How to Pick a Spot For Your Plants

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to Katie r h Garden Line with Skip Rictor.

Speaker 2 (00:04):
It's crazy Trim.

Speaker 3 (00:13):
Just watch him as Google.

Speaker 4 (00:19):
That so many bodies to supposy Greg not a sun
glass gas.

Speaker 5 (00:35):
Sun.

Speaker 2 (00:38):
Hey, good morning, Good Sunday morning. I hope this morning
finds you well. Looking forward to visiting with you about
the things that are of most interest to you regarding
your garden. If you have a question you'd like to
ask or visit about this morning, well, all you got

(01:01):
to do is do this, pick up the phone seven
one three two one two kt r H seven one
three two one two k t r H and we
will take it from there. If you if your question relates,
let's say your question is something I really would need
to see a picture about, like I got this weed,
and well, we can't describe weeds on the air very

(01:23):
well or accurately, so send me a picture. All you
have to do is call Alejandro and get an email
to send it, and then following sending me the picture,
give me a call. That is the easiest way, the fastest,
and I guess from what you would be very interested
in the most accurate way for me to help you

(01:43):
with a question that you might have. I can try
to imagine what you're describing. But you know, maybe we
get it right, maybe we don't, but if I see
a picture, we can we can definitely nail it and
get it just exactly right. The folks that you're around
Houston are really specialists, you know, when it comes to corroeration, compost,
stop dressing, and I render to a lot of people
that will send me pictures and the lawn is just

(02:05):
not doing well. I mean, it's thin, it's dead in areas.
Maybe it's struggling in some areas, and I can see
sometimes I can see, you know, where the foot traffic
has gone across it, and those paths are compacted, and
it's just struggling.

Speaker 6 (02:20):
Well.

Speaker 2 (02:20):
Compost, top dressing, following following a core aeration is the
best way I think to bring along back fast like that.
You can water, you can fertilize. Those are all important.
But if the soil is compacted, then it's going to
struggle period, and so it tends to get compact, especially
as we walk on it or as pets go across it.

(02:41):
Year round Houston dot Com that's the website, that's the
name of the company. Year Round Houston dot Com eight
three two eight eight four fifty three thirty five eight
three two eight eight four fifty three thirty five. They
use top quality compost that settles right down into the lawn,
nice fine textured compost and basically serving this area inside

(03:02):
the beltway around Houston. So if you live in that
area and you're interested in giving them a call eight
three to two eight eight four fifty three thirty five
year round Houston dot Com. I think we're going to
start on the phones this morning by going out to
Katie and talking to Ralph. Hello, Ralph, welcome to Guardline.

Speaker 7 (03:21):
Come skip, good morning.

Speaker 8 (03:23):
How are you.

Speaker 2 (03:25):
I'm doing well?

Speaker 9 (03:25):
Thank you fantastic.

Speaker 7 (03:28):
Hey, I had a question on your schedule. I've been
following it.

Speaker 10 (03:33):
The yard works great.

Speaker 7 (03:35):
And I noticed that it says either June July to
do another slow release fertilization, even though I just did one,
and I'm curious, is that necessary or is it just
a suggestion?

Speaker 2 (03:58):
Right, It's just a suggest and it's based on you know,
sometimes people using the word slow release. There's some slow
releases that are really slow they last a long time,
like four months, and then there's some that are not
as long in terms of how long they last. So
I put that on there just to carry us on
forward a little further. Uh, depending on the rates you

(04:21):
put it down. And when you got the first one down,
you may or may not want to do the second
one in June or July.

Speaker 10 (04:28):
The same with the barricade.

Speaker 11 (04:31):
You have it listed another time.

Speaker 10 (04:34):
Correct, Yes, so it works the same, right.

Speaker 2 (04:39):
Well, the bear another word that's list Go.

Speaker 8 (04:43):
Ahead, go ahead, you want, we.

Speaker 2 (04:51):
Got a time. We've got a timing delay here, so
it's hard to not talk over each other. So the
barricade that's listed in February that prevents that gets a
out of all the warm season weed germination. That's what
we're trying to do. The one barricade doesn't last forever,
and you know when you get about ninety days out
from it, you are going to be it's going to
be breaking down and not continuing if you used at

(05:14):
the proper rate. And so that's where another application can
be used. Especially if you got a thin turf and
you're struggling with weeds, you're trying to keep them out
of there, you can do the second one that is
not a requirement. Hopefully by then your lawn is looking
good and it's filling in and it's not as needed,
but in a lot of lawns, that second application carries

(05:37):
it on further into the summer because things like grasper
and there's some other warm season weeds that may germinate
every month on through the summer.

Speaker 11 (05:48):
Got it, Thank you so much.

Speaker 12 (05:50):
Appreciate it, all right.

Speaker 2 (05:52):
You bet, thanks, thanks for the question. I appreciate that.
All right, folks. Nitrofoss has a number of great products
out there on the market, and I was just visiting
with Den yesterday about some of the stuff that they
have going and the nitrofive Super Turf nineteen four ten
is like that, that's the elephant in the room for summer.

(06:15):
It just really is it. As we were talking about
how long does a slow release last, well, this one's
going to go about sixteen weeks, about four months. And
if you put down a good rate, a recommended rate,
the proper rate for it, it will carry you through. Now,
something I often say is, are you if you return

(06:35):
your clippings, then you get even an extended release, because
when you put on fertilizer and grow grass clippings and
then chop those up, put them back down in the lawn,
don't catch them in a bagger. Well that they begin
to release their nutrients in our hot, warm, summer moist
environment down there in the turf, and by doing that

(06:56):
you get additional recycling of those nutrients. So that also
carries you on further. Not everybody bags, and so that's
another reason why on the schedules in the middle there,
I'll put a second application of the slow release to
carry on through summer. So those are all optional, and
I realize everybody's in a different situation. But this Night
five superturf is an is a very good product designed

(07:18):
for our southern turf grass is designed for our soils
here and it works. It's the bottom line. You're going
to find it in places like plants and things in Brenham.
You go out to Baytown, you'll find it at Fisher's
Hardware there if you're done in Clute Lake Hardware and
Clute on Dixie Drive carries night FoST products as well.
I'm going to take a little break here and we

(07:39):
will be back with your calls. If you would like
to give me a call, it's seven one three two
one two fifty eight seventy four or seven one three
two one two kt r H Well good Sunday morning.
Good to have you guys with us this morning. We
are looking forward to answering questions all morning and talking
to gardeners. That's what we do here online. We try

(08:00):
to help you have a more bountiful garden, a more
beautiful landscape, and more fun in the process. That is
the important part. Enjoy it, have more fun, right all right?
Well all you got to do seven one three two
one two ktr h and you will be live here.
Don't be afraid to call. I talk to people all
the time. By the way, I had a good time

(08:21):
yesterday out at the Ace Hardware Store Hardware City Ace
on Memorial Drive. We had a lot of folks come through.
Good to visit with everybody. Uh and uh. You know,
when we're out at those events and we get to visit,
a lot of times people will go, yeah, I don't
call in because I don't know. I don't want to
call in and be on the air and stuff. And
it's come on, man, Look, if you've listened to Gardenline

(08:43):
for one show, you know I don't bite. I used
to say this all the time. I probably ought to
say that more again, but I used to say, there's
no such thing as a stupid question, just stupid answers.
So the pressure's on me, not you, okay, And that's true.
I mean if you were a brand new rookie gardener,
or a rookie at growing some new thing, maybe a

(09:05):
garden before, but you never grew catalia orkins before, you know,
or whatever you call about, it's okay, that is all right,
don't worry about it. We don't treat questions like their
stupid questions. We try to help you with them. And
so just give me a call because other people will
have that question too. There are a lot of people,
the vast majority of people listen to Garden Line. I

(09:26):
mean vast majority never call in. They just listen because
they like the listening here and do stuff. Well, you're
welcome to call in. So anyway, that's my two cents
worth on that. One of the things I just really
enjoy here on guard Line is our feed store sponsors,
and it's because I grew up going to feed stores

(09:47):
and it's just a great memory. You know, you walk
into a feed store and you smell the smell of
that feed, and to me, that is just a I
don't know, that's like Grandma's chocolate, cookies, bacon, bacon in
the kitchen as you're a kid growing up or whatever
your old factory sent related memories are. But I love
feed stores and League City Feed is that kind of feedstore.

