Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to kt r H Garden Line with Skip Ricord.
Speaker 2 (00:04):
It's a trim.
Speaker 3 (00:13):
You just watch him as many.
Speaker 4 (00:20):
Good things to see Botasys gas days bad not a
sound glass.
Speaker 3 (00:35):
Sunmons of.
Speaker 5 (00:39):
All right, good morning, good morning, and welcome to Garden Line.
Speaker 2 (00:44):
We are ready to go here on the start of
a new show. You know we're here every Saturday morning
six am. Obviously you know that you wouldn't be listening.
Those that don't know that aren't listening. We also here
tomorrow morning at six am. We go to ten every
day each day on the weekend, and we're here to
answer your gardening questions. So if you have any kind
(01:05):
of a question something we can help you with, help
you have success, just give us a call seven one
three two to one two kt r H seven one
three two one two kt r H. I. I've got
a number of things that I'd like to cover today,
things that are seasonal stuff that we need to be
(01:26):
getting done or we could be getting done out there
in the landscape and the garden and even some inside
the house. This has been kind of a wet ish
off and on and definitely a cold past few days
that we've had. It's going to be a good week
coming up. A little bit on the chilly side, but
basically we got sunshine and which is a good thing.
(01:47):
I've got some decent highs for the days we can
get outside and get a few things done. And I
need my soil to dry out just a little bit,
because I've got quite a bit that I've caught the storms.
It seems like they've wherever they rain, they made sure
and come to my house and did a little of that.
So it's nice and moist out there. I'm not going
to complain in that. But at the same time, I've
(02:09):
got to move a garden fence post. Yeah, that's right.
I put a patio in and now my entrance to
the garden is in a different spot, so I have
to move a fence post, move the gate, and so
digging in clay soil when it is wet is a challenge.
You would never want to dig your garden soil when
it's wet. I'll tell you why in just a moment.
(02:31):
But when it comes to moving a fence post, it's
still okay. It's just kind of hard to tamp them
in and get a nice, good, straight, sturdy post that way,
So why not move mix or mess with garden soil
when it's wet, when I dig it rototill, it's spaded well.
Soil has structure. Structure is the way the little clumps
of soil grouped together. The reason that a heavy, gooey
(02:55):
clay is so massive and sticky like that doesn't have
good oxygen, water doesn't move in it very fast. It
is because the structure has been destroyed and the type
of clay just doesn't allow that. So it's kind of
like modeling clay. If you remember playing with modeling clay
when you were a kid. That is a clay with
no structure, no decent structure. As we add organic matter,
(03:19):
as roots go through it, as organic acids some of
the we'd always talk about humus and humic acid and
things like that. That all helps contribute to good structure.
So it gets looser. It's still a clay, but it's
more crumbly. So if you take a criminal massive Houston
black clay, that's the name of the clay along here
(03:39):
along this part of the Gulf coast, Houston black clay
the primary clay, and you let it dry out, it's
like concrete. But if it had good structure to it
if you'd added compost, and if you had all the
biological activity doing what microbes and roots and everything else
is doing. You grab that dry clay and squeeze it
(04:01):
and it would crumble apart in your hand. And from
a soil scientists import they call that friable soil. It
breaks apart in your hand. That's what we're going for.
And if you have a nice friable clay and you
mess with it when it's too wet, you're gonna end
up destroying some of that very important structure that helps
plants thrive. Plants can thrive in clay, A lot of
(04:23):
plants can if it drains adequately well, So we don't
walk on our garden beds. When you're making garden beds,
make the bed and then you never set a foot
on it after that. When we were doing beds and
community gardens and from some school gardens, I always advise
people don't make that bed any longer that the most
(04:45):
sixteen feet. That's a long way, because what's going to
happen as kiddos are gonna be on one side and
want to get the other side, and how they're going
to get there. They're going trapes right through the middle
of that bed. And we don't want to walk on
our beds, so if you make them short enough, people
walk around the ends that are trying to jump a anyway,
don't mess with your soil when it's too wet. So
whenever the soil is moist is the best time to
(05:08):
work it. When it's dry, hard to work dry soil.
It's like concrete, especially clay. But when it's too wet,
you're destroying structure. So you find that sweet spot. And
that's why it's important to take advantage of those moments
when we do have good moderate soil moisture to get
out there and improve your soil. All right, Well, that
(05:29):
was a lot of information there about improving soil, but
that's the important thing. And by the way, when you're
going to improve your soil, you want to make sure
and get a quality compost product, not something that's been
rushed through real fast, not something the composting process, Not
something that is basically a bunch of chunks of wood.
(05:51):
You want a well composted, well screened compost mixed for
the soil. Now, chunks of wood are great for the
top of the soil. You know, when you look at
screened compost. When you look at stuff like our shredded
hardwood composts and other things like that, that's good for
the top. That's called malch in the soil. We want
a good quality compost, and you know you can you
(06:13):
can find that. Somebody asked me the O today, where
can I get some good composts? And they're a little
down south of town, and I said, Cianamulchamult is the place.
They're out there on ear road sharing. It's on FM
five twenty one. You can go to the website. I
can give you days and hours and times and places,
and just go to the website Sienna Maltch dot com,
(06:35):
CNA malts dot com. When you go there, you get
a choice, you get to purchase. If you like landscapers
Pride black velvet, they've got that. If you like products
from excuse me, airloom soils, they've got those. They have
their their veggiane herb mix there. If you need to
add nutrients to the soil fertilizer in other words, from
(06:57):
nitrophoss or from nelson or azemite for micros or microlife
or an organic source, they've got all of that there.
And they have Medina too, by the way, as well,
so anything you know, you always hear me say brown
stuff before green stuff. Well, brown stuff is a soil.
Green stuff is the plants. If you want to go
to a place where you get anything you need regarding
brown stuff, regarding making that soil the best it can be,
(07:19):
so you can have success with that, I would send
you to see an a mulch down there. They they
know what they're doing. They have quality stuff. And by
the way, why are you're done there? You can get
mulch as well. You can get landscaped stones and rock.
I mean, it's it's a great place, all right. Well,
bottom line is take care of the soil. They say,
(07:40):
make hay while the sun shines. I would say, yeah,
you also improve your soil while the sunshines. In other words,
the sun's coming out this week. We may get a
little soil work done. Time for me to take a break.
I'll be right back with your questions at seven one
three two one two ktrhy.
Speaker 5 (08:01):
Good morning, good Saturday morning.
Speaker 2 (08:06):
This is a good morning to be inside listening to
garden line. That is for sure. We we love being outside.
And I alwould say, hey, put your phone in your pocket,
turn upside down, turn the speaker on, get some gardening
work done while you listen to garden line. I think
that's a good plan. That's something I do. I love
(08:26):
to take my phone out with me when I'm when
I'm out and about working in the garden and things
like that. Makes it makes it real easy. Well, uh,
there is a we have, we have some good weather coming,
but there's always you know, there's always the next freeze
that we're going to deal with. And I think, oh gosh,
(08:47):
it was last week or two weeks ago. Even I
was talking about the fact that East Hardware has so
many freeze protection products, and so what kinds of things
am I talking about? What I'm talking about the the
little clamp on lights where you put them underneath the
plant that you've covered and it adds a little bit
of heat under there. Talking about the covers, the various
kinds of frost blanket, different different things you cover a
(09:09):
plant with. And they also have those little things you
screw on to your outdoor faucets that allow for the
water to trickle out when it gets cold. They don't
run all the time. You know, what I've always done
is let my faucet run on a trickle. It's kind
of hard getting it just right when you do that,
you know, But when you have those little attachments, it
(09:30):
doesn't run until it gets cold, and when it starts freezing,
that's when it starts to trickle out and keep that
faucet from freezing up. I think it's a great way
to go, a really cool way to go. They also
have the faucet covers. By the way. That that thing
you screw on up it's talking about is called a
freeze miser. Freeze miser. They have everything like that. Now,
(09:51):
we just went through a little freeze, but one off,
a bigger ones come in. You know, they come, and
you know when they come, you're never ready for it.
You got to run out there and grab stuff. And
everybody else has already been out in shop. Will that'd
be a good time to get stocked up on those
kind of things.
Speaker 6 (10:05):
You know.
Speaker 2 (10:05):
You get you some freeze misers, some passet covers, and
then you got them when the next freeze rise, you
got your clamp on lights and the bulbs to go
in them to provide a little bit of heat under there.
You're ready to go when the freeze comes. Now, Ace
Hardware is all over the place, easy to find them.
There's ACE Hardware up in Willis called All Seasons Ace
up there in Willis, up in Cypress, We've got Cypress Ace.
(10:25):
We've got J and R Ace in Porter, and Kilgour
Lumber down in Claire Lake. Those are just four examples
of a lot of different ACE options. You can go
to Ace Hardware dot com, find the store locator, find
the one near you. But the main thing is, hey,
why not get ready for a bigger freeze because they
can come. And I can't tell you if it will
(10:46):
or won't. We just know that absolutely we have to
deal with that, and so we might as well be
ready to go for it because it will happen all right.
By the way, the Chris Ace is stocking up too,
for we're hitting the point where we're in spring cleaning
right now. Uh, so you get you know, you got
(11:07):
to get everything order. They have all kinds of spring
cleaning supplies, storage toads. I was just putting the still
putting up some stuff from the Christmas holidays and things,
and uh, you know, we're how are you gonna pack
it up? How are you gonna get stored for next year,
ACE Sketch covered on all of that kind of thing.
If you're going to get your garage and order shelving units,
which is something I'm also doing right now, having to
(11:29):
put in some new shelves in the garage and things.
They've got good options for that as well. Uh, it's
just a it's just a place to go for everything.
They say ACE is the place, and it really is.
While you're there, by the way, you need to sign
up online for the ACE Rewards program and I belong
to it. And every time you buy something, you you
build up your points and things for discounts and special offers,
(11:52):
and their special offer is only available to ACE Rewards customers.
They get emailed directly to you. So why not you're
already shopping, just go on to East hardbroad Dock, come
sign up for ACE Rewards and it does pay off,
It absolutely does. Alrighty, let's see here. I was gonna
talk a little bit this morning about some vegetable gardening
(12:14):
things that we need to be aware of. The cool
season here in the Greater Houston area is relatively mild.
We don't have to deal with really difficult cold. We don't.
We're fortunate in that way, but occasionally, you know, we
get some doozies, but in general we're okay. So we
can grow. We can garden all through the cool Seasoncoli
(12:37):
our broccoli right now, we're still harvesting it is doing good.
Our freeze freeze wasn't bad enough to hurt it, and
so we're good. Uh, It's time for me to get
out and plant some more cool season greens. I love
cool season greens. At number one, there's some of the
most nutrient packed vegetables that we can grow, things like
(12:57):
kale and spinach. A lot of folks like to plant lettuce.
By the way, if you're going to grow lettuce, the
bib lettuce or the leaf types of lettuce are much
more successful here than head lettuce. I'm not saying you
can't grow lettushead. I'm just saying the bib and leaf types.
I think they're more attractive. Also in a salad, but
(13:17):
you can grow romain and I know that is a
heading type of lettuce, and I love it for the
crunchiness of it. You can't have a caesar shallad without it, right,
But you can get out and plant those things. Now.
Some of the things like carrots can go in the
ground still. Now we can continue to plant those through
the cool season. It's still good to be if you
haven't planted the blue leaf vegetables. Also, those things have
(13:41):
more names than a criminal on the run. They're called
blue le vegetables. They're called coal crops, colle coal crops.
They're called cruciferous vegetables because of the shape of the
blooms being in across did you know that? In fact?
And they're they're loaded with good, good things, not just
(14:04):
vitamins and things, but things like nutrients as well, and
those can all be planted. Now let me head over
to the phones though. We're going to go to Cypress,
Texas and talk to Steve. Hey, Steve, Welcome to garden Line. Hello, Hello,
you there, Steve.
Speaker 7 (14:24):
Yes, I am, good morning.
Speaker 2 (14:27):
All right, how can we help this morning? Good morning?
Speaker 7 (14:30):
Yeah, good morning.
Speaker 8 (14:31):
The question I have is I planted a number of
trees this fall. I've got an oak tree that I planted,
I planted a Chinese pistache. Is it beneficial to continue
to hit those things with roots stimulator once a month
through the winter.
Speaker 2 (14:51):
Well, roots can grow through the winter and a new
established tree. Anything you do to help the root development
is okay. You just would have to get it down
to where the roots are, and it takes a volume
Once you plant a tree. It's one thing when you're
planning it and watering it in and soaking the root
ball and everything, but once you planted it, it takes
a considerable amount of water to get the liquid down
(15:13):
in there. You know, you put a gallon of water
on and it may not soak all the way down
in there. So just be ready to do the stimulator
and enough volume of water to get it down in
where the roots actually are. But there's no problem with that.
Certainly wouldn't hurt anything. You know, as to how much
it helps, you know, well that that kind of depends
on a lot of factors. But yeah, right.
Speaker 8 (15:37):
Right, What about do you recommend I've seen where they
put pbc in the ground it flow with gravel so
the fluid of it gets straight to the roots.
Speaker 6 (15:45):
Is that a recommendation.
Speaker 2 (15:50):
Of even an established giant trees roots system is in
the top foot of soil. So a lot of people
put pipes down, you know, a twenty four inches or whatever,
and it just that's too deep. Now, I would say,
rather than that, what you want to do is you
want to wed a large area. So if depending on
(16:11):
the bed you're in and you've got a couple of options.
If it's a new tree, there's little gadgets that are
bags that you put around the tree. You fill them
with water and they slowly leak out of the bottom
of the bag. Get it. If you're out in the
country and you don't care what it looks like, you
can do that by putting a five gallon bucket beside
the tree, drilling little tiny holes in it and then
filling it with water and that way all the water
(16:33):
goes down. In a larger area, I like to use
a berm of soil, a doughnut, a ring maybe four
feet across around that tree and soaking it down. So
however you want to go about it is good. But
I wouldn't do I wouldn't do the tube of PVC
for watering the tree.
Speaker 9 (16:50):
Okay, got it?
Speaker 10 (16:52):
All right?
Speaker 8 (16:52):
Well, I definitely appreciate the information.
Speaker 2 (16:56):
All right, man, thanks for call. Take care, stay warm,
all right. Well, yeah, you know, we see a lot
of things done horticulturally as practices, and I've even seen
diagrams where there's a pipe in the ground and it
shows water going out down the pipe and going out
in all directions and stuff. Well, it's gonna wet that area,
(17:19):
but it's better to be able to wet it a
little bit deeper. I mean from the surface down deep,
not to start the wedding down deep. The tree roots
are not way way down there. There's a few sinker routes,
but not a lot. When I lived up in Willis, Texas,
just north of Conroe, we put in a peach orchard,
(17:40):
and in doing so we had to push out a
bunch of brush and things, and there was trees in it,
and it's tough to clear the land for the orchard.
And I was struck by the fact that a giant
pine tree had this big tap root going down, but
all the feeder roots were going sideways in the soil.
It would it just I took picture of it. I
(18:00):
can't show you a picture on the radio, but it
was really striking as to just how much those roots
are in the surface. And if you if you have
trouble believing me there, it's because you've seen these diagrams
where you see a tree sticking up above the ground.
You know that the branches and the trunk and branches
and all that going up and then below ground. It's
(18:22):
like a mirror image of the roots going down and out.
That is not how a tree grows. If you, if
you don't believe me, do a search for Morton arboretom
Morton like Morton salt Morton arboretum tree root diagram or
something like that, and it'll surprise you. There are drop roots,
(18:44):
there are tap There can be a tap root depending
on the species. There can be roots that drop down
from that root system to anchor and to reach down
to get water from down deep when it's too dry
up the top. But by and large, go sideways if
you want to. If you want to better diagram than
that mirror image diagram, take a pancake and set it
(19:04):
on the table. Take a stalk of broccoli and put
it in the middle of the pancake. That's a tree.
