Grassy Glitches

Skip Richter answers you questions all morning long!

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to Katie r. H. Garden Line with Skip Richter.

Speaker 2 (00:05):
Shoes the crazy gas can't you use? You want a trip?

Speaker 3 (00:13):
You just watch him as worlds that are so many
good things to supp raising in the grass like glass
again you joss.

Speaker 2 (00:28):
Back again not a sign and the glasses.

Speaker 4 (00:32):
Like gas.

Speaker 2 (00:35):
The sun beam and down the.

Speaker 5 (00:39):
Gas gas can you jam.

Speaker 3 (00:44):
Starting in and out of the dreaming gases like gasca.

Speaker 6 (00:50):
Good morning, gardeners, let's see let's talk some gardening today.
I'm your host, Skip Rictor. You're listening to garden Line
and this is a call in show for you to
ask whatever gardening questions you got. Give me a call
at seven one three two one two five eight seven four.
We can talk about just about anything if you like.

(01:12):
Maybe it's a problem you're having with a plant. Maybe
it's a plant you're thinking about buying, but I want
to make sure it'll grow here, or find out how
to grow it here. All of those kinds of topics
and more. I the other day was visiting with someone
we're talking about house plants and repotting them just kind

(01:33):
of came to mind this morning again. You know when
you when you have a houseplant and you're you're trying
to decide, you know, does it need to be in
a bigger pot or how big of a pod do
I need for this plant? In general, and this is
a very general guide because there are so many different
kinds of houseplants that bringing a little succulents up to
giant foliage plants and so on. But in general, if

(01:57):
I see a plant in my house, in the plant
is about three times as big as a pot that's
getting toward the upper end of leaving it in that container,
and it's about time to move it to something bigger.
Of course, you know what do you do when you
have a mother in lost tongue go straight up in
the air. It's also called sensibaria or snake plant. That's

(02:18):
kind of different, and some plants are real happy being
pot bound. A mother in lost tongue and zz plant
two of the easiest to grow plants in the world
indoors are outdoors, even in a very shady area. Those
two plants, you know, there you can leave them pot
bound and they do okay, they're pretty tough. But there's

(02:41):
others that you want to bump them out if you
want them to continue to grow and get bigger. That's
tree of plants outside and containers as well. Uh, the
just think about this, when you have a small plant
that you put in a really big container compared to
the size of the little root ball it's planted. All
that soil around the plant that you have that you

(03:03):
reset in this newer pot is going to stay soggy, wet.
There's no roots out there to pull water nutrients out
of that soil, and in time those roots will move
out and do that. But you can easily over water
a plant when you pot it up into too big
of a container. And this is especially true of succulents.
You know the strings for example, people love the strings.

(03:25):
That's one of the popular things now. The string of turtles,
string of pearls, string of tears, string a dolphin, string
of bananas, just on and on, a string of watermelon.
There's a string of everything out there, and those things
they just don't need to be potted in something real,
real large, or it's going to be you get it
wet and it stays wet for a very very long time,

(03:45):
and so not so good. So generally, when you're moving
plants up, you're going to move them up about one
pot size, so whatever that means, you know, start off
in a three inch pot and going up a little bit.
You're going to start off in a a pot that's
a foot across the top and then move it up
just a little bit too. You know, you still want

(04:06):
to double the pot size. In most cases with these plants.
There's some exceptions. You got a citrus tree outside, you're
gonna have to repot it because it's too big for
its container. You can move it up a little bit larger,
it's not as big of a concern. But with our
house punts, just be a little careful with that. Be
mindful of that. Also, use a good soil for repotting,

(04:29):
and a lot of potting soils are very dense and
so they get they can easily get and stay soggy
or muky or however you want to put it. Where
they hold excess amount of water. There's not much poor
space between the soil particles. So if you were to
have it, let's see how to cut away you know,

(04:51):
like a glass viewing side on the inside of that pot,
kind of like you're looking at an aquarium. You would
see like a the soil moisture level goes up there's
standing water in the pot until it drains out, and
with gravity it drains out. But in a real fine
textured potting soil, it holds water so well that there's

(05:13):
not a lot of air space in there as it
drains out. A chunkier soil is going to drain very readily.
In fact, you know, water can run right through and
out as you water. So you want to find something
that holds moisture but not too much. And I often
will take a potting soil and I will add things

(05:37):
to it to create some space in there. If it's
for a secular or something, I may add some expanded shale.
Think of it like little the old clay gray kitty
litter bags, you know, the dusty stuff that everybody used
to use for their cats. Expanded shale is like that
in a way at the kitty litter. It's not you

(05:59):
don't use that are in place of expendit show, but
I'm just using that as a visual for you. But
I'll add some of that into a secular kind of gritty,
kind of gravelly, but it still has a lot of
airspace and the particles themselves. Or for tropical types of plants,
I'll use a larger grade of pearl lighte the little

(06:21):
white things that are in your in your potting soil,
a big chunkier one. Sometimes you can put a little
bit of a bark, a very fine bark mix in
there to beef it up a little bit. But you
just want to make sure the drainage is good, because
that's important. We tend to overwater our houseplants, and that
kills plants quickly, especially some that are in a lower

(06:44):
light and are not using much water. They're in a
cool spot. I just looked at the temperature in our
thermostat and walking through the house of the day, and
it was it was down low seventies. We have a
thermostat battle at the house between me and my wife
and one of my daughters. It's visiting right now, and

(07:04):
she I think has aspirations of raising penguins, whereas I'm
very comfortable a little on the warm side. So anyway,
I was looking at thermostat, going my gosh, I'm gonna
have to get some sort of a coat out to
put it around my little tropical plants because they feel
like they just got moved to Antarctica in those cool
conditions and the low light of indoors and the lower

(07:27):
light intensity of the winter season in general coming through
the windows. There is just not much water use in
those plants, so be careful with that. Of course, you
don't want them to dry out. Drought for a tropical plant,
most tropicals is not a good thing. But just avoid
overwater because that's what we tend to do more so. Anyway,

(07:50):
when you're repotting your plants, think about that. You don't
move up a pot size. When the plant is about
three times the width of the pot, it's a good
time to plant it. With the exception of those plants
that are unique, like succulents or like a very upright
plant like I mentioned, it's kind of hard to estimate,

(08:11):
but you can figure it out. You can figure it out.
Just don't leave them too long in the same pot.
And when you repot them, it helps to kind of
loosen those roots around the outside so they can easily
move into the new size container. And don't be afraid
to cut some roots that are just going around in
circles because they can recover from that too. Well. You

(08:33):
are listening to garden Line, here's a phone number seven
one three two one two fifty eight seventy four seven
one three, two, one two five eight seven four. So
there's a little monologue there on some houseplants. As we
get started, let's take a little break and we will
be back with your questions and some more droning on
by me, because I got some other topics i'd like

(08:54):
to talk about this morning. Looking back to guard Line folks,
good to have you with us. You're here to answer
garden questions and help you have a downaful garden, a
beautiful landscape and more fun in the process. That's it, right.
You don't want gardening to be frustrating, and sometimes people

(09:15):
get frustrated. You know, you spend money, you plant something,
you watch you die. Oh my gosh, that doesn't have
to happen. Give me a call. We'll talk about things
and help you to see things from a plant's point
of view. Once you see what a plant wants and
provide it, that suddenly things turn around. And everybody says
you have a green thumb. Well, there's no such thing
as a green thumb. In my opinion, there's just an

(09:37):
informed thumb. And if a thumb is informed, then knows
how to see things from a plant's point of view.
It looks green. So bring your thumb, sit down in
front of the radio or however you're listening to guarden Line,
and let's talk. We're going to start by going out
this morning to Splendora, Texas and visiting with Chris. Hey, Chris,
Welcome to garden Line.

Speaker 7 (09:58):
Hik Skip. I got a question for you.

Speaker 4 (10:01):
I've got a pair of Florida King peaches. They're about
four years old. They produced in the past. I'm kind
of worried about this year with the not having enough
cold chill hours for them. But the question I have
is one of my trees, I've noticed a white fungus
or mold coming on one of the branches. It's about

(10:24):
halfway up, which is probably about four feet off the ground,
and I'm wondering what I can do to rectify that.

Speaker 6 (10:33):
Can you kind of describe the white to me? Is
it like flat up against the branch or is it
sticking out from the branch kind.

Speaker 4 (10:41):
Of flat up against branch. It looks like a mold,
you know, like a powdery type mold.

Speaker 6 (10:50):
Okay, they're a couple of things. You know, there is
a there are a couple of decomposer type fungi that
when a branch dies, they can move, and that is
one of the visuals of them. That white material. It
could be the branches dead underneath. If you take a
little knife and scrape underneath that bark and see if
it's kind of a kind of a creamy green underneath,

(11:13):
like a living bark underneath the outer bark should be,
then I wouldn't worry about it. It's something superficial. You know,
other things just grow on the outside of branches, and
especially in moist conditions, things like likeen You know, you've
probably seen those before, grown on the outside of tree
trunks and things, So it could be something superficial like that.

(11:35):
But you know, whatever it is, there's not a spray
for it. It's just a matter of keeping the tree healthy.
Which Florida peach did you say, Florida.

Speaker 4 (11:44):
What it's a Florida King, Florida King.

Speaker 6 (11:48):
Okay, Yeah, there ought not be a problem getting enough
chilling for Florida King, So I think I think it'll
be okay, Yeah, all right, has it well for you?

Speaker 4 (12:00):
Last did last last year It was a little thin
compared to the first year that it produced, but we've
still got some peaches off of it and the second
one as well, so I'm thinking about getting a third one.

Speaker 6 (12:18):
So okay, well, and it's always good to kind of
head your bed a little bit and go with, you know,
different varieties because any given year.

Speaker 4 (12:34):
Yeah, I heard you talk yesterday about the one that
was for here in Texas that they developed here. I
can't remember the name of.

Speaker 6 (12:43):
It right now, but uh yeah, it was text prints,
I think was the one.

Speaker 5 (12:48):
That's what it was.

Speaker 6 (12:50):
Yeah, that's that's one. I mean, you know, there's a
lot of good peaches that we can use around here,
but that that's one of the ones. If you go
to the Eggy Horticulture website, there is a section for fruit,
and in the section for fruit there is a whole
publication on peach trees and it gives varieties and it

(13:10):
gives all kinds of information. It might be helpful to
just look at that as free to look at so
or print out if you want. It gives some varieties.

Speaker 4 (13:18):
Okay, all right, well, thank you very much.

Speaker 6 (13:22):
You bet, thanks a lot. Good luck with that for
a good crop. Now, if your peaches produced this year,
I just expect half of what you get to drop
it off the station. We'll call it even all right,
all right, there you go. Hey, Ace Hardware. Gosh, if
you have never been into the new Ace Hardware, you know,
I'm not talking about the one when you're growing up

(13:44):
that you went to. I'm not about the Ace Hardware
of today. It is an amazing place, it really is.
There's so much there. Of course, it's a hardware store.

Speaker 8 (13:52):
You know.

Speaker 6 (13:52):
You need to go in there and you need to
get some plumbing or you need some lighting fixtures or
wire or whatever switches. They've got all this stuff hardware
store have, but so so much more, uh quality, quality,
brands of tools. Quality. Uh barbeque equipment, Oh my god,
walk in there. Look at the barbieque equipment.

Speaker 7 (14:11):
It is.

Speaker 6 (14:12):
Yeah, you have to you have to have some. I did.
I got minded Ace. Oh I love it anyway. Uh,
why you're at ACE. It's spring, so it's time to paint,
it's time to seal those decks. It's time to get
outside and do some things in the yard. Maybe you're
just kind of sprucing up on the inside. ACE Hardware's
got you covered. Don't forget to get the the new

(14:33):
filter for your ACE system. Always got to change those
things out. Of course ACE has all of that kind
of stuff you know, from cleaning supplies and equipment to
you name it. It's at your local Ace Hardware store.
You can go to ACE Hardware Texas. Don't forget Texas
and find my ACE Hardware stores here in the Greater
Houston area all the way from Beauma down to Corbus

(14:53):
Christie area and in between. Ace Hardware Texas dot com
stores like all Star Ace in spr Up there on
Rayford Road. On the east side, there's Deer Park on
Center Street. Just an example of one. Northwest is Cyprus Ace,
which is on Jones Road. I used to live by
that one, went to it all the time. K and
M and a Tascasita on Timber Forest Drive up northeast.

(15:15):
How about Southeast Pacco on West Willis Street in Alvin,
I was there just this last year. And Single ranch
As out on Mason Road in Katie. Let's take a
little break and we'll be right back with your questions.
All right, here we go. Uh, let's go out to
sugar Land and we're going to visit with Patty this morning. Hello, Patty,

(15:36):
welcome to garden.

Speaker 9 (15:38):
Good morning, Stive, Good morning, thanks for taking my call.

Speaker 6 (15:41):
Good morning to you. You bet how can I help.

Speaker 10 (15:47):
I tried to.

Speaker 9 (15:47):
Send Yeah, I tried to send pictures.

Speaker 11 (15:49):
I don't I don't know. My phone doesn't cooperate sometimes
just early in the morning. But my meyer lemon has developed,
like some of the two of the leaves or white,
some are black, not a lot. And then also it's
starting to make booms blossoms again. And so I've sent

(16:12):
my three pictures, so I don't know if that's a fungus.

Speaker 5 (16:16):
Or what that is.

Speaker 6 (16:18):
Right, I got your email. Note none of the pictures
came through, but that's okay. The white is probably kind
of a silvery white, or any of the leaves kind
of curling or buckling.

Speaker 9 (16:31):
I know, I haven't seen. No, I haven't seen that.
The leaves look healthy except for some of them. Are
these weird you know, white kind of color.

Speaker 6 (16:42):
Okay, And can you tell if that white area is
dead or is it just a white on the surface
and the leaf is actually still alive underneath the white.

Speaker 11 (16:54):
It seems to be just on the surface, you know,
because the leaf still looks formed and everything.

Speaker 6 (17:02):
All right. Well yeah, yeah, well my bluemen cycles.

Speaker 9 (17:11):
Okay, maybe the heat and it's got confused.

Speaker 6 (17:15):
Yeah, So I'm gonna I'm gonna tell you what I
what I think may be involved in some of it.
The black is probably a city mold, and it grows
on sugary substances, and those substances come from things like
scale or mealy bugs, or aphids or white flies. Those
are all some of the things that can produce on

(17:36):
a citrus. You can also have some little plant hopper
creatures that get on there and they suck the juices
out and then they send out that sugary substance.

Speaker 12 (17:45):
Uh.

Speaker 6 (17:45):
And so the black is not a problem, except that
it does shade the leaves a little bit. Sunlight has
trouble getting to the leaf because of the black city
on top.

Speaker 13 (17:55):
Uh.