(10:09):
It has been around for over forty years now, is
built in an Okra patch and the third generation of
Thunderbergs are now running the store Wes and Madison. You'll
see them there when you go. The number if you
only get MC call is two eight one three three
two sixteen twelve. They're open Monday through Saturday, nine to
six and six o'clock. That way, you can swing by

(10:31):
after work and grab some things. Closed on Sundays. But
League City Feed is located in League City. It's on
Highway three, a few blocks south of Highway ninety six,
so it's really easy to get to. As you head
south from Highway ninety six, it'll be on the left
down Highway three just a little bit. And all of
those communities in the greater League City area, this is

(10:52):
your hometown feed store. This is old time service where
they carry the bags out for you and they have
the stuff you're looking for, premium pet foods and the
things to control pests in your garden, diseases in your garden,
to prevent or control weeds in your garden. You hear
me talk about nitrophoss and asmide and microlife and heirloom
soils and nilson plant all of that. League City Feed.

(11:16):
So you want to have a beautiful garden and a
bountiful garden, League City Feeds the place to go, tell them,
we said him skipped from Garden Line said high when
you stop by there, Uh, the East Madison has a
I hope, I hope still. I had a little Dalmatian
called Roorschak, and I always thought that was the best

(11:38):
name for a dog in the world. I mean, a
Dalmation named Roorshak. Remember the Rorshak test where you look
at an ink blot and they say what do you
see when you see this spot? So you study the dog,
I guess, and tell them what do you see? Good
name for a Dalmatian? All right? I love dogs. We
got a couple of them ourself, and we sure do

(12:00):
love those dogs. If you have not been to Plants
for all seasons, that's the garden center that's up on
Highway two forty nine Tombull Parkway, just north of Luetta.
So it's on Tomball Parkway, but it's just about a
block north of Luetta on the right hand side there
if you're going north. It's an incredible place. If you're

(12:21):
a green thumb, well you probably already know about it.
And if you have a brown thumb, or you think
you do, then go in there and they will help
your thumb turn green because you know what turns the
thumb green. I tell you all the time on garden Line,
it is information. When you educate your thumb, your thumb
turns green. That's kind of how that works, if you
want to talk brown and green thumbs. This is a

(12:43):
full service retail garden center. It's been family owned and
operated since nineteen seventy three. These folks are true lawn
and garden experts. They are. You can take them pictures,
you can take them samples of plants and they'll identify them.
They'll points you to the right product if that's what's needed.
Even just go into an area and go, hey, look
at that patio. I want to put a container on it,

(13:04):
and what would be some good plants for a container
in this picture to go in this on this patio,
and they can do that. They can direct you through
it and take the time to walk you through select
the plants. They have some great containers there as well.
So as they say, get your green on at Plants
for All Seasons and they can help you do just that.

(13:25):
Plants for All Seasons dot com is the website. The
phone number if you'd like to give them a call
to eight one three seven six sixteen forty six two
eight one three seven six one six four six. You're
listening to Gardenline and I'm your host, Skip Richter. We're
here to help you have a bountiful and beautiful place

(13:47):
and it's not that difficult. You just follow a few
simple principles. Think like a plant. How about that? That
would be my advice. Think like a plant. So if
you were a plant, what would you want? And that's
how you have success with plants. So, for example, you
are an azalea or you are a tomato plant. Okay,

(14:07):
we're going to interview in azalea. What do you want? Well,
I like light, but I don't want to be in
the blazing sun all day. That's just too much. Okay,
we'll provide that. I like moisture consistently, but I don't
want to be in a swamp and I cannot get
too dry for too long. That's what I want, all right.
We can provide that. I'm really from forested regions where

(14:29):
the soil is rich and organic y and just wonderful soil,
and it's acidic, not highph soil. All right, we can
provide you that, and you start doing that for the plant,
not asalia is going to be as happy as a clam,
as they say. I don't know why they say that.
Why would a clam be happy? Anyway, that's how you
do it. But the tomato plant, same interview. I want

(14:51):
to be in the sun. The more sun, the better.
You put me in less than six hours of sun,
and you will not get as much production from me. Okay,
we'll provide that, and on and on down the line.
That's how you have successive plants. What does a plant want?
Give them that? And as we were saying about the thumbs,
the more you know what a plant wants and the
more you provide it, the more people walk on around

(15:14):
and go, well, you must have a green thumb. Well
I have an informed thumb. Let's head out to the phones.
We're gonna go all the way up to Willis Texas
and talk to Ann. Hello, Anne, how are you today? Good?

Speaker 11 (15:26):
How are you?

Speaker 2 (15:28):
I'm doing well? Thank you?

Speaker 11 (15:30):
Good?

Speaker 12 (15:33):
Yellow circles on my lawn. I'm assuming that's fungus.

Speaker 6 (15:39):
Could be.

Speaker 2 (15:42):
It could be, well, we normally the normally is that
brown patch that causes the yellow circles. It is primarily
a cooler season disease, but there is a cousin of it,
arise ac tonia that can attack in the warm summertime too.

Speaker 12 (16:01):
Okay, if do I need a fungus side.

Speaker 13 (16:04):
To get rid of it?

Speaker 2 (16:06):
Yes, probably not. Avoid over doing the nitrogen and avoid
you adding water too frequently. Now you can't control the rain,
but if you were to water your lawn every other day,
you're going to promote that disease.

Speaker 13 (16:22):
Okay.

Speaker 12 (16:23):
So a lot of the the grass is it's new,
it's it's been down maybe a month and a half so,
and then of course we were watering because it was new,
and then we had all this rain and now it's
not very happy.

Speaker 2 (16:44):
When did you first notice the yellowing?

Speaker 12 (16:48):
When we had that first time we had a lot
of rain. I think we had like in two days,
we had like six inches.

Speaker 14 (17:00):
It was a lot.

Speaker 12 (17:00):
Okay, Okay, that's when I first started noticing it.

Speaker 2 (17:07):
Based on what I'm hearing, and of course I'm not
seeing it, but based on what I'm hearing, I think
that you're gonna be okay, just you know, let let's
let it warm up and dry out a little bit,
and I think it's going to be all right. If
I saw a picture, I might see something else that's
not occurring to me as we talk about it. But yeah,

(17:29):
that that would be That would be my suggestion to you.

Speaker 12 (17:34):
Okay, all right, okay, sounds good.

Speaker 2 (17:38):
And another thing you might do is, uh, have you
ever been to Growers Outlet. They're on Highway seventy five
just south of Wales. Okay, well good, Yeah, you might
take them a picture in there because they're very knowledgeable
and visit with them and see see see what they see.
They do carry some products as well, and so you
know that that may be another backup on it. But

(17:58):
you always need another used to go in there, because
the place is great.

Speaker 1 (18:02):
Right.

Speaker 12 (18:02):
Yeah, well I went in there. I actually went in
there yesterday and I was looking at the fungus side
and I was reading the back of the bag and
it was talking about using it as a preventative, and
I thought, well, yeah, well okay, but.

Speaker 2 (18:17):
In general that that's true of fundericides in general. Like
when you get powdery mildew all over a leaf of
a rosebush or whatever you have, it's a little late
to spray and do much about it. Very few fundicides
have curative properties, but they protect and prevent. And so
with your lawn, if it were going to keep getting worse,

(18:38):
you go ahead and do it anyway, even though you
have a little bit of it, in order to prevent
it from getting worse. That that's kind of how fungicides work.
So it's a judgment call as to whether you want
to treat it or not. And I can't see it,
so it's hard for me to give that. But that's
why I would suggest you go talk to them too,
because you can take them a picture right there. I

(19:00):
believe I lost I lost my collar there, all right.
Well anyway, yeah, Growers Outlet for any of you up
there around the lake area around certainly Conroe and Willis
and New Waverley and that whole region up there, even
the Woodlands Grows Outlet. You got to go check it out.
It's Growers Outlet in Willis, Dot com Growers Outlet and

(19:22):
Willis dot Com. It's on Hyset Highway seventy five south
of Willis, north of Conrad, Okay. And you can go
online to that website Growers Outlet and Willis dot com
and you can see they list their availability on the
web and they put the prices as well on the web,
which is very unusual for a company to do that.
But when you go in, you're going to see a

(19:43):
lot of cool things. It's a full service garden center. Well,
it looks like we're getting pretty close here to another
little break in the action. As someone was asking me
about Piercescapes of it in, I just wanted to comment
about them. Piercecapes does anything you need done pretty much
around the landscape, whether it's a design from the beginning

(20:04):
from the ground up, whether it's some renovations, if the
irrigation needs work, if you want lighting, if you need drainage,
and you should know it by now after the rain
we have Go to their website Puerscapes dot com and
see their work and you will be sold on it
as I was. Or call them two eight one three
seven oh fifty sixty. I'm gonna take a break and
we'll be right back. All right, there we go. There

(20:27):
used to be a time before, probably almost all of
our time listening to this when singing cowboys little things.
Some of you may remember that. I remember it just
as watching all movies that was in the day where
you knew who to shoot at out in the West
because they either wore a black or a white hat.