The BROCCOLI's the above ground. The pancake is the root
system below ground. Go sideways. I'm pausing to let you
mumble and grumble it you don't believe them, go check
it out, really seriously. It's important. It's time to get
(19:26):
a lot of landscape stuff done, to have beauty and care,
you know, beauty and all kinds of enjoyment when it
comes to spring, and Piercecapes is a company that can
do that for you. If you want a professional design,
I mean, let you're going to go whole hog and
just turn the place into the taj Mahal, they can
do that. If you just want some additions done, some
(19:47):
revamping of bed areas, some creating an outdoor hardscape structure
so you can enjoy it on the outside. If you
need quarterly maintenance, they can do that. If you need
you irrigation system tweaked, they can do that. Do you
want to add landscape, they can do it all. Piercescapes
dot Com. Go there, look at the pictures. You see
what I'm talking about. Two eight one three seven oh
(20:08):
fifty sixty two eight one three seven oh fifty sixty.
Let the folks at Pierscapes turn your place into a showplace.
And I'm telling you when you go to pierscapes dot Com,
you're gonna be really impressed with the kind of work
that they can do. All Right, time for me to
take a little bit of a break. If you'd like
to call Jonathan get on the board for the next segment.
(20:30):
Seven one three two one two kt r H. All right,
welcome back.
Speaker 5 (20:36):
Ain't no sunshine, Ain't no sunshine when she's gone.
Speaker 2 (20:42):
But we're gonna have sunshine this and I'm looking forward
to it. I like mildly cool weather with the sunshining.
Oh is that ever pleasant? Anybody who's been here for
a summer. Try to work in the garden in the summer,
which summer, by the way, summer months for those of
you just moved here, by the way, welcome to Texas.
(21:02):
Summer starts at the end of April and it goes
all the way sometime in October. We don't know when,
but that's the last summer month for our area. So
we really enjoy this kind of cool weather that we're
having out here. Joking aside, I was talking about preparing
the soil while ago, and then some cool season veggie things.
(21:22):
I mentioned the chrysipherus, the coal crops. That's things like broccoli, cabbage, cauliflower,
col robbie kale, collareds, Brussels sprouts. I'm sure, I'm Mustard
actually is considered one of the coal crops, and they
do so good in the cool season, and they're so
healthy for you as well, this is a time when
(21:43):
we can plant other cool season things. You know, there
are some greens that we just don't traditionally eat in
Texas in general. Okay, now, I know if you moved
here from another culture that you bring those kind of
cuisines with you in things. I know that, But by
and large, the Texas gardens through the decades that I've
(22:06):
been around gardening have just been boring. You know, tomatoes, lettuce, cucumbers, squash, something,
those are all fine crops. But cool season greens like mash,
or like corn salad, or like plantain, or like sorrel.
Do you see what I'm saying? Those are cool season
(22:26):
And there's examples in the warm season too, and there's
more in the cool season. There's a lot of things
we can grow, and you should try that, because you
know you don't. You may be saying, okay, talking about vegetables,
I don't have a garden. We do. You have a
five gallon bucket that you can grow some holes in.
I've grown carrots and five gallon buckets. They do really well.
If you've got a good quality mix and decent drainage.
(22:47):
You can grow carrots in a five gallon bucket. I've
grown kale in five gallon buckets or containers. You know
those nursery containers you buy shrubs and trees in. Don't
throw them way. They're great for gardening it Now, if
you want something pretty, you can buy really nice glazed
pottery to grow in. Do you know my favorite vegetable
(23:09):
gardening container is my favorite one of all the ones
that are out there. It's not one that's made for
vegetable gardening. It's a wheelbarrow. I have had several wheelbarrows
over time. I had an old metal one that actually
started resting out. That was beautiful, It was so cool
for gardening. I had a plastic one that I dropped
(23:29):
a cinderblock in and cracked the bottom, and so now
I have drainage. They are excellent for growing things. Wheelbarrows
hold quite a bit of soil unless it's a little one.
Getch you a good big one and you can grow
all kinds of things. I had a wheelbarrow. Wish I
could show you a picture of it. It had spinach,
it had lettuce, it had broccoli, it had kale. What
(23:51):
else did I have in that thing? That had some
Swiss chart in it? It just had all kinds of
vegetables in a wheelbarrow. And you know what the cool
thing about a wheelbarrow Number one, It gives a neighbors
something to talk about if they hadn't already. Like Mildred,
the guy his garden is in a wheelbarrow. You can
put it wherever you want if you want. If, of course,
you need sun for vegetables to do their best, move
(24:13):
it to a sunny spot in the yard. If you
got a mode, just move the wheelbarrow over when you're mowing,
move it back, or move it to a new spot.
And it's great. It holds enough soil and therefore enough
moisture that you don't have to water it twice a
day to keep things going well. And you know, the
hoa probably will not bother you about your wheelbarrow as
(24:34):
long as it's pretty and it keeps moving. I did flowers,
flowers cascading over the sides, flowers coming up in the center.
You can do an herb will wheel barrow with a
regano or a time or things like that, spilling over
the sides, and then you've got chives around it, and
then you've got uprighter maybe basil plant or something in
the middle. I mean, use your imagination, but it's pretty cool.
(24:58):
I think it looks good. I think it's fun. And
guess what if it Remember, oh gosh, years ago at
my house it dropped down to almost seven degrees and
that's too cold for vegetables. I don't care what the
vegetable is. Where did my wielburrow go right into the garage?
Just as simple as that. When it was time to
move it back rolled it back outside. Again. I'm telling you,
(25:19):
it's a cool way to go, and it's different, and
again it does give the neighbors something to talk about,
as if they needed something else to talk about. But anyway,
that's my favorite kind of gardening bed. I guess what
I'm trying to say is everybody can grow a garden.
If you're listening to me, and you were in downtown
Houston on the eight hundredth floor of some high rise
and you got a little tiny patio, call me. We'll
(25:42):
figure something out. I mean, there are things you can
grow no matter where you are. And so I want
you to try some things this year. Here's a good
New Year's resolution. If you do those things, try something
this year that you'd never done. Before, and I would
suggest try growing something you can eat that is healthy
and taste that you've never grown before. When I do salads,
(26:04):
I try to create all kinds of flavors in the salad.
Sorel has a lemony flavor, en dive has a bitter
type flavor. There are certainly even certain kinds of very
mild herb type plants can be used and mixed in
to create flavor in a salad. And a lot of
(26:24):
the salad vegetables, the majority, the vast majority of salad
vegetables are cool seasoned vegetables, not all, but a lot
of them. And you can grow kinds of good things
out there if you want some. If you'm to do
parsley for garnishing a plate, if you do't do. I
like growing celery. I like the Asian types of celery
as well as the big stalk types of celery that
(26:47):
everybody thinks of when you use the word celery. You
can grow with that here. Just got to get out
there and do it, so try it out. Hey, you
can't fail at gardening. You can only give up. Listen.
Every gardener, I don't care how good they are, has
failed many times over the course of their gardening life
and they just keep trying. That's how they do it.
(27:08):
I wanted to mention you know, we love our feed
stores here on Garden Line and D and D Feed
and Tomball just about three miles west of two forty
nine on Highway twenty nine to twenty so you're big
middle of Tomball there. You head west on twenty nine
to twenty about three miles, it'll be on the left
hand side. The Dover family has been running D and D.
They opened it up in nineteen eighty nine. It is
a wonderful store stocked with all kinds of things for
(27:31):
your garden, nitrofoss products, bonin products, Microlife, turf Star from Nelson, Medina,
heirloom soils, Landscaper's Pride. They carry flats of vegetables, they
carry vegetables, seeds, they carry tools seasonally, they'll have fruit
trees and roses and citrus and other things out there.
High quality dog food, and then everything you need to
(27:52):
deal with the pests and diseases that are in your garden.
It's a one stop shop out there. D and D
Feed has always got things going on, and if you're
thinking about getting backyard chickens, February is when the chicks
come in. D and D was were all the chicks
hang out. D and D feed is going to be
(28:12):
loaded up with types of chickens you've never heard of.
And we'll talk about that more in February. But get
ready now it's time to go out there and get
some of the supplies. They have to get ready for
that if you want to have backyard chickens. All right,
time for me quit talking, Time for us to go
to break. I'll be right back.
Speaker 10 (28:31):
All right, welcome back.
Speaker 2 (28:34):
You are listening to the Garden Line. I'm your host,
Skip Richter, and we are here to help you have
a bountiful garden, a beautiful landscape, and more fun in
the process. You'd like to give me a call seven
one three two one two k t r H. Seven
one three two one two k t r H. I
(28:54):
uh visiting with the folks at Nelson Fertilizer the other
day about some of the products and things that they have.
And they introduced a product. Was it last year? It
was real recently? I know that. And Chris Announcement has
a lot of products from the turf Star line to
the Color Star line to the nutri Star line. The
(29:14):
Nutristar Genesis is a product I'm talking about, and what
it is is it's our first retail blend that incorporates
Micriza bacteria and other good fungi to benefit that soil.
We call it the microbiome. That means all of the
creatures that are living in the soil that take organic
matter and turn it back into plant food, if you will,
(29:37):
and that improve the soil structure. They interact with plants
in ways that help them. Nutri Star Genesis is packed
with that. It's specifically designed to be mixed in the soil.
Now it is a fertilizer. It is releases the nutrients
in But what you do is you put the Nutristar
Genesis in the soil. So if you're going to dig
a hole in plant and mix them in the hole
(29:59):
and then put the plant in, and you can use
it in the soil that you're putting around the plant
to replant it, you know, as you're refilling the hole.
I like to use it whenever I'm bumping up. Let's see,
I'll start some tomato plants and as the little seedlings
get going, I need to move them to a four
inch pot or a six inch or a gallon pot
or whatever. I'll mix the Nutristar Genesis in that, and
I'm telling you it is huge the difference. I seen
(30:23):
it with my own eyes. I did it last year,
watching those things jump out of the ground. They love
that stuff.
Speaker 10 (30:30):
Now.
Speaker 2 (30:30):
It helps minimize transplant shock for a lot of plants,
and it does provide the nutrients in the soil to
then feed the plant. You mix it in the transplant hole.
Do you put it on as a top dress, mixed
in around as you're filling it in however you want
to go about it. But then after you do that,
once it gets going, then you switch over and use
the other line of nutri Star foods from Nelson, or
(30:52):
the color starre if it's flowering plants, or the Nature
Star if you want something that's an organic type product.
You can do all of that nutri Star. So look
for that nutris Star Genesis from Nelson plant food. It's
planting season, it's transplant growing season, and Nutristar genesis is
good for all of those kinds of things. I couldn't
(31:14):
believe it the first time I used it. I was
in I bumped some tomatoes up to four inch pots
and put some nutral star in some of them, it
was like whoa got to move those lights up because
they were heading heading for the sky. With all that
they were happy with that. You're listening to garden Line
our phone number seven one three two one two k
t RH. We've got time for one call here before
(31:36):
the end of the hour and then we will continue on.
If you have a question about gardening, I would like
to know if you have something you're going to do
new this year they have done before. Would you tell
me that? Just let me know. I want to know
what are the things you're going to do different this year?
Every year in gardening we get a brand new start.
I used this etch a sketch example. All the times
(31:58):
you know you don't like what you drew a your sketch,
you turn it upside down, shake it and you get
to start over. We do the same thing in gardening.
It's okay, But what are you gonna try that you
haven't tried before? For me this year, I'm gonna try
some new kinds of fruit, and I'm also gonna try
a grape arbor, a grape barber. I've never planted. I've
(32:18):
had arbors, but never planted on an arbor. My own
grape made the choices and the design and everything like that,
and I'm really looking forward to it. I got this
little spot. It's a good sunny spot, which I've kind
of got to look for in my landscape now because
all the good sunny spots are taken. My vegetables were
first in line. They jumped on the first sunny spot.
(32:39):
But anyway, I'm put a little grape barber in and
it's gonna be a shaded area that enters the area
where I have fruit trees, and so you walk through
underneath this arbor, it's gonna be an arching livestock panel.
You know what livestock panels are. It's like I don't
want to even use the word wire. It's like, but
think of a wire, but each wires more like the
(33:01):
almost the diameter of a pencil, real thick metal. Those
are called livestock panels, coming about four foot by sixteen
foot or somewhere close to that range. And if you
use them as an overhead archway, they are very strong
and sturdy. You just need a good post to hold them.
I use them as vertical panels in the garden for
(33:24):
growing vines and things on too. They're really good for that.
They're galvanized, they last forever. I love those things. Anyway,
that's going to be the arbor top and the grapes
will hang down underneath it. I can already taste them.
Did you know that when you haven't planted something you're
gonna plant, you can already taste it. Same with tomatoes.
Let's go to Gary in Houston right quick for a
(33:45):
run out of time here. Hey Gary, welcome to garden Line.
Speaker 11 (33:47):
Hey, how's it going. I got a question about drainage.
So I'm having standing water. I know it's not technically gardening.
And I just moved out to Winning and.
Speaker 12 (34:01):
I've seen some stuff about a.
Speaker 11 (34:03):
It's kind of like a French strain, but it's vertical.
Do you do you know anything about that? Or because
I was going to make a French strain going.
Speaker 2 (34:11):
To sorry, Uh, explain to me what you mean by vertical.
I'm not picturing what you're saying.
Speaker 12 (34:21):
So what I saw was he dug a hole straight
down and uh and put the rock in it, or
put the cloth in it, put the rock in it,
covered it up with just thot and showed that that
what I've seen was it on the video. Obviously it
got rid of the water, but I don't know for sure,
(34:41):
And I just wondered if you knew anything about that.
If I gotta do a French train, I'm going to
do a garden.
Speaker 13 (34:49):
So I.
Speaker 2 (34:54):
If you had a sandy soil underlying the clay, maybe
and that can't happen, perhaps that would the water could
get down in there and move on down. If it
was just clay, you would just have basically a little
skinny farm pond, a hole that would fill up and
hold water. So I would do definitely the standard French drain.
You can also do if you don't have an area
(35:15):
to drain it too, that's lower adequately lower, so the
water can drain away. You can you can almost dig
like a miniature pit that you fill with water and
put a It has a you put a box in
the bottom with a sump pump in there, and whenever
the water comes up to a certain level, it physically
pumps it through a solid pipe out to another area.
(35:37):
So that's how we drain areas that are already low
and we don't have a lower area for the gravity
to take the water too.
Speaker 11 (35:44):
Okay, yeah, pretty strange, is not cheap, but a lot
of it I gotta go.
Speaker 2 (35:52):
Yeah, yeah, that's that's true. And the other thing about
French drains is sometimes you're draining a whole area. I've
got a spot in the back of my yard that
I'm gonna pu French strain. Now I haven't done it yet,
but it probably covers a fifty foot length, and I
need water to go in all along that fifty foot,
not just in one little spot. So depending on the
layer of your land, you got options. But I wouldn't
(36:14):
just dig a deep hole because it's just gonna fill
with water and hold it unless as I said that.
Speaker 11 (36:20):
Yeah, he didn't say where he was at. He didn't
say where he was at, And I'm assuming that I
haven't really dug yet at the property.
Speaker 9 (36:30):
So I'm not sure.
Speaker 11 (36:32):
I'm not sure what's below, but I'm beat.
Speaker 12 (36:35):
It's just quite you know how it is out here.
Speaker 2 (36:38):
Well, we'll take your time, do some thinking about it.
Sometimes changing maybe downspouts on the house circumcent creating a problem,
and that would be part of the solution. Sometimes a
swale that can kind of direct water in a different direction.
You know. Off, you have a lot of options for
dealing with water. But as you think through it, you'll
figure it out.
Speaker 9 (37:00):
All right.
Speaker 12 (37:00):
I know that wasn't exactly all.
Speaker 7 (37:02):
Thank you appreciate it.
Speaker 2 (37:04):
Oh, nice part, big, big part of garden Thanks for
the question, man, I appreciate you were calling in today.
All right, folks, time for our top of the hour break.
We'll be right back. Hang around.
Speaker 1 (37:17):
Welcome to Katie r H. Garden Line with Skip Rictor.
Speaker 2 (37:21):
It's crazy.
Speaker 4 (37:30):
Just watch him as we may to septis. Sorry.
Speaker 2 (37:49):
Well, good morning, good morning, and welcome to Garden Line.
We are glad to have you with us. This is
a place hopefully that you come to for good advice
for your lawn and garden, for answers to your questions
you can give. You can give me a call at
seven one three two U two K T r H.
We'll be happy to visit with you. I like talking
(38:11):
to gardeners. You know, gardeners are some of the I
don't know, just the nicest people. Have you ever noticed
that you ever visited with somebody, you know, maybe walking
down taking a walk through the neighborhood, down the street
and you see somebody out gardening and they're just always
willing to visit with you and talk with you, probably
share a few plants with you too, and certainly some advice.