Speaker 6 (17:55):
And so I would try to figure out what the
pest is it's doing that, and then control that past
It's going to be one of those kinds of things.
Turn the leaves over, look for little things, flat things
underneath the leaves, look for things bumps along the stem,
and try to figure that out. And controlling that takes
care of the black. As far as the white, I'm

(18:15):
not based on our conversation, I'm not sure what you're
seeing there, but if you will try again, have someone
help figure out how to get that those photos attached.
I'll be happy to look at them and see what
and give you a reply to I see.

Speaker 9 (18:32):
And so that new what we're seeing new blooms.

Speaker 11 (18:35):
Should we cut those off or I mean we still
have two left lemons. I mean you've got about ten
they were you will.

Speaker 6 (18:48):
Yeah, yeah, Now, don't cut them off. Leave the blims.
They're fine. It's not gonna hurt the tree. It's been
producing for a while for you here, and so you're
gonna get cycles like that. And if they'll set, they
may not want to set, you know, a temperatures or
not having something to move the pollen around in the balloom.
But if they do, just just leave them, no problem, okay, and.

Speaker 11 (19:10):
I'll try to I'll try to upload those pictures. I
just as soon as it gets slid out. Okay, thanks
a lot, Okay, you.

Speaker 6 (19:20):
Bet, you take care alrighty. Citrus is popular here. I
started adding some more ceterrius to my yard this last year,
and there's a lot of great types of ceteras. Now
I realized with guardline, we've got people listening all the
way up in Huntsville, got people listening down in Galveston.
Corpus and there is a pretty big wide range. Let

(19:43):
me come back to that in just a second. We're
going to take a little break right now. Welcome back,
Welcome back to garden Line. Wed you with us this morning.
I hope you got a cup of coffee in your hand.
At least one eye open. Hey, look at your window.
Is your neighbor's light on? If it's not, go bang

(20:03):
on the door and tell them they're missing Garden Line.
They will rise up and call you. Blessed me so
happy for you to help inform them like that. Maybe
not today, but in time they will appreciate it. Good
luck with that. Today, I'm your host, skip director. We're
here to have a little fun and also learn a
few things about gardening. That's that's kind of what it's

(20:24):
all about. Gardening is a you know, gardening keeps you young.
It really does, because it is a forever learning process.
There is never a day that I don't learn something.
If I'm trying about gardening. I mean, you can read it,
you can listen to stuff, you can you know, get
out and actually do it, which is the best of all,

(20:46):
and observe what's going on. You're always learning with gardening,
and that that keeps your mind fresh, being in nature,
touching plants, playing in the dirt. Lots of research showing
all the benefits of that to our well being as
well our mental well being. I've seen studies and the
effect of kids with ADHD exposed to gardening time in

(21:08):
school or gardening time during the day versus not, and
the effect on that, Studies of older adults dealing with
the mental decline issues and the benefits of gardening for that,
the physical benefits of being able to get out, to
walk around, to stand up, to get down and up,
and all the tools that are available to help you

(21:29):
when things become more difficult to do physically. With gardening,
it's just a good thing. And then there's a social
aspect of it. Hanging around with other gardeners, lying about
how many tomatoes you grew last year? Very important.

Speaker 3 (21:42):
I grew one.

Speaker 6 (21:43):
It was so big I couldn't get it in a wheelbarrow. Yeah,
that kind of thing. You know what I'm talking about.
Gardening is fun, it really is, and it keeps you young,
keeps you healthy. And not to mention the fact that
you get to bring if you're doing vegetable gardening and
IRB gardening and fruit grow. You actually get to bring
in a produce that's I don't know, a thousand miles

(22:04):
fifteen hundred miles fresher right there. From that you grew yourself.
You know exactly what was put on that produce or not.
And so there you go. That's one of my many
appeals to hey, folks, we need to be getting that
in gardening more. Let's see here. We are now going
to go to tom Ball and talk to Mike this morning.

(22:28):
Hello Mike, welcome to garden Line.

Speaker 14 (22:32):
Hey, good morning, Skip. I sent a picture of a
weed that I have throughout most of my yard front
end back. I was just wondering what it is and
what I need to do to treat it. I did
use the barricade, but it, you know, it seems to not.

Speaker 6 (22:49):
Work on that weed. Okay, this wasn't this morning, I
assume no.

Speaker 14 (22:56):
I said it, yeah, yesterday or the day before.

Speaker 6 (23:03):
Okay, let me let me pull that up here. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah,
I remember the weed. So you got a couple of
weeds there. One of them, the little green, skinny leafed
weeds sort of looks grass like. That's that's a sedge,
could be nuts edge or could be another, probably Nutsedge

(23:24):
from what I can see in the photo. Those can
be controlled. Is your lawn bermuda? I'm having a little
trouble making it out. It's a little pixelated. Is that
a bermuda?

Speaker 14 (23:35):
It's mostly bermuda? Well, it's actually mostly tiff and some
has been growing in it also.

Speaker 6 (23:44):
Okay, So you can control sedges. There are different products
out there, like image and there's another one called sedge
hammer that's probably the most effective. And you have hot
spray it, yeah, spot spray it, and then the next
time that weed comes up. The trick with nuts edge

(24:04):
is that once it has three to five leaves, it's
capturing enough sunlight to start building more tubers underground. We
call them nuts but they're tubers underground. And once it
does that, then you may have killed the weed, but
now you got daughter plants coming up from around the
mama plant you killed. And so once it has three
to five leaves, you need to spread again. So I

(24:26):
always keep a little bit on hand just to go
out periodically and squirt those and if you stay with them,
you can kill them. If not, they just keep replicating.
You kill one and you have eight more that show up.
And so that's my tip on that. There's a publication
on my website about how to deal with nuts edge,
and it's called nutsedge and end Depth Look and it's

(24:49):
at gardening with skip dot com that's free to download.
The broad leafweed in your lawn is it looks as
best I can zoom in on it. It looks like
something they called wild lettuce. There's a number of weeds
that are very similar. They look like thistles. They look
like this weed, which is not a thistle looking, but

(25:10):
they have a taproot going down and any good broad
leaf post emergent weed killer is gonna knock them out.
So that'd be another one you mix up and you
just do some spots brain. You don't have to nuke
the whole yard. I just spots bray there was before
they produce flowers and seeds to make it worse next year.

Speaker 14 (25:32):
Yeah, I've been digging up what I can, but it
just seems like that that's way too many of them.

Speaker 6 (25:38):
Yeah, there's a lot of that could being a tap
rooty weed. There's a little device called Grandpa's weeder and
it has prongs and you put it over the weed
and you step on it and These prongs are like
taking two fingers and your thumb and shoving them into
the soil around the weed. And then you pull back
on the handle and it's like squeezing your finger and

(26:00):
thumb together, like pinching the weeds taproot, and when you
lean back on the handle, it just pulls it right out.
It's real handy. You don't have to stoop over to
do that, and so if you're doing a bunch of them,
you can you can cover a lot of ground if
you'd rather avoid the spray.

Speaker 14 (26:16):
Okay, all right, I was going to use Would Celsius work.

Speaker 6 (26:22):
Celsius probably would on that. I'd have to look at
the list on Celsius specifically, but check the check the
list on the on the herbicide you get. I know
products that have the two four D in them, which
is things like trimech. If you go ahead and do
that now when it's not hot outside, they won't it
won't hurt your grass and it you can you can.

(26:45):
I know those work on it, but Celsius probably will.
I just have to check the label. Because all these
new chemistries out there, it's hard to keep up with
a thousand weeds and one hundred different products.

Speaker 8 (26:58):
Right.

Speaker 14 (26:59):
Also, I have some cannas growing in my backyard and
they've gotten bit by the by the freeze or frost
whatever we had. Could I cut those now because they're
looking they're looking pretty ratty. I was thinking about cutting
and then covering, uh, covering the roots with some pine
straw or something like that.

Speaker 6 (27:20):
Yeah, you absolutely couldn't do that. Cannas. Yeah, they're not
going to want to grow until it warms up a bit,
and we do have some warm spells in the winter.
But there's no problem cutting them back, getting all that
out of there at this point in time. Uh, and
then get your fresh growth in.

Speaker 14 (27:35):
Okay. I got one more question.

Speaker 9 (27:38):
Uh.

Speaker 14 (27:38):
In my front hand bit, I've put down some pine
straw to keep the weeds out, because I get a
lot of weeds in there, and it seems to be
working well. Now when I melch next next spring, should
I remove that the pine needles or can I just
melt right over them?

Speaker 6 (27:58):
Melt right over them? The old mull decomposes in nature,
like think about a forest floor. You got leaves that
hit the ground, whether it's pine needles or oak leaves
or whatever, uh, and they lay there as a mulch,
and then the next season more leaves fall down on
top of them, and those old ones decay, and that
forest floor soil just gets richer and richer over the

(28:18):
decades because of that process. So no need to remove
old mulch. Mult I was talking about.

Speaker 14 (28:26):
I was speaking of the pine needles that I put
over the mulch keep the weeds down.

Speaker 6 (28:32):
Oh okay, well yeah, there you're using the word multch
for commercial products. But the pine needles themselves are a mulch,
and I'm just saying it would be good to leave them.
They will decompose. They're slow because they have kind of
a coating on the surface, but they will decompose and
they will build the soil.

Speaker 14 (28:49):
Okay, I'll do that.

Speaker 7 (28:51):
All right.

Speaker 14 (28:51):
We'll thank you, you bet you call.

Speaker 6 (28:56):
Thanks a lot you too. All Right, folks, let's take
a quick break. We'll be back if you'd like to
give me a call. Seven one three two one two
fifty eight seventy four. Welcome back to Welcome back to
the guarden.

Speaker 15 (29:07):
Linem. Good to have you up driving.

Speaker 6 (29:10):
Hey to hear that music. That's Russell Dicker, so he
is going to be at the Houston Live Stuck showing
Rodeo on night four, some udio time is coming. You
have a great time to get out there and enjoy
the rodeo and enjoy some good music. They always have
an awesome lineup of musicians or bands and individuals. I

(29:32):
love going to Houston Live Structure on Rodeo while you're
out there. By the way, Also there's a horticulture competition
that goes on where youth from across the region come
in and compete in various categories. And so if you're
out at the Rodeo, especially on a weekend on Saturday
and Sunday, there's two weekends where they do the horticulture competitions,

(29:54):
you need to stop by work as a superintendent out
there with the kids, and it is a fun time
to get out. So if you're out in the radio,
come on buy and check out some of the competitions
going on. There's floral design and arranging competitions and plant
other kinds of plant related competitions out there at the
Houston Life Section on Rodeo. Well let's see here.

Speaker 10 (30:16):
We are.

Speaker 6 (30:19):
Visiting about a number of things. This morning. I get
some pictures in on the email. Looking forward to some
calls as people wake up and get going there. What
we do here on Guarden Line is I can't do
email pimpals with folks back and forth, just too many
of you. I'm out numbered. But if you have a
question and a photo would be helpful, you can email

(30:40):
me and call the producer. Just call the show like
you're calling to be on the air. Tell the producer
you need to email me a picture and send it
and then follow it up with a phone call. That's
kind of how we do it. That way, I can
see the picture, make sure I'm not just imagining what
you're describing, but I'm actually seeing it. That is helpful.
If you want an accurate diagnose, make sure it is

(31:01):
a focused picture in sharp focus. Fuzzy pictures get fuzzy answers,
and we don't want you to get a fuzzy answer.
We want you to get a good, sharp, clear, correct answer.
So photos help with that as well. Let's here, Oh
I was I was in Yuma, Arizona, this about a

(31:23):
week ago and noticed out there some furniture that was
outside at this restaurant we went to, and it was
just kind of rusty and stuff. You know, you can
didn't want to sit on it because you get it
all over your pants and things. But it just reminded
me that these guys need Houston powder coders. Now, Houston

(31:45):
powder coders will come out and pick up your metal furniture,
bring it back and put a brand new powder coating
on it that is better than the traditional spray painting
of things gets in all the nooks and crannies or
spray painted. Every time spray paint something and like there's
this little nook and cranny and you try to get
the paint in there, and next thing you know, you
got paint running down the sides from over spray. Well,

(32:08):
powder coating is not like that. It's much much better,
and they'll come out and get it from me.

Speaker 16 (32:12):
Now.

Speaker 6 (32:12):
I don't think they will go to Uma, Arizona to
get a piece of metal. That would be cost prohibitive,
but they'll come get yours. You have furniture, patio furniture
out in the back that you would like to make
brand new. You got barbecue pits starting to rust a
little bit. How about making that thing shiny and new. Yeah,
they're coatings will take hundreds of degrees of temperature. You

(32:34):
can put them around on a barbecue pet and it's
just fine. They know how to do that. Over one
hundred colors to choose from. Here's what you need to do.
Give them a call to eight one six seven six
thirty eight eighty eight. Two eight one six seven six
thirty eight eighty eight, or go to the website and
check out what I'm talking about Houston Powdercoders dot com.

(32:56):
They also have a Facebook page, by the way, where
you can see some of the work that they've done.
And I mean they're not just for lawn and garden.
I mean they they major. You know, a big old
piece of goosen neck trailer or something, run into some
of their larger bins and do that so they they
can if it's metal in a whole still for just
a second, they can turn it into a beautiful, brand

(33:18):
new looking, gorgeous thing. Houston powder Coats dot com two
eight one six seven six thirty eight eighty eight. So
I didn't tell the people in knew about it because
too far away music means I got to quit talking.
You want to take a break. I need some more coffee.
Get both eyes open. Maybe you do too, Hang around,

(33:41):
don't go away. We've got plenty more to talk about.
To start off this morning talking about potting up house
plants and some tips of that. I got plenty more
suggestions like that, and if you have a question, give
me a call. Seven one three two one two five
eight seven four. Actually, the breaks are a good time
to give a call because you get on a line
and when we come back, you can be one of

(34:02):
the first ones up. All right, folks, don't go away.

Speaker 1 (34:29):
Welcome to Katie r. H Garden Line with Skip rictor.

Speaker 2 (34:35):
Crazy gas.

Speaker 3 (34:40):
Trim. Just watch him as well, bodas many thanks to
seep back bazy in buying the bases like gas.

Speaker 2 (34:57):
Kicking not a sign.

Speaker 3 (35:04):
Side.

Speaker 6 (35:09):
Hey, welcome back to garden Line. I'm your host, Skip Richter.
We're here to help you have success in whatever you're
trying to do around your yard, from house plants out
inside to you name it outside. If we can help
you have a greener, less a more verdant life, well
give me a call. Be happy to do that. Seven

(35:30):
one three two one two five eight seven four. We're
gonna head out now to the phones and go to Richmond,
Texas and visit with Robin this morning. Hello Robin, welcome
to garden Line.

Speaker 17 (35:42):
Good morning, good morning. My issue is I have got
brown spots on my Saint Augustine grass in my backyard,
full sun, no trees or anything getting to be. It's
been there for probably a month or so, but getting larger,
and it's completely dead. And there's a couple of different
spots starting in a couple of different areas.

