maidenhair ferns growingall along a little trickling seep of water
coming out. Wood fern, royalfern. Just lots of good kinds of
ferns. One of my favorite,just because it's so darned dependable, is
holly fern. It's named because itsleaf is somewhat hollylike it's instead of a

(33:28):
little wispy fernlike leaf or lacy fernleaf. It's got a little bit of
a boulder leaf on it, butdeep, deep green, kind of a
glossy foliage. The nice thing aboutferns this is like that cast iron plant
we were talking about. They ifthey get to looking bad, you just
cut them off at the ground andthey come back up fresh again, just
fresh new growth. And so itmakes a very tall ground cover through a

(33:52):
shady area. But there are someabsolutely gorgeous ferns, and when you really
get into looking for some other they'rekinds of ferns, you're going to find
some very unusual things, some thingsthat really add a very nice interest to
an area. Well. As youremember, though, when you're doing shade,
a lot of things I'm mentioning aregreen, And so as you get

(34:15):
into shade, the darker green somethingis, the more you don't notice it.
Or the darker the color is likea deep purple versus a light pink.
The purple's going to go a littlemore unnoticed in a dark, shady
area. So what we do iswe try to set our plants out by
putting things around them that are likespotlights that draw your attention to that area.

(34:37):
And one of the best spotlights thatI think we can use is something
called aztec grass. Now, ifyou're not familiar with it, first of
all, the word grass is appliedto a lot of things that aren't grass,
and aztec grass is not a grass. Think of it like a white
with some green stripes. Leiopy thinkof a larioty type plant, but the

(35:00):
leaves are virtually white, but they'vegot little green stripings in them. When
you use that around the bed,or when you use it to line a
pathway into a shady area, itjust draws your eye. It's like runway
lights looking at it. And soinstead of just having like a dark multi
pathway and then dark loriopy or monkeygrass or whatever and then holly ferns and

(35:24):
things that's just green, green,green green, break that up a little
bit and you can do that withaztec grass. That's a perennial, so
you buy it once and it justkeeps going for you. You can also
do it with annual plants. There'simpatients that have white ballooms. That would
be a really good way to achievethe same kind of results. Colladiums that

(35:45):
have mostly white in the leaves anotherway to achieve those kind of results.
So when life gives you shade,there's a way to turn it into a
beautiful area. And I've named whatsix or seven plants, we could name
sixty or seventy that would do well. And again, good reason to go
to a full independent garden center,knowledgeable mom and pop shop where the people

(36:08):
that walk up and greet you,and by the way they do that,
they're unlike some places, and thosekind of garden centers. They walk up,
they greet you and they know whatthey're talking about, and they direct
you to it. And if theydon't know, they don't just blow smoke.
They find out. They ask somebodyelse at the staff, or they
check it out. Sometimes you justlike on this show, there are questions

(36:29):
that come in and it's like,I'm gonna have to look into that one.
That's kind of a unique one there. And that's why we go to
those places. And that's why Isay that those kinds of places are the
most economical places to shop, becausewhen you spend your money, you get
something that does what you want,that last that's like, oh, we

(36:50):
sell it in our stores all overthe United States. I guess it doesn't
do well in the hot South.You don't have to deal with that.
You're talking about local and it reallyreally important. Another good flower for shady
areas, a bright shady areas isNicoceana, and they call it flowering tobacco.
And they're neicoceanas that are down,you know, a foot high,

(37:12):
that are very compact. They're nicoceanasto get you know, third or four
feet tall with big, beautiful bloomsin the summertime. Typically they're red or
white or pink, or there's somethat are kind of pale yellow, but
that's a that's a really good one. In Pentas is another good one in
a Gyptian star flower. It needsa bright shade, but it will light
it up. Being a red andpink and white are the most common colors

(37:35):
of blooms that they have. Allgood things for the shade. Maybe maybe
we'll come back in a little bitand talk more about shade, but for
now we're going to take a break. If you'd like to be on the
air, our phone number seven onethree two one two fifty eight seventy four.

(38:07):
Good morning on a good Sunday morning, and it's gonna be a good
day for gardening. Oh my gosh, the sky is blue, little breeze
out there, temperature is just perfect. I don't know what else could we
ask for. All right, thisis this is perfect. You're listening to
garden Line and I'm your host,Skip Richter. And here is the phone
number. You want to write thisdown so you can give us a call.

(38:30):
Seven one three two one two fiveeight seven four seven one three two
one two fifty eight seventy four.And let's just go straight out to the
phone's. First thing here, we'regonna go out to Lamarck and talk to
buddy. Good morning, Buddy,Good morning, Skip. How are you
today? Well, I'm well,thank you. I have to put some

(38:50):
shrubs in in a spring and aproperty I have and it's a very high
shade area. What type of shrubswould you recommend for a high shade area?
You know, the den sure theshade, the harder it is to
get good density of shrub, youknow, just not enough light to create
that wall of foliage like you wouldget out in the sun. Uh.
There's there's a shrub called a Fatsiajaponica. Fatsia japonica. There's another one

(39:13):
called a neck cuba it's a Ucuba. One form of a cuba is
called gold dust plant because it hasa little flex of gold in the leaves
or actually yellow but in the leaves. Those two can take a lot of
shade, and so I would Iwould consider those. Uh, the U

(39:34):
Japanese U does pretty good too,if the shade isn't too dense. Okay.
And what was the name of thefirst one again, Japonica or something
Japonica, Yes, Fatsia fa tSia, Fatsia Japonica. I think sometimes
I believe that one is also calledJapanese are aurelia also, But anyway,

(39:57):
those two are very, very veryWhen you look at them, you think,
well, that's shrub like, youknow, but but it is.
It is a shrub. It's justnot the kind of the bush structure that
you would think for when you hearthe word shrub, you know. So
okay, it's just something to putin the house to please the Homeboarders Association.
But no sense in buying something that'snot going to live and have to

(40:22):
replace it every couple of years.Yeah, these are okay? And are
they carried somewhere in spring at oneof the garden center. I'm down in
Lamark. In Lamark, yeah,you're you're going to find them at all
the garden centers we talk about themain you know, mom and pops are
going to carry things like that,and you know when you're there. When

(40:43):
you're there, buddy, you mayjust ask them that same question because they
probably you know, I don't knowwhat every every plant that every center carries,
but they may have another suggestion ortwo that also fits that. And
if you're going to a good independentgarden center like the ones I talk about,
I have total confidence that they willnot there. You wrong, So
okay, and then they'll called theproperties up in a spring, I'll get

(41:04):
one locally, so those will knowmore what's going on in the local area
than down here in Lamark. Youstart heading a little bit north in that
direction and you've got you know,our CW Nursery there you have two forty
nine, you've got plants for allseasons. Of course, you all the
way out to Arbigate up in thatarea, they're just a lot of good
Oh and down in the heights there'sBuchanans and they have a really good selection

(41:27):
of shade loving plants as well.Because a lot of the landscapes in that
area because of the big beautiful treesare pretty shady. Okay, I appreciate
that, sir, Thank you.I appreciate the call very much. You're
listening to garden Line. I'm yourhost, Skip Richter, and our phone
number. Write this down seven onethree two one to five eight seven four,

(41:50):
and always listen to garden Line witha pen and a piece of paper,
because who knows I might say somethingthat you want to write down.
At least we hope we do severaltimes a day. Let's go out to
the woodlands now and we're going tovisit with Jill Well. Hello, Jill,
Hello, Skip. I have amulberry tree in my backyard and strangest
thing. It sprouted like a leafor two early early on in the spring,

(42:15):
and now there's absolutely not one leafon it. But when I like
check to see if it's still aliveand pop a branch, it's still,
you know, wet and has greenon it. Okay, but there's no
use. And then this has beenin the ground for more than a year
several years, yes, okay,and never had this happened to it before.

(42:37):
Right now, I'm not sure whythey would have dropped off. That's
something is is shocking the plant.You know, of course drafts can do
that, but that's not what theproblem is with your mulberry. At this
time of the year. It couldbe sometimes saggy, wet soil will be
difficult on a plant, but frommulberry, just to drop all those leaves

(42:59):
and not come out, that's kindof well, the leaves didn't come back
from from from winter. Like therewas maybe one or two in the in
the spring, so like they theydropped in the fall, right, and
then there's one or two and they'renot even there anymore. Yeah, that's
I don't know. Something's wrong,Something is going on in the soil.

(43:22):
And exactly what it is, I'mnot I'm not sure what to tell you.
But I tell you what if you'vestill got green on the on the
twigs, they're supple and green,and there's there's juice in the limbs.
In other words, yes, Iwould I would wait and it's probably going
to come out. Uh. Theonly other thing would be some sort of
a herbicide used around it that mighthave had some stressing effect like that.

(43:44):
Um, unless you just have somedistinct memory of doing some kind of a
weed treatment around it that might havegotten in the root system. Yeah,
i'd say, just wait, itought to bounced back out. But that
is a strange response, and Ican't I can't think of a disease or
insect, you know, particularly that'scausing it. So I think it's going
to be a wait and see.Okay, well wait, Well I've been

(44:06):
waiting for a while. I've beenwaiting to call too, So thanks so
much for taking it. Yeah,I'm glad you called and keep us posted.
I'd be curious to know, youknow, if it if it still
doesn't come out, or if itcomes on out later. And because every
year is different and plants keep teachingus new things, right, No,
I hear you. All right,thank you so much, Thank you,
Jill. I appreciate the call.Oh goodness. We uh yeah, you

(44:30):
know, plants, they do havea way of teaching you amazing things.
Uh. One thing I always liketo say is the plants obviously can't can't
read. For example, I usedto have a list of deer resistant plants,
and my my humorous comment is,yeah I had the list, but
deer broke into my office one nightrummage through the file drawers, and ate

(44:52):
the list in some other words,deer can't read. You know, they're
everywhere it says, dear, don'teat such and such plant, and then
you plan it and deer eat becausedeer can't read. They don't know they're
not supposed to eat that cotton plant. Let's go out to northwest easton.
We're going to talk with Greg.Now, Good morning, Greg, Yes,
we're a good morning. Can youhear me? Okay? I can?
How are you okay? Good?Good? Thank you. Hey.