(20:47):
If the guy on the other side of the big
rock across the canyon had on a black hat and
was shooting at you, that man, he was a bad guy.
Oh boy, Hello, Genatry, Hey, welcome back to garden Line.
And we do play a mix of music here. I
know it's a gardening show, but I like to have
some fun. I enjoy music. I enjoy a variety of things.

(21:08):
We got, we got radio shows you can listen to
that just play all the modern music all the time.
But hey, let's mix it up a little bit. That's
what we're doing, speaking and mixing it up a little bit.
How about mixing it up with one of your calls
seven one three two on two K t r H.
What do you want to talk about? Real happy, We're
happy to visit about all kinds of things related to plants. Uh,

(21:30):
microlife fertilizers. You hear me talk about them all the time.
You see them everywhere you go. I mean feed stores,
garden centers, good quality mom and pop garden centers, and
certainly Ace hardware stores, a Southwest fertilizer. You get the
idea there everywhere. Well, micro Grow Liquid AF is a
product for microlife. And I don't talk about this a lot,

(21:52):
but I'm gonna right now and I want you to
know about this. It is a product that has eight
different beneficial microbes that dominate the soil situation and protect
your plants. Did you know you know, people talk about
microbes or bacteria, and you think, well with people when
they say, well you got bacteria, that's like, oh that's
a bad thing, right, that's a disease or whatever. Well,

(22:15):
bacteria can cause plant disease. But there are a lot
of bacteria that are out there preventing plant disease. That's
why the bad guys don't run wild. We're talking about
the bacteria now that wear the white hats, okay, strapped
to mices and Trachiderma and Bacillus. There's a lot of
good forms of all of those. I was just looking
at a product this morning that actually it's a fungicide

(22:38):
and it has basically the ingredient is Bacillus subtless and
that's one of the things that you find in micro
grow liquid. If there's a pile of research a mile
high about the benefits of these bacteria and fighting disease,
it's fighting disease naturally the way nature does. How does
nature deal with certain diseases. Well, it has other microbes

(23:01):
that defeat them or out out compete them on the
plant's surface, or have other ways that they prevent problems. Well,
that's exactly now microgrow liquid AF. We're not going to
call it a fungicide. What it basically is, though, is
it's a pack of eight different quality bacteria that you
need to have in your soils, and you need to

(23:21):
have active and by doing that you are tilting that
you are tilting the playing field, if you will, in
favor of the good bacteria that protect your plants. Micro
grow liquid AF all right, now, that is a kind
of a purplish, violent colored label. I gotta somebody needs
to teach me about colors, because I'm not real good

(23:43):
at describing colors. My wife finally taught me what Wedgewood
Blue was in Dusty Rose. It took a long time though. Anyway, Violet,
I'm gonna call it violet. Micro grow liquid afs by
the gallon, it's by the court, and it works. And
basically what you're doing is you're taking the bacteria that
wear the white hats and putting them in the soil

(24:04):
on the plant, so the bacteria that were the black
hats going back to gene autry here so that they
don't have the upper hand. That makes sense, all right,
I hope it does. I hope it does. It is
true though, and boy are we ever learning a lot
about how to deal with problems and plants by just

(24:26):
taking a minute and looking at what nature does about
it and going along with those those systems. It's through microlife.
You're listening to garden Line. The phone number is seven
one three two one two kt r H. Seven one
three two one two k t r H. And you
were here to help you have a bountiful garden and

(24:47):
a beautiful landscape and be happy to do just that.
If you haven't been out to Kingwood Garden Center and
Warren Southern Gardens, they're in Kingwood, and I don't know
how you guys in Kingwood managed to get both of
these gardens. But that's not fair because you got two
of them. They're they're just excellent places to go visit

(25:07):
Warrens Southern Gardens on North Park Drive and Kingwood Garden
Center on Stone Hollow, and each has its own I'll
say personality if you will. They're they're not cookie cutters
of each other, but they're both well worth going to
Kingwood Garden Center. The gift shop there, first of all,
is just amazing. You ought to go see it. It's

(25:28):
really cool for the gardener and even the non gardener
on your list. They have a lot of nice things.
You know how it is with people, It's like, what
do you get somebody that has everything, Well, you go
to Kingwoo Garden Center gift shop and find something they
definitely don't have because they got plenty of that there.
Warrens has got a lot of good deals going on
right now. First of all, the color at Warren's is amazing.

(25:49):
I was out there not too long ago, and it
just you just stop and just turn on three hundred
and sixty degrees around and everywhere you look there are lush,
beautiful plants right now they've got their vinkas for twenty
percent off. Vinca also called Madagascar periwinkle. I know that
you're kind of going, what's that. Well, that's the name

(26:10):
I prefer for Vinca. But anyway, we got other plants
named Vinca too. But it's the flowers typically red and
white and pink and kind of a here we go again,
maybe kind of a hot pink kind of color that
just go through summer like crazy. It's part of their
Sinko to Mayo sale. It's twenty percent off the vinkas.

(26:31):
You can get them, you know, in gallum pots, four
inch pots, hanging baskets. They do so well and it
never gets too hot for venka. They are happy colors,
beautiful color in the summertime. So go by there and
check them out. And why are you there? Look at
all the other wonderful stuff they have, because they do
have a lot.

Speaker 13 (26:50):
I was.

Speaker 2 (26:50):
I was amazed. It's just how beautiful it was when
I was out there. Really cool. Alrighty Well, oh, by
the way, when when you're out there, check out the
supply of all the stuff you need to go with
your plants. I always say brown stuff before green stuff.
And you can do them both at the same time.
When you go buy Warren Southern Gardens Kingwood Garden Center,

(27:13):
they got Microlife products, they got Nitrovost products, Nelson Turf Star,
they got products from Nelson Plant Food. In the jars
they have the heirloom soils bags there all kinds of
airloom soils and airloom Soluce has every kind of product
you can imagine for every kind of plant you can imagine,
and it's all quality stuff and you can pick it

(27:34):
all up there at the same time. And this is important.
If you like to buy Microlife or Nelson Plant Food
by the jar, the big screw top lid jars, the
clear jars, you can take the empty jars back in
there and you can get them filled at either Warren
Southern Gardens or Kingwood Garden Center, either one. You can
get them filled right there. So I would recommend that

(27:57):
you do that. It's very economical not throwing plastic away
in the environment, and it's just simple. I think we
ought to have more things that we do by just
refilling them instead of buying a new package. I would
do it. I don't know, maybe some people wouldn't, but
I sure would I think it's a good idea in
my landscape. This past week, I've been working on planting,

(28:21):
getting a lot of stuff in the ground that I've
been trying to get planted for a long time. I
did some planting of some ginger type plants. The gingers.
I love ginger. I just think it's so tropical, and
I like the white butterfly, the hedicium and some of
the other butterflies. I planted two different butterfly gingers near

(28:44):
the back porch where I can enjoy the fragrance of
them coming out, and that just makes me happy to
get those things going. So anyway, and if you're going
to do any planting, also did some containers. Potted up
a lime tree for a container. When you're doing a container,
you want to get a good quality soil that drains well,
and an example of that would be jungle Land distributed

(29:07):
by nitrofoss. Jungle Land is basically based on a blended
Canadian blonde peat with four different sources of aged organic
matter and micro rise of fungi. Microasa fungi connect to
the roots of plants and they make those roots more
efficient and more effective, and they protect the roots in
different ways too, so you can't go wrong using the

(29:30):
outdoor jungle land the flour and vegetable planting soil, or
using the indoor jungle land, the one called water saving
potting soil. Either way, it's a good way to go.
You're going to find nitrofoss products in many places like
down in Angleton. You'll go to Lake Hardware in Angleton
of Alasco. If you're an Alvin Stanton shopping Center, or
North Taylor, or maybe the clear Lake area M and

(29:53):
D Clear Lake, the Bay Area Boulevard, all places that
carry nitrofos products. Time for me to take a little
break here. We'll be back with your questions if you'd
like to be first up down now seven one three
two one two KTRH. Hey, welcome back to garden Line, Volks,
little Steve Miller band. I don't know if you've ever
followed Steve Miller, but I'm telling you that band has

(30:16):
lasted through the years. Definitely not a one shot wonder,
but the very opposite of it, in a wide variety
music as well. You're listening to garden Line and we
are here to help you with your gardening endeavors. If
you'd like to give me a call seven one three
two one two fifty eight seventy four or KTRH if
you like dialing by letters, easier to remember that way.