Speaker 18 (36:04):
Now, so I'm like, okay, I need to do something.

Speaker 6 (36:10):
When you say dead, have you have you gotten down
and look to see if the runners are green and
all the leaves if just turned brown?

Speaker 8 (36:19):
No, but I can right now, I think, okay, I
think it's all dead, okay, because I mean the grass
is completely dead. Uh, I mean just like you know,
completely brown.

Speaker 17 (36:34):
And then so you're saying underneath it should be the
runners should be green.

Speaker 6 (36:41):
Yeah, this is Saint Augustine, right.

Speaker 17 (36:45):
Established. I mean it's a thirty year old yard. They're
green or not? How do you know if the runners
are green? Because everything looks dead.

Speaker 6 (37:00):
Saint Augustine, Robin, is this Saint Augustine?

Speaker 17 (37:05):
Yes?

Speaker 5 (37:07):
Okay.

Speaker 6 (37:07):
When you get down there, there's big fat runners. They
are about a you know, almost a quarter of an
inch wide on top, but more like an eighth of
an inch crawling across the top. Of the ground, and
they're either going to be green or they're going to
be brown. As you look at them, do you see
green in them? Are they all dried and brown?

Speaker 15 (37:28):
Tan?

Speaker 7 (37:28):
Brown?

Speaker 17 (37:29):
The ones that are in the dead spots are dead.
I mean I still have runners that are going all
over the place, you know, that want to go over
the sidewalk and everything that are green, But the ones
that are in the the dead spot don't look like
they have any life.

Speaker 6 (37:48):
Okay, how big are these spots? Roughly?

Speaker 17 (37:52):
Well, the one I'm standing in is about ten.

Speaker 6 (37:56):
Okay? And are they regular shaped or are they circular
in shape?

Speaker 5 (38:10):
You there?

Speaker 6 (38:14):
Okay, I may have lost connection with Robin.

Speaker 17 (38:20):
Let me go back.

Speaker 9 (38:21):
Okay, let me go back in the house.

Speaker 6 (38:26):
Yeah. So, I it's hard to guess, you know, without
seeing a picture. If you wanted to send me pictures,
I would take a look. If you do that, I
would need pictures kind of the whole long so I
can see the spots from a distance, but then also
close ups and then even getting right down to the
dirt and showing me the close up of the grass.
That'll help me diagnose it better. My best guess based

(38:49):
on what you've told me. So far is that it
is take all root rot and that kills grass. The
runners die and the root of course, the roots die,
the runners die, the leaves are of course shriveled and gone.
And I have a publication on take all root Rot
on my website, okay, and if you go, if you

(39:10):
go to gardening with skip dot com, you'll you'll find
it on there and it tells you more about what
to do. So I would I would just suggest you
take a look at that and see, you know, see
what you what you find. There's I think it's a
top publication right now. It's called take all root Rot

(39:30):
and in depth look and then there's a quick tip
for managing take all root rot. Also those are both
free to look at, free to download, and I going
into all the details you know on a phone call
on the area it's too much, but the information is
all there about the steps you can take when to spray.
If you get my schedule which is also right there

(39:52):
below the take all root Rot publication, it tells you
when to treat for take all root rot and and
what do you use for that disease. So that would
be my suggestion if you want to send me the pictures.
I'm gonna put you on hold. You need to hang up,
or if you hang around, my producer will give you
an email and send me the pictures. And let's be
sure that it's that before you go off, assuming that

(40:16):
it is based on my best guess.

Speaker 18 (40:19):
Okay, I'll hold okay, all right, all right, you bet.

Speaker 6 (40:25):
There we go. Well, now let's head out to Needville
and we're going to visit with Steve this morning. Hey, Steve,
welcome to garden Line.

Speaker 7 (40:34):
Good morning, Good morning, Skip love your program. I think, hey, listen,
I'm looking for I live out well, you know, I
live out needs though. I'm looking for a landscape designer
that can come out and just just do everything. I
know you recommend Peer Scapes. I just don't think they're

(40:55):
going to come out this far.

Speaker 16 (40:57):
Do you know anybody else maybe locally?

Speaker 6 (41:01):
You know, I don't. I I just don't keep up
when it comes to the landscape designers and the landscape
care companies in all all areas around here. What I
would do I would still call Pierce Scapes and I
would say, hey, who would you recommend? Who would you

(41:23):
recommend that in this area? Because they know their industry. Yeah,
you probably You're probably too far from them for them,
but I let them. I'll let them go.

Speaker 5 (41:36):
Thank you very much. I have a great day.

Speaker 6 (41:39):
Uh, you bet, thank you very much. Appreciate your call.
That is uh, the uh, that industry is so many
people that are in, especially land landscape care companies, you know,
the mow blow and go folks and show up. But
it is good to ask, that is for sure. You

(42:00):
can talk to neighbors about who they use. I'm just
talking to everybody now, not still not talking with Steve.
But you talk to neighbors about who they use, how
they like the work that they do. If you got
somebody that's doing it now here we're talking about maintenance.
If you don't have somebody doing maintenance in your neighborhood,
they are very happy to add another home to that trip.

(42:25):
You see what I'm saying. Uh, if you, let's say
you had a company like that, would you want to
go to Needville and then turn around and go to
Porter and then run and go to Galveston. Obviously that
would not be very cost anyway, you get what I'm
trying to say. Uh, they love to get a neighborhood
where they can just go down the street and do

(42:45):
house after house, and so you end up with sometimes
a better deal that way as well. All right, let's
let's take a little break here and we will be
right back with your calls at seven one three fifty
eight seventy four spring. What was a movie that?

Speaker 16 (43:00):
That was a.

Speaker 6 (43:03):
I had a bunch of Tunley Jones. I believe they've
been in a funny one. Anyway, welcome back to the Guardline.
Sometimes I get I dropped off about music because I
love music. Lots of good music out there too. Hey,
if you'd like to give me a call seven one
three two one two five eight seven four seven one

(43:24):
three two one two fifty eight seventy four, be happy
to visit with you. Just let me know what your
questions are and we'll see if we can solve them
here for you. If you've sent me a photo today,
please do follow up with a call. We've got some
photos in here, and I'll be happy to I've had
a chance to finally look over them during a little
break right there, so be glad to visit with you

(43:45):
about that. We are in the well, I guess you
could say the middle of winter right now. It's a
little toward the end for most most of us here
in this area. I know, people, if you're listening from
outside of Texas, like further north, you're probably going, what
the middle of winter? Winter's almost over? Yeah, we have
three days of winter here. We just don't know what

(44:06):
three days are gonna be each year, but that's about
what it amounts to. But right now we're enjoying some
moderate temperatures, not too bad, although it's cooled off a bit.
What's gonna happen those we're gonna start getting warming. And
as warming occurs pretty quick here, those of you done
in Galveston already seeing the end of your winter coming up,

(44:28):
we're going to start to see issues as plants start
to grow again, as a lawn wakes up and gets
going again, we have a resurgence of brown patch or
large patch, the big circles in your lawn. They love
moist conditions and cool temperatures. And if you will extra
fertilize your lawn lots of nitrogen, they show up much better.

(44:50):
And that's tongue in cheek. Of course, you don't want
them to show up. But when we push our lawns
with excessive amounts of fertilizer nitrogen is important. Nitrogen is essential.
It's the nutrient needed most by your lawn. But you
can overdo it, and so when you do, then you
increase certain kinds of disease issues. So that's why we

(45:11):
have schedules that tell you how much to put on,
and the labels on the bags tell you how much
to put on. That's important. We talked about nuts edge
a minute ago. Nuts edge will be kind of taken
off again with the warming of the soil. That's another
thing we'll be dealing with. We have a window of
take all root rot control that is in the spring,
and if you look at my schedule, you'll see that

(45:33):
we did some fall treatments for take all root rot.
But once we warm up just a bit more, I'll
probably get about March. Putting some treatments on for take
all at that time would also be helpful if you
have that problem. And I want to be clear, almost
without exception, there are a few exceptions, but we don't

(45:55):
use pesticides just as an ongoing basis, just like nuking
your plants all the time in case something might show up,
if it's in sects. We watch the plants, we see
how they're doing. We look at the population or beneficial
insects controlling this now, are they arriving to help or not?

(46:15):
And at some point we step in, and we try
to step in and stop them if needed. But a
few insects, the presence of something with six legs in
your plant does not warrant a napalm flyover. Okay, not
the words. You just don't have to panic on those things.
But when it's time you can step in. We like
to use products that are as least toxic as possible

(46:38):
and as least disruptive to beneficial in sex as possible.
And the way I described it to someone the other day,
I was trying to I was trying to explain the
different basic types of insecticides that we're dealing with. And
what I said was, there are arrows and there are grenades,
and I want you to, just if you will, imagine

(46:59):
with me. You've got this group of pests out there,
and when you throw a grenade out into that setting,
you're gonna kill everything nearby, just like you know in
warfare with people, you throw a grenade out, and anybody
near their grenades in trouble. But an arrow flies through,
it may pass by two or three individuals and then

(47:21):
it will hit the target that you've aimed it at.
And pesticides can be that way, So things like seven
dusts have been used for years or seven the liquid
forms of it, that is a grenade. It kills good insects,
It kills bad insects, It kills everything that is where
it gets sprayed pretty much, and so that is not

(47:42):
It doesn't kill mites by the way. In fact, it
makes spider mites worse. But that's a story for another day.
But BT bacillister and Gensis is a disease of caterpillars.
So you can get BT and you can squirt a ladybug,
a grasshopper, a chinch bug, and a caterpillar with it,
and only the caterpillar will die. Other bad insects, other

(48:05):
good insects are not going to be killed because it's
an arrow. And anytime you have the opportunity to use
an arrow more targeted, it will work better for you.
And many of the arrows are going to be less
toxic as well. So that's a good idea to keep
that in mind when you're out there dealing with some
of these some of these issues that we have with diseases.

(48:29):
There are a few examples where I will just say, well,
you're going to have to spray if you're going to
stop that disease, because it will be there every year
on that plant. That is just the way some are.
But with most things we don't. We don't just spray constantly.
Same thing for weed control. You get a good healthy lawn,

(48:50):
you get good mulches in your flower beds and things,
and suppress as much of the weeds as you can,
and you don't have to just all year every year,
just be over and over and over again controlling weeds.
That's the goal that we're trying to get to. That
that's not a good situation. That kind of a treadmill
is not good for your lawn. It's not good for

(49:11):
you and not good for the environment, especially when people
misapply these products. What we would rather do is build
a dense, healthy lawn, multi flower beds well, and then
when we have weed situations, assess them and make as
targeted of an application as we can to take care
of them. Now, if you've got a thin lawn, you're

(49:31):
gonna have weed seeds pop up in it where sunlight
hits the soil. Nature plants weed. That's how that works.
But in that case, a pre emergent herbicide will prevent
those weeds from coming up if applied properly, not hurt
your lawn if applied properly. And that is the holdover
until you get a good, dense, healthy lawn. So the

(49:53):
mow water fertilized. I got two schedules online. One is
the lawn care schedule, that's how to grow a dense,
hellth healthy lawn. The other is the pest, weed and
disease management schedule. That's what to do with all the
things that go wrong in the lawn. But you don't
want to live in the pest disease and weed management schedule.
You want to live in the lawn care schedule and

(50:14):
get your lawn healthy and not need the pest, weed
and disease management schedule as much. See how that works.
Kind of like with our bodies. I mean, can you
imagine just you're constantly on an antibiotic and all these
other medications in case something shows up, Well that that's
not a good way for your body to live, nor
is it a good way for plants in your gardens

(50:35):
and landscapes to live either. All right. I hope that
made sense. Let's go out to Richmond, Texas now and
we're going to visit with Robin this morning. Hey, Robin,
welcome back.

Speaker 17 (50:47):
Hi. I emailed you like four or five pictures, so
I hope you can tell from that.

Speaker 6 (50:53):
Yes, yes, I've got you. Sure did. I'm looking at
a number of different effects that you have, so yeah,
well they are truly dead what you're showing me, it's
truly dead. And for a couple of reasons, because of

(51:16):
where it is in the lawn and because of the
pattern of it in the lawn, I'm about ninety percent
sure you have take all root rot. Okay, Okay, it's
very erratic. The pattern is very erratic. It's not nice,
nice round circles. It's not starting at a driveway or
a sidewalk or a curb. It's occurring all through the

(51:36):
lawn and it's flat out killing the grass. So yeah,
I would say that's take all root Rot. And again,
if you go to my website, Gardening with Skip dot com,
the top publication on the front page is called take
all root Rot and in Depth Look, and the one
right below it or quick Tips for managing Take All

(51:59):
root Rot and one. Right below that is the Lone
Pest and Disease Management Schedule, which has entries for take
all Root Rot in the disease row.

Speaker 9 (52:10):
Okay, so the.

Speaker 6 (52:12):
Top three publications are what you need to read.

Speaker 18 (52:16):
Okay.

Speaker 17 (52:16):
Is the treatment going to take like months?

Speaker 18 (52:19):
Is it going to take my whole yard?

Speaker 5 (52:20):
I mean, what can I go bag?

Speaker 6 (52:25):
So here's how it take all works. It kills roots,
which is why it has the name take all root rot.
And so if you have a grass plant and the
roots are ninety percent dead, it's going to be very
hard to keep that plane alive long enough for it
to regrow and fill back in. If it's only about
twenty five percent dead, are thirty percent in an area,

(52:48):
then you can stop the take all progression and start
to get the healthy grass around those areas to send
runners out and fill back in. If the areas are
larger than a couple of feet, for sure, larger than
two feet, I would definitely plug in some healthy grass
so that it speeds the coverage of that area, because

(53:09):
you don't want the bare soil. Then you're just going
to get weeds in those dead areas where sunlight is
hitting their soil that was going to be.

Speaker 17 (53:16):
My next question, Can I just dig it out and
put new grass in, but I still have to treat
it regardless?

Speaker 6 (53:22):
I would. I would because the organism. The organism is
in almost every lawn. It's just when the lawn gets
stressed Robin that is when the disease can move into
the point of actually killing the grass. So if you
have drought conditions, it doesn't get watered well. If that's
an area where you walk and the soil is more compacted,

(53:46):
if it is a spot that's extremely shaded. Those are
Those are various things that stress grass, and stress to
grass is more susceptible to take all. Just like if
you don't eat right, you don't sleep right, you don't
have any exercise and stuff, you're more likely to get
sick than someone who's doing all of those three things right.

(54:08):
And Okay, with our plants, avoid the stress to avoid
more of the disease issues.

Speaker 17 (54:15):
Okay, but my question is I guess if I put
like several new squares of grass, like I dig up
the eight foot direct area and then fill it in
with new graphs, is it going to immediately kill the
new grass or the new grass should have I mean
should have a chance to survive.