(45:16):
We have an important garden dust inour back yard that has several plumps of
sedge nut in them, and wehave already treated them with sedgehammer. Had
talked to Randy last summer before hepassed, and he had suggested a technique
of using a cotton glove over yourhand and dipping it into the liquid of

(45:38):
the sedge hammer and actually coating eachplant to avoid spraying in a garden where
you have other it's all ornamental plantsand any food producing at the moment.
But anyway, so I did thetreatment about a week and a half ago,
and at about a week many ofthe plants started showing kind of a

(46:01):
yellowing and somewhat of a wilting process. But anyway, from reading the packaging
and instructions with the sedgehammer, itwasn't real clear how long you have to
wait for the chemical to really doits work. You know, they said
it could take a week to twoweeks for you to see the signs of

(46:21):
it. But it works, likeyou get rid of the stinking things that
I kind of like to know howlong I have to keep looking at them
and have them well interfere with theother things I want to do. I
would give them at least a couplemaybe two weeks would be a good number
before you would just like you know, weed eat up them off at the
ground. By then it would havemoved down into the plant. So if
you're tired looking at the top growth, you can remove it or you can

(46:42):
just leave it. But it takestime to work, but it does work.
It does work. Sometimes you haveto retreat because there's going to be
some nuts that had not sent ashoot up yet. So you think,
while I killed it and it cameback, well, maybe it was a
different nut underground that came back.Sometimes a big strong tuber underground we call
them nuts, but tubers they haveseveral buds on them and you knock them

(47:04):
back real far. But one budsurvives and comes on back out. So
be ready to do a retreatment.Don't let it up for air. Once
it has three to five leaves onit, it needs to be treated again.
All right, yes, all right, well, thank you very much.
We're gonna go to take a break. Appreciate that call. Greg.
You were listening to garden Line.Our phone number is seven one three two

(47:27):
one two five eight seven four sevenone three two one two fifty eight seventy
four. Nikki, did you knowthat you can eat nuts sedge? No?
I didn't know you can eat thetubers from yellow nuts edge. So
sometimes you feel like a nuts andsometimes you don't. All right, well,
thank you speechless. I had to, I had to follow up,
but I'm gonna drop and we're it'sall news now, bye bye. Boy.

(48:08):
You're listening to garden Line. Herewe are Sunday morning, and you
could not have a better afternoon aheadin this kind of weather. I mean,
is it is awesome. It's agood day to get out and fertilize
the lawn if you haven't done thatalready. If you fertilizing, it was
like six weeks ago and you puton one of the quick releases to get
an early green up, you needto get the fertilizer down now that's going

(48:30):
to feed slowly and take you throughthe summer. This is the time to
be doing that, and so youwant to get out there, get those
products, get them ready to go. Get your soil built as best you
can. Because whether it's a lawn, a vegetable garden, a flower bed,
a herb garden, you name it, the soil is the bank account,
and you can only spend money whenthe bank account's got money, right,

(48:53):
Isn't that true? If the soilis dry, If the soil a
saggy wet, that's a problem.We need good drink, we need good
moisture content. If the soil islow in nutrients, that's going to be
the limiting factor. Do you knowthere's a thing we're going to nerd out
a little bit here, But bearwith me because I think it helps to
understand some of these principles in horticulture. So here we go. I'll make

(49:15):
this quick. There is a thingcalled Lee Bigg's barrel. From long time
ago, a scientists named Lee Bigg, a soil scientist came up with the
idea of a barrel and the staveson a barrel each represent a different nutrient.
So imagine a big old whiskey barrel, okay, and each stave coming
up. One is nitrogen, oneis phosphorus, one is potassium. You

(49:37):
get the idea all the way,all sixteen seventeen different nutrients that are absolutely
essential for the plants. Now,imagine if you cut one stave off halfway
up the barrel, how high couldyou put water in the barrel? No
higher than that, right, becauseit just runs out. So that analogy

(49:59):
that he created is a good onebecause you may add plenty of nitrogen,
plenty of phosphorus, plenty of potassium, But if you're lacking in sulfur,
or if you're lacking in zinc,or if you're lacking in manganese, or
if you're lacking in magnesium, that'sgoing to be what limits what your plants
can do. They can only beas productive as the least available nutrient that's

(50:22):
there in the soil. That's whywe build our soil, that's why we
add compost to the soil, becausecompost is dead organic matter. It's organic
matter that grow making plant parts thereforerequired every essential nutrient or it couldn't have
grown. It wouldn't be essential ifyou could grow without it. Right,
So when you take a leaf offa tree, that leaf has a blend

(50:45):
of everything that that tree needs tobuild a leaf, to function, to
do all the biological processes. Soit's the limiting factor that we're looking at,
and that's why we add compost.That's why we return our grass clippings
when we mow the lawn. That'swhy we buy fertilizers. And then we
also supplement with the trace minerals,the trace elements, those kinds of things

(51:09):
that are all the elements you'd neverthink of, but they're important for plant
growth, are implant important for humangrowth. All of that combination provides a
bank account. So when the plantsays I need I need some copper,
but I just need a little bitof it for this function in the plant,
there's copper in the bank account thatit can draw from. Not too

(51:31):
much to cause imbalances, but there'senough. And when you hear me talk
about fertilizing your law, and oryou hearing me talk about using one of
the mineral supplements, you know thatyou might find like a Nature's Way has
one. When you hear me talkabout using something like an azamite for all
the trace minerals that are in there, that's what we're talking about. We're

(51:52):
talking about getting a bank account thatis stocked with everything a plant is going
to need, because strange enough,you could have all of the minerals,
all the things you need, exceptone being short, and that's the one
that's going to stop your tomato fromproducing, your lawn from thriving, your
trees from doing well. It takesall of them. And that's what we

(52:15):
mean when we say spend money onthe brown stuff before you spend money on
the green stuff. Fix your soil, and then the green stuff you put
in the ground is going to thriveand it's going to be money well spent.
It's an investment. And I liketo think of a soil as a
bank account because that is a goodanalogy. We all understand what happens when

(52:37):
it's called overdrawn ride or it's calledin not much money left there, right,
we want to build a bank accountthat it's not just one thing money
coming out. It's seventeen different andmore than that, different minerals and nutrients
that are in that bank account,and we can draw this one or that
one or the other one just exactlyin the amounts we need, the timing

(52:58):
we need. That's the seas tosuccess, and that's what we're raiming for.
And you know what, it's somethingthat nature taught us a long time
ago. And I'll talk about thatcoming back from break. Right now,
I'm gonna give you a phone numberto call get on the board while we're
in break, and that's seven onethree two one two fifty eight seventy four.
Brag you may well, good Sundaymorning. This is a good day

(53:32):
for getting out there and getting somegardening done. A good day for getting
out there and visiting some garden centers. This afternoon. Boy, you just
this is chamber of Emers weather we'vegot. Oh my gosh, it's sitting
inside and doing a radio show.I love doing a radio show, but
Agent, I just look outside andit's like the plants and dirt are calling
me. I need to get outthere. Hey, let's head over to
the Heights now. We're gonna talkto Steve and the Heights. How you

(53:55):
doing this morning, Steve us askip. I'm doing pretty good. I
had a mulberry tree that was justfull of mulberries, and then the web
worms got it, and they've prettymuch I pretty much roted it off,
but now they're starting. I boughta few other little trees. I got

(54:16):
a few peach trees and a plumtree going, and now the web worms
are getting on that. I boughtsome regular stuff that's supposed to kill bugs,
you know that you just put onyour water hose and stuff. And
I've been spraying it like it's supposedto last, like for four weeks,
and I spray it today and thenthe web worms are back tomorrow. So

(54:37):
is there something I can put onthese? The key to the first of
all, I'm surprised you're having thatkind of a web worm problem now.
Usually we have a little bit ofa spring outbreak. It's very small though,
and then in the fall we havethe big web worm season when it
just can defoliate a tree. Butanyway, nevertheless, first of all,

(54:59):
if is this a small tree whereyou could reach up there with a stick
and break up the WEBSHOI not really, no, no, no, The
big one it's probably at least twentyfive okay tall or so all right,
and that's what I've been doing onthese two smaller ones. I've been getting
a rake and on a ladder andtry to just drag the web all for

(55:21):
then sprays and wall spray. Butwell, you want you want to when
you can, You want to breakthe webs up and then spray, because
what they do is they build thisweb so they can feed on the leaves
inside and be protected against wasps.And the webs tend to deflects mists like
spray. So there are hosen sprayersthat shoot a straight stream a good distance,

(55:44):
and with the strength of that streamyou can kind of break through the
web because you want to get thefoliage inside covered with what you're spraying.
And the safest thing you can useis as the products that contain BT.
BT is a disease of caterpillars,so it works on them. It doesn't
kill grasshoppers or lady beetles or anythingelse. It's a grasshop it's a caterpillar

(56:05):
disease. The BT only lasts abouta day, but if you get good
coverage, it's gonna it's gonna takethem out, and then you may come
back three to five days later andhit it again. And you may have
to come a third time. Butthe BT is the less disruptive to all
the things that are out there thatare helping you fight the pests in your
garden. But that would be anoption. But I think the key to

(56:30):
success, even with the product youpurchase is getting through those webs, getting
the foliage covered, because when youcoat the foliage and they eat the foliage,
that'll take them out. Okay,so let me answer you something.
This tree I got, it's apretty big tree, and it will.