(30:39):
If you've got some furniture outside and it's not so
good shape, you know, the worse for the wear. As
they say that the weather is taking its toll, you
need to know about Houston powder coders. If it's metal furniture,
it could be wrought iron, cast iron, aluminum, patio furniture,
whatever kind of metal. They can coat it and they
coat it with whatever color you want. And I really

(31:00):
mean that. And I talked about me being color challenge.
They have over one hundred colors that could need I
could probably name five, right, that's me. But anyway, they
have any color you want, really, and you haven't come
in and take care of it. What they do is
they come pick it up and they deliver it. If
you're in the Houston area. Now, if you're further out,
you can bring it in to them. But what they'll

(31:22):
do is they'll do a powder coat on it, which
is way better than you trying to paint the stuff.
I mean, it looks like new because they don't just
put a coating on the metal. I mean, if you've
got rusty hardware, you know, nuts and bolts, they put
stainless steel hardware back on it. If you've got vinyl
straps and sling fabric and things, depending on the kind
of chair or whatever piece of furniture it is, they

(31:43):
replace that. If you you know the plastic feed and
the end caps on some of the tubular metal furniture,
they replace that. They make it right. It needs a
little weld here and there to kind of restrengthen they
can do it. It's brand new when they get through. Essentially,
and this isn't just furniture you sit on tables and
chairs and things. This would be artistic things that go

(32:04):
on the wall you know of your house, or on
a fence or something. You got some wrought iron kind
of an an artistic kind of piece. If you have
a rail or you know, a rail around a patio
or something, or some stairs. If you've got a light
pole out in the in the yard that you know
is metal. If it's a metal, they can do it.
Doesn't matter what it is. They can do it. They

(32:26):
got the equipment. Here's the thing. Take a picture of
it and just find out. Take a picture send it
to sales at Houstoncoders dot com. Sales at houstoncoders dot com.
They'll give you a quick quote and you can go
on their social media accounts and see examples of their work.
The website worth seeing too, Houston Powdercoders dot com. Houston

(32:49):
Powdercoders dot com two eight one six seven six thirty
eight eighty eight two eight one six seven six thirty
eight eighty eight. They're up in North Houston, North sut
of Houston. Knew the intersection about Way eight and Hardy
Toll Road, so it's easy to get to them. But
I'm telling you, the work is amazing. You know. Every
time I look at the stuff they've done, and this

(33:11):
is tongue in cheek, but it's also I kind of
really mean it. It's like I want to go find
some old furniture so I can have it powder coated
because it looks so good. They, you know, something that
somebody else would be going like, yeah, let's throw this away.
This is well, take it to Euston Powder Court to
see what they can do with it. Really nice stuff. Anyway,

(33:35):
I was talking to one of my neighbors who's doing
a little bit of fertilized getting ready to do a
little bit of fertilizing here for summer, and we're talking
about some different products and things, and we're talking about
the schedule of the different kinds of product you can
put down in the sense of an immediate release or
a slow release or whatever. And we discussed that they

(33:57):
had tried the Sweet Green and really liked They just
said it, I mean, everything just greened up so pretty,
and of course it does. Sweet Green is an organic
type fertilizer that has eleven percent nitrogen, which is a
high nitrogen content, so you use a little bit less
of it. And because you're always putting down about a
pound of nitrogen actual nitrogen when you fertilize your lawnch

(34:21):
so you get a concentrated fertilizer, you use less, you
get a less concentrated you use more. That's just how
that works. And anyway, the Sweet Green dissolves away with
the moisture and it releases the compounds that have nitrogen,
and a bacteria grab onto it. Bacteria love sugary substances.
That's why organic gardeners have used molasses for years. They

(34:45):
know the benefits of that. Well, they get a hold
of it. They go crazy. They release the nitrogen to
your plants, and the rest is all history. As I say,
in other words, your place looks good, and you're going
to find Sweet Green and other nitrofoss products all over town.
You go down to the Sagemont area, M and D.
Beamer on Beamer is going to have it. You go

(35:07):
to Mount Bellevue Fisher Hardware on FM thirty one eighty.
You head up to Dan Defeed and Tomball on twenty
nine to twenty. You're going to find nitro fosh products,
including this Sweet Green works really well. I wanted to
visit a little bit about selecting sites for plants. And

(35:29):
the reason I bring this up is I've got a
yard that is more shade than sun, which when I'm
sitting out in the yard, I like that. But so
many of the plants I want to grow needs sun.
It takes sun to grow fruit, a lot of sun.
It doesn't take a lot of sun to grow leaves.
Some it needs sun. But fruit, yes, whether it's a

(35:52):
peach or a tomato, it takes a lot of sun.
It takes sun to grow flowers, and some things like hibiscus,
they really need a lot of sun to do well.
Most salvias need quite a bit of sun to do well,
and in order for that to happen, you got to
have a spot that gets I would like to see
six hours of sun, and I've got a lot of
spots that don't quite get that. So what do you

(36:15):
do well other than cut down a tree, which ain't
going to happen. Because we love our trees. Here, we
find the sunniest spot that we can. And so I've
got also the option of putting some fruit in that's
a little more tolerant of shade. Doesn't want to be
in shade, but it can put up with some Blueberries
can take a little more shade. They do great. And

(36:36):
if you're a blueberry grower, you better put it in
full sun if you want to make money on it.
But if you're homegrower and you got some bright shade,
they'll do better, but better than like a peach tree
or something would in the same spot. Big trees will
put up with some bright shade as well, And sometimes
you just have to compromise and do the best you can.
And that's kind of where we are right now. So

(36:57):
I'm planning this back bed that goes all way across
the back of my property and some areas. What I
did is, and I suggest you consider this. I went
out and I took pictures of the bed almost every
hour from the morning through the afternoon. So it took
me about four days to do it because I would forget,
so I'd have to set a time er, oh tomorrow
at nine am, and I take a picture two pm

(37:20):
or whatever. And I look at all those pictures, and
I see the pattern of the sun, and I can
say that spot right there is the sunniest spot in
that whole row. And over here that is it almost
never gets sun over there. And you pick your plants
accordingly to fit those areas rather than just go out
and plant it because you like that spot right there.
You got to make the plants happy. Remember the thing

(37:42):
about having a green thumb is you just know what
a plant wants. And you know this stuff a lot.
You know, you know a lot of these things. So
I'm me telling you, but that is a very important
concept to keep in mind. You make the plants happy,
the plants will make you happy. Okay, all right, I'm
I'm a post that our social media here. Let's head

(38:07):
out to Clear Lake Texas, and we're going to talk
to Sarah. Hello, Sarah, welcome to Guardenline morning.

Speaker 14 (38:13):
Skip.

Speaker 15 (38:14):
You were just talking about venka and I can take
the heat and all that stuff.

Speaker 2 (38:19):
I buy it every year.

Speaker 15 (38:20):
I've bought it from home depot, I've bought it from
mass nursery. I've bought it everywhere. Every year I buy it,
I plant it. It's wonderful, and then it just starts
to wilt. Why it doesn't to me every single year?

Speaker 4 (38:33):
What am I doing wrong?

Speaker 15 (38:34):
I've got good dirt, all right, good part.