Speaker 6 (54:32):
The new grass should be fine as long as you're
when you put new grass in, it doesn't. Its root
system is about a half inch long, because if you
buy side, that's about how deep the roots are on
that piece of side, or an inch, and so it's
going to naturally be stressed. So you want to keep
it extra moist early on until it gets a good
root system in, and then as it's moving in it

(54:54):
should be fine. But look at my schedule at when
take all maybe an issue, and then going into this summer,
just everything that would stress your grass, and that includes
using herbicides incorrectly that also can lead to take all root.

Speaker 18 (55:08):
Right.

Speaker 17 (55:08):
I've never done anything to my yard ever, ever, ever,
except I put Nema toads out last year to treat fleas.
And I thought, oh my god, did the Nema toads
cause this?

Speaker 6 (55:22):
Not at all? Not at all? Did they work on
the fleas?

Speaker 18 (55:26):
Seemed to.

Speaker 15 (55:28):
Yeah, it seemed to help.

Speaker 17 (55:29):
I mean I had a very very mild case and
I treated the house and I thought, well, I'm gonna
try that and you know, non chemical type treatment, okay,
And you know I haven't really had I still have
squirrels so I used to have please in but.

Speaker 6 (55:43):
All right, Robin, well I'm against. I'm against. On five seconds,
I have to stop talking. So I'm going to say
goodbye and good luck with that I do.

Speaker 8 (55:51):
I do.

Speaker 6 (55:51):
Wish you well, folks, will be right back. Hey, welcome
back to guardenline.

Speaker 15 (55:55):
Folks.

Speaker 7 (55:59):
That's like.

Speaker 6 (56:01):
Unds like it could be from Star Wars or something,
you know, where all the ships are heading out. All right, folks,
good to have you with us. If you got a question,
here's the phone number. Seven one three two one two
five eight seven four seven one three two two fifty
eight seventy four. Gimme a call. We'll talk about the
things that interest you. Just going into break, you know, visiting,

(56:24):
talking about take All root Rah, talking about some other
things that are going on in people's yards. I mentioned
that take All is a disease that kills the turf,
kills the lawn, and that's one you need to watch for.
You need to deal with it because it's around. But
just know this that it's in almost everybody's yard in
the neighborhood. But that's not a problem.

Speaker 15 (56:45):
Uh.

Speaker 6 (56:45):
And it's not a problem because it only is a
problem when the plant is stressed and weakened, and the
take all has the opportunity to take over.

Speaker 13 (56:53):
Uh.

Speaker 6 (56:53):
And an analogy I use. I don't know if this
works for you, but it does for me.

Speaker 8 (56:57):
Uh.

Speaker 6 (56:57):
Let's say you got around the side of your house.
You got a little water faucet, and it's shady over there,
and so you were to take a turn on the
faucet and have a mist that sprays on the brick
on that side of the house, just a fine miss,
keeping it moist constantly. Over there, you would notice algae

(57:18):
growing on that brick, or mold or whatever growing on
the brick. Well, where did that algae come from? It
was there. It's in the nature. It's ubiquitous. The spores
of fungus and the spores of other things, they're there.
But you created the perfect environment, so it started growing
on the brick. Okay, the same thing happens in diseases

(57:39):
in our lawns. The diseases are there, they're not. It's
not like somebody brought their lawn mower in and brought
the disease into your lawn. Although that can happen, certainly,
it can travel that way or on our shoes and
feet and things. But many of these are ubiquitous and
it's just a matter of creating the condition. They give

(58:00):
the disease the upper hand and the opportunity to take over.
So think about that that way, that will help a lot.
That's one of the reasons why we say avoid sprinkler
irrigation when you can on landscape beds and use drip instead.
And it's because every time you wet the foliage, you
increase the incidence of disease. So if you had let's say,

(58:24):
had two rose bushes out in your yard, and one
of them you had drip irrigation under, so the only
time the leaves got wet is when it rained. The
other one you had sprinkler irrigation on. So every time
the rose got watered, the leaves were wet. Well, the
one that sprinkler irrigated it's going to get disease more
and worse because of that. That's the only difference is

(58:46):
getting the leaves wet or not. Now, we get a
lot of rain over in Southeast Texas, and so we
already have enough issues with diseases and things, but just
realize that there's a lot we can do culturally. The
way you grow a plant in order to avoid problems.
Doesn't it make sense to do that? It sure does.

(59:09):
That's why when I'm talking about fertilizing or using products.
If a teaspoon is good, a tablespoon is not better.
In fact, it may be worse, may may cause more problems.

Speaker 19 (59:21):
Uh.

Speaker 6 (59:21):
And I know, I know you're. I know who you
are listening out there. You're you're you're the You're the
guy that uses the glug method for applying pesticides. You
know the label who needs a label. I'm just gonna
go glug, glug, glug glug. Okay, that's enough. I'm gonna
put that on yeap that leads to problems.

Speaker 7 (59:41):
I know, I know.

Speaker 6 (59:42):
We don't read labels. What was it the Humphrey Bogart movie.
They said said to the law enforcement guys, uh, show
me your badges, and he said badges. We don't need
any stinking badges. We're the federal allies. Well, you need
a label. You need a stinking label. Read the label.
Read instructions. I know, guys, we're designed to not read instructions,

(01:00:04):
or at least that's our excuse.

Speaker 7 (01:00:05):
But you got to.

Speaker 6 (01:00:07):
You got to or you end up getting to pay
what I call the stupid tax. I'm roving here, but
I'm just gonna keep going. My kids are growing up.
I had a thing that I told them, and it
was called the stupid tax. A stupid tax is what
you pay whenever you do something stupid. Right, So if
you if you make a silly mistake just because you're

(01:00:29):
not thinking, you're not paying attention or whatever, the consequence is,
that's called the stupid tax. You get to pay the
stupid tax. So don't pay the stupid tax when you're
fertilizing your lawns, when you're doing pest and weed, disease
control of the lawns, or any kind of plants like that.
Read the label. It's there for a reason. All right,
I'm gonna give you one more reason to read the

(01:00:50):
label because I'm kind of on a soapbox here. Another
reason is, think of it logically. Okay, you're you're a company,
and you you have a product. Maybe it's a fertilizer,
or maybe it's a pest control or disease control or
weed control. Now your goal would be to make money, right,

(01:01:11):
That's what companies do. None wrong with that. That's what
companies do. But if you put on the label to
use a teaspoon per gallon over x acres or excuse
me x square feet lawn area. If you say put
a teaspoon per gallon, why wouldn't you put a table
say put a tablespoon per gallon, because then you would
sell more product. Right, So, if there's an incentive for

(01:01:35):
a company to want you to use more, but they
don't because there is a certain concentration, a certain application
rate that research is shown does the job, and you
go below that and you don't get the job done.
You go above that and you have secondary issues. Could
be stressed to a lawn, It could be just killing

(01:01:57):
a lawn. It could be damaged to the environment. There's
a lot of other things. So the label is there
for a reason. And if using more was okay, they
would tell you that because they did sell more product.
Hope that makes sense makes sense to me. All right,
that's my best shot. Guys, uh, use the label. I'll

(01:02:19):
probably come back to that sometime because it is a
soapbox for me. Well, you're listening to garden Line our
phone number, I believe it or not. This is a
call in show seven one three, two one two five
eight seven four Give me a call. We'll be glad
to visit with you about that. I think here we're
gonna I'm gonna go ahead and take a little break
and we'll be right back for our last segment of
this second hour guard Line. All right, we're back. Welcome

(01:02:42):
back to the Guarden Line, and we got a gardening question.
Seven one three two one two five eight seven four
seven one three two fifty eight seventy four. Let's head
out now to Fairfield and we're gonna visit with Marty
this morning. Hello Marty, welcome to Garden Line. You know what,

(01:03:04):
hang on, Marty. It always helps if I actually pick
up the call and just start don't start talking to
you up in the garden line.

Speaker 9 (01:03:13):
Hi, good morning.

Speaker 20 (01:03:14):
Hey, my dollar weed has come back in a vengeance.
And last year I put on the image with sir
fact that. I believe that was that one I used
the barricade, and uh, you said something about the surfactor.
Something had changed with image, and I was just wondering

(01:03:35):
if you would repeat that, and can I put it
down now.

Speaker 19 (01:03:40):
As a potion?

Speaker 6 (01:03:41):
Don't remember, I don't remember making that comment about image
and surfactant.

Speaker 17 (01:03:49):
He said they weren't putting it in.

Speaker 20 (01:03:52):
Yeah, yeah, towards the end of this, towards the end
of the season, you said, don't add to surf fact and.

Speaker 9 (01:04:01):
Because it would getting too hot.

Speaker 6 (01:04:07):
Oh oh oh oh oh that was that was Oh gosh,
it begins with the sea. So what I talk about
it all the time.

Speaker 9 (01:04:18):
M sure it wasn't.

Speaker 6 (01:04:19):
That was a different product. I don't think. I think
that was Celsius that I said. I don't know that
to be true about Image. I know, yeah, I know
Celsius in haha weather. Celsius itself doesn't It can be
used in warmer temperatures than most of the broadly herbicides.

(01:04:41):
But when you add this sur fact that that creates
an additional problem. I don't know of that situation with Image.
But if you read the label a little, if there
is a concern there, it would.

Speaker 9 (01:04:50):
Tell you not to my knowledge, okay, it's not it's
not working.

Speaker 20 (01:04:56):
This image keeps coming I mean this, this dollar week
keeps coming back here after year, and it gets yeah,
and it gets more and multi evasive invasive.

Speaker 6 (01:05:06):
Yeah, there are there are a number of different products
that have dollar weed on the label. And the problem
is that it's one thing to say it's on the
label and it works a little bit, but it doesn't
tell you how well it works, right, And there's a
variation there. Some people are are using met sulfur on,

(01:05:29):
which is either ms M those three letters MSM or
manor M A n O R is another met sulfur
on product that's labeled for the lawn and can be
used in st augustine. You're going to be very careful
with it if you put a lot, put extra amounts
on and get rain that washes it immediately right down

(01:05:49):
into the roots. That can damage broad leaf shrubs and
trees around it. So be very careful with it. But
it does work. Use used properly, it's it's it's safe.
Let's see what else. There are some things that are
used as a pre emergent. Gallery is used for dollar weed,

(01:06:11):
so it doesn't kill existing dollar weed, it prevents seeds
from coming up on dollar weed. And then there's some
other things that I generally don't talk about on the
air because of people's misuse of them. And I know, yeah,
I'm just not going to talk about them on there.
If you wanted to send me an email or something,
I could discuss it with you on the email. Proper

(01:06:34):
use and things. But I found before that sometimes I
say things and then people don't hear it and they
misuse a product, and I try to avoid that. I
just certain things I just don't talk about on the air.

Speaker 20 (01:06:46):
Sure, sure, well these are post emergent. They came up later,
or they were coming up and I thought I had
gotten them taken care of. It was during the cooler
weather like right now.

Speaker 9 (01:07:00):
And if I get msm or Manor cannot put it
down now.

Speaker 6 (01:07:05):
You can just now, yes, yes you can. And actually
actually MSM or Manor is another one, sort of like
Celsius in that if it's a little warmer, it generally
doesn't do damage like some of the others do. It's
just that it's just a concern about people over applying
it and then getting in in the root system, because

(01:07:25):
it can damage trees and shrubs a little bit.

Speaker 9 (01:07:29):
It's just in the grass. It's taking over the front yard.

Speaker 6 (01:07:34):
Okay, Yeah, anything more you can do to drive anything
you can do to drive that area out would also
be helpful. You know, it thrives in soggy conditions, so
you can't control rainfall, but maybe an area that doesn't drain,
improving the drainage in it, or if you're if you
had to overwater that area, then not doing that those

(01:07:55):
things can help slow it down a lot.

Speaker 9 (01:07:58):
So yeah, I haven't been water but that's for dollar weed.

Speaker 18 (01:08:01):
I didn't know that.

Speaker 6 (01:08:02):
Okay, okay, dollar we loves wet conditions. Okay, okay, you
remember that is it looks like the way I remember
that is it looks like lily pads. Lily pads.

Speaker 20 (01:08:14):
Yeah, it looks like lily pads or lots of money,
lots of money.

Speaker 9 (01:08:19):
There you go, good luck, Thankskip.

Speaker 6 (01:08:24):
You bet, you bet, And and do add the read
the label on on the MSM or mayor manor uh
and uh check unless it says don't use a surfactant,
do use one because that that dollar weed's pretty slippery
on the leaf. All right, thank you very much. All right,

(01:08:47):
Uh well I see here. What are we doing on time? Yeah,
we don't have time for another call right now. If
you would like to give me a call and be
first up after the top of the hour, we're going
to go to the news here in just a bet
seven one three two one two five eight seven four
seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy four. Hey,
if you don't anything to do during break. When I
go to my website and check it out, I keep

(01:09:07):
talking about all these things that I put up there
that are free to download or look at online gardening
with Skip dot com, Gardening with Skip dot com. That
is gonna got some other things that are in the
works to go up on the website additionally, just make
it more and more valuable. A lot of these questions
that are hard to answer with a real quick answer,

(01:09:27):
you know, the take all root routs a good example
of that. Or how to protect plants from frosts and freezes.
There's a lot to that. That's why I create publications
for those and put them on so you can read
about them. You don't have to try to remember what
was that? Was it manor or manor what did he say?
It's there, it's on the website. You can find out
everything you need to know. Alrighty, I'm gonna come back.

(01:09:52):
When we come back, I want to continue some of
the discussions that we've been having. I won't drone on
again about reading the label anymore. I think I've done
that so efficiently for today. But I would like to
talk about some other things that are very timely for
this time of year, including prim pruning, plants, proper pruning,
how we go about that, the deus and don'ts and
so on. So stick around, get you a cup of

(01:10:15):
coffee and we'll see you in just a moment. Don't
go away.

Speaker 1 (01:10:56):
Welcome to Katie r. H. Garden Line with Skipper.

Speaker 2 (01:11:00):
Churches Mill the crazy gas trip. Just watch him as.

Speaker 3 (01:11:15):
So many spot basic bays.

Speaker 2 (01:11:25):
Not a sad glass, guys, sal Bemon.