(56:52):
I mean they pretty much devoured itand I had even so it will.
It will come back next year orlater on once. Okay, absolutely,
you'll come back, and they probablywon't be right back with the new growth.
They do run a life cycle,and but you'll have them if you
had them, and now you're goingto have a heck of a time with

(57:14):
them in August, September, maybeOctober when they come back again. So
just be ready and on all thesesprays, especially on the BT, you
want to spray it when they're youngcaterpillars because as they get old and they're
about to become moths, going toa pup and become a moth. These
products are not going to be aseffective, especially the organic BT. So

(57:35):
watch for the start of them,and that's when you have access to all
the foliage and you know they'll layeggs on a bare leaf. They have
a little cluster yellow eggs into theleaf. And when you first to see
some start of the damage and youstart spraying the foliage, that's the way
you get ahead of it and shutit down. Once the big webs are
there, it's it's more work,and it's kind of more hit and miss.
It's more more physical work that youhave to try to just not know.

(58:00):
I was getting a rake what Ican reach and find to drag the
webs off, and then I wouldjust spray them on the ground. So
get this BT, Yes, that'swhat you call it, justs BT and
I'm getting I'm sure Southwest has itthe Southwest. If you go over and
talk to folks at Southwest they willtake you they probably have. There are
four different bts they sell. Butthe thing to remember about BT is it's

(58:21):
not it's not a toxic poison.So you spray it on the on the
pest and they die. It's it'ssomething they have to eat, and it's
a disease. So it's like sprayingbubonic plague on your leaves. But the
bubonic plague attacks caterpillars, okay,so they eat, they get it inside
of them, and then then theyit kills them that way, But early

(58:44):
on is the way to go,no matter what products you're using. Let
me ask you this, and becauseI've got I've got a couple of little
smaller you know, eight ten footlike a peach tree and a pear tree
and a plum tree. It wouldn'tbe a bad idea because they're all to
spray that stuff now, even beforethe caterpillars get on it, right before

(59:06):
the most worms on peach, pearor plum. They'll attack mulberry, that'll
tack pecan, they'll attack black cherryand a few other things. But they
shouldn't be on those. Hey,Steve, I'm gonna have to hit a
break here, but I appreciate thecloud and good luck with that. I
wish you, wish you the verybest. I want to tell you about

(59:29):
a garden center that you I don'tknow if you've been out to Kingwood before,
but even if you don't live upin the northeast part of town,
Kingwood Garden Center on stone Hollow Driveand Warren's Garden Center on North Park.
They it's an amazing place to visit. I stopped by there yesterday. I
was in Kingwood and I checked outour friends at Kingwood Garden Center. They've

(59:50):
got all the products we talk about, but they also have one of the
most amazing gift shops I've ever seen. And Mother's Day is coming up not
too far away. You need tocheck it out out because even if your
mom's not a gardener, they've gotsome really cool stuff in there that I
think she will love. That's KingwoodGarden Center on stone Hollow Drive, both
Kingwood and Warren seven days a week. And you've got plants, you've got

(01:00:14):
bling, you've got everything you're lookingfor. You won't be disappointed if you
check those places out. Yeah.I always like to stop into garden centers
like that. We we just forme. It's inspiration and I learn every
time. You know, you goto a garden center and I'm walking through
and I'm going, oh, well, there's a salvy I've never grown before.

(01:00:37):
I'm gonna try that one out.And actually I brought I brought a
couple of things home from Kingwood GardenCenter yesterday just to try out in the
yard, see how it, seehow it does. So when I advise
you, it's not just me readingsomething in a book somewhere, it's maybe
I've actually done it myself. Atleast that would be ideal. Tom out
in Jersey Village. We're having tohead to a break, but I hope

(01:00:57):
you'll hang on. We'll get toyou. You will be the first up
after we come back from break.For those of you who would like to
get on the board with Josh sevenone three two one two fifty eight seventy
four seven one three two one twofive eight seven four. Well, thank
again everybody who came out at Kand MS Hardware yesterday in Kingwood. And

(01:01:20):
I do want to let you knowthat in a couple of weeks, on
Saturday, May thirteenth, I'm goingto be at the arbor Gate, Now
that's a day before Mother's Day.I'll be out there for a couple of
hours at Arbourgate Nursery. Believe me, you will find somewhere between five and
one hundred thousand different things you canbuy your mom. Five thousand different things

(01:01:40):
that you can buy your mom forMother's Day at Arbor Gate. I hope
you'll come out Saturday the thirteenth andwe'll see you there. KTRH Garden Line
does not necessarily endorse any of theproducts or services advertised on this program.
Welcome to KTRH Garden Line with Skiprictor just watching. Well. Good Sunday

(01:02:12):
morning, on a great day forgetting outside, a great day for gardening.
You just this afternoon you need toeither bee in your garden, in
your lawn, or out visiting agarden center for inspiration and for some pretty
cool things to bring home. No, momaid, I had forgotten about that.
That is important to give our pollinatorsa chance to you know, have

(01:02:34):
a shot at some some different bloomsthat can help support them. Just remember,
though, one one drawback is inyour lawn. When you allow your
lawn weeds to bloom a number one, it's great for the bees. I
mean, bees love dandelions, theylove chick weed and all that. But
uh, here you're you're building seedthat's going to be in your lawn.
So if you are not tolerant ofany weeds in the lawn, maybe you

(01:02:57):
know that's not the approach. ButI can tell you this dry down the
roadside, I'll pull over. I'llsee little white flowers weeds, we're talking
weed roadside weeds. I'll pull overand just kind of go look at them
to see what's on them. AndI always find pollinator insects. I always
find beneficial insects. Some of thethings that are eating afids, for example,
in your garden are going to beout there on those flowers. And
so when we create a flowerless environment, you know, we got our Saint

(01:03:22):
Augustine lawns that go everywhere. We'vekilled every weed in the lawn. Maybe
not doing a real great job planningall kinds of blooming plants around the landscape.
You're just not going to have thoseguys around because there's nothing for them,
there's nothing to support them. NoMomay, you know I would I
would have said, no momay iswhat we call June first. When you
get to June first, there's nomowmay. Josh. We need like a

(01:03:45):
symbol crashing couldn't sound or something forwhen I tell one of those horrible,
horrible chokes. Let's head out toJersey Village and talk to Tom. Hello
Tom, good morning morning, Skip. How are you today? Better than
I? Deserve. Thank you.Well, good, How can we help?

(01:04:05):
My wife has a I guess you'dcall it a pondless waterfall that still
has a pond, and he observedsome string alja and he has other critters
like frogs and whatever that are relyingon that pond. And she wanted to

(01:04:28):
put some sort of a treatment,and she got a product that she didn't
want to apply it until she gotmore information because it has the environmental cautions.
And she's got a Texas Wildscape NationalWildlife certification and a monarch waystation,
on and on and on. Soyou had mentioned something yesterday in your program

(01:04:49):
to somebody about a product that containedthe alga in that situation, and I
didn't write it down and wondered ifthat would be an appropriate cure for this
situation. Oh, I'm trying toremember what we were talking about yesterday where
I mentioned that this and this wasprobably though not in a pond. I

(01:05:12):
don't remember having a pond conversation onalgae. Well, it's called AKA something
you'd mentioned it. I didn't writeit down. Okay, Well apparently I
did, and I'm not remembering nowwhat what that was, but I can
tell you this when you have algaein a pond, and is this are
we talking about a big farm pondor like a little coipond kind of thing

(01:05:33):
in the backyard. It's approximately sixfeet by yeah. Yeah. So a
lot of the products we would useon algae are going to be toxic to
fish, for example, and sowe don't want to use them in that
kind of environment. One thing that'sdone by people's little ponds like that is

(01:05:55):
you can purchase straw, little strawbales, and the straw is just a
dried grass material, but it drawsnitrogen out of the water. And because
that's a high carbon straw bale thatyou're putting in and it literally takes the
algae down. It drops the numbersdown. And I think some of the

(01:06:16):
some of the plant some of theplaces that will sell like to do pond
work, you know, like Nelson'sGarden out there in the Kadi area.
They may have an access to that, or they may have another product that
they would recommend for reducing the algaethat you have down in the pond.
That would be probably the best thing. There's actually there's a lot of different

(01:06:40):
algae. I think you mentioned filamentousalgae there's a plankton algae and a macroalgae
and other things, and each oneis handled a little bit differently, so
it's hard to generalize. But ifit's the filamentous types of algae, I
think you're going to find success witheither the straw bales that you just set
in the pond, the soap,or one of the products that they may
have that's safe for fish and otherthings. Great, she misses you.

(01:07:04):
She was a master gardener out thereat Bear Creek. Oh it's flooded after
Harvey. Oh well you said youwere always helpful. Well, thank you.
That's kind of her. Yeah,those were those were great days.
Boy tell you Harvey we hit Welost our office at Bear Creek twice,
the Agrilife extension office, And afterthe second one he's like, okay,
that's enough. You know that.The second time, I think it was

(01:07:25):
underwater for like weeks before you couldeven walk back in there to see the
damage. And that was a nicefacility served as so many years the Houston
community. But yeah, we'll sayhi to your wife. I appreciate the
kind words. Our anniversary is tomorrow, Well, happy anniversary. Hey,
thank you. Skip you you needto do. Is she listening now?

(01:07:48):
If not, I'll give you somegood ideas. She's always listening to you,
skip, Well, I would thoughther a lot. Since she's listening,
I think it's appropriate for you tobuy her jewelry that's garden related.
It has lots of diamonds on itfor an anniversary. Gap. I'm sorry
to do that to you. I'mjust saying thank you very much, thank

(01:08:08):
you for the call. Tom.Sorry, sorry to stir that pot.
Just have to be a little bitdevilish there. All right, all right,
let's I'll tell you what. We'regoing to run out to Bill and
conro a. Bill, we gotabout a minute. How can we help
here today? We got you there? Bill? All right? Yeah,

(01:08:28):
here, I'm there you are.I'm dealing the takeall patch and I'm doing
two applications a fungicide two weeks apart, and I'm in the middle of the
middle of that. Okay. Myquestion really is after the second application,
when should I apply fertilizer and Ishall use the fifteen five, or should
I move along to the next round. Yeah, I'd move along to something

(01:08:50):
that's more gradual release over time.And you know I've been talking about those
today are the folks that we talkedabout here, the nitrofoss the folks,
the Nelson folks, microlife. They'reall going to provide you with things that
can gradually feed out over time.And that's what I would do. And
don't worry about timing with that andyour fungicide. It's okay. Just fertilize
when you want to fertilize. Okay, that's a great. Yeah, alright,

(01:09:15):
good luck you bet. Thanks forthat call. Rich In Spring and
K and Pareland. We are comingback to you. You guys will be
the first up when we get backfrom this little break segment. You're listening
to Garden Line. I'm your host, Skip Richter and our phone number.
Please write this down and give usa call. Seven one three two one
two five eight seven four seven onethree two one two K t R H.