Speaker 2 (38:37):
I think, Okay, my best guess, and I'm about ninere
on this one. Unless you're just it's going totally water logged.
But I doubt that. I think it's a disease called
aerial phytoptha blight, and there's no springing for that. What
you need to do is you need to get a

(38:58):
vinka that's been bred to be real resistent. Get all
that old venca out of there, because it stays persistent
in the soil in that bed for a good while.
So either you're going to need to transition the bed
to other types of worm seasoned flowers that don't get that,
or you buy a type of a vinca called Cora

(39:19):
co o r a. It's a series. There's trailing coras,
there's upright coras, but the Cora vinca series is resistant
to fight top there unless you've developed a a type
in your in your beds that even cora gets attacked by.
But that that's the way to keep getting growing vincas.

(39:40):
To use the cora or so And if it's.

Speaker 15 (39:42):
In a pot, then I need to empty out the pot,
sterilize the pot and start over.

Speaker 2 (39:48):
Yeah, empty the soil. You can use that soil for
something else, not if I top their vecas the primary
thing that it attacks. So I mean you can grow
you know, marigols or something else in that soil, but
clean it out real good and put some press soil
in it and get some cor inca and you should
be good.

Speaker 4 (40:04):
Okay, okay, very good.

Speaker 15 (40:05):
Thanks for help.

Speaker 2 (40:07):
All righty Sarah, thanks for the call. Appreciate that, folks.
I'll be right back after the news. Hey, good morning,
good Sunday morning. Welcome to Garden Line. I'm your host,

(40:27):
Skip Rictor, and we're here to help you have success
in your garden. That's what we that's what we're all about.
Oh you got to just give us a call. Seven
one three two one two kt r H seven one
three two one two k t r H. The folks
at Nelson Plant Food have a number of different quality
products available in jars. They're clear plastic jars, the big

(40:49):
fat wide lid, and there's the color Star line, their
most famous line. Been around for a long time. I'll
leave over forty years now, sold all over not just Texas,
but the whole country. Really, it's an amazing product and
it works anything with color that you're going to grow.
You're gonna grow with annual flowers or any kind of

(41:10):
plant like that, perennials, shrubs and trees and other things.
You can use it on a lot of different things.
It's got fast acting effects, so it immediately gives you that,
but it also has slow release, so it's going to
feed for about three to four months as well. It's
not just a one and done. Some organic nutrient sources
that really enrich the soil. That's the color Star plus.

(41:30):
Then there's the nutri Star line, which is jars for
specific kinds of plants. There's a nutri Star for vegetables,
there's one for hibiscus and flowering tropicals for example, and
that would be a good one for this season right now.
If you enjoy hibiscus, aboon and villias and flowering tropicals, plumerias.
There's nutra star for all of those products or all

(41:52):
of those plants, and you can find it. It's all
over the place. It's easy to find Nelson by the
jar and there are about a dozen places around town
where you can take your jars in when you're emptying
them and refill them. It's a little more economical and
it avoids putting that plastic in the environment. Just makes
good sense, which makes sense that Nelson would provide something

(42:14):
like that. Let's dad out here to the phones. We
are going to go to Bill and Kingwood. Hey, Bill,
welcome to garden Line. Good morning, Good morning.

Speaker 14 (42:28):
I sent in some pictures yesterday, one of which is
a pepper plant. I suspect that it might have bacterial
leaf spot disease. If do you have your head the
opportunity to look at that picture in the one of
the tomato I.

Speaker 2 (42:42):
Have, the pepper has bactrial leaf spot on it, a
really significant case of it. So for that disease, the
best control, well, first of all, that plant hardly has
a leaf without vactril leaf spot on it, and so
the spots that it has are not going to get better.

(43:04):
It would be you know, I would tell you pick
all the leaves off that have spots on them, but
you basically would be picking all the leaves off. But
it splashes every time it rains, and it is a
very difficult disease to manage. So if it were mine,
as shocking as this is, I'd pick every leaf off
that I see it on, including the leaves on the ground,

(43:26):
because it's difficult. It even comes in by seeds. It
may have been on the seed that were planted to
make this plant, but anyway, then get a copper spray
something with copper and get menko zeb Bone eye makes
a type of men kazeb and the colination of those

(43:50):
two m A n co zeb zs and zebra menkseebb
by bon eye, and it's being bon eyed.

Speaker 14 (44:02):
You know.

Speaker 2 (44:03):
Those Their products are sold in a lot of different places.
If you have trouble finding any of those, you can
email me and I can help you find one. But
menka is that by bonnight ought to be pretty pretty
widely available in good garden centers. For example, I would
check Kingwood Garden Center or the Warren Seven Gardens out there.
There's also an ACE hardware store out there in that area.

(44:25):
That would be another good place to check. So anywhere,
in fact, you have several aces next year just makes
you sure you're using good fresh seed. I would plant
the peppers in another location in your garden beds. Try

(44:46):
to avoid that exact spot because there are any kind
of remnants it can be around, and then when we
get splashy, rainy weather, it just goes everywhere. So anyway,
after you do your spraying, if you see any leaves
with spots, hopefully new leaves will be coming out. You
want to spray those, make sure they're they're coated with
the spray to protect them, and then pick off any

(45:09):
other leaves that you see, and that's going to get
the best we can try to get those. I believe
jalapenos to a ripe state. Okay, second is what about so.

Speaker 14 (45:23):
Try to try to get rid of the leaves and
try to spray everything or other plants like tomatoes or whatever,
are they affected also with the same type of.

Speaker 2 (45:33):
Disease tomatoes can they do? Tomatoes have a bacterial leaf spot?
I don't know if it's exactly the same strain. Is
the one that attacks peppers?

Speaker 14 (45:42):
Are not?

Speaker 2 (45:43):
Uh so maybe yes, maybe no? On those they do
get this disease. But diseases have strains that attack certain
kinds of plants. The powdery mildew that attacks roses is
not the powdery mildew that attacks crape myrtles, for example. Okay,
the same name, same disease, but different strain. All right,
So the tomato, that's a caterpillar that chewed that hole

(46:05):
in it. If you got a lot of them, it's
probably worth putting out a spray of a BT about
every I don't know, maybe seven days on the plants
to get good coverage on it. They eat it, they
get sick, they die. That's the safest, lowest talks option
for controlling the categoris out there. But that that's a caterpillar.
It could be a tomato fruit worm is a likely one,

(46:28):
but there are others that could do that.

Speaker 14 (46:32):
Okay, okay, all right, yes, sir, thank you so much
for your help. I appreciate it.

Speaker 2 (46:37):
Uh you bet you, thanks thanks for your call. I
appreciate that. Let's see here, oh, you know, talking about
places to get things Southwest Fertilizer. You know some of
these products that I come up with. It's like, yeah,
I don't see that in many places around town, but
you're always going to see it in Southwest Fertilizer. It's

(46:58):
just because they carry everything. They don't have it, you
don't need it. That's the way I like to put it.
They're on the corner of bisin Nutt and Renwick. I've
been around since nineteen fifty five, seventy years. Seventy years
that place has been in business, and there's a reason
for that. When you go by, you'll know those of
you came out to see me. When I was at
Southwest Fertilizer, I comments about, you know this place has everything. Well,

(47:20):
yes it does, tools and products and fertilized. I mean,
everything you need it's there, including good advice. You bring
a sample or a photo in and they can help you.
You know, if you'd haul this pepper with bactrail spot
on the leaves in, they would have looked at it
and they'd have told you what to put on it.
Southwest Fertilizer dot Com seven to one three six sixty
six one seven four four seven one three six six

(47:44):
six one seven four four. I'm gonna take a break.
When we come back, Dwayne and Katie and John and
Webster be our first two up. All right, welcome back
to your guard Line. I'm your host, Skip Rickord. Good
to have you with us. I know we got those
people out there that are lurking on the outsides, on
the edge. Don't want to call in. That's okay. You're

(48:05):
welcome too. Glad you're listening this morning. I hope you're
having a good Sunday morning. Feel free to call in
if you like. It's like what the water's worms, take
your toe in the water. It's good. Come on, let's
do this. Let's head out to Katie. First thing here,
we're going to go talk to Duane. Hello, Dwayne, and
welcome to Guardline.