Speaker 6 (01:11:37):
Hey, welcome back to the guarden Line. Folks. Good to
have you with us. Got a question, well, here's the
phone number seven one three two one two five eight
seven four seven one three two one two fifty eight
seventy four. I want to talk about pruning a little bit.
We are in pruning season. The time of the year

(01:11:58):
when we do most pruning is in the winter, mid
to late winter. And here is why. If you do
excessive printing during the growing season, it is more stressful
to the plant. And you have a plant us in
a condition where the bark will easily separate from the

(01:12:20):
interior wood. We call that slipping bark that starts in
the spring with the flow of sap pushing out new
growth and everything, and so it feels like a banana,
and that bark peeling off like that creates a huge
wound that is extremely slow to heal. So we would
rather prune when the bark is tightly adhering, and that's
in the midwinter. It's a good time to do that. Also,

(01:12:44):
there are other reasons why we don't do excessive amounts
of pruning in summer, but you can prine any month
of the year. There is some printing that could be
done any month of the year. To some degree, mid
to late winter is the best time to do most pruning.
Exceptions of that or things that only bloom in the spring.
So if you have a Ladybank's rose or many climbing roses,

(01:13:07):
or like ladybanks or once bloomers, they bloom in the spring,
they're done. Might as well be a red bud tree
or something it blooms in the spring, that's it. Other
roses are repeat bloomers. They bloom and they bloom and
they bloom through the season. Depending on the rose, it
may be a whole lot, constant blooming almost or it

(01:13:28):
may just come in a couple of two or three waves.
But the bottom line is those repeatment don't prune once
blooming plants in the wintertime because you're taking off their
bloom show and they're not going to bloom again later.
So for example, a red bud, or a dog wood,
or a Chinese fringe tree or a native fringe tree.

(01:13:49):
Those are all examples of things that bloom in the
spring and then they don't bloom again. But then there
are things that bloom in summer. You can prone those
in the winter as much as you want, because they're
to bloom on the new growth that occurs after pruning
or after the winter is over with. And so that
would be things like vitex, like a crape myrtle for example,

(01:14:12):
like an oleander. They all bloom on new growth, so
you can prune tho as much as you want.

Speaker 8 (01:14:18):
Now.

Speaker 6 (01:14:19):
Things that don't bloom, shrubs and trees that don't bloom,
you can prune those in the winter as well. But
now's the time really to begin doing some serious pruning
on your plants. And if you're if you're going to
hire pruning done, perhapsally gonna call Affordable Tree Service and
have them come out and do pruning for you. This
is prime time for doing that because they can prune
anytime you're on the pruning that's needed at those times,

(01:14:41):
but affordable tree would would come out and do that,
or if you're gonna do it yourself, you do pruning yourself.
Now is the time to get out there. I strongly
urge you to learn about pruning before you go out
and prune. There's proper ways to make pruning cuts. There
is proper styles of pruning for different plants. Even within
fruit trees. For example, we prune apples and pairs to

(01:15:03):
what's called a central liter system, whereas we prune peaches
and plums to an open bowl shape, an open center
type of pruning. So learning how to prune properly is important.
If you've got a big limb to remove, there is
something called a three point cut that you need to do. Now,

(01:15:26):
here's what happens. You prune a branch, You start above
a branch, you start cutting down. As you get far
enough down, the weight to the branch that you've cut
so far that it starts to sag down and fall
off and as it falls it tears bark off. So
what we do in a three point cut, as we
start off, let's say, kind of depends on the size

(01:15:48):
of the branch. But let's seny, you've got our foot
out from where it attaches to the trunk. Just to
make an example, you cut upward about one third of
the way up into the branch pass because you cut
too far and it's going to sag down and bind
your saw and you're not gonna be able to get
you saw out of there. So just a little bit,
just about third of the way up. Then go out

(01:16:08):
from that, not toward the plant, but out or toward
the trunk, but outward from away from the trunk, from
that first cut, and you cut down and you just
cut and cut until it breaks and falls away. That
first cut you made keeps it from stripping down the
trunk or the branch and it falls away. Now you
have a stub that you've left, and you make the

(01:16:30):
third cut where a cut should be made, which is
where it starts to flare out as it attaches to
the trunk itself. You can go online. I know that
was descriptive of your brain's probably going, Okay, I can't
picture Roger saying, go online, look for a three point cut,
and it'll show its diagram shows you exactly how to
do it. Here's when you need a three point cut.

(01:16:51):
If you cannot hold that branch easily in one hand,
you need a three point cut. I have tried before,
thinking I can hang onto that, and I reach out
and hold the branch and I'm cutting downward with that
one just single cut you. I'm gonna put it right
where it goes to make single cut, and I can't
quite hold it, and then here you go, and when

(01:17:13):
it strips, you will have a wound that is very
slow to heel. You don't want to do that, so
when in doubt, use a three point cut. That is
very important to do. Learn where to make the cut. Again,
if you look at a brand, now, each tree is different.
Some trees don't quite fit this design. And I'm gonna
give you give you a pine tree, for example, it

(01:17:36):
does flare out a little where it attaches, not so much.
Certain kinds of oaks can also go straight into a
branch and they don't have a big flare at the base.
But most branches, as they come into the trunk, they
flare out, meaning they get bigger right where they attach
to the trunk. So just picture that in your mind.

(01:17:59):
If you were to go out and follow the branch
toward the trunk and right where it's about to get bigger,
or right where it starts to get bigger. You cut
it there, and then you walk around and look at
that cut. It's going to be a roundish cut a
certain size. If you were then to go back and
cut it off where it attaches to the trunk and

(01:18:20):
look at the cut, it's a huge cut, a big
area that now callisaster crawl across to close over that
wound and protect the inner wood from decay. So it's
better to prune about at the beginning of where it
flares out again. You can find a lot of good
information online and a website. The Texas Forest Service has

(01:18:46):
a good information on that Texas for Service website and
if you go there at the it's tfsweb dot com.
They have a pruning section and it has something on
pruning young trees, and it has something on pruning mature trees,
and if you click on it is very very helpful

(01:19:08):
and you can get a lot of good information, including
pictures of what I'm showing you. A branch that says
outside the branch collar a cut. They show you pictures
of those because you don't want to leave stubs on those,
but I would recommend you do that. Another really good
website is is A I think it's ISA dot org.

(01:19:30):
I believe. Let me check that make sure now it's
not that internetions called the International Society of a Bora Culture,
and if you go to the International Society of our
Bora Culture, it's ISA dot orb. Arbor or is a

(01:19:52):
dash arbor dot com. And if you go there you
can find out a lot of information. It'll show you
how to find local arborists and things, and there's a
lot out of products handouts that help you know how
to do things, how to prune, and if you go
to some of those, they're called the Trees are Good
Consumer brochures. They are very helpful. There are pruning, mature trees,

(01:20:17):
mature tree care, insects and disease protection of trees, trees
and turf, new tree planting, everything about trees and tree health.
The ISA is excellent for that. And if you go
to Trees are Good, UM, Trees are Good dot org,
treesar Good dot org. That's the website and they have

(01:20:40):
a section for tree owners and it is really really helpful.
So I would recommend you do that before you go
out and prune. Don't prune just because the trees there
and it's winter. Find out what you're doing, because when
you miss prune a tree, you can do more damage
than good and a butcher tree often you can't fix it.

(01:21:03):
You can do things to try to help it, help
it along, but you can destroy the structural integrity of
a tree, and you can destroy the beauty of a
tree by improper pruning. And when you hire somebody to
work on your trees, they need to know what they're doing,
and not because they told you they do, but because
they do. They do know what they're doing, and don't

(01:21:24):
hire I call it the two jerks on a train
saw chainsaw tree service. They own a pickup and a
chainsaw and they drive down the road knocking on doors,
sticking cards in the in the door. That doesn't mean
everybody that does that is doesn't know what they're doing.
It's just you need to do better than that. Okay,
there you go. Let's see it's time for me take

(01:21:46):
a little quick break and we'll be right back you
little music from Luke Bryan there night four, noxcuse me,
Night eighth from the Rodeo. Luke will be here on
night eight for the Rodeo, lots of good entertainers, music,
forever taste. When you look at the rodeo lineup, it's

(01:22:07):
all awesome every year. Take advantage of it. Houston Life
selection on Rodeo is one of the best things, and
that happens down all year around. There is something for
everybody there, even if you're not into raising livestock and
those kinds of things. It's still as a big fun
thing as you all know already. Nelson Nursing Water Gardens

(01:22:30):
out there in Katie is your independent garden center that
is a destination garden center for the west side of
Houston area. You head out Interstate ten. When you get
to Katie, you turn north on Katie Fort Ben Road.
It's just up the street a little bit on the
right hand side. Here's a website Nelsonwatergardens dot com Nelson

(01:22:51):
Watergardenstock come. You need to go check those out. They've
got lots of cool season color in right now. Violas
and pansies and dianthus one of my favorite plants. This
for cool season color and also snap dragons and that'll
carry you well in the spring with some beautiful colorful things.
They always have a good selection of herbs and all
kinds of plants in the nursery park. And then when

(01:23:14):
it comes to water gardening, oh my gosh, you're not
going to find anything more beautiful, just so cool. And
if you never added water to your landscape, you ought
to consider it. I edited a water feature a while back,
and we just love sitting out there and just hearing
the sound of water, even if you're not thinking about
it or noticing it. It has this soothing effect, really

(01:23:36):
really cool. Nelson Nursery and Water Gardens out in Katie,
Texas Nelson Watergardens dot com. We're going to go now
out to Spring Branch and talk to David this morning.
Hey David, welcome to garden Line.

Speaker 18 (01:23:49):
Good morning, Thank you for taking my call. I had
a couple of questions my piece threes. It's already budding
out enormously because of the weather, you know, but I'm
a little bit concerned that we get some cold, cold
weather it's going to killed it all all the buds.
Is there something that I can do to maybe help

(01:24:11):
it to survive really cold temperatures?

Speaker 6 (01:24:16):
How big is this tree is? How long has it
been in the ground.

Speaker 18 (01:24:20):
Oh, it's been in the ground for like about seven years.

Speaker 6 (01:24:23):
Okay, well, yeah, if you can, if you can cover it,
that's the thing. And it's going to take a really
large structure or of tarp or whatever to be able
to get over that tree and cover it. But if
you're able to do that and have the cover drop
down to the ground, weigh it down so nothing blows

(01:24:46):
out of the air, and then put some heat lamps
underneath it, not shining on the tree or the trunk,
but down toward the ground that that warmth will raise
up in there and you might get those blooms through
a good cold night if you have enough of the
warmth underneath it. The problem is getting that tarp over it,
and some people use you know, big arch sections of

(01:25:06):
PVC to kind of create a little igloo shape if
you will to pull the tarp across.

Speaker 15 (01:25:11):
Uh.

Speaker 6 (01:25:12):
That's the hardest part, not easy to do, but that's
the only way to protect it when it's already begun
to push out balloons and stuff and a hard heart
freeze occurs.

Speaker 18 (01:25:22):
Okay, okay, I will I will. I was thinking about
doing just that because once the the freak kills it all,
they will not come back this year, They will not
fruit this year.

Speaker 17 (01:25:32):
Correct.

Speaker 6 (01:25:34):
Now, the blooms were set in the late summer and
fall last year, and that's the only time it sets
blooms and springs the only time they push out on
a peach tree.

Speaker 18 (01:25:44):
Okay, I got one fine a question. I have a
chemical inpdient. It's called bit or s and the stages
can be used for chinchbugs. I believe it has an
ingredient by said print. I always get chinch bugs in
my yard, maybe like every other Yeah, I was maybe
to use it this year for chinchbugs. Have you ever
heard of that mon it? Would you recommend it?

Speaker 6 (01:26:07):
Well? I don't know the brand, but the Byfentherren is
a synthetic pyrethroid that's used in a lot of different things.
It's used for a lot of outside inside control. Uh,
and so it will kill It does kill chinchbugs by
fenthern itself does. The key is you want to watch

(01:26:28):
your lawn and when you start to see a little
bit of browning. Typically it starts next to a driveway
or a sidewalk or a curb. You see a little
bit of browning and you water it and it doesn't
perk up. Get down on your hands and knees pull
the grass apart and look at the soil surface and
look for the little bugs. You can go online and
see what they look like. Uh, and if you see them,
then treat, don't treat. Don't treat before you see trenchbugs.

(01:26:50):
That won't do a whole lot of good. But Byfentherin
sticks around a pretty good while. So you know if
you treated a couple of weeks ahead of time, that
it would still be around. But I I generally like
to wait because this may be a year where you
don't have chinchbugs.

Speaker 18 (01:27:08):
Correct, Okay, Well I appreciate all that information.

Speaker 5 (01:27:14):
And yeah, I'm.

Speaker 6 (01:27:18):
Curious is your is your HM is your lawn of
Saint Augustine lawn?

Speaker 18 (01:27:25):
It is? It is? Yes?

Speaker 6 (01:27:27):
Okay, Yeah, that that is especially bothered by the chinchbugs.
That's one that can cause a lot of problems for
sure in your lawn.

Speaker 8 (01:27:36):
Uh.

Speaker 6 (01:27:37):
There is a there's a product that green Light makes
called bug Out. I'm sorry, green Light Nitrofoss makes called
bug Out and it contains by Fentherne and it's a
granule design to put on a label to put on
your lawn. So that's that's a by Fentherne that I
would suggest you try bug Out by by Nitrofoss, big

(01:28:00):
yellow bag with a green letters and a black bar on,
easy to find.

Speaker 18 (01:28:05):
Okay, and that's good. That's good for the chinchbus.

Speaker 6 (01:28:08):
Yes, absolutely, And it tells you how much to put
out and everything local company, local product. All right, Thanks,
appreciate that.

Speaker 7 (01:28:18):
Thank you.

Speaker 6 (01:28:19):
Yeah, and we're going to go now to Columbus and
talk to Tom. Hello, Tom, Welcome to garden Line.

Speaker 10 (01:28:25):
Hey, good morning, Skip. Thank you for taking my calls.
I have been in three photos of a live oak
tree that I have in my yard that had a
small injury from a lawnmower around the base of it
several years ago. And that's yeah, all of a sudden,
well I say, all of a sudden, probably in the
last year, that has grown into a very large area

(01:28:48):
where the bark is detached. And I was wondering if
there's anything I can.

Speaker 16 (01:28:53):
Do about it.

Speaker 6 (01:28:54):
I saw your picture. It's a fairly young tree, uh
and and so it's got a lot of growing to
do and it will close that over. It's a serious
wound because it goes about halfway around the trunk in
one area of it, and that's a lot of area
to cover. Over, But I already see a lot of
callous farming. It's already on its way to closing back over.

(01:29:18):
We don't use the term healing for trees, but it
closes back over, and now that inner wood will be
protected once it completely seals back over. That so I
would just continue to do things that promote tree vigor.
If you can create a mulched area around it so
it's not competing with grass, that's helpful for trees. They'd

(01:29:38):
rather be in a forest than a meadow. And so
getting the grass away, making sure the weed eater and
lawnmore don't damage the trunk too. And then water and
fertilized water is more important than fertilizer adequate moisture during
summer heat and drought, but fertilizer will also help. I
would get a lawn fertilizer and for every inch of

(01:29:58):
trunk diameter, put a cup or two of fertilizer sprinkled
around out to the branch spread of the tree, and
then water it in. But don't think fertilizer is the
most important. It's it's really watering that causes the best
response in tree growth. And in a few years, ampty
close back over awesome.

Speaker 7 (01:30:20):
That's great to hear because I like the tree and.

Speaker 10 (01:30:24):
Was helping that it was well, thank you very much.