(01:10:03):
Well, good morning on a goodSunday morning. Excellent day for gardening
ahead, day to get out inthe yard, day to go visit a
garden center, day to get inspiration. This is spring. You know,
when you get out there and youprepare the soil and you plant the right
kinds of plants, the ones thatare going to survive. Here that they
are going to thrive here. Youwill enjoy the benefits of that money and

(01:10:28):
that work all through the rest ofthe year. And if you if you
pick good shrubs, trees, perennialplants, you enjoy them for decades to
come, and your home value evengets better each time you enhance your landscape
and make it better. Well,let's head out to Spring and we are
going to talk to Rich this morning. Hello Rich, good morning. Skip.

(01:10:48):
Questions are regarding three emergence. I'vedone a split application of prodiamine and
I'm still and I know pro diamine, I don't think it's good against kalinga
and nutsedge. Is there anything alongthe pre emergent lines that will handle kalinga
and nutsedge? I? You knowwhat, Rich, I'm going to have

(01:11:13):
to look at some of the productsthat we have on that. I have
not checked the barricade label for thesedges and related plants. I can do
a little looking into that and maybecomment back on it a little bit later
in the show. If you wouldlike to hold on, let me put
you on hold, have Josh giveyou some information and you would send that
to me. It'd give me achance to go read some labels. You

(01:11:35):
know, it's one thing a lotof plants. A lot of times you'll
have a herbicide says this label forthis and another one's label for the same
thing. But they don't perform equallywell. And I'd like to steer you
in a direction of what's going tobe a little bit more effective against that
particular kind of plant. So wouldyou hang on josh that information and then
let me get you a better answerthan I'm going to be able to give

(01:11:57):
off the top of my head.Okay, we'll do, thank you,
all right, Well, good luckwith good luck with those Yeah, I
tell you the You know, wehave a lot of different groups of plants.
We talk about annual grasses, andwe talk about a broad leaf weeds,
and those are the two big ones. But then we have all the
sedges and the sedge like plants,and that would be things like nutsedge and

(01:12:18):
kalinga that Rich was mentioning, andthings perform differently. Then we have this
other group of plants that is kindof caught between a grass and a broad
leaf, and that would be thingsthink of wandering jew think of dove weed,
or think of basket grass. Thosekinds of things they have the you

(01:12:40):
look at the leaf and the veinsrun parallel to the leaf, but it's
a broad leaf, not a grasslike leaf. Those are kind of caught
in between, and they can bea challenge to find the herbicides at work
well on them, and especially ifit's in a lawn situation, you don't
want to you want to carry yourlawn in the process, so that that
can be a little bit of achallenge to pull off. Well, let's
head out to pair Land now andwe are going to talk to k this

(01:13:01):
morning. Well, good morning,Kay, good morning Skip. Thank you
for taking my call. I talkedto you a couple of weeks ago about
some plants I was trying to highbiscusand blue plumbago that had free freeze trying
to recover from and I've lost afew. But anyway, in the meantime
it's a forty foot bed raised bed. And in the meantime, the Virginia

(01:13:26):
button weed is kind of creeping intaken over, and there's a long,
long runner kind of of thin bladedgrass too. I don't know exactly what
it is. I think it camein with the dirt, but anyway,
I've pulled a lot of it outback, maybe eight or ten inches away
from the plants. I was wondering, can I along the edges of these

(01:13:49):
beds? Can I spray with roundupor some other weed killer. I actually
have a big piece of cardboard witha V cut in it to protect the
plant. You not want to spray? Yeah, if you're if you're using
something like that, you definitely needto protect the plant. And this is
just a general answer kind of goesbroader than your question. But whenever you're

(01:14:11):
using a product of any kind that'sgoing to kill a plant that you have
desirable nearby, you want to makesure and not pump your sprayer up with
too much pressure. That tends tomake it put out a mist that can
float in the air. So youwant course droplets, low pressure corse droplets.
You want to just spray enough tobarely wet the foliage. If it's
dripping off and going into the ground, you're wasting product. And followed by

(01:14:34):
a rain, you can actually havesome of those products go in the soil
and do damage to the plant roofs. You want to be careful with that.
Uh, you know, I'm sorry, What was the kind of plants,
desirable plants that you have in thebed, high discus and blue plumbago,
plum bagons, both broad leaves.Yeah, I would be real careful

(01:14:56):
because the Virginia button wheat is toughto kill and it's going to take special
products and you're gonna have to doit more than once. And so if
you're gunna spray, you know youneed kind of a weed beater, ultra
kind of product. There's another oneout. Oh gosh, the names escaping
me right now. Fertilone makes that. We'll do pretty good job on button.
We'd be it takes more than oneapplication. But if it's you had

(01:15:20):
told me Celsius was one that wasone, well knows, yeah, No,
Celsius is one. That's not theone I was thinking of. But
the nice thing about Celsius is weuse it in the lawn. And I
keep saying, don't use broad leavesin your lawn, broad leaf control in
your lawn. When temperature gets upabove the mid to opper eighties, well
we're still inside that that line,yes, but we're not going to be

(01:15:40):
very much longer. But celsius cango up into probably ninety ninety one or
two degrees and still be okay inthe lawn. But it's not I don't
believe it's going to have an ornamentalbed label for application, so I know
it's a long bed you've got.But anything you can do just to get
in there with a little spade kindof fork and try I'm going to get

(01:16:01):
a claw thing to maybe, yeah, one a little claw clawing to grab
the runners underneath. Yeah, that'sright, just kind of I have a
little fork thing that's that's a holdof my hand. It's not a spading
for it, but and I justit just loosens the soil and you can
kind of shake the weed as youpull it, and it comes right out
at the soul's moist. I woulddo a lot of him pull and i'd

(01:16:23):
especially get it done before the buttonweed produces the buttons, which are next
next plant a cycle seeds and tryto get those out of there. There
are things you can squirt on themthat are pretty effective, but button wheat
is tough, and I've seen itget squirted right in the face with something
that you kill it, it getsweak and then it bounces back. But
after that, if you hit itagain when it's in its weakened state,

(01:16:45):
you get much better control. Sodon't think of button weed. If you're
going to spray as a one off, expect to have to come back and
do it again. Okay, butagain in that situation, I think you're
going to be if you can takethe time, get you a good kneeling
bench out there where you can youavoid all the things that happened to us
when we get down and get up, and get down and get up eight

(01:17:05):
hundred times on a Saturday morning.Yes, actually, when you're eighty three
years old, it's a little harder. That's right. That is that is
right, That is right. Iunderstand that we all remember sometime north of
forty when we woke up one morningsore and we couldn't figure out why.
It only gets worse, doesn't it? But does? Seriously though that you

(01:17:28):
know, just a little bit oftime here and there, you know,
going through a few mornings and earlymorning, don't work late, have a
cup of coffee. It's just amazinghow much ground we can get covered that
way. What's the first one yousaid to use in the bed for the
for Denny button, We've the firstI think I mentioned, I think I
mentioned we'd beat our Ultra as one. There's another one that also contains the

(01:17:53):
ingredient carfentra zone. That's one thatyou don't see in a lot of the
broad leaf weed controller products, butit has it does a good job when
you're dealing with the weed like that. And I'm off the top of them.
I had the names escaping me thatFertlane has a product that does that.
I think we'd beat their ultras ofbonide product. And you know,

(01:18:14):
the brands not what is important tome here, it's getting the right set
of ingredients out there. And sothat's that's what I would do. If
you know, if you can't doall the pollen, at least do that.
I'll give it a try. Thankyou so much. A great day.
To be real careful with it,because it kills broad leaf plants and
it doesn't care whether you think they'rea weed or not. It kills broadly

(01:18:35):
plants. So yeah, I knowI don't have a lot of don't have
a lot of leaves on my plantsyet, but day some of them are
struggling to come back. All right, Thank you so very much. I'd
like your little air track. Kay, thank you for the call. Okay,
appreciate that very much. You're listeningto garden Line. I am your
host, Skip Richter. We arehere to answer your gardening questions. So

(01:18:58):
if you want to write down ournumber, if you'd like to give us
a call, it is seven onethree two one two five eight seven four
seven one three two one two fiftyeight seventy four. They are there's a
lot of different weed issues that wedeal without in the lawn and garden,
and everybody has, you know what, they're varying tolerance for different things.

(01:19:21):
And you know, we're we're aboutto go to news here in a minute.
But Nikki walked in and you youwere talking before about I mentioned that
you could eat nuts edge and youtook us fat almond joy. Do you
know that one of the names forthe edible uh nuts edge nuts is they're
called earth almonds, And so Ibought some seed one year now here I

(01:19:45):
am. I hope nobody's out therelistening. I basically planted nut grass.
I bought the tubers, but it'sit's called tufa nuts tufa and they're used.
They can be roasted and they havean almond like flavor. But I
would not recommend them, because it'slike you put them in your mouth,
you chew a while, and thenyou spit out a mouthful of sawdust and

(01:20:06):
you're walked with somewhat of an almondlike flavor. But did you know that
Egyptian pharaohs were buried with their chuffanuts in the tombs in the pyramids in
Egypt? I did not know thatthat is one of the many things they
took with them to the afterlife.Nuts. Yeah. Can you imagine being
buried with your nut grass? That'slike also, I'd like to be buried

(01:20:27):
with a bag of fire ants.Uh and what from for crying out loud?
Buried with your nut grass and yourfire ants and everything. And anyway,
I just thought that was interesting,very good earth almonds. You heard
it here first. You also heardthat. I don't recommend that you do.