Gardeners have opinions. We all have two elbows, but gardeners
(38:32):
have way more than two opinions. I'll tell you that
for sure. They have opinions, and so do I, I guess,
to be totally honest, I certainly do. But gardening is
a fun hobby. It's a it's a kind of thing
that I find to be really renewing and encouraging, and
that that is important.
Speaker 10 (38:53):
You know.
Speaker 2 (38:53):
The gardening gives you the chance always to start over,
to try something different, and to do something you haven't
done before. And I asked, I talked about this last week,
and already this morning, I have what are you going
to do different in twenty twenty five? And I don't
mean just what are you going to change? Like, oh,
(39:14):
don't do it that way anymore? Do it this way?
That's fine, But I'm talking about what are you going
to grow that you haven't grown before? What are you
going to try as a gardening practice that you haven't
tried before? For example, have you ever tried propagating your
own plants? Have you ever tried rooting a cutting? Have
you ever tried doing something called an air layer. An
(39:35):
air layer is where you bring soil up to the
stem of the plant or soil or peat moss or
potting soil, whatever, and you cover it with something plastic
to hold the moisture in, and you wound the stem
and the roots form inside that soil. So and you
can buy little devices, little devices, little gadgets that you
(39:57):
fill with soil and they click together around the stem
the way I've always done it. Back first time, I
did it just an old bread wrapper tied around the
stem at the base. Fill it full of soil tied
around the stem at the top, and then put some
foil around it if it's outside, to keep the sun
from shining through that clear wrapper. But anyway, it works,
and you can do that. And if you got a
(40:17):
plant you want to propagate, that's the way. How about dividing.
Have you ever done division before? So let's do it this.
Let's say you had a clump of grass, ornamental grass,
or let's say you had like all the fall blooming
Salvia salvio lecanta, a Mexican bush safe and do you
(40:38):
grew it last year? And now it's instead of being
a little you know, came out of a French potter
or gallon pot. Now it's a clump that you know,
maybe about I don't know, eight eight inches across, six
inches across. You can take a shovel straight down through
it and divide it into two and now you have
two of those one some other location, or share one
with a friend. That's another kind of propagation. What kinds
(40:58):
of propagation are you going to try this year that
you haven't done before? Have you ever done seeds starting before?
That is easy to do. Your local garden centers, a
lot of feed stores also ace hardware stores. They're going
to have supplies for that kind of thing where you
can go in and you can start your own seats,
and it is really a cool thing to do. It's
(41:20):
enjoyable to get out and try some new kinds of gardening.
What are you going to do different? If you call in,
I want to hear that. I want to hear about
what are you going to try they haven't tried before?
Or maybe you can tell me what did you try
in twenty four that you hadn't tried before. Either way
we can do it. We just want to talk about
encouraging people to try something new. You know, there are
(41:41):
many kinds of gardeners out there. There's a range. There
are the people who want a beautiful lawn and a
beautiful landscape and they get on their phone and call
and tell somebody to do that. That's okay, that's legit.
We can help you have a beautiful landscape that way
as well. And then there are people but everything is
(42:01):
their own, do it yourself project, and they are the
garden is never finished. And that's true of a lot
of gardens. We never finish them because we're always changing them.
And however you want to go about gardening, what are
you going to try something new? I hope you will
try that. If you've not done much in the way
of fertilizing and taking care of your plants. By the way,
(42:22):
we're coming into the big spring planting season. That's a
big one. If you haven't planted woody ornamentals, including fruit trees,
by the way, but woody ornamentals that need to go
on the ground, do it today, not today, Do it
soon as soon as you can, because they need time
for the roots to grow before summer arrives and puts
the demands on the plant. That way, you don't have
(42:45):
to be so touching go in the summer where you
could possibly lose a plant by forgetting to water for
a little while. Well, when you put it in the ground,
you need to water it in with a good quality
solution to do things to help those roots. And for example,
Medina has one call has to grow six twelve six
plant food six percent nitrogen, twelve percent phosphorus six percent potassium.
(43:06):
Phosphorus is really important in a number of things. It
helps with blooming, but it also helps us with root development.
And Medina has to grow six twelve six has Medina
soil activator which stimulates biological activity. It's got humate, humic acid.
Humic acid improves soil structure. It helps with nutrient uptake,
it helps it is the final stage of decomposing organic matter.
(43:31):
That's humus and humic acid is one of the acids
or humic acid and full OFC acid and others. But
it has beneficial effects in the soil and it's in
that it's in the has to grow six twelve six.
It also has to grow six twelve six. Also has
seaweed extracts. They stimulate fruiting and blooming. So you can
use as to grow six to twelve six is a
(43:51):
full of your application. You're not going to burn your plants.
But since I'm talking about planting time, and because it
helps build the bial biological activity in the soil, I
would suggest doing it as a transplant. You could take
a plant out of a container and soak it in
a dilution of has to grow six to twelve six.
(44:12):
You can plant the plant and then drench it in water.
In really good with medina has to grow six twelve six.
How do you want to go about it? The instructions
are on the label. It doesn't take much, goes a
long way like in a flower bed. Probably an ounce
of has to grow six twelve six per gallon of water.
You can apply it with a sprinkling can. That's how
I like to water in under plants. How do you
(44:32):
go about it?
Speaker 9 (44:33):
Do it?
Speaker 2 (44:34):
You're going to find medina at many of our home
garden centers, at our feed stores, certainly Southwest Fertilizer, ace
hardware stores all carry the medina has to grow six
twelve six, so that you can have success with that. Well,
you are listening to Garline and I'm about half the
day time flies. They say what flies when you're having fun?
(44:56):
But I just think it flies anyway, the next hour segment,
when we come back, I want to talk to you.
First of all, We're going to take a call from
Glenn in College Station right when we get back from
the break, and I'm going to talk to you a
little bit about our trees, because this is the time
when we need to be taking care of our trees
as well. We'll be right back.
Speaker 5 (45:17):
Welcome back, Glad to have you back with us here
on Guarden Line. We are going to be taking your
calls all morning until ten am seven one three, two
one two kt our age. Why don't we start off
by heading out to College Station and talking to Glenn.
Speaker 14 (45:37):
Hey, Glenn, welcome to Garden Line. Good morning, Skip. It's
great to be on your program. I got the bleasure
sitting next to your daughter in law on a plane
ride about a little over a year ago and we.
Speaker 15 (45:50):
Got to talking about your program. So she's a very
very lovely young lady. She very supportive of what you do.
Speaker 14 (45:57):
Anyway, I bought some time.
Speaker 2 (45:59):
Thank you, she told me. But she told me about that.
I didn't. I didn't know who she talked to, but
she said she met somebody on me was me.
Speaker 14 (46:08):
So I bought some fopon hollies two years ago, put
them in my bed and they grew beautifully. And now
I found out well during the growing of two years
they are not dwarfs. They got up to six foot
tall and blocked the windows.
Speaker 2 (46:24):
And things like that.
Speaker 14 (46:26):
So a week ago, when we had good soft soil,
I pulled them up at the front end of a
loader and a high school boy and I dug holes
and transplanted them along the fence line. Is there any
chance they're going to grow after being transplanted? Being that mature?
Should I have cut them back? Is there anything I
(46:48):
can do to help them along?
Speaker 9 (46:50):
Now?
Speaker 2 (46:52):
Well, by doing it in the dormant season, you did
a good thing. That gives them a good chance by
if you If you when you dug them, didn't like
let the roots dry out. You know sometimes people dig
them one day and then plan them another day, and
in the meantime the roots start to desiccate. If you
get them right in the ground, that's a good thing, watermen,
real good is a good thing. And don't worry about
(47:14):
fertilizer right now, just as it gets dry. And I
know right now you are stopping soggy wet up there
in College Station just when it needs water a little bit.
Just remember they have a very limited root system and
will through a good part of the summer this year.
So just small amounts of water pretty much, I say,
(47:37):
within two or three feet of the base of the
plant in all directions. That's primarily what you're trying to
help because the roots are very confined. Get that watered
in real good, and that's the main thing in your
power to do, especially when the weather heats up. But
you can do a little fertilizing later, but first we
(47:58):
need to get a good root system before we start
putt in fertilizer.
Speaker 14 (48:02):
Perfect that's exactly what I've done. And I was a
little word with the cool weather if that was going
to affect them in any way. But I did water
them in. They were out of the ground maybe about
an hour and before we started transplanting them, and they
look great. But of course I know that takes a
long time for them to dry out when they're stuck
(48:22):
in the ground, but they look great so far, and
I just wanted to know if there was any chance
I could help them out in any way, so I
appreciate the information.
Speaker 2 (48:31):
Well you yeah, you did it right, just always in
your brain, in your mind, you know that established Jopon
has got roots going way out in all directions through
a huge volume of soil. And now what you've got
now is something with a bunch of stubbed off roots
from the digging process that's going to take a while
to get where it was before you dug it. So
(48:54):
be aware of that consciously, and then you'll water appropriately
as a result of that.
Speaker 14 (48:59):
I appreciate the information. Skip, Thank you so much for
all you do.
Speaker 2 (49:04):
All right, thanks l Carle. Appreciate that. Glenn. You take care.
Let's head out to Cyprus now and talk to Nick. Hey, Nick,
welcome to Gardline.
Speaker 12 (49:13):
I'm how are you, Skipped?
Speaker 14 (49:16):
Hey, you were, Thank you.
Speaker 16 (49:19):
I'm doing things you've never done before, such as seeding
and such as that. I grew an African violet from
a leaf.
Speaker 15 (49:29):
That was a leaf.
Speaker 2 (49:31):
There you go, a leaf from.
Speaker 16 (49:34):
A plant that my sister in law grew for her mother.
I pinched off a leaf some water. I waited for
it to get rooting. Then once it rooted, I put
it in a pot inside and it is now robust
and greed and full. My question is cool, would make
(49:56):
it bloom better? Because it's not bloomy, it's just kind
African viot robots.
Speaker 17 (50:01):
I'm sorry.
Speaker 2 (50:03):
Yeah, African violets need a moderate amount of nutrition and
a consistent supply of moisture. That's why you often see
them grown in little pots that have a little wick
that goes down in a water pot below that and
it brings the water up through the wick. They don't
want to be soggy, they'll rot, but they also can't
take any drought, so keep it moderately moist in one
(50:25):
of those little wicking pots. They have different forms they take,
but one of those would be helpful. Good lighting, not
direct sun, but a very nice bright light. Some people
use a window location, that's fine. Some people put them
under a little artificial light. That's fine too, Okay, and
then provide get you what's called it?
Speaker 16 (50:46):
I'm sorry, No, go ahead, Oh, I would saying I
have it in a window, right, I mean in on
a shelf right by a window, and it seems to
be doing well, and I'll rotate it so that it
doesn't all grow direction.
Speaker 2 (51:01):
So but that's good about and.
Speaker 16 (51:04):
I appreciate that because my mother in laws was blooming,
but mine wasn't.
Speaker 2 (51:09):
So yeah, well the wick makes it easier. It makes
it a little more fool proof. You know, when we
go on a trip or we forget or whatever. It's
good for that also get you an African violet food.
There are products out there called African violet food and
that way, you know you're getting a good blend of
nutrients for those plants.
Speaker 16 (51:28):
Okay, well that sounds.
Speaker 2 (51:30):
And when you fertilize it give and when you fertilize
African violets, you can put that food in the the
water container and it'll wicket right up to the plants,
so you don't have to put dry granules of the
salt based fertilizer around the African violets. You don't do that,
all right, sir?
Speaker 16 (51:49):
All right, thank you, Skip, I appreciate it. You have
a good day.
Speaker 2 (51:53):
Yeah, congratulations. Yeah, And everybody that's a that would be
thing to try. You got a family, friend, relative, or
something's got a little African violet, you can learn how to.
It's crazy. You break a little leaf off and you
put it in the ground so that the stem is
below ground. The leaf petiole that holds the leaf is
(52:14):
below ground right to the point where the leaf is
almost going into the ground itself right there, and that,
believe it or not, you're going to get roots for
him and little baby plants coming out right there at
the end of the petiole, right before it goes into
the leaf. Pretty cool stuff, all right, that's a good one.
Alan in Cyprus, Welcome to garden line. How can we
(52:34):
help today?
Speaker 7 (52:36):
Did you hear me?
Speaker 2 (52:38):
Yes, sir? Look okay, good, yes, sir.
Speaker 18 (52:43):
You were talking earlier about air layering fruit trees, and
I'm actually my way today beyond County where I have
several varieties, but I was actually going to do that today,
and I'm curious, Texas, is there the best time to
try that?
Speaker 2 (53:04):
Did you say fruit trees, yes.
Speaker 18 (53:07):
Sir, apples, pears, beaches, apricots, Okay, where the coming out?
I actually stated that them can try this, and I
was just curious if there's the best.
Speaker 2 (53:19):
Time well for air layering. I wouldn't recommend it for
fruit trees for a couple of reasons. Stems that are
juvenile root very well. Some plants are just wanting to root,
you know, vicuses and diffenbachia and a lot of the
houseplant type things are very happy to root that way.
(53:42):
Figs or root easily like that. That's a fruit tree,
but a lot of the others. What you're dealing with
on a fruit tree is you're taking They take a
bud from mature wood and they graft it onto a rootstock,
and so what you've got is a more mature type
of wood up there that is not is easy to root.
The second thing is if it rooted and you made
(54:05):
a plant, you wouldn't have the benefits of the rootstock.
So in the case of peaches, they graft them onto
things that are Nema toad resistant. In the case of apples,
it may be a semi dwarfing rootstock or other things.
But in general, could you do it. Maybe if it
were a seedling plant that grew and you could get
(54:25):
a shoot from near the base, you could do the
air layer on that and root it and that would work.
But if it is a grafted tree, probably going to
be hard to have success. And if you do, then
you got the issue of Okay, now it's not on
a rootstock, and sometimes that's a problem.
Speaker 18 (54:42):
Okay, so maybe the water sprout's from the roots, but
not likely any of the other branches.
Speaker 2 (54:48):
A water sprout. If it's not a graph the tree,
you know, if it's coming up, sometimes a graph the tree.
You got these shoots that are basically the rootstock growing,
not the variety of the tree I got you.
Speaker 15 (55:00):
Okay, thanks so much.
Speaker 2 (55:03):
All right, man, thanks a lot. Appreciate your call. Good question,
by the way, too, Appreciate that a lot. I was
talking earlier about the importance of taking care of your trees,
and I wanted to mention a couple of things. You know,
tree care. The winter time is a very important season
for that. Winter is when we do the majority of
our pruning, and it's when we should be doing our
(55:25):
planting fall and winter. And we've had a lot of
unpredictable weather here in the winter. I mean it's always
that way, you know. We may have cold fronts with
a hard freeze, and we may go through very mild periods,
and we got to take care of our trees. And
if you have, if you can't remember the last time
you had someone come out and prune and evaluate your
(55:46):
trees for their health, now is the time to do that.
And Martin spoon Moore is a guy you need to call.
He's with Affordable Tree Service Martin Spoon Moore Affordable Tree Service.
If you like websites a ff tree service dot com
aff tree Service dot com you can find go there,
find out everything you them know, or just give him
(56:06):
a call. Seven one three six twenty six sixty three.
Now Martin or his wife Joe will answer the phone.
The owner's answer the phone there. If if you don't
talk to Martin or Joe when you call, you've called
the wrong place. Seven one three six ninety nine twenty
six sixty three. You gotta get him scheduled now. And
if the guy does good work, he stays busy. Schedule
(56:28):
him now to ensure your trees are in top shape.
Not just for winter that's important, but for when growth
begins in the spring. He can come out of value
you trees, give you an estimate of what needs to
be done that would involve pruning or training in general.
Uh and deep root feeding. He does that. He does
a lot. He did pretty much. If your tree needs that,
Martin can do it. Martin Spoon Moored Affordable Tree seven
(56:49):
one three six nine nine twenty six sixty three.
Speaker 9 (56:54):
Uh.
Speaker 2 (56:55):
You know a lot of people let their trees go
and they just don't take care of them. And when
they call the tree the tree person, it's because a
branch broke off in a storm. Don't wait until that happens.