Speaker 6 (01:30:28):
Yeah, I get that. I get that. Well, that's how
it is, so good luck getting that tree back in shape.
All right, all right, you take care, yeah that We
can do a lot to speed the growth of trees.
Some trees grow slow naturally. Some trees grow fast naturally.

(01:30:50):
And I can't say without exception, but most of the time,
when you get a tree that grows fast, it's not
worth having most of the time.

Speaker 8 (01:31:00):
Uh.

Speaker 6 (01:31:00):
And you see these things for sale, you know, the
royal polonia tree sometimes in advertisements you see it for
sale and it grows fast. It sure does. But I
just say, grow fast, die young is kind of what
that amounts to. There are some trees that grow at
a nice pace that are good trees. Red oaks can
grow at a good pace. Chinese elm does good at

(01:31:23):
growing at a good pace. Just take care of it.
And it's mainly water that you're doing. All right, We're
gonna take a break. We'll be right back and John
and Tomball you're our first s up. Welcome back, Welcome
back to the garden line. We're going to jump right
back into the phone calls here and head to Tomball.
Elizab with John this morning. Hello John, Welcome to garden

(01:31:45):
Line Skip.

Speaker 18 (01:31:46):
How you doing.

Speaker 5 (01:31:49):
Good.

Speaker 15 (01:31:49):
I have a good question about a meer limit. I
got small lemons, real small limons in meer lemon in
a pot. Should I move it in time this week
during the cold snap?

Speaker 6 (01:32:04):
How cold is your area predicted to get?

Speaker 15 (01:32:09):
Oh, I'm thinking maybe low forties. It's not gonna be
that cold, but I don't know what your lemon will
be threshold would be.

Speaker 6 (01:32:17):
Yeah, Now, your your lemon is is going to be
just fine at that Myers has a time a little
bit of cold heartiness. I mean it's not among the
most cold hearty citrus that we have, but it does
have some cold heartiness. And I wouldn't worry about it
at that temperature. Yeah.

Speaker 15 (01:32:37):
I guess when we had total quick when we had
the winds the last couple of days, I moved it so,
you know, because I didn't want all the lemons small
lemons just falling down. I guess that's a good practice
to do. We're when it gets through a.

Speaker 6 (01:32:53):
Windy if it is good, if if you it's not
too much trouble to move it. That's good, you know,
because if the wind's strong enough, I mean, you can
do a little bit of the damage you're talking about.
But in general, I think you're on meyer. You're you're
pretty good as long as it doesn't get too cold.

(01:33:14):
Another thing about citrus is when the plants are very young,
they're less hardy. That is, the plants get better established.
So uh that that's another thing to keep in mind.
So early on, I might be a little more careful
about about that, but in general you shouldn't shouldn't have
to worry about it.

Speaker 15 (01:33:34):
Okay, going to shoot.

Speaker 6 (01:33:36):
You bet, good luck with it. Just send me half
your meer lemons and we'll call it even. Thanks John.
All right, all right, there you go, Hey, if you
got a question seven one three two one two five
eight seven four. Now you hear me talk about micro
life products all the time. They've been loved by gardeners
and landscape professionals for that matter, for well over thirty

(01:33:59):
five years now.

Speaker 8 (01:34:00):
Uh.

Speaker 6 (01:34:01):
When you look at microlife products, you've got the granule
products like the common fertilizers that we use. They've got
one for acid living plants, they've got one for lawns,
they've got some for fruit trees and things, and then
they have the other granular products like the humates. Humates
products are basically the final decomposing state, decomposed stage of compost.

(01:34:23):
Microlife products have a good stock of beneficial microbes also
in them, because you know microbes, they basically rule the
world when it comes to growing plants and many other
things for that matter. And then they have the liquid
products for microlife. I like the Biomatrix the orange label
seven to one to three. It is a high nitrogen

(01:34:45):
that's seven percent nitrogen, one percent phosphorus, three percent potassium.
You mix it in water. I use a lot from
houseplants because with that high nitrogen you're going to spur
good growth, and houseplants are basically foliage plants for the
most part, and it's what I use. Another great product
by them that I like to use is Microlife Ocean Harvest.
It's a blue label product Microlife Biomatrix orange label, Microlife

(01:35:10):
Ocean Harvest blue label. It's a four to two three product, uh,
and it just doesn't burn your plants. Microlife products being
a natural based not salt based, they you you can
use them as folio, your feeds and things. They're not
going to burn your plants. They actually are very safe
to use for people in pets as well.

Speaker 13 (01:35:31):
Uh.

Speaker 6 (01:35:31):
If you go to Microlife Fertilizer dot com, you can
find out about all their plants or all their fertilizer
products and other products microbe based products. Microlife Fertilizer dot com.
You can also find where to get them. And if
you look at a map at the Greater Houston area,
so where to get microlife it is just just go
outside and throw a rock in any direction, you're going

(01:35:53):
to hit a place where you can buy Microlife. That's
how that's how available it is in the guard Line.
We're here to help you have success with your plants.
The way I like to put it is, we want
you to have a bountiful garden, a beautiful landscape, and
more fun in the process. That's what we try to
do because gardenings should be fun. I talked about a

(01:36:15):
number of different things they have. I was talking about
pruning a little bit ago, and I want to continue
that just a little bit. When when we're pruning plants,
we have to think about what our goal is in pruning.
Early in the plants process. Of the plant's life. We're
doing training on that plant. You know, you've got a

(01:36:36):
fruit tree and you're training it. The training the trunk
and you're getting the main scaffold branches established. Same thing
is true with the shade tree. You're you're knowing how
the final goal of the shape and form of that
tree is, and so you guide it toward that goal.
As once a plant becomes older and established, then we're
doing maintenance types of burning to it. But you need

(01:36:59):
to have an understand of what that is going to be.
So you create a plant like you want. And boy,
have I ever seen some crazy pruning jobs.

Speaker 16 (01:37:08):
It is.

Speaker 6 (01:37:10):
I drive by a house bat a couple months ago.
I was driving by house looking at what they were
doing to their shrubs, and I thought, I finally found
where doctor SEUs lives. That's got to be his house,
because if you ever read a Doctor Seus's book, you
know you got some crazy creatures and the shrubs kind
of look like that. Hey, at your yard, at your shrubs.
You do what you want. I'm not maning to make

(01:37:32):
fun of you, but I can't.

Speaker 3 (01:37:33):
I am.

Speaker 6 (01:37:34):
I'm going to reserve the right to laugh out loud
at some of the things people come up with, But
figure out how to do what you want to do.
What does a plant want? If you're going to do
a hedge and you want privacy, you need to make
sure that it is filled with leaves that are dense density.
So that means having walls that are slanted slightly inward

(01:37:55):
toward the top. So to make it simple, I like
to use analogies and things. Your shrubs should look more
like a capital A than a capital V. Okay, shrubs
want to grow outward at the top like a capital V.
When that happens, the inside gets the bottom. Lower levels
get shaded and there's no foliage and you can see
right through them. So you had that neighbor that sunbathed

(01:38:18):
in his speedo. You don't want to look at that. Well,
you better. You better keep the bottoms of the shrubs
wider than the top and maintain a nice cover of
foliage all the way, all the way from top to bottom. Now,
capital A is a little exaggerated. You don't have shrubs
that are a point at the top, But just know
that the sides of the shrub should slant in slightly

(01:38:41):
toward the top so you get good sunlight to all
areas and maintain density. Just a little tip there on that.
Let's take a quick break and when we come back,
K and Pairland you're going to be our first up.

Speaker 2 (01:38:52):
All right, it's so slow.

Speaker 6 (01:38:55):
Welcome back to the garden Line. Get heavy with us
as always. You got a question seven one three two
one two fifty eight to seventy four. Let's head out
to Parlem now and as promised, visit with K.

Speaker 7 (01:39:09):
Hey K.

Speaker 6 (01:39:10):
Welcome to garden Line.

Speaker 13 (01:39:11):
Good morning, Good morning, Skip, thank you for taking my call.
I have a question about a plant. I brought you
a picture of it. It's been a long time ago
and that I brought it down to when you were
at Portes and I brought a picture. It's an elephant
foot plant and most of them that are in nurseries
now have kind of a fringy top. This one has

(01:39:33):
branches with big leaves on it. And in twenty twenty one, uh,
some of the branches froze and I cut them back,
cut the frozen part off and they re reproduced. They
started putting out branches in the leaves again and now

(01:39:55):
I have a couple of branches that are like six
feet tallerant makes it's kind of difficult to cover it
to protect it in a freeze. And I was going
to prune it in the spring, but I heard this
morning you were talking about pruning. Now, would I want
to cut them back?

Speaker 6 (01:40:17):
Quite something about yeah on something on something like that,
k you could print it in the spring. You don't
need to promote growth on it right now. Uh, well
that's what I was Yeah, Okay, that was a generic
state when I made about like trees and shrubs in
general out in the landscape. Okay, but cool, Okay, what's

(01:40:37):
a very unusual plant?

Speaker 16 (01:40:40):
It is?

Speaker 6 (01:40:41):
Yeah, and trying to remember that over for years.

Speaker 14 (01:40:45):
Yeah, you see a lot of pictures.

Speaker 16 (01:40:50):
It is an unusual.

Speaker 13 (01:40:52):
Unusual hardly anybody knows what I'm talking about.

Speaker 6 (01:40:57):
Well, and there's yeah, sometimes the ponytail palm is called
elephant foot and that's a very different plant. Uh it's similar,
and that you get this big swollen base like on
a true elephant foot plant.

Speaker 12 (01:41:13):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, ever, oh over fifty years good, I'll
be eighty six at.

Speaker 13 (01:41:24):
The end of this month.

Speaker 6 (01:41:26):
So yeah, I've put that thing in the will. I'm
telling you that thing sounds like it wants to live
a long time, can grow so I think, yeah, you
have you always just brought it in. Is that from cold?

Speaker 16 (01:41:43):
Yes?

Speaker 13 (01:41:44):
But well I cover it because it's so too heavy.
It's in a great big pot and it's too heavy.
And my yard is my back porch. I don't have
a walkway from my back port that I can get
to the front sidewalk to get to the garage. It's
just grass and you can't roll anything. It probably weighs

(01:42:08):
one hundred over one hundred pounds, and you can't roll
something that heavy over grass that it just doesn't.

Speaker 6 (01:42:16):
Well, yeah, you need one of those dollies that has
the pneumatic tires, the air fill tires, you know, big old, wide, spongy.

Speaker 8 (01:42:24):
Yeah.

Speaker 13 (01:42:26):
Well I have a yard helper that can lift it.
He and his brother can lift it. So I'm going
to have them come when it gets a real hard
freeze to bring into the garage for me.

Speaker 6 (01:42:45):
How big got it covered? Yeah? How big? Is that
round dome like base on it?

Speaker 13 (01:42:55):
No, it's no more than twelve inches wide.

Speaker 7 (01:42:59):
It has.

Speaker 6 (01:43:02):
Okay, I had.

Speaker 13 (01:43:05):
My aunts took up residence in it for a while,
and I didn't realize that, and it was it was declining.
I finally found it and took care of that and
it has come back and it's a survivor.

Speaker 6 (01:43:17):
I'll tell you, like me, well, if you would be willing,
I would like to see some pictures of your plant close,
maybe the whole plan or something like that, if you're
wanting to do that, and you could email them to me.
I would love to see those. Let me. I'm going
to put you on hold, k and uh if you're

(01:43:37):
if you're willing, that's up to you.

Speaker 13 (01:43:39):
Uh, I'm willing. I tried back with Randy typed to
email some things and it didn't work. So that would
be great if I can get the proper email and
instructions on how to do it.

Speaker 6 (01:43:56):
All right, all right, well okay, yeah, Nicholas will pick
up just here in a second. Don't go away. Thank
you for I appreciate that. It's always interesting.

Speaker 17 (01:44:05):
Uh.

Speaker 6 (01:44:05):
You know people that have plants for a long long time,
and so I don't know it's if it's fair to
call elephant planet house plant, but basically be in cull
tender it kind of is. But to have a plant
for fifty years, Wow, that's amazing. That is amazing. So
here's a phone number if you'd like to call seven

(01:44:27):
one three, two, one two, five eight seven four seven
one three two one two fifty eight seventy four. I
talk about Southwest Fertilizer all the time. It is a
Houston lawn and garden tradition, you know now, and it's well, really,
I guess about to go to the seventy first year.
But this place has been around a long time and

(01:44:47):
people love it because when you go there, you get
what you want. First of all, when you walk into
Southwest Fertilizer, here's what's going to happen. You're gonna get
friendly service, you're gonna get greeted, and you're gonna get
helped by someone who's got the snap and know exactly
what you need to do. I mean, take them a picture,
take them a sample, just describe the situation to them
and they will help you find what you need. Maybe

(01:45:10):
it's a brand new tool from their ninety foot wall
of tools. Maybe it's something controlled insects, diseases, or weeds.
Maybe you're an organic gardener and you want your fertilizers
and your pest control to be all organic products. No
place in the Greater Houston area has an organic selection
as extensive as Southwest fertilizer and as well as the

(01:45:32):
synthetics as well. Everything you need is there. If you
can't find it in Southwest fertilizer, you don't need it.
Everything that works that I would recommend is a Southwest fertilizer,
all right, corner of Bissinet and Runwick in Southwest Houston.
Seven to one three six six six one seven four four,
seven to one three six sixty six one seven four four.

(01:45:57):
Give them a call. Let's take a little bit right here.
I'm going to get some music going here in just
one second, and then we will be back for our
final hour of garden Line coming up. If you have
a question, want to dial during the break here and
be one of the first couple of ones up when
we come back. Seven to win three two one two

(01:46:18):
five eight seven four. Remind you again, as I've done
shamelessly today several times, my website gardening with skip dot com.
It is free to go and download things and see
things on there. You can't talk me down on the
price of free. That is everything that you might need
for various kinds of problems. Had some people call in

(01:46:40):
and a while back and wanted to know how do
I get rid of poison ivy and how do I
get rid of hackberries coming up in the fence line.
Go to my website. It's there. If you go to
my website and look at the publications, click on all
publications and scroll down. Controlling woody Weeds and the land
Escaping Garden tells you exactly how to do it in

(01:47:04):
a way that works, that uses a minimum of herbicide
as safe as you can get. But you need to
know the products you need and how to apply them
properly in the safest possible manner. It's here on the
website and it's free. All right, there you go. We're
gonna take break here when we come back. I just

(01:47:24):
see Mark popped up from deer Park. Mark, you go
be our first stop when you come back.

Speaker 1 (01:47:37):
Welcome to Katie r. H. Garden line with scamp Rictor.

Speaker 2 (01:47:41):
It's just watch him as gas a sorry Sam and

(01:48:13):
between starting is so clean.