(01:20:48):
By the way, that's yellow nutsedge, not purple. Purple nuts
edge is bitter. The nuts arebitter flavored. You don't want that.
Don't want that one. But ifyou can't beat them, eat them.
That's that's what I there. Yougo, all right, Well, good

(01:21:21):
Sunday morning on a good day,Oh my gosh, a good day to
get out get outside this afternoon.There is wonderful weather. You just can't
beat it. And if you justget some fresh air, do it for
your mental health if no other reason. I mean, if you just walk
through a park, get outside anddo that. This is this is like

(01:21:42):
free therapy, just everywhere outside onChamber of Commerce weather to day. We're
gonna go now out to Titusville,Florida and talk to DC. A good
morning DC today. Well I'm well, tell me how you are in Titusville,
Florida listening to guard Line well ashide Assville, Flard is doing just

(01:22:02):
fine. Um. I've got afront yard and I have between the sidewalk
and the street, I have Northfolklines and also a crepe myrtle, big
crape myrtle, and the grass betweenthe crape myrtle and the one of the
Northfolk pines is not growing. Itjust kind of dying up and gets the

(01:22:26):
direct sun of everything. So I'mthinking that they're just battling with the trees
for the glasses. It's been agood water out of the grass, so
it's not growing. That's my dealing, but I'm not Yeah, hey,
d D see what kind of grassis that st Augustine, Saint Augustine.
Okay, Well, as you geta lot of tree roots, uh,

(01:22:49):
the soil basically gets filled with wood, right, I mean these are big,
giant tree roots, and there's lessroom for the plants to get their
roots in and reach good soil.And that's one thing. Of course,
the shade under a tree is something. But I think you indicated this is
a pretty sunny area. I wouldI would do a couple of things.

(01:23:09):
Have you tried have you fertilized thisspring yet? Yes? I have a
Scott's botusaster my little commers. Allright, we'll be careful with the ones
that you know have that combo inthem, because sometimes the products that are
killing the weeds can also have aneffect on the lawn or maybe the timing

(01:23:29):
maybe a little off. But I'mgonna assume you put that down at the
proper rate and got it watered inand everything. I would just I would,
I would check the area out andsee what what do you think about
soul compaction there? I don't know. If you're in a sandy soil,
it's not an issue. If you'rein a clay soil, it can be
an issue. Make sure that goahead, okay, okay, good,

(01:23:53):
Well, in that case, Iwould just kind of watch how things are
going, make sure it's get adequatemoisture. You might want to contact your
your extension office for your county.Uh and in Titusville you probably have a
horticulturist in the office there, butask them about a sample. Bringing a
turf sample in you. They maybe able to determine that there's a particular

(01:24:15):
disease, like take all root rodon it. We're not in chinch bug
season right now, but you knowchinch bugs grubs. A good turf sample
may help us narrow down what exactlyis going on. Then we know what
to do about it. Because you'resaying you've got good decent sunlight, you've
got good soil, and you fertilized, so that grass should be doing better
than it is. Who let meask you. Of course, if it

(01:24:39):
doesn't, it is baddly with thosegreets. I know, I can take
out a big once a while conser, but what about us like fer jazz
as it is? If I can'tget the grass to put federick Jasmine all
couple that work. Confederate Jasmine isa pretty big and sprawling planet. You
know, it's not like Asian jasminethat stays down a little tighter. You

(01:25:00):
can keep it a little tighter,closer to the ground. I like Confederate
jasmine. Uh, you know,it's a it's a nice vine on a
fence or something like that. ButI think the Asian jasmine may may suit
that a little bit better. Thereare some others the advantage of a vining
ground cover as opposed to a clumpinglike I'll use a low riopy as an
example. You know it lo riopy. The clumps can't grow where there's a

(01:25:23):
big root sitting right there, soit tends to be kind of spotty.
But with a vining, the vinefills in all around, and so you
get a nice even coverage despite thefact that there's some roots here and there.
Okay, all right, and I'lllook into that. Asian jasmin.
Does that have a good No,No, it doesn't. In fact,

(01:25:44):
it basically doesn't bloom. Now,there's some types that have some colorful foliage,
so they are a little extra attractive. You go to a good garden
center in your area, you're goingto find some that are not just the
plain old dark green that they havesome either yellow or some white and other
thing in the foliage that are kindof attractive. And then there are a
lot of other good ground covers.I know what Delia is a popular one

(01:26:05):
in the South, but it isa takeoff, running, sprawling booger,
and so you need to be ableto keep it in control. But it
is one that could sprawl through thereand fill in really well. I just
think you're not gonna like it,because it's going to be jumping over the
curb and jumping over the sidewalk,and probably a little bit too aggressively vigorous.

(01:26:26):
Yeah, because I've got a livewoopie all along my walls, along
the edge of the house, prettymuch all into the pot yard. But
can I take some of them littlewopee like along the street edge, along
the side walk, just make aborder? Yes, you bet you can
dig it. You can dig itup, take a clump, take a
sharp shovel through it in two directions, make four plants out of it,
and spread it out and it'll dojust fine. Hey, I've got to

(01:26:49):
take a break, DC. Thanksfor calling out from out in Titusville,
Sandy. We see you out therein Cyprus. You're the first up when
we come back our number seven onethree two one two fifty eight seventy four.

(01:27:14):
Good morning on a good Sunday morningfor getting outside getting some fresh air
this afternoon. I hope you're outin the garden or you're walking in nature,
you're visiting a garden center. Uh, Sandy, I see out there
in Cyprus, and I almost gotto a minute ago, and then I
got decided to go to a readingand come back. So how can we
help today? Okay, skip,I need a real big sosh my yard

(01:27:44):
in the back backyard. I don'tknow what these weeds are, but they've
got some pink flowers. And thenI think I have I don't know if
they're the dollar chy or the onesthat look like it's a round circle,
but it looks like a clover almost, okay um. And it's like there's

(01:28:09):
like probably by my pen's line that'sabout fifteen feet by ten feet that nothing
but weeds the same August UNI canbarely see. Okay. Well, and
I did the fertilizer um. Idid the fertilizer um at the end of

(01:28:30):
February beginning of March, and thenI did the asam the next weekend.
And then I did the fertilizer againlike last week, but I think I
did the wrong one. I didthe fifteen five ten. That's okay,
that's okay. I mean, it'sfine. It's just gonna be an immediate
release. So you're gonna probably wantto after about six weeks do another light

(01:28:54):
fertilization. Uh, going into summer, okay. So as far as the
weeds, Sandy, a couple ofthoughts I have. Number One, a
broadly weed control product is going tobe effective in killing the existing weeds that
you have. But my first thoughtis why are they there? You know,
why is it that the grass isn'tthere and the weeds are doing well

(01:29:15):
there? It is it soul compaction? Is it that there's not enough sunlight
for the soil, but these particulartypes of weeds there they're getting by there.
Is it that you know something elseis out of balance or wrong?
The area is seeing too wet todry. There's a lot of things that
give weeds an advantage over grass,and I would try to figure that out

(01:29:38):
first, because we can certainly sprayingkill the weeds, but if we're not
fixing the underlying problem, then it'sjust we're just going to be on a
treadmill of spraying periodically to try tokeep weeds out of an area that grass
is not doing well in and wewant the grass to do well, all
right. And the only thing Ican think of is I've lived here for
twenty years and this is my firstyear having this, and really, to

(01:30:01):
be honest, the first fifteen years, I don't even think I did fertilizer
in my yard. The only differenceis this task. Winter October, November,
December, January, part of January, even for February, those five
months I didn't have my grass cutat all, Okay, but maybe once,

(01:30:25):
okay, once or twice in thefive months. Is that? Does
that have something to do with it? It's better to mow the lawn regularly,
no matter whether you mow it highor low. If you mow regularly,
it makes a densure lawn. Andwhen your lawn gets a dentsure,
the weeds have more trouble, andyou give the lawn the upper hand rather
than the weeds when you don't mow. When you mow irregularly, and when

(01:30:47):
you cut it back, it looksreal bad until Larry Green's up again.
That erratic cycles hard on your grassplant and it gives the weeds the light
they need to get a good headstart. So I would I would give
a regular mowing schedule as you could. I would use a broad leafwat control
product. Though. Now try toknock those out and let's get that done
before the temperatures are up in themid to upper eighties, because we are

(01:31:09):
right on the cusp of entering thewarm season and we don't want to damage
the grass with the products we usedto kill the weeds. Okay, okay,
So what do you recommend I get? You could do something called wheat
free Zone from fertiloam Bonide also hasa product was I was mentioning it a
little bit earlier. It's called weedBeater Ultra. There's a lot of good
products out there that'll do it.Europe, in Cyprus, so you're not

(01:31:32):
far away from plants for all seasons. From the RCW or Arburgate, those
places can all steer you to theproduct they have on hand that'll work well
with that. With that, youtell them if you do, oh yeah,
absolutely. If you're in Cyprus,there's there is the M and D
ace and the Cypress area. You'vegot the ace up on Jones Road in

(01:31:55):
the Cypress area, and they allhave a wide variety of products, absolutely,
and they can point you to manyoptions. Take them a picture of
the weeds that you have, justso you know we know which weed we're
talking about when they recommend something.But those two products i mentioned Ace is
going to have, They're gonna haveboth of them. Thank you, you
bet all right, thank you,Thank you for the call. Well,

(01:32:18):
you are listening to garden Line andwe are here to answer your gardening questions.
We will be taking a break now, but we will be back and
when we come back, you canbe ready to go on the boards.
Give Josh your call at seven onethree two one two five eight seven four
seven one three two one two fiftyeight seventy four. Can't wait to visit

(01:32:42):
more about some things that are goingon today. I've got a few other
things I'd like to talk a littlebit about, So please hang around.
You got neighbors that have not listenedto garden Line before, tell them about
garden Line and listen to us livefrom six am to ten am every Saturday
every Sunday morning. You can alsosubscribe to the podcast and that way you

(01:33:03):
can go back and listen to passshows. Maybe something you missed. Tell
your neighbors about that. It isa great opportunity for people to be able
to listen. It's always interesting tohear all the different places people listen from.
Gosh, we were in Florida today, but that's kind of cool.
But garden Lines here to help youhave a more bounabul garden and beautiful landscape.