The way a tree is trained from the day it's
planted to the way it's prune decade by decade through
its life helps create a strong structure or allows problems
(57:18):
to develop. And we want to stay away from those.
That is it. Don't delay. Trees are the single most
valuable plant in your landscape. For your trees, and you
got to take care of them. And that's why you
got to trust it with somebody that knows what they're doing.
I see so much more practice on treecre not necessary.
All right, I'm going to take a quick break. When
(57:39):
we come back, Leon, you will be our very first
s up. All right, welcome back. Let's get going here
on some more garden talk. Here on garden Line seven
one three two one two KT Rights. That's the phone number.
Like you gi me call seven one three two one
two KTR. Going to now go and talk to Leon. Hello, Leon,
(58:02):
welcome to guard Line. Good morning.
Speaker 10 (58:05):
How you doing today.
Speaker 2 (58:08):
I'm well, fans.
Speaker 10 (58:10):
All right. I called about three or four weeks ago
about a lemon tree that had the black leaves, and
you told me to get the hornicultural oil and spray
on the bottom side, And yes, I did that and
it took care of mo. I think there's a few
branches I might need to go back and do a
second treatment on. But my wife and the neighbor lady
(58:34):
across the street said, oh, I wouldn't need those lemons.
There are a bound to be something wrong with them.
Are they safety?
Speaker 9 (58:40):
Eat?
Speaker 2 (58:43):
They're perfectly safety. And the oil spray for the blackest
city moll. The city mold comes from either scale or
aphids or mealy bugs or some other insect. When you
spray the oil, you kill the insect. But that doesn't
make the city mole grow away overnight. It just just
the production of it. And in time you're gonna you're
(59:03):
gonna not have the black city on there. Some people
will blast it with kind of a spray or a soapy
spray or something to just wash it off. But uh,
there is absolutely no effect on those lemons whatsoever. Here
here's what it's like. It's like if you took sugar,
mixed it in water, and then you went out and
sprayed it on some plants, and those plants got sot
(59:25):
on them. There would be no problem to the plant,
to eating that plant, right, It just just so that's
all I do.
Speaker 10 (59:32):
Right, Okay, when's the best time or when should you
harvest the fruit?
Speaker 2 (59:40):
For lemons? Do you have a is it a Meyer lemon?
Speaker 9 (59:46):
Yeah?
Speaker 10 (59:46):
You know now it's a Mark.
Speaker 2 (59:49):
Meyer Okay, Meyer's actually across. It's not a true lemon.
It's a cross between a lemon and amandain type orange.
And uh it is it mature? It goes towards it's
an it's a yellow color, but sometimes they even go
a little a little bit toward the orange side, but
then they're way too far along.
Speaker 14 (01:00:08):
Uh.
Speaker 2 (01:00:08):
I would just pick it, harvest it and taste it.
When it starts to get good yellow on it, you
could harvest it. I was sample one, but a lot
of citrus. You know, we think an orange has to
be fully orange. Well you're grownside zoom as you pick
them before they're fully orange for top quality. And the
same thing is true on lemons and things. They are
going to be sour sour lemone before they're fully yellow.
(01:00:31):
So do a little sampling and see what you like,
but just don't let them go too far.
Speaker 10 (01:00:36):
Okay, I've been in the last three years. I've been
picking them right before the freeze so I could put
my tin over my bush and you know, protect it
from the freeze.
Speaker 5 (01:00:46):
Okay, yeah, yeah, you said you're supposed to pick them
in February.
Speaker 10 (01:00:56):
I said, okay, no, no.
Speaker 2 (01:00:58):
Well, in some some citrus and lemons can kind of
do this. They may have more than one fruit cycle
during the year. Some things like orangeice is they're gonna
they're gonna have one cycle where they produce, and other
things can repeat bloom depending on what kind of citrus
it is. But so now, the all you need to
do now is get you some plywood and two by
(01:01:20):
fours and make a lemonade stand so you can make
some money out of the street.
Speaker 10 (01:01:23):
Oh yeah, yeah, I have to get a permit from
the city, though, I'll do you.
Speaker 2 (01:01:31):
You can't. You can't just ask for forgiveness, give a
give one they show up, give them a glass of
lemonade as hush money. Right, all right, thanks a lot.
Leh alright, man, take care alight, Baba. There you go.
Gardening advice as well as lawlessness here on Garden Line.
Let's go to Tomball and talk to Wayne. Hey, Wayne,
(01:01:54):
welcome to garden line. I have a question, well, thank
you out.
Speaker 19 (01:02:01):
I have a question about knockout right. My knockout roses
every year are so gorgeous, you know, every you know,
I cut them back twice a year. They come back,
you know, then they flush back out and then you know,
early spring early, you know, you know early, you know,
class a year they bloom really gorgeous.
Speaker 13 (01:02:21):
When it's not so hot.
Speaker 19 (01:02:23):
Well, this year, lots of my roses are just real straggly,
you know what I'm talking about. I mean, like they
don't have a lot of foliage, sporadic blooms look more
woody than you know, anything else. And now I have
some that are fine, but most of them are just
(01:02:46):
and I'm just shocked.
Speaker 2 (01:02:47):
Because they're always so.
Speaker 19 (01:02:50):
You know, beautiful, and but this year they're not.
Speaker 16 (01:02:52):
I've never seen anything like it.
Speaker 2 (01:02:55):
So I was wondering description. Uh huh yeah, based on
your description there, Waane, I don't I don't hear a
problem that is evident in what you said. Uh. Now,
you know, roses in the winter oftener a little scraggly
or than normal depends on the winner we have in
(01:03:16):
the condition of the rose and things. But well, we
cut them back and the new growth comes out, they
should be good. Now if when the new growth comes
out you start to see weird things.
Speaker 10 (01:03:25):
Well I do.
Speaker 19 (01:03:25):
That's what I want to tell you about now, so
you don't how when you cut them back. When the
new growth comes back, the new growth is kind of raiched,
you know, it's it's kind of red. And then as
the leaves get bigger, bill they green up, well a
lot of them. When the new growth comes on, it
looks like the new growth is being burned.
Speaker 9 (01:03:43):
You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 19 (01:03:44):
It's like it's it's like the leader.
Speaker 2 (01:03:47):
Okay, Okay, here's what I need you to do. Okay, yeah,
I don't wanna. I don't want to alarm you. It
could be something very bad or it could be nothing.
But uh, could you take some pictures of the show
me the whole bush and then show me up as
close as you can get in good sharp focus. And
you may have to put your hand right behind the
(01:04:09):
stem and the leaves so when you focus it doesn't
focus on something behind those stem and leaves. But I
need a good close up two or three and sharp
focus and let me look at them. If you can
email them to me here before the show's over. We
can talk about it and I'll take a look at them.
Speaker 19 (01:04:26):
Well, I may not be able to get I'm already
give you.
Speaker 2 (01:04:27):
A quicker okay, but I will send them to me.
Speaker 19 (01:04:33):
Can I tell you one other things?
Speaker 11 (01:04:35):
So you know, I've got a lot of.
Speaker 19 (01:04:38):
I got a lot of the knockout roases that are
really established, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 9 (01:04:42):
But so also.
Speaker 19 (01:04:45):
Back in the end of the summer, I bought some
more knockout roses when I caught them on sail and
all that kind of stuff, And they were so full
when I bought them, and they're just you know, they're
they didn't flush out. But yet I'll have a few
that flushed out really good.
Speaker 2 (01:05:00):
That's what's confused.
Speaker 20 (01:05:00):
I'll have it to you that really.
Speaker 19 (01:05:02):
Flushed other ones did, but I will to take a
picture and I may not be able to send that
till tomorrow, and then maybe I can call in them all.
Speaker 2 (01:05:11):
Yeah, I call tomorrow. That's fine. Whenever you want, just
give it to me, but don't delay too much. Some
of the possibilities or stuff that would be more of
a concern, and I don't want to go there until
we know what we're dealing with. But a photo will
tell me if it's a good sharp photo. Check up,
make sure they're all focused. Oh and the last thing, Wayne,
don't embed them in the text. Don't paste them into
(01:05:31):
the text, attach them to your email. Okay, use a
little paper club.
Speaker 9 (01:05:38):
Okay.
Speaker 19 (01:05:39):
I will take a picture of the new plannings and
I want to take a picture of the you know,
the established one. Okay, all right, then, thank you.
Speaker 2 (01:05:45):
So much, thanks a lot man. All Right, you take
care alrighty, we'll get to the bottom of that one. Well,
it looks like it is time for me to go
to a break. I'll be right back with our last
segment for this hour. We're back. Welcome back to Guarden Line.
(01:06:06):
We are here to help you have a bountiful garden,
a beautiful landscape, and more fun in the process. That's it.
Gardening is fun. It's rewarding, it's good for your health,
physical and mental health, and it's just fun. It's just fun.
I warn you it is addictive. I have to put
that disclaimer on it. I need to roll somebody to
read legal terms real fast here at the end, like
(01:06:28):
they do on commercials. Can be addictive, can be habit
forming and so on. But it's a good habit, a
good habit to have when you're trying to have success
in your garden. You know, you want to do good practices.
You want to follow good horticulture practices. That's what we
try to teach about here on Garden Line when we're
talking about specifics, and I always try to lead you
(01:06:50):
to success. I always say like brown stuff before green stuff,
trying to make the point that when you get the
soil right, you get your plants happy. That's the key.
That's a foundation. There's other principles like plants need light,
plants e moisture, but not too much moisture in most cases.
And following those you do those things right and you
got it. And when you need supplies for that, you
(01:07:11):
know I was talking about has to grow, you know
from Medina while ago, talking about Nilson plant foods one
of their products a little bit earlier, and all of
those kinds of things. If you're kind of wondering to
where I get that, well, one place you can go
and get all of it is Southwest Fertilizer. There is
not a product that comes out of my mouth and
(01:07:32):
my knowledge. I don't think I've ever mentioned a product
that is not at Southwest Fertilizer because Bob makes sure
if something is worth carrying, if it's a good product,
people going to need it, He's going to carry it.
And that's how it works. Southwest Fertilizers on the corner
of Businet and Runwick in Southwest Houston. It is the premiere,
one stop shop for everything. Do you want to start seeds,
(01:07:54):
Bob's got everything you need to start seeds. Do you
need to have a certain of gardening tools, It's time
to prune. By the way, he carries quality brands like
Felco and Barnell and Corona. Or you an organic gardener
and you go, yeah, you talk about pesticides and secticides, fungicides, herbicides,
I'm organic. Well, there's organic versions of all of those,
(01:08:16):
and nobody has a bigger organic selection than Bob does.
At Southwest Fertilizer corner Abyss and Nutt and Renwick. Southwest
Fertilizer dot Com is a website you on a phone number. Hope,
hopefully you're listening to garden Line with a pen and
paper nearby here it is seven one three six six
six one seven four four seven one three six six
(01:08:37):
six one seven four four. If Bob doesn't carry it,
you don't need it. It's as simple as that. If
you like to give me a call my phone number
seven one three two one two k t r H
seven one three two one two k t r H.
Let's help. You have a bountiful lawn and a beautiful
(01:08:58):
landscape and a bountifl garden and all those kinds of things.
Plants fall seasons is the garden center right there on
two forty nine as you're going up toward Tomball from
Houston or vice versa, right there on two forty nine,
just north of Luetta. So when you exit for Luetta,
you just you just right there, I mean just a
(01:09:19):
what about a half block north of Luetta on the
right hand side if you're going north. Plants for All
Seasons always has a good selection of everything that is
in season. And so for example, if you if you
go to Plants for All Seasons and you're you're looking
for a particular kind of flower or maybe vegetables, or
(01:09:40):
maybe containers or all kinds of things like that, they've
got it all. They have it all right there. Plants
for All Seasons. You're going to find right now they
are stocked up on roses. Oh my gosh, I got
a lot of roses there. Still good good cool season color,
really good cool cool season color plants. They're veggies for
(01:10:01):
cool season. And you know I was talking about cruciferous
crops before, Well they've got them. They've got them there
in a nice size, transplant size. There are plants for
all seasons. You're gonna find. You can't even walk out
of the place to check out without going through all
of the fertilizers and the soil types of products that
are so important so that that beautiful plant, that basketful
(01:10:24):
of plants you got shopping there, you got to grab
the mixes, the blends of the composts, the mulches, the
fertilizers to make those plants have success. And they got
you covered there. They've been doing this for a very
long time. Plants for all season. In fact, I believe
it goes back to Oh my gosh, in nineteen seventy three,
I think is when they begin, and so they know
(01:10:44):
what grows in Houston. They're not just people that sell plants.
They're gardeners with experience that know what they're doing. The
plants for all seasons. Well, you were listening to garden Line,
and we are coming close to a wrap. I probably
could take a real quick call. One want to call
for the top of the hour here, we're getting real
close to the end for that and we'll be back.
(01:11:06):
Of course next segment. When you're talking about things to
be doing right now, it is time to get those
seeds started. In fact, this afternoon, that is one of
the things I'm going to be doing is starting some
more seeds under lights that I have inside the garage.
Got a little heat map to go underneath them under there,
(01:11:26):
and I've got a lot of different things I want
to try. You know, there's the standard way where you
go buy a packet of seed and you bring it
home and planet of course, that's legit. That's what most
people do. I do seed saving from my non hybrid
varieties of flowers and vegetables. I'll often save seed from them,
and that's another way to do it. And then I'm
(01:11:47):
a seed collector.
Speaker 20 (01:11:49):
You know.
Speaker 2 (01:11:49):
I was out on a roadside recently and saw some farkleberry.
Have you ever heard of farkleberry. It's a relative of
blueberries that grows wild up north of Houston and the woods,
and it has beautiful burgundy color in the fall, and
it makes these little tiny berries that are like a blueberry,
but they're small and they're mostly seed, so none to
(01:12:11):
write home about. I mean, you can make jelly out
of them, but they're graft compatible with blueberries, and they
grow on soil that blueberries might struggle in. So I'm
going to I've got some seed. I'm going to start
some farkleberries, and when they're old enough, I'll try grafting
them to blueberries. Remember I said try something new this year.
I haven't tried before. So that's just an example. I
(01:12:31):
saw some beautiful roadside wildflowers that just were unique in
a specific I won't bore you with the details, but
it's like, Ooh, I haven't seen that species look like that.
I collected the seed. They're about to go out in
my garage and go into containers, and I'm going to
check them out and maybe pick out some good ones.
That would be another thing. And you're talking about things
you haven't done before that you ought to try this year,
(01:12:54):
that you're gonna try this year. How about trying your
hand at improving a species or a crop. So I
do that with Okra. For example, I cross okra and
my best ones, I save them, and then I plant them,
and I pull up everything that is not the best,
and the ones that are left are the best, and
then I do it again and again, and you get
(01:13:15):
better at that. You can do the same thing. A
lot of really quality plants that we have now were
found by somebody somewhere and brought in and grown in
that kind of way. And so these wildflowers that I planted,
when I plant those seeds, they're not all going to
be like what I the mama plant that I took
them off of. So I'll pull up everything that is
(01:13:38):
not like or better than the mother plant and just
let it cross with itself and keep going like that.
That's a hobby. And I know a lot of you're
listening to go, I'm.
Speaker 9 (01:13:47):
Not gonna do it.
Speaker 2 (01:13:48):
That's fine, you I have to do. Gardening is a broad,
broad hobby. Everybody is to do what they want. But
I like playing in the dirt. You know, you're never
too old to play in the dirt. You aren't. That's
what they say. There's a shirt that says that. By
the way, I'll collect gardening t shirts I have some
(01:14:08):
really unusual as right, I'll posted the first to face
all right, top of the hour. When we come back,
Kay and pair Land, you'll be our first up.
Speaker 1 (01:14:21):
Welcome to kt r H garden line with skin rictor.
Speaker 2 (01:14:27):
Crazy Trim.
Speaker 3 (01:14:33):
Just watch him as many spots.
Speaker 2 (01:14:50):
All Right, we're back. I have refueled on coffee, so
I'll be somewhat coherent even in this next hour. Our
phone number seven one three two one two k t
r H. What do you wanna talk about regarding plants? Uh,
happy to talk to you about that. Just give us
call seven one three two one two k t r H.