Speaker 6 (01:48:30):
And all right, folks, we're back. I just got back
in here with a cup of coffee. Maybe I can
get that other eye open. It's been kind of slow
to open this morning. Started to make a little bit
of sense. After about three cups of coffee. Let's head
out to the phone. So we're going to start by

(01:48:51):
heading out to Deer Park to visit with Mark this morning. Hey, Mark,
welcome to garden Line.

Speaker 18 (01:48:57):
Hey, how you doing.

Speaker 5 (01:49:00):
Hey, I gotta got a question.

Speaker 21 (01:49:02):
Yeah, I've got I got grass where I don't want it,
and I don't have grass where I do want it.

Speaker 6 (01:49:08):
So I'll tell you that that's a problem in life, Mark,
I know that's right.

Speaker 5 (01:49:17):
Now.

Speaker 21 (01:49:17):
I've got some shady areas where I just you know,
Saint Augustine grass is obviously not going to grow in that.
What is the best kind of grass to plant that
is in shady.

Speaker 5 (01:49:29):
Area that doesn't have to have direct huntlike.

Speaker 6 (01:49:33):
Well, Saint Augustine is as shady as we as shade
tolerant as we can get in turf. That right behind it,
pretty pretty close to Saint Augustine are the fine textured zoysias,
the ones with they're just real fine skinny leaves, wast
skinnier than bermuda grass leaves, you know, very very tiny.

Speaker 8 (01:49:53):
Uh.

Speaker 6 (01:49:53):
And those kind of ysiers are Okay, they're not better
than Saint Augustine, though I wouldn't say, at least my
experience is up in So what you end up then
with Mark is you got a few options which are
probably not going to be that acceptable, but here they are.
You can trim trees up and brighten the shade. That

(01:50:14):
is going to have to be done periodically and as
it comes at some expense and not the best thing
for the tree, but that's one thing you can do.
Or you can take the grass out and if you
want a grass like excuse me, if you want a
grass like thing there you can do sedges. There are
some sedges that are like a very tall, tufty grass

(01:50:38):
that will grow well in shade and have a grass
like look to them. Uh. And then there's also things
like monkey grass. You know that you're familiar with monkey
grass or mondo grass that'll grow in a lot of
shade and start green, and you know you could mow
it down periodically once a year or so just to
come up with real fresh new growth on top.

Speaker 5 (01:50:58):
But the noise would that be.

Speaker 14 (01:51:03):
I'm sorry, go ahead, go.

Speaker 6 (01:51:04):
Ahead, Well I was gonna say, the third choice is
to go with something else.

Speaker 21 (01:51:11):
Okay, The best choice for that situation you're saying is
San Augustine. That's the best option out there.

Speaker 6 (01:51:19):
If you want shade tolerance, that's the best we can do.
You want to mow your Saint Augustine higher in the
shade to allow more solar panels to capture the limited sunlight.
You want to try to keep foot traffic off of it,
and don't try don't overfertilize it. In fact, it needs
less fertilizer in the shade because if you tish it
with two much drogen, it has even more problems. And

(01:51:42):
so you it's going to be weak as it is,
and so you're just trying to keep it from thinning out.
But there's some point where there're just got enough light,
not enough light to have success with it.

Speaker 21 (01:51:56):
I got you, okay, but we'll we'll try that at it.
There was some kind of it was some kind of
permuted grass in there, and it just it just not
doing very well. So but I'll try to send Augustine
in there now.

Speaker 5 (01:52:11):
The other question is is that the grass I got where.

Speaker 14 (01:52:14):
I don't want it and I can't bow it.

Speaker 21 (01:52:18):
And I've tried this weed killer grass killer with the
gloss offate and that just doesn't last very long. I mean,
I'd have to do it three times a year just
to keep the grass down. Is there something better out
there than gloss of eate that to keep that grass down.

Speaker 6 (01:52:39):
Well, yeah, it'll kill anything pretty much, grass and broad leaves.
There are products that just kill grass, but they're not
going to be any better than glyphosate. I mean it's
using them three times a year. That makes that makes
sense because the grass is going to come back in time.
It kills what you spray it on, but then it

(01:53:00):
grows back in what are these flower beds or what?

Speaker 15 (01:53:03):
What do you?

Speaker 6 (01:53:04):
What do you what kind of area grass that you
don't want it in?

Speaker 5 (01:53:11):
Well, really weeds.

Speaker 21 (01:53:15):
It's up against the fence line and in some areas where.

Speaker 18 (01:53:18):
I can give a more.

Speaker 6 (01:53:22):
Okay, so I mean the no.

Speaker 5 (01:53:26):
I've tried a.

Speaker 21 (01:53:27):
Soil sterilizer one time before and it seemed to do
pretty good. And I can't remember what that soil sterilizer.

Speaker 6 (01:53:37):
What the name of that was?

Speaker 21 (01:53:38):
I know it was it was a blue color in
a in a like a pint bottle. Yeah, I can't
remember what the name of that stuff is.

Speaker 6 (01:53:49):
Okay, And the other thing I can I.

Speaker 5 (01:53:51):
Can think of it that would probably go ahead?

Speaker 6 (01:53:57):
No, no, go ahead? What what probably you probably put out?

Speaker 8 (01:54:04):
Uh?

Speaker 6 (01:54:05):
I'm sorry about this delay. It makes it frustrating trying
to talk with folks.

Speaker 16 (01:54:09):
I know.

Speaker 6 (01:54:10):
But uh, there's a product ingredient called I am a
z A p y r a mas apeer and it
but when you put it down, I mean it's gonna
kill kill everything. You don't overuse it and you'll be
very careful with it. But for a good period of
time it controls unwanted vegetation. Nothing's gonna want to grow there. Well,

(01:54:35):
I say nothing, and then some weed will pop up
that's resistant to it. But in general that's over the counter.
In garden centers, products containing a maze a peer are
used for that. I just don't generally recommend them because
of the drawback, the potential drawbacks.

Speaker 21 (01:54:54):
Okay, okay, yeah, No, it's in an area where I
don't have any trees, so I don't have to worry
about any other stuff. Yeah, I'll come in contact.

Speaker 5 (01:55:03):
With it where it would kill it.

Speaker 21 (01:55:05):
So but that my Amisa power, amaza power.

Speaker 5 (01:55:08):
Is that you okay?

Speaker 6 (01:55:10):
Uh, I am a hey, I am a z a
Like you're gonna write amazed, but no, that's not the
right spelling. I am a z A p y r
amazing peer. Yeah. Yeah, go go to garden. Something that

(01:55:31):
kills weeds and keeps them killed.

Speaker 21 (01:55:35):
I got you, okay, all right, mighty fine, Hey, I
do appreciate your help.

Speaker 9 (01:55:39):
Thank you very much.

Speaker 6 (01:55:41):
All right, you bet, and good luck with that getting
to the bottom of that one.

Speaker 5 (01:55:45):
Okay, all right, all right, thank you sir.

Speaker 6 (01:55:47):
Thank We're gonna head now out to Angleton and talk
to Josh this morning. Hello, Josh, welcome to garden Line.

Speaker 5 (01:55:57):
Hey, I'm gonna skip me start up with the show,
and you're great show. I had a question on the
I've got about a peach tree and a Freney gawn pot.
It's about six feet tall. Can I cut it off
a foot or two above the graft which are basically
just leave a stick, but so it can grow outwards

(01:56:18):
that it's tall?

Speaker 6 (01:56:24):
So how tall is the plant right.

Speaker 5 (01:56:28):
Now in the in the pot on the ground. It's
probably five five and a half feet tall.

Speaker 6 (01:56:37):
Okay, that's a little drastick.

Speaker 8 (01:56:39):
Uh.

Speaker 6 (01:56:40):
What I do When I get a little pitch in
that I'm planting and it's just a straight up stick,
I will cut it off about waist high maybe, and
then as as the growth begins, it's going to start
off on top, primarily up up new the cut and

(01:57:01):
I'll snip off. When those get about six eight inches long,
I'll snip the tip side of those, and you'll get
some branches that start out down below that and go
out and they cut it at a nice wider angle.
And from that wider angle, it's easier to create that
open bowl shape that we're aiming for a peach pruning.

(01:57:22):
So cut off a little higher and everything that you tip,
it's like you create a bone's eye. It doesn't grow,
it branches and it has leaves, and that supports the tree,
which is important to not take. I'm afraid with what
you originally described that's just cutting too much off. But
you leave that. We call it a trashy top because
you just think of it as a little bowling ball

(01:57:43):
of leaves in there, and then the new growth comes
out and it's supporting the new growth. And then at
the end of the first winter you cut that center out.

Speaker 5 (01:57:53):
Okay, yes, sir, appreciate that.

Speaker 4 (01:57:56):
I don't know if that visually works for you, but yeah,
good luck, there's kind of an amour.

Speaker 5 (01:58:01):
I just didn't know how far I can take it back.

Speaker 6 (01:58:05):
Yep, there you go. All right, Well, good luck with it.

Speaker 8 (01:58:08):
Now.

Speaker 6 (01:58:08):
When fruit finally does appear on it. Just bring me
half the peaches to the station, and you call this
advice for free and even take care Josh, good bye, bye.
Let's go to a break, folks. I'll be right back.
All right, here we go. You welcome back to guard Line.

(01:58:28):
You got a question, I can provide you an answer.
Give me a call seven three two one two five
eight seven four. Happy to visit with you and come
up with a good solution for what you're trying to accomplish.
One of the things I like about horticulture so much
is that it is almost endless in the number and

(01:58:49):
types of plants that you can grow, that you can
learn about. And you know, there's there's a lot of
different kinds of folks out there when it comes to horticulture.
There's the guy that just wants it's a beautiful lawn
and landscape, or a lady and they're gonna har somebody
come in, create me one, take care of it for me,
and I want to look at it when I drive
in and out every day, or I want to sit

(01:59:09):
out in the backyard and enjoy a beauty. There's that,
fair enough, that's the majority of people. And then they're
those that like to get involved, to get their hens
in the dirt, and they want to go out and
find some things and buy them and bring them home
and plant them to have a beautiful lawn, beautiful trees
and shrubs and just maybe even going as far as
a garden and an orchard and their landscapes. That's cool too.

(01:59:34):
And then there are people that get really into stuff.
They get into stuff. I mean we're talking about plant
society type stuff. You know, I'm into roses, like the
best plant on Earth, right, I'm into roses, or I'm
into succulents. That's a fairly new arrival on the scene
in terms of the last decades and that we've been

(01:59:57):
doing this kind of stuff in my life. But the
second one's very popular, very popular on houseplants, very very popular.
And then you get people that actually get into breeding plants.
I've met people that breed dailies their whole life. There
a yard is a big daily patch because they're into that.
They like that and that's fun. That is cool. And
then there's the plant collectors that have got to have

(02:00:19):
whatever they don't have. That's their shopping list is whatever
I don't have, And especially when it comes to certain
kinds of plants, and we see folks that within any
kind of plant, there's certain limitations genetically on that plant,
but breeders are always pushing the edges of that. I
remember as they were looking for a yellow African violet.
You know, African violets are pink and white and blue

(02:00:42):
and purple and those kinds of things. Looking for a
yellow African violet, it doesn't, you know, exist in the
current trade. And then they finally found something that was
kind of yellowish out there in that. But we're always
looking for things that are on the extreme, more dwarf,
more foliage color, different kinds of flower, bigger flowers, and

(02:01:05):
so on. And as we push plants out to the
limits of their genetics, we usually, as we achieve that,
we usually have to give a lot of other stuff
up along the way because you're selecting for one thing,
you know, I want, let's say a rose that has
a bloom. I wanted to get as close to as
big as a hibiscus bloom as I can. Okay, well,

(02:01:27):
good luck on that. But as you go for that,
maybe you leave disease resistance behind. Maybe you leave the
amount of blooms that it puts on as you're trying
to get that biggest bloom on it, and that's kind
of what happens. But that's the fun of horticulture. You
get to play around with stuff like that, you get
to enjoy it. Recently, my wife decided she likes tolentsias.

(02:01:52):
Delentcias are basically bal moss. Okay, bal moss is a tolentsia,
and things called air plants that just like hang on
a piece of fishing twine. Airplants those are often delancias,
And that's a whole other group of plants that for
years I looked at it and it's like that just
looks like ball moss. We'll look at this one. Yeah,

(02:02:12):
that's a ball moss with wide leaves. So that's my
biased opinion of it. But I can appreciate it. I
could appreciate We got ball moss in our house now
because she likes that it's not real ball moss. But
I think I'm gonna go outside and I'm gonna find
search the woods for ball moss and find a unique

(02:02:33):
kind of ball moss and then name it after myself
or people often do. And I don't know if that'll
make the market or not. But anyway, you gotta have fun,
and you can have fun with plants so many different things.
Years ago, I was hanging back in the nineteen seventies,
I guess terrariums were the rage and everybody wanted a terram.

(02:02:55):
You can still get terrariums. You can find them in
these little round glass globes with a hole on the
side that the growing stuff in, and then the big
aquarium that's turned into a plant place. And that's fine,
not as not as the rage now, but that's just
a whole nother world of plants. You put a little
light on it. So I mean you could live on
the eight hundredth floor of a high rise downtown in

(02:03:15):
Houston with no windows and have plants by having a
ger arium with a little light on top. That's what
I'm talking about. It makes this fun. But I got
to warn you these are all addictive, all addictive. All right,
let's go to Southwest Houston and we're going to visit
this morning with Ann. Hello, Anne, welcome to garden Line.

Speaker 16 (02:03:35):
Good morning, Skip, Skip. I know I turn on my
radio lates, so you've been talking about proning, and I
have pruning questions. I thought a red bud, good traveler
weeping red bud from Carnelia's nursery years ago. And I
just realized this year that part of the tree dropped

(02:03:57):
all its leaves and the rest of it did not.
And I think what lost the leaves was the rootstock. Okay, yeah,
it lost all its leaves. So I went to Cornelius
and they said, don't cut it down. Don't cut it

(02:04:17):
out now because the rest is weeping. But that one
is just branching off like a traditional red bud. So
if I cut it, do I cut it now now
that the leaves have all fallen down to the ground,
or and put like a sucker preventative? Should I leave

(02:04:37):
it alone?

Speaker 6 (02:04:39):
Well, let me make sure I understand because I got
a little confused in the question there. So you've got
a traveler and it has an upright trunk and then
a weeping top. And are the leaves on the weeping
that are still there? Are they on the weeping top
or are they on the trunk coming off the trunk?

Speaker 16 (02:04:56):
I had multiple trunks, like three small or weeping sunks,
but one dominant that's probably an inch and a half
that is just like a traditional red bud. With no
weeping at all.

Speaker 6 (02:05:08):
That's okay. Well, yeah, that so that section, one of
two things has happened. Either the thing it was grafted
onto has sprouted out there, or sometimes you can get
a genetic change that occurs in a plant. We see
this like in shrubs that are are kind of variegated

(02:05:31):
white and yellow, and suddenly you'd get just green branches
growing in them. That's a reversion back to the original genetics.
So it doesn't matter what is causing it. But what
I would do is I would prune out the normal
red bud looking parts of it, cut them all the
way back to where they attach to the other parts
of the plant, and leave your weeping top because that's

(02:05:51):
why you have traveler. It's a weeping a variety of
red right.