(01:33:24):
KTRH Garden Line does not necessarily endorseany of the products or services advertised
on this program. Welcome to KTRHGarden Line with Skip Director, so just
watch him as well. Good Sundaymorning. Wow, have you looked that

(01:34:03):
side? This is the day toenjoy this afternoon. Get out and do
some gardening. Maybe go visit agarden center, take a walk in the
park. Good therapy for you there. You know, if you have purchased
yourself a little piece of property,maybe you've had a piece of property for
a while and you are looking,and you've been looking. Maybe I need

(01:34:24):
to get a tractor or some thingsto take care of the property. Well,
I've got a deal for you herethat you need to listen up because
this is unbelievable and it's not gonnalast long that is Lansdown Moody and Cabota
Tractor getting together. You can puttogether one of those packages. Maybe you
want a Texas Edition L twenty fiveh one. Perhaps the nice thing about

(01:34:45):
that one I like is the hydrostatictransmission so you're not grinding gears all day.
You can add a front end loaderor a box blade or a rotary
cutter, put the whole big packagedeal together and get this zero down zero
and for interest for eighty four months. Now, if I do my math
right, that's seven years now.This deal is only available until June thirtieth,

(01:35:09):
so you don't want to delay.But if you're looking to purchase a
tractor, you're not going to dobetter than this, And you don't just
have to buy the L twenty fiveoh one. There's a lot of other
good Capoda tractors that are part ofthe lands Down Moody program. Now you're
going to find LANSDOWNE Moody all overthe place. They've got a bunch of
stores. Wherever you live, there'sgoing to be a place where you can
go and get that tractor locally.Go to LM tractor dot com. L

(01:35:33):
M tractor dot com you'll see whatI'm talking about. Drive by there,
stop in, you'll get they'll letyou sit on a tractor kind of check
things out. I think you willfall in love with a Caboda from Lansdowne
Moody. I was talking about theother day being out and about and seeing
things, and one of the oneof the things that I enjoy doing is

(01:35:57):
getting out to garden centers. AndI've talked to you about that before.
Familiar with that, but I wasat Buchanans Native Plants done in the Heights
and it's like a little secluded hideaway. And I say little, I probably
should say large secluded hideaway because youget in there and you just wander through.
You know, there's the shed wherethey all have all the products that

(01:36:18):
we talk about, the fertilizers,the soils, pest and disease management things
that that's there. You're going tofind a great gift shop. And by
the way, Mother's Day is coming, so if you cannot find something for
your mom and the Buchanans gift shop, you're not trying. Buchanans Plants dot
Com. They're on East eleventh Streetin the Heights and allow some time because

(01:36:43):
it takes a while to see everythingthat they have everything you can possibly imagine,
from vegetables and herbs and flowers andtrees and tropicals and perennials and especially
native plants and all the products werecommend Buchanans Plants dot Com. I'm gonna
put the phone number out there.We've got seven one three two one two

(01:37:03):
fifty eight seventy four if you wouldlike to be on garden line. I'm
gonna start off by heading right outto at Tascacita and talking to Cheryl.
Well, Hello, Cheryl, Iskip, good morning. I have a
question. I'm gonna be putting Microlifesix two four on the grass next week.

(01:37:24):
Yes, and I was wondering thedifference between the humates plus and azamite.
Okay, well, there's a bigdifference and there's some similarities. Both
of them are going to give youa wide range of micros because the azamite
is the mind product with that andthe humates plus. It's formerly it was
a plant organic matter, and nowit's been broken down to the point where

(01:37:46):
everything that was in those plants isconcentrated light, concentrated compost in a bag
and it will provide those kind ofnutrients as well. With the humates plus,
you get a lot of micros thatyou're not going to have in the
asomite. That would be an additionthat the humates plus would give you.
And the humates plus with being amicrolife product, it's just kind of natural

(01:38:08):
to do the green bag and thepurple bag, and you do each of
those when you do them. Buteach of these products has its strengths and
each of them will provide the qualityof the nutrients and things that you need
going into the ground. Just thinkof the humates plus more as a concentrated
compost in a bag with the micros. The azamite is a mind product with
micros as well. You're not goingto go wrong with you either way either

(01:38:30):
one. Okay, all right,thanks hip you bet, Thank you,
Cheryl. I appreciate the call.Now let's head out to Kendall in Tanglewood.
How are you this morning? I'mgood? How are you? I'm
well? Thank you. So Ihave Saint Augustine that's in shade and I've
had it for fifteen years and it'sbeen great. But now it has a

(01:38:51):
fungus and so I tore out someof the grass and put in Ivy English
Ivy. But the rest is thefungus is still just eating the grass and
turning it into dirt. And sonow I'm concerned. Do I need to
But I have other Saint Augustine that'sunaffected. But is it coming its way?
Is there a way to fix theSaint Augustine get rid of the fungus?

(01:39:13):
U? I'm not sure what todo. That's a good question,
Kendall. And what what I wouldask is what when you say you have
a fungus? Was did somebody diagnosesomething? Can you describe to me what
you saw? What do you think? Yes, I asked, are I
have a landscaper talkson Hansen who cameout and they said it was a fungus
and I didn't tell me what kind. And they said there's nothing I could

(01:39:34):
do about it, and that I'dhave to tear it all up and put
in ivy R put in plants.But I have a large front yard that's
divided by a sidewalk, And thenI just didn't I didn't know what is
it going to jump to sidewalk?Am I eventually going to have to tear
up the whole yard? You know? I really didn't want to do this,
so I just torek part of it. And it's just it's just it's

(01:39:55):
it's not like it turns brown.It literally just sort of eats the grass
and then it's dirt, and soit looks like sitting hair on a bald
man. The description you're giving remindsme more of what the effect of the
fungus take all root rot might be. Yeah, like most funguses that attack
fungi that attack our Saint Augustine,it could be great gray leaf spot,

(01:40:17):
it could be take all root rot, it could be others. They're ubiquitous,
they're out there in nature, andwhen conditions are right, they move
in. And so what we tryto do is culturally avoid the conditions for
the fungus being right. And Keno, I'm running out of time here in
this segment, but if you wantto hold on, I'll be glad to
keep going on this and we candiscuss it a little bit further. But

(01:40:38):
I'm gonna have to take a breakhere in just a bit, so please
hang on for just a little bit. Well, good morning on a good

(01:41:00):
Sunday morning for gardening. I mean, it's a good Sunday overall for gardening.
Get outside today and enjoy some ofthe air. We're going to head
back out to take away again.We're visiting with Kendall and Kindle. Let's
continue our conversation. We were lookingat some possibilities of diseases and I think
I said, take all root rot. Maybe maybe one of the ads that
you're looking at, Yes, Ithink that might be it. Okay,

(01:41:24):
I would make sure an aerate thatarea. If it's a small area,
you can just do it, youknow, with a little spade and fork,
you kind of wiggle straight into theground and kind of rock it back
and forth a little bit and thenpull it out. Just make those little
holes to kind of break it opena little bit. If it's a bigger
area, you can hire someone todo it the right way with a core
narrator. But if you do thatand then you follow that with a good
top dressing, normally I would recommenda leaf mold compost and that that is

(01:41:49):
a good mix to use anytime you'retop dressing. Take all root rots.
Specifically, if we can acidify thatsurface a little bit, it really helps
give the grass the advantage over thedisease. And so that would be acidifying
fertilizers would do that, but thepeat moss spread about a half inch thick
over that area. And you canbuy these compacted bales of peat and you

(01:42:12):
just sort of break them up intoa wheelbarrow and then dump a little piles
around so that you can then kindof spread them around. I use a
soil rake turned upside down with thetines pointing up. And you know,
I don't know if you've ever playedshuffleboard. I never have, but I've
seen pictures, and you know howyou have this long shuffleboard and you're kind
of you're holding your arm down byyour side as you push the shuffle forward.

(01:42:36):
Do the rake that way, turnthe times up, and just it's
like you're playing shuffleboard in the lawn. It makes it so easy to spread
the peat moss all over a smallarea. Now, if you've got a
big lawn, of course that's tootedious. But water that pete in when
you're done and continue to fertilize.I'd use kind of an acidic fertilizer.
Normally, I would say like aMicrolife six two four the green bag,

(01:42:59):
but there's a sick to forward that'sin a pink or reddish bag. That's
for acid loving plants. And ifyou're fighting the take all in an area,
I think I would switch over tothat one and try that one.
It's not going to cure the takeall instantly, but everything we're talking about
doing, air raiding, peat,moss, acidifying, fertilizers, that all
makes that take all not very happy, and it gives your grass a chance

(01:43:20):
to recover. Okay, okay,so that can I plant new grass on
top of it because there's not muchgrass? Laughs? Yeah, I would
just get the you know, getany organic matter on the surface out of
the way, because you want theside you put down, the soil on
the bottom of those pieces to touchthe soil in your yard and have good

(01:43:42):
We call it sid to soil contact, and that's important on helping it root
through. So if you've got awhole bunch of dead grass or thatch or
whatever, it kind of gets inthe way of that. It creates kind
of like an air gap underneath theside between it and the soil, and
we want it to touch the soil. Okay, all right, all right,
that sounds grateful. I like I'vegiven you a lot of work to

(01:44:03):
do today. Sorry about that it'sall good. Thank you all right,
Kendall, thank you for the call. I appreciate that. Let's head out
to Spring now and we are goingto talk to Mo. Hello, Mo,
Hi there, Steep. Hi areyou doing today? I'm good,
Mo. What can we do foryou today? Well, my grape plants