(01:15:11):
Let's run out to Paarland now and talk to k
first thing this hour. Hello, okay, welcome to guard Mine.
Speaker 21 (01:15:17):
Yeah, thank you for taking my call. I was just wondering,
is this an okay time to plant amarilla spulbs. They're transplants.
Speaker 2 (01:15:27):
Yeah, it's fine. You can do that now. You know
normally we we we do a lot of bulb planting
in the fall. Uh, yeah, you can still plant them now.
There's there's nothing they'll they'll they'll grow. There are these
ones that you are moving around your yard or are
these ones you've purchased.
Speaker 21 (01:15:47):
No, these are ones I dug up. I didn't dig
them up until about a month ago. I was having
all my beds mulched, and I thought, well, I'm gonna
get them out of there and put them back in.
Speaker 2 (01:16:00):
Okay, it ought to be fine. It ought to be
fine to go ahead and do that. You bet, have
have fun. Send me a picture when they all come
out and start blooming.
Speaker 21 (01:16:10):
Oh okay, I'll try.
Speaker 22 (01:16:11):
Thank you talk to you.
Speaker 2 (01:16:13):
About all right. You're welcome to you bet. Yeah. By
the way, all of you, you're welcome to brag about
your stuff. You know, if you grow a tomato that
you're particularly proud of, I'll I'll tell you a look
at that. I'd like to see that, you know, or
some beautiful Amarillus bulbs, or I don't know, some homemade
contraption that you made. Well, well, we will go along
(01:16:34):
with any of that kind of thing. Gardeners love to
talk about gardening, you know. It's kind of like you know,
you dog people, which, by the way, we have two
golden retrievers, And so if you look at the photos
on my phone too, but my wife's phone, you scroll
through them and it's like eight hundred thousand pictures of
(01:16:55):
our looks along with kids and grandkids and everything else.
But gardener's that way. You know, you got to take
pictures while your stuff. You should by the way that
reminds me of something. Uh, this would be. I don't
like the term New Year's resolution because to me, what
that means is something I think I should do, but
I'll never get around to when the when the rubber
(01:17:16):
hits the road, right, But I'll just use it new
Year's resolution. Here's an idea to journal your gardening activities
this year. And you're thinking, Okay, I'm not a journ
I don't have a journal that I write about what
I think and feel and everything else. No, I'm talking
about something different. I'm talking about when you plant and emeralists.
(01:17:40):
Let's say this. We're just talking to okay about amarillis.
When they come up and bloom, take a picture of
it and where they are and where they're blooming. I've
taken pictures of things after I planted them that are
they're going to disappear away and later you want to go,
like a bulb, dig it up you don't know where
it is. Well, that's one thing you can do. But
also take pictures of how things are doing and what
(01:18:02):
works and what doesn't. You're out this year, You're going
to grow tomatoes in your garden, let's say. And so
you grow the tomatoes and you see a bug you'd
never seen before, take a picture of it. Take a
picture of it, and keep track of that. Some people
like to write in a journal. You can do that.
I like the electronic ones. There are different kinds of
things that you can I'm not going to go into
(01:18:23):
all the apps and softwares and things, but there's a
lot of it out there. Some people just use, you know,
something like Microsoft Word or Excel or something. You can
take those pictures and you can put them into the
journal of that year with those plants as well as notes.
And I go back to notes all the time. You know,
(01:18:46):
what was two years ago I planted a whole bunch
of hot peppers. What was the name of that one?
Or how did that do? Or what earlier? I two
years ago, I took a picture of some stuff on
Okra that I'd never seen before, And now I was
just not too long ago thinking about, Okay, what was
that and what month was that that I saw that?
(01:19:07):
On it? With's on the picture the date on the picture.
I mean, I'm just saying. You can journal about a
lot of different things that you try and what works
and what doesn't work. You can journal about pests and diseases.
You know what You can also do You can clip
something from online that you read that's really good and
put it in that folder. I have folders like that
where I read an article about not just make something
(01:19:29):
up here, you know, Like I read an article about
this great new carrot that has got way more vitamin
or more beta caroteene in it, which is a precursor
to vitamin A, and this and that and the other
about this wonderful carrot, and I may just take a
click that link and paste it into my journal in
the section on vegetables or carrots or whatever, however organized
(01:19:51):
you want to go about it, or however unorganized, however
in depth or however just cursory. Find a way to
capture the things that you see in or learning. You
go visit a botanical garden in another city and you
see this cool plant, take a picture of it, take
a picture of the tag on it, and there you go.
Now you know what it looks like, what it is.
(01:20:11):
So when you go home, you can go see, hey,
do you guys carry this plant? You got it with you,
so take advantage of that. Some you can use the
word journal however you want to look at it, just
however you want to go about it. Do that. I
really like the Microsoft product. One note for that I
(01:20:33):
have used. Oh gosh, I can't even say the names
of past softwares that I've used. And find what works
for you or at you know, in the old days,
we just cut clippings out of the newspaper and wrote
on a you know, big chief tablet or three ring
binder those things down. You will find that those become
(01:20:57):
very helpful and educational for those of you that want
to get really serious about gardening in one aspect or another,
or at least to learn and remember. All right, that's
enough of a spiel on that, but I think that's
important and I encourage you to try doing that well.
The folks at Microlife have put together a number of
(01:21:19):
quality products, and I talk about these all the time,
but micro Grow Liquid AF is one I just want
to briefly mention to you. It is loaded with a
bazillion different kinds of good things, eight specifically extremely dominating
microbes for example, there are microbes that help control certain diseases.
(01:21:42):
Micro Grow Liquid AF bioinoculate is loaded with those. There
are microbes that live on the leaf and when a
diseasepore lands or a bacteria lands, it out competes them
or it just outright kills them. There's microbes that cause
plants to growth to be regulated in a good way.
There's microbes that help the plant obtain nutrients from the soil,
(01:22:04):
and on and on and on down the way. Micro
Grow Liquid AF bioinoculate. This is a liquid. You can
get it at a granule, but this is a liquid.
It is very effective and it's everywhere you see micro
life sould. It's a maroon burgundy colored label. Micro Grow
Liquid AF all organic liquid biological inoculation for your plants
(01:22:26):
and for your soil. Time for me to take a
quick break. I'll be right back with your calls.
Speaker 5 (01:22:31):
Amaze, Welcome back to garden Line see dancing Glad to
have you with us this morning.
Speaker 2 (01:22:38):
I'm your host, Skip Rechtor, and we're here to guide
you to success in your gardening. How's that for a
lofty goal. It's not rocket science, man, you can do it.
Let's talk. You got a question, you got something you
maybe I can be assistance with helping you have success
with Let's talk about that very very important. Try to
(01:22:59):
give you some principal. I try to avoid too much
of the what is it didactic radio where I'm just
like teaching the or that kind of thing. But I
think at times it helps to understand the why. You know,
a little bit of the why is helpful because then
then you understand and you can apply that to other things.
(01:23:20):
However you want to go about it, We're here for that.
Seven one three two one two k t r H.
The folks at wild Birds have come up with a
new product and it is really cool stuff. They call
it the Cardinal Confetti Blend. That was it was a
Cardinal Confetti blend is designed you know, for cardinals, but
(01:23:44):
I'm telling you a lot of birds will like this blend.
It's got safflower backs, black sunflowers, sunflower chips, It's got
something called nutris saff and, which is a safflower. It's
got the bark butter bits, it's got peanut halves, dried
meal worms. I'm not a bird is starting to make
my mouth water, and striped sunflower seeds as well, and
you put it in a I would just put it
(01:24:06):
loose in a tray. You put it in a one
of those tube feeders, or have a squirrel eliminator, my
favorite bird feeder of all. You put it in there.
They're going to keep this available year round because Cardinal's
around year round. But it is really really cool. They've
got a Cardinal tube feeder. It's brand new, also designed
for this confetti collection, Cardinal Confetti. There's also a good
(01:24:29):
evening Cardinal feeder. Two new feeders that are really really
effective and they're attractive too, by the way. They also
this time of the year because it's winter, the Winter
super Blend, it's a still very important, very timely it's
got the energy and the fats that birds need for
winter survival. In fact, it's wild Bird Unlimited, its highest
(01:24:50):
fat seed blend, the Winter super Blend. That's what's in
my feeders right now, Winter super blund. And then they've
got something called bark butter. Now this is crazy, but
bark butter is a spreadable suet and you can literally
you just go out there and smear it on a
tree trunk and birds will come up and peck it.
Out of that tree trunk. I mean you can smear
it on a feed or whatever you want. But no
(01:25:12):
bird food attracts more species of birds than Gem's birdaceous
bark butter. Is that a name, Gem's berdaceous bark butter.
Now Jim Carpenter, by the way, he's the wild Birds
Unlimited founder, But they have documented one hundred and fifty
plus bird species that are attracted to this bark butter.
I mean this is this is like, this is like
(01:25:34):
bird crack. Okay, I mean there's it's probably a control
substance in the bird world. It is so good. It
comes into bark butter bits and or little bite sized nuggets.
It comes with something called bugs and bits. This does
not make my mouthwater. It's bark butter bits with dried mealworms,
and birds love dried mealworms, and so any kind of
(01:25:55):
an insect eating bird especially is going to be very
interested in that bark butter. So I can sit here
and brag and brag and talk about it, but just
know cardinal confetti blend, the new product with the cardinal
tube feeder and the cardinal Good Evening cardinal feeder are
all there. Also, know your birds need water. Birds drink
every day of the year just like you do. So
(01:26:15):
make sure there's always a supply of water out there
for them, and you're gonna have good success with that.
That reminds me I need to go out and check
my feeders, another thing for me to do this afternoon.
And I've not gotten the cardinal confetti yet, and then
reading about I gotta get some. Next time I'm down
at the wild birds, I'm gonna grab some of that stuff.
That is really cool stuff. Cardinals are such beautiful birds.
(01:26:37):
Beautiful beautiful. I mean, probably one of the most recognizable
birds even by children out there. And they may call
them a redbird, but cardinals are beautiful. They come to
my feeder. Well, it is time for me to take
another little break here in just a little bit. I
(01:26:57):
want to let's see here. Yuh, I'm a little early
on that, aren't I? Yeah, I'm a little excuse me,
I have my time all wrong. I got time to
go out here and talk to Mark in the woodlands.
So let's do that. Hey, Mark, Welcome to garden Line.
Speaker 20 (01:27:13):
Hello, Randy, good morning.
Speaker 2 (01:27:15):
Oh wrong, guy, I skip. That's all right, Sorry, that's okay,
that's okay, Randy Randy. Randy was a friend.
Speaker 20 (01:27:29):
I know, I know we miss him. Hey, I've got
a meer lemon tree in a pot.
Speaker 17 (01:27:36):
That has absolutely bloomed.
Speaker 20 (01:27:38):
I've got I've got lemons glore on it like I
wish I had in the spring, and I've got it
in the garage now and I'm thinking I'm just gonna
go with it and see if I'm going to be
able to produce lemons with uh with this tree right now?
Is there any harm in doing that? Or should I
take them off?
Speaker 2 (01:27:59):
No? Not it all. When they're real tiny, they may
abort if they go into some sort of stress and
the little tiny pea sized lemons fall off, But as
they get bigger, they stick. I would get that thing
out of the garage as much as you can. If
it's going to be above thirty two, I'd get it
outside where it gets sunlight because sunlight on the leaves
make carbohydrates and that's what helps that those lemons to
(01:28:21):
grow mature and ripen on your tree. So as much
as you can get it out, and if it goes
below thirty two, put it back in. But I'm just
telling you that tree will keep going even in the
cool weather out there unless you just have an awesome
lighting set up in the garage. I'd give it some sunlight.
Speaker 20 (01:28:40):
No, I'll get it out for sure. But so that
means I'm probably I usually get those lemons in November
and December when I when I take them off, But
that means I'm going to have lemons and yeah, je.
Speaker 2 (01:28:51):
July, you'll have lemons coming up from them. Yeah, I would.
I would take care of that crop. That's a good one. Yeah,
then it a little bit.
Speaker 20 (01:29:02):
If I got so many lemons on there right now,
it's unbelievable.
Speaker 2 (01:29:07):
Yeah.
Speaker 9 (01:29:07):
Well.
Speaker 2 (01:29:07):
One of the principles of fruit growing is that, of
course the sunshines on the leaves and make carbohydrates, right,
That helps the tree set buds for fruit that turn
into flowers and then fruit. But when you have a
lot of fruit, the carbohydrates are going into that fruit,
and so that may affect the bud set coming up.
(01:29:30):
So if you lessen the load a little bit on lemons,
if you have way more than you need, and you
could lessen that crop load to an acceptable level, it
may help it then do better at the next fruit set.
A lot of the carbohydrates will go into forming fruit buds.
Later that for your normal cycle that you were talking about.
Speaker 20 (01:29:52):
Okay, okay, hey, can I one more question?
Speaker 2 (01:29:56):
Yeah?
Speaker 20 (01:29:58):
You got Yeah, trees. Should I have them trimmed it
back by now or not?
Speaker 2 (01:30:06):
No, it's fine. You can trim them now. You can
trim them a little later if you want. But there's
just trim them before the buds start to push out,
swell up and start to push out.
Speaker 20 (01:30:17):
Okay, very good, Skip, Thank you very much. I appreciate
your help.
Speaker 2 (01:30:21):
Sure, all right, Mark, thank you. You take care. You
know that thing about I was saying about carbohydrates and fruit, uh,
fun fact, fun story. This is true. This is history.
I have to say it's true, as if the other
things I'm saying are not true. But really, this is true.
When the Spanish conquistadors were floating across the ocean over
(01:30:45):
here to find out what was going on in the Americas,
what became the Americas. A guy named Cabeza de Vaca,
which I can't imagine any mama or any person wanting
to name their kid or be called or whatever Cadese
Devakamin's head of the cow. I mean, how would you
like that? He talked about a boy named Sue for
a name head of the cow. Anyway, he was he
(01:31:07):
was captured by Indians here in Texas and he was
tied to a pecan tree. And he was the first
guy to write about alternate bearing. In his notes that
he took later, he wrote about alternate bearing of pecans
or state tree. That means that one year pecans have
a huge crop, the next year they have a very
(01:31:31):
light crop, and then the next year they have a
very heavy crop. That's called alternate bearing. And just the
fun fact was the history that's that's the first guy
that wrote about it over here, and he had plenty
of time being chained to a pecan tree anyway, or
tied not chained. The reason for that is pecan's bear
in the fall. So if you have a heavy crop,
(01:31:54):
all of those carbohydrates are going in to create pecan kernels.
I mean, that's a lot of protein and oils and
things that are going in there to make that luscious
pecan kernel. So the tree isn't able to set pecan
fruit buds or nut buds that would then come out
in the spring with the little kakins that are hanging
(01:32:15):
down that drop on the driveway, and then the little
nuts that come out and get set, so the next
year you wouldn't have a good pecan set. Then it's
growing all through that year with no pecans on the tree,
hardly at all, and it has one heck of a
big set in the following fall. That's alternate bearing of pecans.
And it's for the same reason that I was just
discussing with Mark on thinning out that lemon a little
(01:32:36):
bit to help out with that that heavy fruit lot.
It's even worse with pecans for the reasons I've mentioned.
But okay, fun fact, you learned that here you heard
here first, or maybe you did our phone number seven
one three two one two kt r H seven to
one three two one two kt r H. Your local
Ace Hardware store is set up for everything you need.
(01:32:59):
That's why we say ACE is the place you know.
In the Houston area. We got a lot of Ace
Hardware stores and you can go in if you want
to find the one near you, go to the website
Acehardware dot com and find the store locator and find it.
It's gonna be all over them, but there's gonna be
one close to you. And so right now, are you
doing spring cleaning? Do you need storage toats for things.
Maybe I was just putting up some Christmas stuff that
(01:33:21):
I needed to get a toat for. You can go
buy your ACE Hardware store before the lawn and garden
season hits. They've got everything that I'll be talking about
or I am talking about and lawn and gardening. They
also have shelving units there. You know, fire is kind
of a fun thing. They have a fire pit from
Brito and Solo Stove. Really cool. They have firewood that
(01:33:43):
you can replenish your stock with for these cool days.