Speaker 1 (48:23):
Morning Strip. Send you an email with some pistures of
my burrow tree. It's got some type of a larva
in it. Not sure exactly what it is. I wonder
if you could tell me what that is and if
something to be concerned about or not.

Speaker 2 (48:34):
Okay, I did get your photos out there, and what
that is. It's a like a leaf miner. A little
insect feeds underneath the top surface of the leaf, and
when it does that, it's protected by that cuticle that
the top surface of the leaf, and most beneficials can't

(48:57):
get to it. There are a few wasps that can
lay in egg through that cuticle and get it. But
it's a little it's a little caterpillar like insect that's
down there. Actually maybe a fly larva in this case,
I can't tell exactly, but that is a extremely minor
issue for the tree. That tree produces so much leaf area,
and your trees are in such good health, beautiful leaves

(49:20):
that I wouldn't worry about it at all. It's you know,
it's just a little bit of a cosmetic freckle. That's
a mount on those trees, so don't worry about it.
But that's what it is. Kind of interesting, a little creature.
And did you notice them late when you looked at
the spots, could you see the little larva inside there?

Speaker 1 (49:39):
Well, it's look at what they maaked eye. You can't
if you see it on the picture, you can see
it in there. But what I noticed there was war
But when I squeezed the area, you could actually see
it crush. Yeah, whatever it is in there.

Speaker 2 (49:52):
At some point that larva is going to drop out.
It's going to eat its way out of there, or
it may pupate in that spot and then come out.
But yeah, it's a yeah. It's one of the hundreds
of thousands of insects out there that really, really, we
just don't even need to think about it. It's one
of the less concerning leaf miners on the planet.

Speaker 1 (50:12):
All right, all right, well, thank you, sir, I appreciate it.

Speaker 2 (50:14):
You have a good day, Yes, sir, you as well,
Thank you. I appreciate your call. Nelson Water Gardens, Nelson
Nursery and water Gardens out there in Katie is a
wonderful place to visit. They have so their selection of
plants is outstanding. I know they're known for the water gardens.
They're world famous for the water gardens because of the

(50:36):
contribution they've made to that industry. For example, in the
water gardens, they invented the disappearing fountain, you know, the
big beautiful urn ceramic urn where the water's coming over
the sides and recirculating. They designed that, and if you
want to do one, they can set one up for you,
or they can just see the pieces of barts and
tell you how to put it together. And go home

(50:57):
do it yourself if you want to do that. And
that is true of a lot of things there. You know,
the folks know what they're talking about, but don't. I
want to get past the water garden just for a
minute here and talk about the nursery the garden center.
They have a wonderful garden center full of all kinds
of flowers. First of all, when you walk in the building,
right up front, you will see some of the prettiest

(51:18):
little house plants you've ever seen, and really not some
common houseplants, but some very uncommon, very uncommon houseplants that
are there in beautiful shape. I mean, you could walk
right out of there with a plant and give it
as a gift. Drive somewhere and give it as a gift.
It's ready to go. It's beautiful. You go out in
the back, you see flowers, You see annuals and perennials,

(51:38):
you see herbs and vegetables and just all kinds of
bedding plants. You got shrubs, you got trees, you got fruit.
It just if it oh in watercourse water plants as well.
It's a great place to visit. Nelson Water Garden and
Nursery is a destination. You need to take your friends
and y'all need to just sit out there and visit

(51:58):
and enjoy the south of Water. It'll make you want
to do a water feature at your house there on
Katie Fort Ben Road, just north of it Katie Freeway
out in Katie. Nelson Watergardens dot com. That's the website,
Nelsonwatergardens dot com. Let's head down to Webster now and
we're going to visit with John. Hello, John, welcome to

(52:21):
garden Line morning.

Speaker 8 (52:23):
Skip. Hey.

Speaker 3 (52:25):
I've got a bell pepper plants potted in a bucket,
and one morning I went out there and noticed.

Speaker 10 (52:31):
A little trail on the leaf.

Speaker 14 (52:33):
So I Google lends it and said it was leafminers.

Speaker 1 (52:39):
So they said one of the treatment was to take
off the leaves.

Speaker 13 (52:43):
So I've just yanked off those leaves.

Speaker 8 (52:47):
I don't see anymore on the leaves, but the plant
is growing, it's got new leaves on it.

Speaker 1 (52:54):
The flowers they flower, but then they turn brown and
fall off.

Speaker 2 (52:58):
I've got no peppers, okay. Well, the flowers falling off
in the leaf minor are two different, unrelated things. The
flowers falling off, they're either not getting pollinated or possibly
some little insect is doing damage to them to causing

(53:21):
them to a bort. I think the second it would
require it would be a very tiny insect feeding in
the flower or something that's snipping off the flowers, and
that one. You know, I hate to send you out
there to nuke your peppers every other day trying to
kill anything that might show up, because a lot of
things that show up you don't want to kill. I

(53:43):
think I would. I would give them a little time,
and I think they'll start setting better. You should have
some pollinator activity around them. If you're not seeing any
bees at all coming around, that might be a concern
and you can't change that, and you can't go out
and recruit bee, but that would be helpful if you

(54:04):
had an increase in the pollinator activity. A lot of
times I'll see peppers do some aboarding and then they'll
start setting on their own. And so I think I'd
be patient on this one and not jump to spray
in chances are that most of the time it seems
to fix itself. Now, the other thing is the leaf miner,

(54:25):
and the leaf miner does such minor damage that it
just isn't worth worrying about it really isn't the a
little bit of a trail that they make. You know,
they start off if you look real carefully, one into
the trail is like a little thread, and then it
gets bigger as it goes through the leaf. That's because

(54:45):
the little critter eating eating that tunnel is getting eating
and getting bigger, and so the critter is always at
the big end of the tunnel. They drop out, they
go to the soil, pup eate and fly back again.
But the amount of solar panel that that insect imaged
is so minor. The leaf is still producing a lot
of carbohydrates to fuel the plant, and it's just not

(55:07):
worth treating for those leaf miners. I've seen some pretty
bad cases, but it's rare. Usually it's a little cosmetic
and not costing you any pepper production.

Speaker 10 (55:21):
Okay, well, thank you very much.

Speaker 2 (55:22):
Have a good day, all right, John, Thanks for the call.
Appreciate that I certainly do. Yesterday I was at Ace
Hardware that's called the Hardware City on Memorial Drive. We
had a good time. A lot of folks came in appreciate,
but I'm in the folks that you know hosted us
and brought us in there every time I go into

(55:45):
an ACE, I'm just amazed. I mean, you know, we
were walking around, I was, I was showing customers, you know, well,
here's this product, or here's our product or whatnot, even
some tools and things that are special. They just have
an excellent selection. If you want a beautiful yard, if
you want a bow, a full landscape and garden. Ace
is a place they've got the products. They are loaded

(56:05):
up on. All the fertilizers. You hear me talk about
all these fertilizers all the time for your lawn. Well,
ACE has got them, and a good selection of things
to manage insects and diseases and pests. And they have
got a sale going on with barbecue equipment right now
and a select types of barbeque pits, select brands and things,
and it is time for that. If you unless you

(56:29):
just got a new barbecue pit recently, you need to
go check out some of the brands at ACE Hardware.
I mean at ACE you're going to find things like
Big Green Egg. You're going to find trigger grills, the
pellet grills for example. You're gonna find Weber and other
brands as well, many other great brands there, and equipment
to turn that outdoor living space into something special. You know,
you get you a nice little porch or patio or

(56:50):
an area underneath the big beautiful spreading tree for shade.
We do love our shade around here once we get
to May, especially all the way to at October. But
Ace will turn that outdoor living area into something special. Now,
there are Ace Hardware stores all over. You can go
to Ace Hardware Texas dot com. Ace Hardware Texas dot com.