(01:44:26):
has suddenly got some kind of grayishsnow started at the base of the tree,
as you know, the plant,okay, And I was wondering what
kind of spread there just to breakit away. Are you talking about down
on the trunk near the ground orwhat? Yeah, okay, I would
not worry about that at all.If it's if it's a grape vine and

(01:44:49):
it's got mold growing around deer nearthe base, that is not something you're
going to spray or worry about.You just make sure the grape has good
drainage, good moisture, good nutrients, uh malts the soil to keep the
weeds away, and it'll take offand grow. Just find there's not a
disease of grapes that appears as moldon the on the truck. Okay,

(01:45:10):
all right. And the other thingI was going to ask you, what
kind of peat moss can I spreadit all over my uh grass in the
front yard. I would use justthe compacted bales of pete. But I'm

(01:45:30):
not recommending everybody that has a yardgo put peat on it. That's where
the leaf mole compost is the wayto go. In general for your yard.
You should spread leaf mole. Okay, oh my gosh, Yeah,
that's not practical. Well, petemoss is definitely not practical either. The
peat was just for a situation,whereas the disease called take all root rot
and it it's a suppressive thing.It's not a cure, but it suppresses

(01:45:57):
it. And we're trying to givethe grass the upper hand. But yeah,
if you eleven acres, you know, forget the top dressing. That's
probably not going to be practical foryou. Just take good care of it.
Take good care of it, makesure it gets adequate nutrients over time.
Make sure when it's dry, youwater, but you don't overwater.
Make sure it has a good sunlight. And that's the best thing you can
do to have a big, beautifullawn. Okay, thank you, all

(01:46:20):
right. I wish you a niceday as well, and thank you so
much for the call. You know, we're talking about soils and the importance
of you know, like top dressingand soils and things. If you have
not checked out airloom soils before,you really need to. Now you can
go to the website write this downairlooms Soils of Texas dot com Airloom Soils

(01:46:45):
of Texas dot com. When yougo to airloom Soils, you're going to
find everything you can imagine. Theygot the rose soil, they got the
compost, they got mulchous to goon top of the ground, and a
lot, a lot of other thingsfor every kind of plant growing you might
need to do. One of thecool things about Airloom Soils now is that
they have the supersacks. Imagine agiant sack that holds a cubic yard of

(01:47:08):
soil that they set in your drivewayfull of a cubic yard of whatever it
was you purchased from them. They'lldeliver those and you just need to call
them up and make arrangement. Ofcourse, there's a charge for delivery.
It costs money to get big bulkproduct like that out to a place,
but it's reasonable and the supersack isa pretty neat, clean way to go.
Now, when you're If you don'tknow how much you need, you

(01:47:29):
need to go online Airloom Soils ofTexas dot com check out their cubic yard
calculator. No matter how you wantto spread it, by the wheelbarrow,
by the five gallon bucket, youname it, you can find out exactly
how much you need from Heirloom Soils. We love talking to gardeners on garden
line. I want to give youa phone number here if you'd like to
give us a call in. We'reentering our last half hour here, pretty

(01:47:53):
quick of garden line for this weekend, So right down seven one three two
one two five eight seven four sevenone three two one two fifty eight seventy
four, and we'd be glad tovisit with you about whatever it is of
interest that you might you might beinterested in on gardening. Had any vegetable

(01:48:14):
calls today. That's kind of alittle bit of a surprise, because usually
there's some interest in the vegetable garden. But we can talk lawns, we
can talk trees, we can eventalk talk house plants. When I was
out at Kingwood Garden Center yesterday,I noticed a really nice supply of house
plants by the way. I wassurprised at K and Mason Kingwood. When

(01:48:34):
I was out for the appearance,I did not realize they had a nice
plant section outside the store. Ikind of caught me off guard, but
I walked through it and it's like, man, they had a lot of
good stuff that you really do wanta plant in this area. So it's
kind of cool to get out andcheck that out. But the house plants
are kind of a hot thing.People are excited about them, and I

(01:48:56):
just think you just really can't haveenough right enough house plats. We'll talk
about that maybe a little bit ina moment. Right now, I'm gonna
run out to Trinity and we're gonnatalk to JR. Good morning, JR.
Hello there. Huh. I've gotnew construction here, a barndow that
we've made, and we've got acouple of slopes and one's about a thirty
degree slope, the other is abouta forty five. Tried to do spray

(01:49:19):
seed, but it ran off ofthese heavy rains. So I guess the
question is is there it gets minimalsun maybe three to four hours max in
some areas, and there is therea grass that I can get in a
sod that you think would work onthis sixty forty mix, or should I
just go ahead and get some riprap and be done. So you got

(01:49:43):
a slope that you're getting the erosionoff the side of and you want to
cover it with a turf type grass? Is that? Am I understanding that?
Right? Yeah? I didn't knowwhether or not there was a zoysia
or a maybe a some sort ofbehavior and not behaved bermuda grass that I
could buy a thob that I couldstake to the ground and maybe get that

(01:50:03):
to it here. Yeah, ifyou get it, if you can get
it to root in, yeah,give it a couple of weeks of you
taking good care of it and gettingit rooted in well, and any of
the turfs will work in that kindof a setting. The bermuda and the
zoysia is probably going to hold theground a little bit better than Saint Augustine
because it's got the underground runners andthe above ground runners. But either way

(01:50:24):
you should be able to do good. And if you get it out now
the weather's warming up enough to whereyou can get good growth and establishment on
it, I think it'll work wellfor you. It's not too steep to
mow right. It's one of thosekind of things I won't be doing with
the riding mower. I will definitelybe having a handboard. It's pretty good
angle, that's for sure. Okay, Well, you're not going to find

(01:50:45):
anything better at holding soil than grass. I mean, we have ground covers
that'll grown a slope, but nothingholds the soil as well as grass does.
So I think I think you're onthe right track their trinity, and
I do I do appreciate that call. We're gonna head here to break in
just a second. Craig out inSpring Valley. I see you on the
boards. You'll be first when wecome back. If you would like to
get on the boards and join Craigseven one three two one two five eight

(01:51:11):
seven four that's two one two,kat r H and Josh, we'll get
you on the board where we cantalk during our upcoming segment. About thirty
minutes left today, So if youwant to talk gardening, this is a
time to give us a call.Well, good morning on a good Sunday

(01:51:41):
morning, this is going to bea day this afternoon. Get out there,
do a little bit of gardening.Maybe go visit a garden, center,
enjoy yourself, get some inspiration.I think you will find if you
can't get a gardening bug this timeof year, I can't help you tell
you this is this is the timeof year when just about everybody with a
pulse is going to at least appreciatethe beauty of plants, if not find

(01:52:04):
one they have to come home with. We're gonna head out to Spring Valley
and we're going to talk to Craigthis morning. And how are you doing,
Craig. I'm doing well. Thankyou, thanks for taking my call
today. Yes, sir, so, I've got a question. We have
a about a two year old lemontree in our backyard. It last year

(01:52:24):
it produced I don't know, maybeseven It was kind of small, made
it through the freeze, and thisspring it has really started budding out.
I mean there are dozens of,you know, small little lemon buds coming
out on this thing. And inthe last three days the leaves have started
turning yellow, and yesterday they starteddropping off, I mean like most of

(01:52:49):
them. And you're talking about leaves, not the lemon buds themselves, but
the leaves. No, just theleaves, right, huh. Well,
let's see when lemons. When citruslike that suddenly gets a bunch of yellow
leaves that fall off. I usuallylook at a sole moisture issue to dry
to wet those kinds of things,or a root damage could cause the same

(01:53:13):
thing, because it's it's essentially havingthe same effect on the plant as sort
of it's too dry or too wet. If it's the new growth that's turning
yellow and the old growth looks fineand green, then we look at things
like an iron deficiency, for example, as the nutrient. If it's face
versa, the new growth is stillthere and green, but the old growth
is kind of getting yellow and startingto head south, then we look at

(01:53:34):
mobile elements like nitrogen being deficient.But what you're describing to me sounds more
like something is wrong, something shockingthe plant itself, that's system and causing
that yellowing and drop of the leaves. Tell me about again the growing site
and the conditions and the soil thatthey're in. Well, I mean,

(01:53:57):
it's it's soil that it's been youknow, we've had other trees in the
same spot than the guy because ofthe freeze and so forth. Yeah,
this one's I haven't done anything toit. Other than we did start our
sprinkler system about four days. Excuseme about it. I think it's right
now two or three days a week. We just started out in the last

(01:54:18):
week and a half. But Imean it's no, it's not getting a
ton of of uh you know,sprinkler on it. Yeah. Obviously we've
had the rain the past few days, but that's really that's the only thing
that's truly changed. Yeah, veryinteresting. Well, if it's just a
yellowing and drop of the leaves,I'm I'm thinking underground. Something's going on

(01:54:39):
underground, and so, uh youknow, other than dig down maybe three
inches feel the soil. Is itwetter than you think it is? Uh?
You know? And or is itgetting it can't be getting dry right
now, So excessive moisture is allI can think of. In the meantime,
I think it's gonna be okay,and I think it's gonna bounce back.
Just watch that it doesn't stay twoside you wet. Provide a good

(01:55:01):
Centrius food fertilizer. If you haven'thave you fertilized it this spring yet,
I'm miss If you said it,I'm not sir, Yeah, I would
get a good Centrius food and it'sgoing to have a blend of nutrients,
including nitrogen. Let's give it aboost. You're going to find that,
you know, in the Nelson's PlantFoods and Nitrofis foods, they're going to
have the foods for specific kinds ofplants like that. A Microlife has a

(01:55:26):
citrus specifically a centrius food as well. But get you one of those kind
of things, and let's give ita boost. Let's getting watered in really
good, and watch and see howit does. I think you're going to
see new buds up here, andI think normal growth is going to take
off. Okay, all right,well, I appreciate your time. Thank
you very much. You Bet Craig, thank you for your time. I
appreciate very much. A task aCeda Thomas. What's up this morning?