You know, when you're in there, just make sure and
sign up for the ACE Rewards program so that you
get discounts and special offers that are only available for
ACE Hardware customers now. To just remember that, I mean,
you're gonna shop there, get the benefit of that. That
is a really I belonged to ACE Rewards for I
(01:34:06):
don't know, over a decade now. Uh and it really
is a worthwhile thing to do. And while you're in there,
as they get restocked up on all these cool weather supplies,
you know, how you go in to buy that heat
lamp or that fascic cover and uh, yeah, they're all
gone because everybody else is doing it because it's gonna
freeze tonight. Get it now. Get ready. You're gonna need
(01:34:28):
fascic covers for the next X years are many years
you're in that house, You're gonna need faust covers. Go
ahead and get them. Get them now. The little freezemiser
that prevents those faucets from freezing over it, they've got those.
Get those now. What else do you need? They've got it?
All right. I'm gonna take a break. If you'd like
to call in the meantime, you'll be first up when
(01:34:49):
we come back. Seven one three two one two KTRH.
All right, you're back. We're back. Let's talk. We've got
gardening to talk about. Seven to one three two one
two fifty eight seventy four seven one three two one
two five eight seven four. We're going to go out
to talk to Let's see Sharon. Now, Hey, Sharon, welcome
(01:35:11):
to garden Line.
Speaker 17 (01:35:13):
Thank you, good morning.
Speaker 6 (01:35:14):
I need uh some replacement plants for some Japanese box
woods that that I lost during the summer. They had
uh like dive back. Uh the branches would turned really
for you. You probably know what I'm talking about. But
I've got a hedge row and I was wondering, is
there a plant that I could put in the places
(01:35:37):
that I lost those box woods that would be compatible
with the leaf shape of the Japanese boxwood.
Speaker 2 (01:35:48):
One idea would be to use a dwarf yopon. There
are very compact dwarf yopons. You can let them grow naturally,
or you can share them to squared around or whatever
shape you want to do, just like you would have boxwood.
That would probably be the first suggestion. That's a plant
that's native in our region anyway, and I think that
(01:36:09):
would that would be what I would suggest first. There
are a few other things out there. Different things have
their own challenges. Every plant has its pros and cons.
But I think I think dorothy upon would be a
good choice because.
Speaker 6 (01:36:21):
I don't want a pressy plant. And that's why I
put the box woods out there, because I had locations
than they were hardy. But some reason this past summer
it was it was really bad.
Speaker 2 (01:36:36):
Yeah, so are the are the boxwood still around or
are they gone off the property? And everything now?
Speaker 6 (01:36:43):
Well, No, the ones that were really bad, I dug
up and I dug out the soil that was around there,
and I haven't replaced anything, yet I needed to do
some research and find something that was heardier.
Speaker 2 (01:37:00):
Yeah. Well, the reason I ask is if you can
find some of the roots system of those box woods,
it makes some of it may still be on the soil,
but kind of take a spade and for it and
dig it out and come of wash some water off
and look at it and see if there's little bumps
and knots all along the roots, if they look kind
of normal, or if they are just very knotted and
bumpy like a string of pearls, or that makes it
(01:37:23):
sound prettier than it'll be. But anyway, that's nematodes and
they can be a contributing factor, and knowing that they're
there helps guide you as you're going to plant other
things in the area too. So that's one of the
things that attacks box woulds. So let's just make let's
find out, just get that info by checking the root
the roots that you can find still around.
Speaker 15 (01:37:44):
All right, good, I will do that. Thank you so much.
I appreciate your help.
Speaker 2 (01:37:50):
You bet, thanks a lot. Thanks for the call, Sharon.
We're going to go now out to Seabrook and talk
to Sarah. Hey, Sarah from Seabrook.
Speaker 23 (01:37:59):
Hello, Rick, how are you?
Speaker 2 (01:38:02):
I'm good today?
Speaker 13 (01:38:03):
Hello?
Speaker 2 (01:38:03):
What can we help?
Speaker 23 (01:38:05):
I want to do air layering. Air layering on some
kumquats that my friend has and I saw on YouTube
where you can use spagnum moss and a plastic a
small plastic bottle where you soak your spagnum moss and
(01:38:26):
then put it in the bottle and then wrap it
all up real tight. The only thing I was concerned
about is there going to be root rot or rot
in that bottle?
Speaker 2 (01:38:39):
Well?
Speaker 23 (01:38:40):
If it all the water?
Speaker 2 (01:38:41):
Can you put any kind of right? You can use
all kinds of things to hold the soil around the stem.
I mentioned doing it with bread wrappers when I was
first learning to do this. That works great. You can
buy You can take a little plastic bottle like you
see and cut it and put the two halves around
the stem and use that. There's the only way for
(01:39:03):
water to get in will be when you open it
up so that you can like pour a little bit
of water back into the bottle, like if it rained
on it or something. It's not going to get soggy
because there's no way for water to get in once
you've wrapped it up. In fact, once roots start to farm,
you're going to have to open it up just a
(01:39:25):
little to add more water. You know, when the first
root forms, don't take it off. It's not ready yet.
It needs a little bit more of a root system
inside that. If you use a bottle inside that bottle.
But yeah, it's not going to get soggy, you just
it will only get soggy if you build a bottle
fort of water, which you're not going to do.
Speaker 23 (01:39:45):
Okay, okay, as long as the spagnum moss is wet,
then just leave it with that much moisture.
Speaker 2 (01:39:52):
Yeah, and you can use spagnum. I typically grab some
potting soil and use that. I mean, there's there's no
magic to it either way. Whatever works for you. Some
people like the stringy sphagnum because I don't know, it's
kind of hard. It's kind of easier to have it
stick on there, whereas potting soul tends to fall away
as you're trying to get it to stay to the
stem till you can get something wrapped around it.
Speaker 23 (01:40:15):
Right, It is now a good time to do it.
Speaker 2 (01:40:18):
All right, anytimes you've done to do an earlier Okay,
all right, yes.
Speaker 23 (01:40:25):
I'm on it, all right, Thank you so much.
Speaker 2 (01:40:28):
Take care, good luck with us. Hey, if it roots,
send me a picture of it. I want to see
your can see how I did. Thanks a lot, Sarah,
all right, our phone number seven one three two one
two kt r H seven one three two one two
kt r H. You know the folks up at Nature's
(01:40:49):
Way Resources, which is on Intertate off Interstate forty five
up toward Conroe. If you were in Houston heading toward Conroe,
right where fourteen eighty eight comes in for Magnolia on
the left, you turn right across the railroad tracks and
that's Sherbrooke Circle, which is what Nature's Way is on.
And when you go in there, you're going to find
the highest quality soil based products from a place that
(01:41:12):
actually originated in our region. Many of these products, you know,
we talk about leaf more compos well, that's where it
was born. Nature's Way Resources, we talk about rose soil,
that's where it's born, and Nature's Way Resources. Right now,
they've also got firewood. They got it bagged and bundled.
It's a nice well seasoned oak firewood, nice natural scent.
(01:41:33):
Good for grilling too. By the way, if we get
through winter and you know where you're done with the fireplace.
It's good for grilling, it's good for smoking meat. It's
just a good quality product. And they have it there
at Nature's Way Resources. Of course, they're famous for their soils.
They're different mixes. They also have pine straw, pine straw
(01:41:54):
bales that you would use for mulching. Yeah, pine straw
like on the floor of the forest. Now, one thing
I will tell you about the pine straw is people
have asked me a million times, but doesn't that make
the soil to acidic? Would you listen to me? The
answer is no, absolutely not. Now, if you take fresh
(01:42:15):
fallen pine needles and measure the pH, yes, they are acidic.
By the time they dry out and lay on the ground,
they are not. And the I mean, you could pine
straw malts for ten years and there would barely be
any movement in the pH of that soil if any.
Don't worry about that. Pine straw is a wonderful, beautiful
I love the bronze look of the little needles. I
(01:42:37):
think it's really really attractive too. It holds moisture, it insulates,
it's kind of slow to break down, you know, which
is for a malt that's kind of a good thing,
good for erosion control and so on. You can get
it there. Nature's way resource is just another quality product
that they have. Time for me to take a break,
I will be right back with your calls. Seven one
(01:42:59):
three two point two kat r h all right and
welcome back. We are gonna head straight to the phones.
Start off with Paula. Hey, Paula, welcome to garden Line.
Speaker 24 (01:43:14):
Thank you, good morning, Thank you for taking my call.
I have a two part question. I have three beautiful
one set of plants, one limb walk off and I'm
the type of person that pinches everything and roots it
and plant it. I tried to put this in water,
but it looks like that tip is starting to rot.
Speaker 2 (01:43:35):
Also, I would like.
Speaker 24 (01:43:36):
To plant these outside. My aunt has beautiful points setters,
but she does live in port of that which is
closer to the Gulf. She planted hers on the south
side about twenty years ago and they're almost as tall
as her house.
Speaker 22 (01:43:52):
What can I do.
Speaker 2 (01:43:56):
Well? I would I'd pull it out of the water.
They're not going to do real well rooting in there.
If you can, I would make a fresh cut, put
it make a cut just below a node which is
where the leaf attaches to the stem, or where there
was in the past a leaf attached to the stem.
And then dip that point seta in rooting hormone. Get
(01:44:17):
some rooting hormone powder and get rooting hormone on the
sides and especially the base of that point set of cutting.
Then put it in some kind of a container with
it could be just pearlite, or it could be you know,
a quality potting mix. Put it down in there and
put a clear bag over the top, something that will
(01:44:39):
hold in the moisture. And there's a lot of ways
to do that, but however works for you. Do that,
and then put it in a very bright spot, but
not direct sun, direct son. It'll get too hot in there.
And once you've got moist mix and you've the point
seta has rooting hormone on it, and you've got it
in a bright area, Uh, then that's all you can do.
(01:45:02):
After that. Nature has to take over from there.
Speaker 22 (01:45:06):
Okay, And now what about replanning the uh, the points
shadows that are in the pot.
Speaker 2 (01:45:16):
I would wait until we are long past all the
cold weather. You know, we don't want nights even down
in the in the forties really. I mean, but if
in the meantime get them outside while you can during
sunny days and begin they've been in your house so
they're not used to sun, so you don't just stick
(01:45:36):
them in the full brunt of the sun all of
a sudden, but gradually give them a little more and
more sunlight, because you want to get those plants as
strong as you can, and it takes sun to do that.
They're diplenished right now from being inside. Get them as
healthy as you can. Then when we get past all
the frost, what what roughly where do you live? What
(01:45:57):
area do you live in? We are you north?
Speaker 22 (01:46:02):
Fifty miles north of the Gulf of Mexico.
Speaker 2 (01:46:10):
Oh okay, all right, well I would say let's yeah,
well let's get into you know, maybe second week of
March or so. That's plenty a good time to go
ahead and start putting those things out. Remember, the root
system is very confined still, so over the first few
months after you plant it, when you do your watering
and fertilizing, you're primarily doing it within a foot of
(01:46:33):
the stem of that plant, around the base there to
help it get established. But the main thing right now
is it's been in way too little light, and we
got to get some sun and some carbohydrates so it
has the energy to rebound.
Speaker 22 (01:46:50):
I can do that. And now, how much water as
the plants get large. My aunt just doesn't do anything,
but she it must just be a perfect location. How
much water do they need a lot of water during
the summer or just medium water?
Speaker 2 (01:47:08):
Yeah, so as there as their root as they're establishing
during twenty twenty five through the season, a little more
water than you normally would, not keeping it soggy, but
always keeping it moist. Once the point said, it gets established, Uh,
you just kind of have to water as needed. You know,
if it's one hundred degrees for three weeks without rain,
(01:47:28):
I mean you got a water, but uh, it's not
something like you're having to water them every day. Once
they're in the ground and have a root system.
Speaker 22 (01:47:37):
Well I know they have. My ants had all right,
Bety flowers, And I just want to be able to
plan thesea. And I appreciate your information. I'm going to
follow it to the letter. Thank you so much for
the call.
Speaker 2 (01:47:52):
All right, Well, once they get established and stuff in
the future year, if you think about it, send me
a picture. I'd love to see that. I appreciate you calling.
We're going to go now to Curtis and Friends with Hey, Curtis,
welcome to garden Line.
Speaker 9 (01:48:04):
Good morning.
Speaker 13 (01:48:07):
I have a question about I have a mango tree
that's about four feet tall and the pot it's a
way too small. I have it in my garage, so
it's not getting the freeze and cold, and I wonder
(01:48:30):
if it's okay for me to repot that now while
I have it inside.
Speaker 2 (01:48:38):
You could you know? If you do, I think it
needs to be out in light as much as possible
and better lighting. So yes, you're correct, it doesn't want
to be cold. But if we if we can warm
up a little bit and get some days where their
sunshine and it have a little light like that, I
(01:49:00):
think it would really help it. When you repot it,
you're going to want to cut the roots that are
circling the container, and there's going to be a lot
of them, so that's why I would first i'd probably
cut those roots and then put it in the new
pot that's larger, of course, and help it begin to
(01:49:22):
re establish a new root system. And after you cut them,
within a couple of weeks, you're going to see fresh
new root. If you pulled it up, you would see
fresh new roots growing from the cut ends, so don't
be afraid to cut them. But do that, do some
root pruning so that it doesn't get all pot bound
or stay pot bound, and make sure you give it
a little bit of light. If you have the time
(01:49:43):
and energy to run it out every day for some
sun and then back in, that would be ideal as
far as the plant's concerned.
Speaker 13 (01:49:50):
Well, I have the pots on Dolly's with wheels, so
I roll it in and out, and I've already used
like a masonry trou slide down around, so I've listened
it in the pot over the last week.
Speaker 2 (01:50:09):
Okay, Well that's good.
Speaker 13 (01:50:13):
A new pot.
Speaker 2 (01:50:15):
Okay. And what I would suggest you do is what
now that you've got it loose, lean the pot over
when you're ready to pull it out. Don't pull it.
Don't grab the stem and pull it up out, lean
it over and slide it out to the side. For
various reasons, that's a little bit safer, better way to
handle that. And then you can see the roots. You
can use pruners or a box cutter knife or whatever
(01:50:38):
to slice vertically down through that that root ball and
make that those cuts when you're doing the repotting.
Speaker 15 (01:50:43):
Okay, okay, thank you.
Speaker 20 (01:50:48):
I appreciate.
Speaker 2 (01:50:50):
All right, Curtis, good luck, good luck with that. And
all I ask is it someday when you get mangos,
you send me a few. You take care boy. Bye?
All right, folks, time for a break. I hear music.
That means you know what music means. It means skip
stop talking. If you'd like to give a call when
(01:51:10):
we come back Katie in Columbus, You're going to be
our very first uh. And for the rest of you
seven one three two one two kt rih. We'd love
to hear from you. Give us a call.
Speaker 14 (01:51:22):
Well.
Speaker 2 (01:51:22):
I answer the kinds of questions that you might have.
What are you gonna be doing new this year? What
are you going to try new? I've suggested a lot
of things, like try your hand at dividing plants, try
your hand at rooting cuttings, try your hand at air layering,
grow vegetables if you never have before, grow vegetables you've
never grown before. If you are a vegetable gardener, what
(01:51:44):
are you gonna try it's new. There's a lot of
cool stuff out there, saving seeds all kinds of things.
Try something new this year. Gardening is way too much
fun to just do the same old, same ole over
and over and never nothing new.
Speaker 1 (01:52:00):
Welcome to Katie r h Garden Line with Skip Richard.
Speaker 3 (01:52:04):
It's trip just watch him as many good things to see.
Speaker 2 (01:52:20):
By all right, folks, welcome back to garden Line. If
you have a question and would like to give me
a call seven one three two one two Katie r H.
That's how you do it. In fact, I'm going to
just start off by going straight out of the phones
here and we're going to talk to Carrie in Columbus. Hello, Kerry,
(01:52:44):
Welcome to garden Line.
Speaker 25 (01:52:46):
Hello Skip, Happy new year to you.
Speaker 2 (01:52:50):
And you as well. Thank you.
Speaker 17 (01:52:53):
I have a.
Speaker 25 (01:52:54):
Question about a avocado seed that I planted. Early your shows.
You were talking to a lady about the roots that
have the little knobs, pearl looking knobs on them. Well,
when I planted this seed, it had that. Now it
is in its own pot, but it's currently in a
(01:53:17):
greenhouse with a lot of other plants, So I'm wondering,
is this going to cause a problem with my other plants.