(57:13):
That's the website and you can find Ace Hardware stores.
I don't care where you live. If you are over
and Humble, we've got a K and m Ace over there.
You know. If you're up in Porter, you got Jnr's
Ace up there. If you are a Spring Cyprus, there
is Spring Ace. And if you are in League City,
Kilgore Ace. And if you are on Highway six North,
there's Hamilton Ace. You know, you go to the Katie area,

(57:38):
you got Plantation Ace Hardware. Just these are just examples.
You've got a lot more what I'm saying, But I'm
just saying that there's Ace Hardware's everywhere. And if you
go to Ace Hardware Texas dot com you can find
your local Ace Hardware store and go check it out.
They have wonderful gifts for indoors as well at Ace Hardware.
It's always fun to visit. I do enjoy that you're

(58:03):
listening to garden Line. If you got some gardening questions
that we could help you with, feel free to give
me a call. All you have to do is call
seven to one three two one two katrh or if
you like numbers, fifty eight seventy four, fifty eight seventy four.
I was checking my mosquito buckets. I'm kind of obsessing

(58:24):
over these mosquito buckets. I check them all the time
to see, you know, if they got larv in them,
they got larv in them. Normally you walk out in
your landscape and you see mosquito wrigglers, larva, you know,
wiggling around in water, and it's like, I got a problem,
gotta pour out that water. And well not when you
got a mosquito bucket. Mosquito buckets something you get from

(58:45):
Pest to Brothers. Pest Brothers is a complete pest control
service that covers the greater Houston area from the Woodlands
all the way down to Texas City, you know, from
out West and Katie all the way across to Baytown
and they do the whole thing. Tomato, tomatoes, termites, termites.
They've got some incredible state of the art products for termites.

(59:11):
They pest Brothers. No hast knows how to do things
that are effective, that really work, but how to do
them in the safest manner and how to get the
longest term results without the worries. And they have a
new termite system that's like a ten year system and
it's just a little trench they dig around the base
of the base of the house. Ask them about it.

(59:33):
The pestbros dot com b r O s thepestbros dot
com two eight one two o six forty six seventy
two eight one two o six forty six seventy Why
are you there saying? What is this mosquito bucket that
kick skip keeps rambling about. Well, they'll tell you about it,
but I'll tell you this. When a mosquito comes to

(59:55):
that bucket, not only is that mosquito history, the larvae
lays in the buck That's why I'm excited to see
lore their history, and that mosquito is going to carry
mosquito controlled things to other spots. You didn't treat you, don't.
You have the nuclear yard with a fogger. All these
little spots that we got now because of the rain,
we had those spots in my yard and my neighbor's yard.

(01:00:18):
By the way, my mosquitos are making sure all those
little water spots mosquitos aren't gonna be raised in them
as well. Pretty cool system, Pretty cool system. Uh yeah.
I was looking at some of the roses at RCW
the other day when I was there, and r CW
is just a there's just a one stop shop for roses.

(01:00:41):
I mean, all the rosarians in used to know about it.
You know, what's six pages I think of roses that
they get in in February and they still have roses.
There lots of good roses in that place. When you
go to RCW. Now it's heating up and you still
plant roses. By the way, it's still good to plant.
They've got shrubs and trees and all kinds of things.

(01:01:02):
But those hot weather flowers, you know, the hibiscus, they
have wonderful line. They have perennial hibiscus, and they've got
the tropical types that Cajun series that I like so much.
We were talking earlier about Madagascar periwinkle also called vinka.
They've got that as well, and other things that thrive
in the heat. And they got good advice and good

(01:01:22):
products to go with it. RCW Nursery is where Beltway
eight and Highway two forty nine Tombo Parkway come together.
I'll be right back, all right. How many of you
remember the Archies? So when I was a kid, there
was a cereal called super sugar cress, super Sugarcoats, I
believe that was what it was called, something like that anyway,

(01:01:45):
And at one time they actually printed into the back
of the box a record, a grooved record. Yeah, and
you cut out the cardboard record from the back of
the box, and this song, triv Sure was the one
that they played by the Archies. Isn't that crazy? All right?

(01:02:05):
Well some of you are going, what's a record player?
All right? Brad in Spring, welcome to garden Line. It
is good to have you with us.

Speaker 9 (01:02:14):
What's really crazy is that I remember that box of
cereal and that record.

Speaker 2 (01:02:20):
Oh my gosh, I wonder who would remember that. Isn't
that crazy?

Speaker 5 (01:02:26):
Yeah?

Speaker 2 (01:02:27):
I had that?

Speaker 9 (01:02:29):
And uh yeah, thanks? Now all right, now we're feeling
Now we're feeling extra old this morning. No, no, no,
I was.

Speaker 2 (01:02:40):
Nowhere around when they signed the Magna Carta. I'm not
old at all. Go ahead, how can we help you tonight?

Speaker 9 (01:02:49):
Good morning. I have a southern facing yard.

Speaker 4 (01:02:54):
And I'm trying to Uh.

Speaker 9 (01:02:57):
I've planted some lantana.

Speaker 16 (01:02:59):
Uh.

Speaker 9 (01:03:00):
I wanted to see if you had any solid tips
and tricks to uh to help that lantana get well
established and h and fuller.

Speaker 2 (01:03:10):
I just put it in a.

Speaker 9 (01:03:12):
Week and a half, two weeks ago, and I'm a
little behind the little behind the curve. So I'd like
to see if there's something I can do to drop
kick that and get it get it going a little faster.

Speaker 2 (01:03:22):
Yeah, I would get some Medina has to grow. It's
a six twelve six plant food. It's got an extra
boost of phosphorus, which is helpful for root development. UH
and uh. It mixes in water. You're not going to
burn the plants with it. It's not salt based. Medina
has to grow six twelve six uh and put in
a watering can and drench those plants in and then

(01:03:43):
about a week later, do it again. A week later,
do it again, and those those three applications give it
the best chance. The number one thing those plants that
your house bread need to do is get a root
system out there. You know, with that they were in
that little confined pot, and now we need a root
system that takes off and when it does, the top
growth will follow and it can happen. And so that

(01:04:04):
I would do that. They need lots of sunlight. So
if they're in quite a bit of shade, they're not
going to perform as well. And so the good sunlight,
you know, other than cutting down a tree, where they
are is where they are, and so I would think
those two tips would be good. You might watch them.
There's a few little pests that will suck the juice

(01:04:24):
out of lentana leaves. You see these little tiny, little
white tan speckles all through the leaf. That's indication that
that's happening. You get enough of those, and it takes
away some of the plant's ability to capture sunlight and
support good growth. So if you start to see that,
you might might need to do a treatment for that.

Speaker 4 (01:04:44):
What what are we what are we treating those with?

Speaker 2 (01:04:49):
Well, A perrethern type insecticide would be the organic end
of it. A synthetic perrethroid would be the synthetic end
of it, and both are available. You know, you go
to your whatever garden centers or the ACE hardware stores
and in places like that, they're going to have those
kind of products. Most of the time you will not
need to spray Lantanna. I'm just saying that something to

(01:05:11):
watch for that can happen. Mainly, it's get them a
good boost and get them going.

Speaker 9 (01:05:18):
Okay, sounds good.

Speaker 2 (01:05:19):
Thank you very much. Enjoyed that. Thanks Brad. Appreciate your
Appreciate your call very much. Someone who was asking me
when I was at Hardware City ACE which is on
Memorial Drive in Houston yesterday about azamite, and they were saying, Okay,
explain this to me. It's like, you know, what is it?

(01:05:40):
Is it a fertilizer. Well, in a sense, yes that
it has nutrients, but it's not like your lawn fertilizer.
It's not like the fertilizers with the three numbers on
the bag. You know, nitrogen, phosphorus, potassium. Those are needed
in large amounts. We put them out to make the
plant grow and thrive and get big. Azonite is a
trace mineral supplement. It is essential that plants have trace minerals,

(01:06:02):
but they only need a little that's why they're called trace.
Are also called micro nutrients because they're just needed and
micro amounts, but they're essential and so you can do aszmite.
They asked me the question, well, when do you do asmite? Well,
anytime of the year. Most people do it when they fertilize,
because you're already fertilizing. You got the spreader out there,

(01:06:25):
you just finish your fertilizing, come back, change the setting
because asmite is a very small particle and you just
need a little bit and then you put out your asmite.
But you could put azmite out in January, you can
put it out in July. I mean, it doesn't matter
when you put it out. It's just easiest to go
ahead and do it when you do your fertilizing, and
that that makes it easiest to remember. Now you find

(01:06:46):
more information on it if you want it asmite Texas
dot com. And where are you going to find it?
Pretty much everywhere, feed stores, garden centers, ace hardware stores,
Southwest fertile all of these are places that typically will
carry asmite. I'm going to head up to Tomball now
and we're going to talk to David. Hello, David.