(01:55:48):
Good morning, so here to talkabout nitrogen for a minute. I've been
using the Microlife liquid organic maximum woolon my plants. Yes, and I'm
getting nice color. I'm getting somuch green, so many leaves and not
as many blooms as I should begetting. Okay, well, what's the

(01:56:10):
kind of plant we're talking about?Um? Well, my day lilies,
for one thing. They're just goingcrazy, okay, And I've got everything
under the sun. I've got scotchbroom, you know, bagonias and the
only kind of thing that the ground, little ground flowers and the leaves are
coming great. And I've got plentyof blooms, but not a lot,

(01:56:34):
not that I should have. Well, let me see if in the next
forty seconds here I can give youa good answer, and I think I
can. When you start looking atlack of blooms, it can be due
to a number of things. Certainly, the amount of sunlight is a big
deal. You know, something likea day lilies. I come bloom in
the shade, and I realize yougrow dailies. You know better than to
put them in the shade. Butsunlight is important for that. Nutrients is

(01:56:57):
important. When you overdo nitrogen,you can encourage vegetative growth at the at
the expense of blooming or fruiting withplants at fruit and so you just want
to watch it. You don't overdoa good thing. That would be a
possibility, But that fertilizer is agood one and it ought to be performing
well. Your plants ought to beperforming well. So they may just need
a little more time I don't knowwhat else would be going on other than

(01:57:20):
either a lack of sunlight or someother nutrient issue. But if they've done
well in the past, it's notlike your soil changed dramatically overnight. So
you have been good soil and plentyof sun light. Yeah. So I
don't know. I you know,I don't know the exact rate of everything
that got put out, But ifyou feel like you knew you stayed within

(01:57:42):
about what the label would recommend interms of use of it, then I
would just wait and give them alittle more time. I don't think it's
gonna be still with you. Thetemperature. It's been a cool spring,
and that has delayed some things forus. But we still have good performance
out there in the garden. ButI have noticed significant delay, especially on
certain plants. And it's like aboutthe time it starts to warm up here,

(01:58:04):
we go back down into the upperfifties and you know, in the
evenings and so spring is dragging itselfout. We're gonna wish we had this
cool weather though, when July andAugust get here. YEA, thank you,
sir, all right, thank you, sir. I appreciate that call
very much. Phone number seven onethree two one two five eight seven four,

(01:58:24):
give Josh a call. Let's getyou on the boards. They read
scriptures, they passed play. We'reboth preyed. He don't pree delay,

(01:58:47):
but he's getting ad and that's yourstar. Yeah, it's eighty five degrees
outside, just getting hold up.Well it's not eighty five degrees outside yet,

(01:59:08):
but it is that kind of day. I tell you for sure you
are listening to garden Line. Iam your host, Skip Richter, our
phone number. You're gonna write thisdown. This is our last segment,
last chance to call for next Saturday. Seven one three two one two fifty
eight seventy four. And we aregoing to head right out now to Missouri
City and say good morning to Paul. Yeah, good morning, Skip,

(01:59:32):
I thank you for taking my call. My question is wild Bermuda. My
yard is in really very good shapethis year with Saint Augustine, but I
do have a two foot by sixfoot strip of wild Bermuda which is pretty
much choked out any Saint Augustine inthat area, and I'm anxious to knock

(01:59:56):
it out now. I'm not avery patient person. I want to treat
it aggressively. Either chemically or mechanically. By mechanical I mean I'm willing to
hack it out with a pick axe, okay, or should I poison it?
Well, you have those two options. You can get in there with

(02:00:17):
some spading forks. I wouldn't usea rototiller because it'll just break the bermuda
up into little pieces and then you'regonna have resprouting coming out everywhere. But
get down over a spading fork andkind of loosen the soil up and get
as many of those underground runners asyou can out of there now. And
doing so, you're going to getthe Saint Augustine out of there too,
right, I mean, because youcan't do one without the other. But

(02:00:38):
hand digging it as an option.After you hand dig it, just water
it in, wait and watch becauseyou will miss some, and then do
it again. You may need todo it a third time just to get
all the sprigs. Because here's thedeal. Once bermuda, as in your
Saint Augustine, if it's a goodsunny spot, it is going to be
virtually impossible to get it out ofthere with a selective control product. So

(02:01:00):
in addition to the hand digging,the other option would be to spray and
kill everything in that area, andI'd go a little bit out beyond where
you see the bermuda, because it'sgoing to have runners moving out in that
area already beyond where it is visibleabove ground. And so you would spray
it and kill everything, and thenwait because you won't get all of it
with one spray. After a coupleof weeks, you should see some resprouting,

(02:01:24):
and then you could go in andindividually just hit the little bermuda weeds
that are coming up sticking their headsup above the ground and stay watching it
for a month or so because youcan always get another sprag and again once
he gets a foothold, then yougot the mess that we're in right now.
And so those are both dramatic,drastic measures. But you said you

(02:01:44):
don't like to mess around. Youwant to get it done. And there's
no other way to get in thereand just get the bermuda out without sacrificing
the Saint Augustine and then replanting theSaint Augustine back in Okay. So when
you say spray, am my sprayingwith you can spray. There are number
of products that will kill bermuda grass. The common when you hear people talk

(02:02:06):
about is glypha said, and thatis a kills everything that you spray it
on product. There are products alsothat are grass only killers, and they
would have do you have a penor pencil handy. Yeah, I'm gonna
spell an ingredient. And there's morethan one ingredient and grass only killers.
There's two different ones, but I'mgoing to tell you about one, and

(02:02:28):
it's set h O x y dI M suthoxy dim. Now, when
you go to the garden centers,you know you're out in Missouri City.
You got some great ace hardwares bythe way out there in the Missouri City
area, and you if you gointo one of those, you may see
something that says grass killer or grassbe gone or well, you know some

(02:02:53):
the label just tells you this killsgrass. And you're probably going to see
that suthoxidem as ingredient. There's onethey're ingredient. And I'm not going to
spell the whole thing out in theair right now, but it's flu a
Z flu a Z. If yousee those letters, and then there's more
to the word. That's the othergrass only killer. Either of those sprayed

(02:03:15):
on will kill the bermuda you're saying, augustine, any other grass that's in
that area. If you go theglyphasate route, it kills all that,
but it also comes broad leaf weedsas well, and some people prefer not
to use glyph sate. That's fine. These two grass only killers. They
will they will work just fine onit. But just know that one treatment,
it's not like a miracle cure.One percent of all of it dies.

(02:03:39):
There may be some sprigs underground thathaven't sprouted yet and then they will.
But then you come back and hitthose and once you get that cleaned
out, then go in and reside. What's your opinion on atrazine. Atrazine
is an effective pre emergent weed killerthat has some post emergent activity. The
reason we're not fineto atrazine is becauseit can wash off into places we don't

(02:04:03):
want it to wash. It cango down in the roots system and damage
trees as well. And I've seenpeople misuse atrazine and get a good rainfall
and suddenly the trees are getting somereal weird yellowing symptoms and damage because of
the atrazine products. So it's generalwe kind of stay away from it.
You know, each product is goingto have its pros and cons and so

(02:04:28):
there's not like a product that isjust one hundred percent safe. I mean
even organic products have their pros andtheir cons and so that's the con of
atrazine. The other thing for meabout atrazine is depending on the season that
you're in, the time that youA lot of times it's put in fertilizer
products and that's fine, But dependingon the season you're in, the best

(02:04:51):
time to fertilize and the best timeto put on a pre emergent we control
don't always overlap fully, and soI would rather see you by quality fertilizer
and if you've got a weed issue, by the right weed control product and
use them separately, and I thinkyou're going to have much better results.
There's other issues that come with combiningthem. You can get away with it.

(02:05:13):
There are a lot of big brandson the market that do it all
the time. You know, theysell the combinations. Uh. It just
you're asking me personally, and mypreference would be fertilized with a fertilizer,
do weed control with a weed controlproduct, and that's geared toward the weed
that you have and the timing thatyou need to do. It sounds like
a complex issue, Thank you somuch. You know it can be.

(02:05:38):
But you can call me here ongarden line, I mean, and we
can talk about it. And youknow, you can say I've got crabgrass
that comes up every year, orI've got clover in my lawn, and
I can direct you to that productthat'll that'll do that and the right timing.
It would be nice just to sayweed killer, and you know,
and all it is is a quoteweed killer, and then you just use
it everywhere any time for any weed. That product doesn't exist, you know,

(02:06:02):
there's always a yeah. But there'sannual weeds and perennial weeds, there's
broad leaf and grass. There's coolseason and warm season, and so if
we oversimplify it, we're not goingto have good results. So I can
direct you to fertilizer, I candirect you to a weed control. Just
call anytime. Thank you so much. All right, thank you, Paul.
I appreciate for that call out therefrom Missouri City. Wow, we're

(02:06:28):
this morning flew by. At leastit seemed like it to me. This
has been a good, a goodvisit with you about a lot of different
kinds of plants and plant kind ofissues. I just want to remind you,
by the way, on the daybefore Mother's Day, that would be
on Saturday, May thirteenth, Iwill be at the arbor Gate from eleven
thirty in the morning until one thirty. So you got two weeks to get

(02:06:50):
ready for this. But put itdown on your calendar. Number one,
you don't want to miss an opportunityto go to Arburgate. But on top
of it, we'll get to me. We'll get to be there. Can
bring me some plants in a baggy, or you can bring me some pictures
or something. I guarantee you Arburgate'sgonna have the plants you need, and
they're gonna have the products you need, and so you know, we can
kind of kill a whole bunch ofbirds one stone there. But the main

(02:07:13):
thing I want to point out isMother's Days the next day, and you
maybe you want to come out andbuy a surprise for your mom. They've
got gift shops out there, they'vegot plants out there, they got all
the bling that you might want togo with anything, and you're longing landscape,
but maybe you'd want to bring yourmom out and just say hey,
Mom, here's the treat. We'regonna go out and have fun to Arburgate.

(02:07:33):
By the way, Mom's life youspending time with them. Trust me,
I'm a dad. I understand howthat works. Arburgate, May thirteen.
Don't forget it. Write it down.