Speaker 2 (01:53:26):
No, I think that's something else you're seeing on the
avocado seed. I wouldn't worry about that.
Speaker 25 (01:53:31):
Okay, okay, very good. Thank you.
Speaker 2 (01:53:35):
Are you saying it was on the roots that came
out of Are you saying it's on the roots that
came out of the seed? Yes, sir, on the roots
if you want to, if you want to take a
picture of it, put your finger in there in the
picture pointing to one of those, or a pencil or
something pointing to one of those root white things, and
(01:53:56):
get up close and sharp focus and send me a photo.
I'll put you on hold when we finish here. If
you would like to wait, Jonathan'll pick it up and
give you an email to send it to. I'll check
to be extra sure. It's very unlikely that that is
a nematode, but I will take a good close look
(01:54:16):
at it if you want to send me a picture.
I think you had another follow up question.
Speaker 25 (01:54:21):
Yes, I have another avocado seed that I'm growing. I'm
kind of curious. Is there any way I could get
these things to produce fruit.
Speaker 2 (01:54:34):
In time? They will. That seed is juvenile, and as
it grows, the plant is juvenile, and at some point
a maturity process occurs where it can produce fruit. It
would be like a human or an animal. You know,
a young child is not capable of having offspring, but
(01:54:57):
as they get older, there is a point where you're
capable of having off That is true with plants too,
and that avocado has to get past the juvenile stage,
which could take I don't know off the top of
my head. In avocados, I know with like a pecand tree,
that could be fourteen years. With a peach tree, probably
about seven. But it's going to take a while, but
(01:55:17):
at some point it is able to produce avocados from
a seed.
Speaker 25 (01:55:24):
Okay, yeah, because my husband and I both like avocados,
so we thought we'd tried to grow a tree because
I've googled and I'm able to find you know, I
tree that I could actually plant now and it would
produce fruit in a couple of years. I mean, because
we're in our sixties.
Speaker 2 (01:55:43):
And there all. Yeah, you're out there in Columbus if
you came in as far as the Kadi area just
north of ten.
Speaker 19 (01:55:58):
H.
Speaker 2 (01:55:58):
Nelson Water Garden, Carri's fruit. And I don't know that
they carry avocado. They may carry them, and they may
be able to get them. They probably won't have them
in stock now because it's wintertime. But if you wanted
to call Nilson Water Garden, I'll bet they could get
you one. If not, it depends on how much of
a trip you want to make. But you could go
(01:56:19):
down to enchanted gardens between Katie and Richmond Rosenberg, and
I bet they have avocados seasonally, and plus those are
fun places to visit anyway. But you could get a
tree that you put it in the ground and it
won't be very long before it's ready to produce fruit
because it's been grafted.
Speaker 12 (01:56:40):
Right.
Speaker 25 (01:56:41):
Okay, we know where both of those areas are. We
came from Katie, so we know where everything is. Okay, Well, great,
I appreciate your help, and yes, I'll try all right.
Speaker 2 (01:56:52):
Columbus, Texas. Yes, I was just saying Columbus, Texas. When
I was a kid, we would travel from Sand Antonio,
let's just say San Antonio to Houston basically, and that
was back before convenience stores and all of that. You know,
there wasn't such a thing as a seven eleven or McDonald's.
And we had to stop at a Gulf gas station
(01:57:12):
in Columbus where they had a little side room where
you could put a coin in a box and pull
it and you'd get crackers out the bottom.
Speaker 13 (01:57:20):
Right.
Speaker 2 (01:57:21):
That's my Columbus story. That was civilization as far as
I was concerned as a small child, and during a
four hour trip. Carrie, thank you, thanks for enduring that story.
Take care bye bye. That's like, you know, that's like
one of these old stories. You know, the guy that
had to walk you know, your parents they had to
(01:57:42):
walk uphill through the snow to school both ways going
and coming. We're going to go to friends with now
and talk to Beverly. Hey, Beverly, welcome to garden Line.
Speaker 17 (01:57:52):
Hello.
Speaker 26 (01:57:53):
I have a Jerusalem artichoke that I planned probably a
year ago, and I don't know when to harvest them.
I tried, you know, the green comes up and it
blooms and then it dies back down, and I thought, well,
maybe that's when I would dig them up. But they
were very very tiny. It's like very.
Speaker 2 (01:58:12):
Small when you say small, small as like like a
pece an inch across or across all right, Well, for
some reason they didn't, Yeah, they didn't. How tall were
they when they were growing before the coal weather hit?
Speaker 26 (01:58:32):
Oh a good two three foot They were very tall
and they bloomed it looked really healthy. And this is
in the container, a big, huge container.
Speaker 2 (01:58:42):
Oh a container. Okay, that may be part of the reason.
That may be part of the reason they're Jerusalem Artico
chokes will get pretty tall, and now they vary between varieties,
but they ought to be, you know, up in the
five six foot range in the ground, growing healthy. And
what happens is the tops grow and they collect sunlight
and they put it in the in those storage tubers
(01:59:05):
on the roots. That is what you're growing the plant
for those tubers, right, and they should get up to
be the size, oh about an inch in diameter, up
a little bit bigger than that. They can be larger
than that, but they don't get much bigger than an inch.
So next year, if they're in really good sunlight, you
should they should do better. You can. You can dig
(01:59:26):
them up and put a few back in the ground,
but just know that they can get a little weedy,
so don't let them just run wild and free for
too long because they'll spread on you.
Speaker 26 (01:59:37):
Okay, thank you very much, I appreciate that. But when
do you harve it in the fall? After that the stem.
Speaker 2 (01:59:44):
Seat, well, you can harp you can harve the meantime,
you wait till fall if you want to get the
most production and size out of them. But you might
try to kind of digging down, get your little spade
and fart and going to there and lift the soil
up a little bit and kind of just work. You're
not digging up the plant, you're just kind of exposed
some of those see what's underneath there. But it's been
a long time since I grew jerwis lamartin chokes. We
(02:00:06):
grew a number of varieties and that some are round,
some are elongated, and yeah, it's you can grow them.
They're enthusiastic growers well.
Speaker 26 (02:00:14):
And they're very good for you to eat too, especially
for people. I'm not diabetic, but for people who are diabetic,
that is true.
Speaker 2 (02:00:23):
The type of sugars in there, it's different, that's true. Hey, Beverly,
I got a run for a break. But thanks and
good luck with those. Appreciate it, all right, folks, I
will be right back seven one three two one two
k t R eight. All right, we're back back with
(02:00:44):
your calls on garden line. All you got to do
is dial seven one three two one two k t
r H seven one three two one two K T
R H. I'm happy to visit with you. We're in
our last hour of the morning. Show'll be done by
ten o'clock the day, start back over again six o'clock
(02:01:04):
in the morning. Look forward to seeing you bright eyed
and bushy tailed at that time. I've but if someone
told me one time, I will rise, but I refuse
to shine. Okay, well, if you'll at least your rise
and turn on the radio, we'll go with that. Listen.
I mentioned earlier the importance of tree care. Last year
we had storms twice that were really bad and we
(02:01:26):
lost power for a long time. The number one reason
for damage to homes, the number one reason for loss
of power is trees falling on lines. Now, if you're
there's times when you can't do anything. I mean, you know,
if a torn eight, it hits a tree, and I
don't care how you pruned it, it's in trouble, right.
But there's a lot that can be prevented by proper
(02:01:48):
pruning and care. And Martin spoon more or more of
affordable tree that's what he can do. He's an expert
at this. He's not the guy down the driving down
the street just has a truck in a chainsaw, trying
to talk you into letting him touch your trees. No, don't
do that. Martin knows what he's doing. You can give
them a call seven one, three, six, nine, nine, twenty
six sixty three. He come out. He'll evaluate your trees,
(02:02:12):
will give an estimate on what needs to be done,
including pruning. If you want to have deep root feeding done,
he can do that too. Anything that your tree's going
to need, Martin can take care of it. You got
to call now, though, to get on his schedule. You
got to take care of your trees. Don't wait until
the storm has done the damage it's going to do.
From the time a tree goes into the ground, really
(02:02:33):
it ought to be you start the training process of
building a good, strong tree, and that continues throughout the
life of the tree in the form of occasional pruning
as needed. Someone with a good eye that knows what
to look for can tell you exactly what needs to
be done on that tree, and that's Martin. So if
you can't remember the last time you had your trees
pruned and evaluated for their health, now is the time. Absolutely,
(02:02:57):
don't delay. The single most valuable plant your landscape is
a tree. It adds much value to the home it provides.
It can provide shade for cooling during the summer months.
It's a valuable thing. They'll mess around cal Martin seven
to one three sixt' nine nine two six sixty three,
or just go to his website aff tree service dot com.
(02:03:20):
Aff tree service dot com. I saw a tree the
other day that had been uprooted. What happens. What happened
is rain, rain, rain, rain, rain. The soil is basically
just soup. I mean, it's just like oat meal. You know,
it's all soft and gooy and everything. Here comes the
wind and that tree's anchorage. It's got the roots out there,
but you know, the soil goes with it and it
(02:03:42):
just it doesn't hold. You got to take care of
your trees. You want to have a good, a good, good,
proper caring for them. What I also saw the other
day was a tree that wasn't prune right, and I
could tell because the branch had fallen off, and where
it had fallen off, there was a big black area
where it attached. You know, your branch attaches to the
trunk and if it's a narrow angle, the bark gets
(02:04:05):
squeezed in there. As the trunk gets bigger, and as
a branch gets a bigger, the bar gets squeezed in there.
And so that's a very weak union. I mean, there's
no connection in that black area. It's just a bunch
of dead, rotting, composting bark. And so when it snaps
away there, we saw it, and I knew exactly why
that branch snapped. It was a very weak union. And
(02:04:26):
that starts with proper training early on in the process.
You're listening to garden line. I haven't mentioned it all
day to day. I can't believe this, but I have
a website. It is gardening with Skip dot com. Gardening
with Skip. That's me. You can garden with me. Gardening
with Skip dot Com. Go there and you're gonna find
a lot of good information there. And I say that
(02:04:48):
because I put it up there on purpose. First of all,
the first thing you're gonna see is Randy Lemon Scholarship.
Randy was a legend in our area and all of
you who benefited from him, no I'm talking about and
there's you can give toward a scholarship that was set
up by Dan Nelson in Randy's name, up at Texas
A and M. You can give online or you can
(02:05:09):
write a check and mail it to them. And if
you go to my website look at the Randy Lemon's Scholarship.
It tells you everything that you need to know. And
I would ask you to consider, just consider making a
donation to Randy Lemon's scholarship at A and M. I
know how happy and proud he would be of that.
That was his alma mater as it was mine. And
(02:05:30):
this is your chance, you know, to help the next
generation of horticultures coming out of the university War Department there.
That is important. I'm a product of that, and as
you do things now, you make a difference for the future.
There's also an article on growing transplants and it's specifically
(02:05:51):
on quality lighting for growing transplants. I'm going to put
another one up on how to grow transplants and it
goes beyond lighting taking care of transplants. There's an article
also on there, and you don't see it in the
new articles you got to you gotta click on all publications,
but as you scroll down there is one called tis
the Season to be Freezing? That links you to a
(02:06:14):
publication nine pages on how to protect plants against cold,
and I would recommend you take a look at that.
There's other good articles and things on there as you will.
But anyway, gardening with Skip dot com, Gardening with skip
dot com, go check it out. We're gonna put more
good stuff up there. And that's one way that I
can answer a question that requires more information than I
(02:06:37):
can go into on just a phone call or more
in depth. And I'll continue to post those things up
there if you'd like to give us a call. Maybe
you have a gardening question seven one three two one
two k t r H. Seven one three two one
two k t r H. Well, all this rain means
(02:06:57):
that our clay soils have swollen up. Do you know
a clay shrinks and swells, or at least some types
of clays especially shrink and swell a lot. And that's
the kind we have here in the Houston area along
the Gulf coast. When that happens, it causes Well, how
about this. Have you ever been going on a sidewalk
and seeing this big giant pad of sidewalks sticking up
(02:07:18):
or you trip over it, or maybe your driveway is
cracking or heaving in the same way, that's the soil
moving it around. Well, all you have to do is
call Martin. Martin, I'm back on the tree. Thing called
Ty Strickland at fixed my slab foundation repair. Ty's been
doing this for twenty three years. He's a native Heystonian,
fifth generation Texan. He knows our soil, he knows what
(02:07:42):
happens to foundations, and he knows what to do about it.
And if you call Tye at two eight one two
five five forty ninety nine, he can come out. He
can take a look. Tell him you're a guarden line listener.
Free estimates for garden line listeners. Have him come take
a look. Maybe your doors are sticking inside, or maybe
sometimes they stick and sometimes they don't. That's a movement indicator.
(02:08:05):
Maybe there's a crack in the sheet rock or on
the brick on the outside, that's a movement indicator. Have
him come look at it. He'll evaluate, he knows what
he's doing. He'll tell you if nothing needs to be done,
and he'll tell you if something needs to be done,
what your options are. The things that I most appreciate
about Tie is that he shows up when he tells
you he's going to show up. He's on time, he
(02:08:28):
gives you a fair price, and he fixes it right.
One two three. Boy, if you could have that from
any service person that comes to your house, wouldn't you
love to have that on time, fair price, fixed right.
That's important and that's tie. Fix myslab dot com is
a website. Fix myslab dot com two eight one two
FI five forty nine forty nine. The We have had
(02:08:55):
to bring service people into our house for various things.
And I'm telling you, boy, there is a night and
day difference. I had had a plumber come a while back,
and oh my gosh, I said they're gonna be there
first thing in the morning. By mid afternoon still hadn't
showed up yet. I'm sitting there wasting my whole day
(02:09:16):
waiting on them to show up. A stuff drives me nuts.
And then the job they did is like I think
I could have done that anyway. I'll leave it at that.
Let's go out to the phones. We're going to talk
to Ronnie and Lake Jackson. Hey, Ronnie, welcome to garden Line.
Speaker 9 (02:09:33):
Yes, sir, I appreciate you taking my call. Hey, what
I'm calling about is I've got a couple of rows.
Speaker 27 (02:09:37):
Of Japanese box woods that run up and down my driveway.
And in the last year now they've been through, of
course all the Hurricane two hill storms and everything.
Speaker 9 (02:09:49):
And I went online and I found some fertilizers specifically
four boxwoods type. Do you think it's okay to shout
out until spring comes? Or should should? I? Is it
okay to go ahead and fertilize them now?
Speaker 2 (02:10:09):
Well, you could fertilize them now, some of the nitrogen
will wash away in the meantime, uh, you know, because
it nitrogen's a volatile substance, so it might be better
to wait and have it around more when the plants
are actually ready to take it up. I don't know
what fertilizer it was you saw online. I don't really
(02:10:30):
don't really need to know. I know Nelson has one
called Nutristar Tree and Shrub. Nutristar Tree and Shrub is
designed for our trees and shrubs here in our climate
here in this part of Texas. There's also Nitrofus has
a really good U one for trees and shrubs. We
call those woody ornamentals.
Speaker 10 (02:10:49):
You know.
Speaker 2 (02:10:50):
Nitrus has a really good one for that as well.
Those are both available about the canister. So you know,
you just got a tree or two you're taken care of.
You you can use those, so that that's what I suggest.
But anyway, as far as timing, yeah, let's get a
little growth starting on them and then put that down
and watered in really good. And I think you're gonna
get the most bang for your buck that way.
Speaker 10 (02:11:10):
To get my by.
Speaker 9 (02:11:11):
As always, I appreciate the information.
Speaker 2 (02:11:15):
All right, good luck with us. You take care. Thanks
for the call. Glad you call first. Yeah, if you
have any kind of question on things like you're about
to buy. One of the things that is most discouraging
for me is to talk to someone who made a
mistake and then they call, you know, and maybe it's
(02:11:36):
like they went out and pruned their tree and now
they're asking me if that was right, or they they
spent some money on a plant to put in the
ground and you know, maybe it's a fascipia or a
lilac because they came from the Midwest and they remember
those plants. And I got to be the bearer of
bad news to go. It's just not going to do
well here, you know, call me first and let me
help you with that. I hate to see people waste money.
(02:11:58):
I hate to see people waste time. And I can
help you avoid both of those, and that's definitely wanted
to do. Hey, it's your choice. You know I'm not
in charge you. I don't tell you what to do.