Speaker 16 (02:05:56):
But do I put like something to prevent it from
respe outing that the graft portion or would that hurt?

Speaker 6 (02:06:04):
Yeah, you can't. I think my first My first attempt
would be just to cut it off as close to
where it attaches as possible and hope I take care
of it there. If you get re sprouting of the
the non weeping red bud form from that spot, then
I would do a product there are products like sucker

(02:06:26):
stopper that you would apply to that cut as you
referred to, around the base of it, and it would
stop regrowth for a period of time. You may later
have to do it again, but a sucker stopper would
would be that.

Speaker 17 (02:06:39):
Okay for that and skip?

Speaker 16 (02:06:40):
Do you have time for another question on trooning? It's
on safe trees. I have various types, but I have
a little miss figgy which is supposed to be a
dwarf but it's really not mine or branching out like
Medusa's head, and I'm almost like, cut it all the
way down to the ground and let it reach brought

(02:07:03):
in the spring to try to control it better.

Speaker 18 (02:07:07):
Should I do that?

Speaker 6 (02:07:08):
Well, you can do you can you can do that.
You can do that. Missfigures sometimes put in containers, and
containers themselves help control the size of a plant by
limiting the root system.

Speaker 16 (02:07:19):
Okay, then could I move you elect the Bordeaux sig tree?
Could I move that from a location right now while
it's dormant or that's not recommended.

Speaker 6 (02:07:31):
I have never had a be elected bardoux that you're
a plant collector, lady, this is some special.

Speaker 19 (02:07:39):
Stuff in Chicago.

Speaker 18 (02:07:41):
Hardy bless and yeah, okay.

Speaker 6 (02:07:45):
Well I know where to come get cuttings. Then when
you can you can move figs. Yeah, you you can
move figs just fine. Just take them up. Go ahead
and do it now, uh or at the very end
of winter. But get it done before it warms up
too much. And you can move them. As far as

(02:08:07):
the figs you can cut them back, you know. And
as you go north in Texas there's areas where figs
pretty much in the winter time are going to freeze back.
But then they sprout out again from the base if
you when you move it, when you cut it back,
cut it back to about four to six inches high,
and then and then not that spread from there. I'm sorry,

(02:08:29):
I missed my time and I'm gonna have to go,
but good luck with that. And thank you very much
for the call to welcome back to Garden Light. Little
music from Forrest Frank, who will be at the rodeo
on the seventh night. Just another plug for some great
music out there. Houston Livestock showing Rodeo every year. Great

(02:08:54):
lineup the performers. Let's go out to the phones. Now
we're gonna have to sugar Land and talk with Denise.
Hello Denise, welcome to garden Line.

Speaker 22 (02:09:07):
Good morning, Skip. Hopefully you're doing well. I have a
pruning question on our bipech. It's about three years old,
I think, not more than four. It started out about
six feet tall and now it's like twelve feet plus
a little bit. This thing is huge, right, so we
need to prune it. We just don't know for sure how.

Speaker 13 (02:09:31):
How do we do that.

Speaker 22 (02:09:32):
There's a lot of little twigs in there, of course,
and then the big question can we trim back a
limb that's like an inchine diameter or leave those?

Speaker 6 (02:09:42):
So we need to help with that, all right, So, Denise,
Vitex is really prone to suckering and re sprouting, and
as you try to shape it into some form like
you would think of other trees, maybe having it resists that,
but you can. You just have to stay with it.

(02:10:04):
And a lot of the little twiggy growth is dead anyway.
The stuff that's so maybe half the size of a
pencil or smaller in diameter, that's probably already did so
you can print all of that out. If you are
going to try to make vitext do what it doesn't
want to do, you might have to have a product
called sucker stopper with you on hand, so that when

(02:10:26):
you make a cut like that, you can treat the
cut in the area around it and it'll suppress the
regrowth of buds from that spot for a while. And
I've done that. I've tried to force a Vtex into
a single trunk very upright tree, and I've had to
use sucker stopper to get it to do that, because
that's not Vitex's normal shape and form. Once you get

(02:10:47):
the tree print like you want it, you can maintain
that just fine. But when you cut off an inch
diameter branch, you're going to get probably four or five
or six shoots that come out from the base of
that without if you don't use a sucker stopper.

Speaker 22 (02:11:04):
Okay, so can we trim down the top quite a bit,
top it off.

Speaker 6 (02:11:09):
You can, it's gonna shoot suckers up everywhere, and you're
gonna be having to stay on it pretty diligently to
get it under control. Otherwise that it just kind of
goes crazy up there from that.

Speaker 22 (02:11:24):
So if we would cut it down, stay it's about
twelve feet to three feet off, the top would get back.

Speaker 6 (02:11:33):
Yeah, just keep in mind anywhere, Like think of a highway.
You've got a highway and then you have these exit
ramps going off to the side. So if that highway
was a branch, and instead of just stubbing it off
somewhere where like the top of a broom handle, you

(02:11:53):
cut it off just above an exit ramp, just above
a side branch. You get a little less re sprouting
from that because you're directing the growth to what already
exists going out to one side. And so as you
bring that top down, rather than just mow off the
top of it like a hedge, come down and find

(02:12:14):
a side shoot that's acceptable and cut it above that
and then treat those cuts with sucker stopper. And that's.

Speaker 22 (02:12:24):
The horizontal growth too, is really wide. Can we trim
on the sides of it somewhat?

Speaker 6 (02:12:32):
You can? And again I would cut back to where
there is a side branch that is acceptable to you,
and cut it off just out just above that side
branch exit where it exits the main And then all the.

Speaker 22 (02:12:45):
Little twiggy, really thin limbs in there now that we
see with no leaves, those can probably.

Speaker 10 (02:12:50):
All be.

Speaker 6 (02:12:53):
Yeah, you can cut all that out or just ignore
it and it'll fall out in time, but Vitex does
a lot of a lot of that.

Speaker 22 (02:13:02):
Okay, and then can we do can we through now
or do we need to wait a.

Speaker 6 (02:13:06):
Well no, I do it now. And you're also going
to do it when new growth starts again. And what
I'll do on mine when you see new growth starting,
I may just take my thumb and rub off a
little shoot that's a quarter or a half inch long
starting to come out. You know you don't have to.

Speaker 22 (02:13:23):
All right, we'll see what we can do. Thanks a lot, good.

Speaker 6 (02:13:27):
Good luck, Thank you, Denise. Appreciate appreciate your call very much.
Uh let's see here, Oh I want to I wanted
to talk about a Medina product. I've talked about a
number of different Medina products before, but they have something
called liquid humus. And liquid humus is a liquid, of
course the name implies. But humus is like the final
decomposed stage of compost. So here's the way I describe it.

(02:13:52):
You got a pile of leaves and you compost them,
and you've got compost. You have a pile of composts
and you let it keep composting, and you end up
eventually with humis the final decomposed stage, so it's like
concentrated compost in a bottle. For this particular humate humic acid,
and it contains a couple of very important ingredients that

(02:14:12):
are in nature in humus. There's a humic acid and
there's a fulvic acid. And don't let the word acid
scare you. It is a natural product that helps build
the soil with structure. It helps do a number of
things down in the soil. They create a better soil
for plants. Plants build soil over time, and humis is

(02:14:33):
one of the ways that that happens. And you can
shortcut that whole process by buying humate liquid humus from
the folks at Medina and using it as directed on
the label. Works very well. We're going to take a
quick break here, Steve and West Houston. You will be
first up when we come back from this brief break.

(02:14:54):
By This is Robinson, by someone you probably didn't expect it.
This is Robinson from a group called the Lemonheads, and
I played that just I've been thinking about Randy Lemon,
my predecessor here on the show for over twenty five years.

(02:15:15):
Randy was a host of Garden Line and he made
this show. He grew it. He basically put it on
the map in a bigger and bigger way. And it's
been around for a long time since the fifties, a
garden line or a version of it, and Randy Reid
put it on the map. And a year ago, early

(02:15:35):
this January, Randy passed on that year, several years ago,
early this January, Randy passed away.

Speaker 18 (02:15:41):
And that.

Speaker 6 (02:15:44):
Date passing, I always think about it every year now
in early January on a trip up to the New
York area kind of came as a shock and a
surprise for all of us. But I just want to
take a moment to honor Randy and remember Randy and
the contribution that he made. And I we were friends
in college. Actually we lived in the same dorm at
Texas A and M. And I've known Randy for years,

(02:16:06):
been on the show a number of times before I
actually became a host of the show. But his passing
was very, very unexpected and a great loss for the
gardening world around here. Randy was bigger than life, that's
for sure. You knew if you were in a room
and Randy was in it, you knew it. You sure
did know it. So just a just a remembrance of

(02:16:28):
Randy Lemon. Let's let's head out now and go to
West Houston and talk to Steve this morning. Good morning, Steve,
welcome to garden Line.

Speaker 19 (02:16:40):
Thank you, good morning. Speaking about Randy, of course I
remember him. He and I went to the same high school,
but he was a few years younger, not too many.

Speaker 10 (02:16:50):
But.

Speaker 6 (02:16:53):
Steve was was that down in Sharpstown or what part
of Houston was at Stafford.

Speaker 18 (02:16:59):
Near where it was Robert E.

Speaker 19 (02:17:01):
Lee which is no longer there? Okay, Hillcroft near Richmond.

Speaker 6 (02:17:08):
Okay, down southwest anyhow, right, good, Yeah.

Speaker 19 (02:17:13):
I made the mistake of putting barbecue ashes in a
compost container. It's mostly had just old you know, soil
in it. But then I got to read something and
they said, oh, that's a no no, And I would say,
though the majority was just wood. Now I can't remember.

(02:17:36):
There may be some brickheads, but that would be a
small amount. And it's all, you know, fine ash.

Speaker 18 (02:17:43):
What can I do?

Speaker 19 (02:17:44):
I have not put it out anywhere? What can I
do to remedy that problem? With too much ash content?
I don't want to spread it around and burn things up?

Speaker 6 (02:17:54):
Right right? Well, Steve, ashes can be used throughout the landscape.
The things that ashes do. As you use too much
of them, you get a concentration of certain nutrients. A
little bit of ash goes a long way. If you've
ever seen a burn pile and a pasture where they
pile up wood and burned it and then the grass
grew back in, the grass is greener right there, unless

(02:18:16):
there's too much of it, and then the grass won't
grow right there. It raises a pH quite a bit too.
So if you were going to grow blueberries or as alias,
you wouldn't want to use compost with ashes in it
around those plants eat it down enough. Yeah, I don't
know how much ash you put in versus how much
compost you have. If it's too concentrated, you can just

(02:18:37):
make more compost and kind of dilute it down. But
a little bit of ash is it's minerals, it's nutrients,
and it can be a good thing just in excess.
Those are the those are the drawbacks to it. So
I wouldn't throw it away now I would. I would
just find a way to dilute it down, maybe maybe
put it around some plants and just kind of a

(02:18:58):
very small test spot and see see how it looks,
and if it does okay, then use it. If not,
makes more pomposts and dilute it down a little bit.

Speaker 18 (02:19:07):
Not this.

Speaker 19 (02:19:09):
Particular container material we're talking about. But I have put
not a lot, but time to time put ashes around
fruit trees. Would you say, do not put this kind
of ash around the around fruit trees.

Speaker 6 (02:19:30):
Ashes that are from the fireplace and stuff are a
burnpole kind of thing. That's fine. I'm not real crazy
about brickets sometimes, you know, with lighter fluid and other
chemicals and stuff that might be around, I'd rather not
use those, So I don't use my barbecue pet ashes typically.
I don't know. Maybe it'd be fine too, but I
just I'm gonna err on the side of caution there,

(02:19:50):
but I'll never do again. It's yeah, if you go
online and do a search for using ashes, you kind
of have to be careful by it based on the
sol but sometimes you'll find yeah, you can use like
in a line you can put out x pounds per
thousand square feet of ashes or something, and that then
that would guide you on on using them. All right, sir,

(02:20:13):
thank you so much, Thank you care Yeah, appreciate your
call very much. Appreciate that. Hey, I want to remind you.
Texas Gardener has its Planting Guide out. It's been out
for a while now. The Planting Guide or ex see
me Planning Guide, not planting Guide. Their Planning Guide is
a really cool little booklet. It's got month by month
planting schedules for each region of Texas, including ours. Of course,

(02:20:37):
it's got expert tips in it for planning your garden,
how you would lay out your garden. It has reminders
as you go through the season, what kind of maintenance
you to do now you know it's it's a late January,
what do I do in the garden and things. It
has some really good recommendations for some Texas native plants too,
and that that's always popular. Native plants are as popular

(02:20:58):
as they've been in a very long time, and now
I see that growing in popularity. And then it has
some tools for weather tracking and planning and so on
for your garden. You can get these from the folks
at Texas Gardener. Here is their website. It's really easy
to remember. Probably don't even have to write it down
Texasgardener dot com. It's a great magazine. I write for it.

(02:21:18):
I do several articles typically in an issue, and it
is their motto is by Texas Gardeners, for Texas Gardeners,
and that is really true. I know a number of
the writers for Texas Gardener and they're horticultural experts and
they grow here. It's not like they read it in
a book somewhere. These are people that actually get their

(02:21:41):
hands in the dirt and have experience for years and
in many cases professional training too. And it's an excellent magazine.
I can't recommend it more. I subscribe to it Cheves
Texas Gardener, and you can subscribe to get the print magazine.
You can pick it up at a lot of our
local nurseries and garden centers will carry Texas Gardener magazines
are at the checkout. Or you can also subscribe to

(02:22:03):
the online version or both. If you want print and online,
you can do that, but mainly right now, Hey, it's January,
New Year, New Year's resolution for your garden. Get the
twenty twenty six Planning Guide from the folks at Texas
Gardener magazine. They call it the Planning Guide and Calendar.
I believe it in a nineteen bucks, which is a

(02:22:23):
really good deal for what you're getting out of that
all right, texasgardener dot com. Well, music means the show's
over until next weekend at least this time. The music
means that appreciate you being with us here on garden line.
I hope you have a wonderful week out there in
the garden. Just another reminder, go to the website gardening

(02:22:45):
with Skip dot com. Download these things I've been talking
about today. You'll find some things on there I haven't
talked about that very interested in. And as well, you
can find my schedules. The lawn care schedule, which is
in a nutshell, how to grow a beautiful, dense lawn.
That's the most important schedule up there. The second schedule

(02:23:07):
is what do you do when things go wrong in
the lawn. You're an organic gardener, you're synthetic gardener, you're
both whatever. There's help for you in those schedules. So
I recommend you download those, print them out, pick them
up in the garage or under refrigerator, take them with
you when you go shopping. So you say, I need
some of this right here,