I give you my advice. You decide whether you want
to take it or not. But at least give me
a shot and helping save time and help you have success.
That's what I want to do. Time for me to
(02:12:18):
take a break. I'll be right back at seven to
one three two one two k t RH. Hey, welcome back,
Welcome back to guardenline. Hey, let's do this. We got
some more to talk about today, and we got a
half hour, not just under a half hour to get
it done. If you got some questions, I have open
phone lines. Believe it or not, they are open phone lines.
(02:12:41):
If you would like to give me a call. I
can't promise you you'll be first. Someone may dialet faster,
but you definitely will get on if you want to
give us a call now, seven to one three two
one two k t r H seven one three two
one two k t r H. Simple as that. Uh,
it is fruit tree planning season. Earlier, I mentioned that
I was going to plant a grape that's going to
(02:13:04):
go on a trellis that I've already got the spot
ready to go for it. I just need to get
my plants and put them out there and do that.
And if you are looking to plant a grapevine, a blueberry,
a fig, a BlackBerry, any kind of fruit tree, any
kind of fruit plant, now this season is a great
time to go ahead and get that done. And you know,
(02:13:26):
the grapes, if you're going to plant a grape, you
want to plant one that's going to do well. Here,
one that's going to do well. Listen, grapes are very
disease prone, and we struggle with a lot of issues
on grapes, but there are a handful of varieties that
are very resistant. Blanc dubois is a white grape. If
(02:13:46):
you go to a vineyard in southeast Texas, nine inches
out of ten you're looking at Blanc du bois grapes
because they are Pierce's disease resistance, and that is a
grape killing disease. They're good. There's an old variety black Space,
It's tough, that's been around for a while. There are
muscadine grapes. Muscadines are extremely adapted to the wet, humid
(02:14:10):
climate that we have here. There's one there's one called
Victoria Red that was named after Victoria out there. It
was actually an Arkansas a breeding line that does really well.
And then my favorite of all the table grapes is
Southern sensation seedless table grape. So where do you get
something like that? Latteywhere you get them? At Arburgate? Arborgate
(02:14:34):
has got I was talking to Canon and Beverly out
there and just said, hey, send me a list of
all the fruit trees that you got going. I want
to know what you carry pages. Send me pages of
fruit trees and all those grapes I mentioned ar at Arburgate.
Do you want plums? How about this? Have you ever
heard of a pluot? A pluot is a cross between
(02:14:56):
a plum and an apricot. They've got those at Arburgate.
They got palm granites. I'm going to the unusual things here.
How about gogie berries? Have you ever done of the
dragon fruit fruiting edible bulberries? Of course, yeah, they got
those there. One of the longest selections is some fruit
that you're ever going to see I mean like fig
(02:15:17):
Their fig list is way over a dozen different figs
you can choose from. All are Arbrogate. Of course, when
you're at Arburgate, you know you're gonna find everything else
cool seas, color, vegetables, herbs. Right now they've got gorgeous camellias.
They're in both in bud and in bloom and there's
more coming by the way. Row their roses are blooming. Yeah,
it just I just spend the whole day going on
(02:15:38):
about it. They also have seed starting kits and the seeds.
So I've been talking about growing your own transplants. Now's
the time run by Arbigate. Grab your seed starting kit
and some seed. And remember they got that new parking
lot in back where I don't care how much it rains.
I don't care how many people are visiting Arborgate and
it's a popular place. You can go in the back
and have easy access to good safe park and easy
(02:16:01):
accessed into the nursery there at Arburgate. And for those
of you who've been living under a rock don't know
where Arbigate is, it's west of Tombull on twenty nine
twenty Highway twenty nine to twenty. Just west of Tombull.
You'll see it over on the left hand side. You
can't miss it. Let's go to the phones and we're
going to head out to let's see Clark Spring, Texas.
(02:16:22):
Is that right? And talk to cry there. Good morning,
Hello cr Yeah, Cat.
Speaker 7 (02:16:29):
Springs, check it out west of Beauville.
Speaker 2 (02:16:33):
Oh, Cat Springs. I love that old German what do
you call that round octagony kind of building that the
German settlers would build out there. You got one of
those out there in Cat Springs Country. I can't remember
what it is. It's a community building. I can't think
of the name of it. Anyway. Yeah, anyway, go ahead.
Speaker 7 (02:16:52):
Hall, Yeah, it's the egg hall. It's our egg hall
that you're talking about.
Speaker 2 (02:16:56):
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Though you see those kind of the
middle part of Texas, it is. It is old time
cool all right. Anyway, you didn't call me to talk
about buildings. How can I help?
Speaker 7 (02:17:09):
Yes, sir?
Speaker 9 (02:17:09):
Okay.
Speaker 7 (02:17:10):
So with the weather that we've had over the last week,
we covered all of our olive trees and our gave
plants that we have out on our ranch, and you
know we cover them up well with all the frost
blanket with the burlap. So we completely covered them, did
a really good job. Titlem all did them correctly. Well,
(02:17:31):
now my question is it's gonna be warmer over the
next five days or so, but then it looks like
next weekend it's gonna, you know, be back down in
the mid to low thirties. So with that said, specifically
for the olives and the tequila gave plants, will I
go ahead and uncover them for the week and then
have to put all that back on or can I
(02:17:53):
just leave it on through the week and will.
Speaker 9 (02:17:55):
They be okay?
Speaker 2 (02:17:58):
So the cloth is I had a kind of a
white spunbound polyester kind of fabric that you put.
Speaker 5 (02:18:04):
Over them, yes, okay, And you said.
Speaker 2 (02:18:10):
So burlaps on top of the plant, not wrapped around
the base or anything. Okay, Yeah, the burlap is shading
them too much. I hate to catch you to the work,
but ideally I would pull it off because you're gonna
have a bunch of sunny days at least five I
believe of sun. You probably ought to let them catch
up from that, let the soil warm up and stuff,
(02:18:33):
and then put it back down. But I'll tell you this,
if it's not going to go below below thirty two,
may even thirty. You're in good shape. Those olives are
not going to be killed at thirty. And I've never
tried to grow the tequila type of agavii you have,
but my bet is that it can take thirty two
because we're thirty also, so I don't know that you
(02:18:56):
have to recover them, but I don't know. Let's get
closer where we have a more accurate weather prediction before
we make that decision.
Speaker 7 (02:19:04):
Okay, So at this point, go ahead and pull off
the burlap and the white crostcloth woad, and just pull
that off for the week and then see what the
weather looks like.
Speaker 2 (02:19:14):
Yes, shade is a stressor for plants that like sun,
and sun makes carbohydrates. Carbohydrates make our sugars that are
essentially anti freeze in the plant. So we want to
give them all the chance for that that we can.
And so I would if you left them shaded, would
it be the end of them? Probably not, But I
think the best would be to let them have sunlight
(02:19:36):
because we've got a lot of good, good sunny days here.
Speaker 7 (02:19:39):
Okay, So as long as I look at the weather
and next weekend, it's not going to be below thirty two.
Don't worry about covering them. Even if it's thirty four
or thirty five.
Speaker 2 (02:19:47):
I can leave them un covered, absolutely absolutely, and even
I bet they'd even go to thirty without a problem
on those I know olives can. But anyway, yeah, how
old are these olive trees?
Speaker 9 (02:20:01):
Yeah, so.
Speaker 7 (02:20:03):
They're anywhere from three years that eight years. But they
were recently planted okay, six months ago?
Speaker 2 (02:20:14):
Oh okay, okay, well yeah, that little extra care on
a new plant like that, once in olive is established.
I've seen him go down, you know, twenty eight and
be fine.
Speaker 7 (02:20:23):
So okay, well great, that's good news, sir. I appreciate
your help. Thank you.
Speaker 2 (02:20:30):
You bet take care. Let's now listen, I got I
got to take a little quick break. Hey, Cleveland, san Antonio.
I'll be coming to you first when we come right
back from this break.
Speaker 5 (02:20:42):
All right, welcome back to Garden Line. We're gonna run
straight out to San Antonio. That doesn't take a while
to get Santonio running. We're gonna talk to Cleveland. Hey Cleveland,
welcome to guard Line.
Speaker 26 (02:20:54):
Good morning to step How you doing.
Speaker 2 (02:20:57):
I'm well, sir, I'm well. How can we help today?
Speaker 15 (02:21:01):
I'm going to add a little color to my landscape.
Speaker 11 (02:21:04):
Most everything's all brown out there, and I was going.
Speaker 14 (02:21:07):
To put down some rye grass.
Speaker 11 (02:21:09):
I was trying to find out if it's too late
to do that.
Speaker 2 (02:21:13):
Rye grass. It's a little late. Normally he'd plant that
in November in San Antonio. Uh, you could put it
out now, it will come up. Uh, as long as
we don't have a really really bad cold snap or
something that messes with the little tender seedlings. You ought
to be okay on it. It would be it would
be worth worth giving it a shot at this point.
Speaker 9 (02:21:35):
Oh, okay, it sounds good.
Speaker 20 (02:21:37):
Thank you you.
Speaker 2 (02:21:39):
But hey, Cleveland, do you know have you ever heard
of David Rodriguez uh out there in San Antonio on
the radio?
Speaker 9 (02:21:47):
Yeah?
Speaker 20 (02:21:48):
Yeah, part of them.
Speaker 2 (02:21:49):
Yeah, Okay, David's a friend of mine. He is on
iHeart station in San Antonio, and I'm telling you he's
a great horticulturist too. Please keep listening to garden Line.
But I just wanted to tell you about him because
he's he's local there, and he is he is an expert.
Very very good. That's it. Hey, thanks for calling me.
Appreciate You're welcome calling anytime you want. All right, folks,
(02:22:12):
let's go to Carol in Baytown. Hey, Carol, welcome to
garden Line.
Speaker 17 (02:22:18):
Jared morning. I have sent you pictures on an email.
Speaker 2 (02:22:26):
You did and.
Speaker 17 (02:22:30):
I'm opening I've never you always did to try, Steph.
So I'm trying. Mhm, and I don't know what to
do with both people.
Speaker 2 (02:22:38):
Good for you, So what what is your what is
your question? Just on cutting it back? That's that's basically
what you're.
Speaker 9 (02:22:47):
Wanting to know on this fair.
Speaker 17 (02:22:50):
I hadn't in the ground.
Speaker 28 (02:22:51):
I've always read that it was supposed to be like
three years or something before it produces.
Speaker 17 (02:22:55):
But this, this is so big, and well.
Speaker 2 (02:22:59):
What is this? Yeah, no, it's good. No, No, you
can you can. Okay. Here's the thing with asparagus. It
actually does better further north because they have a real
winter and it dies to the ground and it doesn't
come up until spring, and then it comes up with
these nice strong spears that we eat. We harvest the
first spears that are coming out here. It says green
(02:23:22):
above ground all winter, and so we don't really get
that carbohydrate storage sometimes or to the degree we want.
I've talked to people that will just come in and
they will cut that asparagus off at the ground and
let it come out fresh totally and do the harvesting
at that time. So if you want to wait a
little bit, maybe get into a little further into January February,
(02:23:46):
or you could try it doing it right now. Either
way is fine. But just know that we are so
warm here that asparagus doesn't fully go dormant like like
it should, but that yours.
Speaker 17 (02:23:58):
Is very happy.
Speaker 28 (02:23:59):
Yes, okay, okay, so wait late January, cut it back, yeah, just.
Speaker 2 (02:24:07):
Cut all the way to the ground. It'll it'll be
fine because up north it freezes to the ground has
to start all over again.
Speaker 28 (02:24:12):
So you can do that with the that I can
cut them right it comes up and cut them okay, okay.
Speaker 15 (02:24:20):
Broccoli, absolutely.
Speaker 9 (02:24:23):
See it.
Speaker 2 (02:24:26):
No, it'll be fine. If you're going to get down
to twenty eighth, well, molts for weeds and stuff, but
the broccoli is fine. I would just uh, that's a
small head forming in there. Just watch it. What happens
the broccoli heads. You know, not all broccoli makes a
big head. For various reasons. You may end up with
a head the size of a golf ball or the
(02:24:47):
size of a softball, or they had the size, you know,
even the large ones. Just watch the buds as the
buds start to get bigger, and you want them to
get larger the individual little bud in the head. But
at some point it starts to kind of get looser.
It's not a good tight head, and you want to
pick it before it gets loose, and certainly before the
(02:25:08):
buds start to open up the yellow flowers, so uh
you wey don't have to grow to get more out
of it, and then cut it off just below if
you haven't grown it before. What's going to happen is
you're going to get side shoots of broccoli that come
out below that head, so it'll produce a second crop
of small broccoli stalks. They won't get very big, and
(02:25:28):
you'll get a second harvest out of those. So once
you cut the top one out, but you want to
let it get as much as you can without it
getting big and loose. That's the bottom line.
Speaker 17 (02:25:37):
Okay, sounds good.
Speaker 15 (02:25:39):
Okay, And I was going to tell you there's another picture.
Speaker 17 (02:25:44):
Yeah, it's two of each. There's two of broccoli.
Speaker 28 (02:25:50):
I want to tell you I grew burgundy okra this season.
I got it from Buchanans and it.
Speaker 17 (02:25:59):
Was so pretty.
Speaker 28 (02:26:00):
I'm enjoying oprah because it goes a long time. You
can it just now froze. So I've been saving my seeds.
I knew you like oprah, Yes.
Speaker 2 (02:26:08):
Good, good for you? Yeah I do. And burgundy is
an open pollinated variety. You can save the seed from
all right. Now, you've got to figure out other ways
to cook it. Do you have a favorite way of
eating okra? Do you have a favorite?
Speaker 17 (02:26:24):
I really don't know how to save it.
Speaker 15 (02:26:25):
Well.
Speaker 17 (02:26:26):
I like to roast it. That's how my daughter likes.
Speaker 15 (02:26:29):
To eat it.
Speaker 17 (02:26:30):
But when I get an abundance, is it better to
cut it and freeze it or just freeze it whole?
Speaker 2 (02:26:39):
You know, I'm not a food preservation expert, but there
is a website at the University of Georgia. It's a
National Food Preservation website, and I mean it's got everything
from freezing to drying, to canning, to water bathing to
you name it, and they can tell you all about
(02:27:00):
what you need to blanch and what you don't need
to blant. I don't know how you roast yours. We
rub olive oil on ours, sprinkle salt on them, and
put them on the grill for two minutes on each side.
And that's how we like people make gumbo out of okra.
I also dry okra. I will I will slice it
and put enough food dryer and dry it and store
it in a jar or run it through a like
(02:27:21):
of item X type thing to grind it up. And
now you have okra powder that can be used. You
can use the dried sliced okra to reconstitute in soups.
You can use the powdered You know, people are gonna
roll their eyes when I say this, but I take
a spoon of okra powder put it in my smoothies
and it thickens them up. And they don't taste like
(02:27:43):
okra when you do that, they taste like the smoothie.
But it's a good thing for thickening soups and things.
So yeah, there's a lot of ways to preserve okra.
Speaker 15 (02:27:52):
Okay, all right, I better run.
Speaker 2 (02:27:53):
I'm about out of.
Speaker 17 (02:27:54):
Time here, all right, Thank you so much.
Speaker 2 (02:27:57):
Yeah, look for National Food Preservation you better. Thanks very much.
You know, we love feed stores on Garden Line and
League City. Feed Down in League City is a great feedstore.
It's one of those old time feed stores. You go in,
you're going to find all the fertilizers I talk about.
You're going to find an animein, nitrophys, azumite, microlife, heirloom
(02:28:18):
soil products, bon eye products, Nature's creation, Nelson plant they're
all there. Pesticides, herbicides, fungicides to control problems, quality pet foods.
If you got back air chickens, they got everything you
need for your backyard chickens. They are three blocks, a
few blocks actually, south of Highway ninety six on Highway
three in League City two eight one three three two
(02:28:40):
sixteen twelve League City Feed. Any of you anywhere in
that region should swing by there and make that your
hometown feed store because it's a good one. Well, I
hear music, which means we gotta go today. I got
stuff to do. You know they say the cobblers kids
go barefoot. I got to get up in my garden,
start taking care of it. I'll be back in the
(02:29:00):
morning six am. Talk to you then,