Speaker 10 (01:07:06):
Hey, good morning, sir.

Speaker 3 (01:07:09):
Hey, and uh, I too remember cutting out the cardboard
record on the cereal box?

Speaker 2 (01:07:15):
Are you kidding me?

Speaker 6 (01:07:17):
Oh?

Speaker 10 (01:07:17):
I remember?

Speaker 3 (01:07:19):
I remember that coming out, Hey, and not the reason
I called. But uh another little funny thing of some
Kasey case On trivia about that particular song. I heard
this from Kasey Caseum and it stuck with me that
Sugar Sugar was the only song that went number one
on the pop or whatever charts it was on at

(01:07:41):
the time by a band that didn't exist. The Archies
were not an actual band. They were a bunch of
studio musicians. Song went number one, and so yeah it was.

Speaker 2 (01:07:58):
It went number one.

Speaker 3 (01:08:00):
It was by a band that really didn't even exist.

Speaker 9 (01:08:03):
But anyway, that's not real.

Speaker 4 (01:08:06):
Hey, I heard you one time.

Speaker 3 (01:08:07):
It seems like you mentioned some handheld little flower bed
garden tools, a little spain and rake and fork that
you hold with your hand, that you said. I think
you said they had a lifetime warranty. What if you
recall what is the name of that product? Are those
what's the brand name?

Speaker 2 (01:08:25):
I do not remember saying that, And if you were
asked me what tools have a lifetime warranty? What I
what I would I would sugget, Well, there's a lot
of good tools out there, and there's a lot of
cheap tools out there, and you can look at them
and tell that's a little tack. Well that's not going
to hold up, you know, things like that. Uh, Corona
Tools are very good line of tools.

Speaker 14 (01:08:47):
Uh.

Speaker 2 (01:08:47):
They that that would be an example of a good brand,
but it is not the only brand of quality tools
out there. So okay, that would be one one that
comes to month.

Speaker 3 (01:09:00):
I got a birthday coming up, and I'm just gonna
maybe put that on my waishlist.

Speaker 2 (01:09:05):
Oh yeah, that's good. Well, and you know when it
comes to pruners like ham pruners and loppers and saws
and things, Corona is a good brand for that as well.
And Bob, it's South. I was fertilized. I know, well
your way up in Tomball. But don Bob's got a
number of different brands that are all quality that he
carries down there, including Corona. You're gonna find Corona up
in your area, though I know some of the garden

(01:09:26):
centers will carry Corona up there in Tomball.

Speaker 4 (01:09:30):
I'll look for it all right, thank you, sir.

Speaker 2 (01:09:33):
All right, thank you. Appreciate the call and the information.
And by the way, you said, Casey Cason, there's another
one that I bet not everybody remembers. We used to
listen to his top forty all the time. Take care, David,
appreciate your call. Alrighty, let's see where are we here?
Watching my time. I'm gonna take a little break here,

(01:09:53):
so Alex and Richmond and fred In Spring you will
be our first two up when we come back. All right,
welcome back. Hey. I was talking to somebody a minute
ago about Medina recommending, you know, getting a lantana established
and fast and getting it growing fast and on its way. Well,
Medina has to grow six twelve six plot food. It

(01:10:15):
is one of the many products from Medina that is
very very effective. It works, and I use it myself.
If I'm in a plant of plant, you want to
mix it up, I put mine in the water and
can and I just plant the plant and drench it
really good, wet that area. Sometimes I'll set the plant
in the whole drench the whole hole, and then fill
in soil and drench it again, and then a week

(01:10:35):
later do it and a week later, do it again.
So three times a good soaking about a week part week,
ten days or so apart, and you get your plants
off to a good start. And you're going to find
Medina has to Grow six twelve six all over the place. Now,
they have other products from Medina that work very well,
and I don't have time talking about all of them
that they have, but you can go to Medina agg

(01:10:57):
and you can find out more about these good product.
One that I really like is Medina has to Grow
for lawns. It's a twelve four to eight formulation. It's
got that three to one to two ratio. You hook
it up to a garden hose and go over your lawn.
Maybe your lawn has some spots that aren't doing so
good and you want to just kind of treat those areas.
It's real easy with the end of a garden hose

(01:11:19):
to just water those areas, you know what I'm saying,
rather than have a spreader with granular where you're trying
to just cover those areas and you can just kind
of give them an extra boost with that, or you
can do the whole lawn. I mean, it's good for
the whole lawn. But I'm just saying one of the
advantage of that hose in with Medina has to grow
lawn food six twelve six is that you can do

(01:11:41):
some spot extra treatments if you need to give a
little boost to those areas. Let's go out to Richmond,
Texas now and we're gonna talk to Alex. Hello Alex,
welcome to garden Line.

Speaker 7 (01:11:55):
Thanks give good morning.

Speaker 16 (01:11:56):
I found morny build its farm worm moth caterpillar.

Speaker 4 (01:12:01):
It was on one of my genius so it's the
only one I found.

Speaker 13 (01:12:06):
I got rid of it.

Speaker 4 (01:12:07):
But my concern is more for the turf grass.

Speaker 16 (01:12:09):
Saint Augustine, I know you're not a big fan of
sort of preemptively throwing down grub control or pest aside.
Uh yeah, from what from what Google told me is
it can be pretty detrimental to the to the turf.

Speaker 2 (01:12:23):
What do you think, Well, number one, it's not super
common to see velvet army worm around here. Normally we
deal with fall army worm, and and there are other caterpillars,
and in a sense it kind of doesn't But no
matter what kind of caterpillar it is, they eat leaves

(01:12:43):
and they they are controlled by the same products. So uh,
I when when you say the word grub, then that's
not at all connected to caterpillar. That's a beatle larvae
and so that's a separate thing. But the caterpillars that
are worth eating in a lawn or pretty much just
the army worm typically the fall one here late season

(01:13:06):
army worm mostly and the sod webworm, which occurs some
years and other years you don't see them hardly at all.

Speaker 3 (01:13:13):
Uh.

Speaker 2 (01:13:13):
And so are we are? Is your main concern? I
may have missed this, But is your main concern your lawn?
Or is it the flowers and things?

Speaker 7 (01:13:24):
No?

Speaker 17 (01:13:24):
My lawn?

Speaker 2 (01:13:26):
Okay, yeah, I I don't think that what you're seeing
is going to be a big concern. You can watch
your lawn and if you see foliage of the grass
being eaten and things, then go ahead and jump in
at the first of it. And I would use a
product containing probably there's two options. The organic option is

(01:13:48):
spin no said s P I N O s A
D like spin the letter O and SAD. That's the
organic option for caterpillars in the lawn. And the synthetic
would be by fen Thren b I F E N
T h R I N Thren by fen thrin. Nitrofoss

(01:14:10):
has it by fen thren product that you can put
down on your line to granule, and then the spinosaid,
typically is going to be something that you spray onto
the turf, but the spino said doesn't last forever, and
so doing it ahead of time and then having the
caterpillars really show up in masks later you would have
to do it again.

Speaker 4 (01:14:32):
Got okay, So I was I was more concerned for
what sign to look for.

Speaker 18 (01:14:37):
So I guess I expected more of a grub sign,
so just kind of dead patches, but I'm looking for
more the same thing you'd see on a plant from
a caterpillar, holes and leaves signs that they've been eating
on the leaf of the grass plant correctly.

Speaker 2 (01:14:51):
Yeah, and not even in the in the in the lawn,
it won't be holds. It will be like the caterpillar
grabs the side of the leaf blade and it chews
it away. And so if you kind of look at
your lawn, it's like something's wrong right there. You can't retell,
and you get on your hands and knees and start
looking at grass blades. When you see those jagged, chewed
up sides of the grass blades. That means you got

(01:15:12):
the caterpillars, and that's plenty of time to jump in
and take care of them. Lawn is resilient. A little
caterpillar damage here and there isn't gonna be a deal.
You just don't want them to defoliate the whole thing,
and so jump in early on that. But I'm gonna,
I would say, eighty five percent chance this is not
going to become a problem in your lawn, but it might.

(01:15:33):
Just keep an eye on it. All right, all right, Skip,
I appreciate it, sir.

Speaker 13 (01:15:38):
We'll talk to you later.

Speaker 2 (01:15:40):
Hey, thanks for the call, Alex. I appreciate that very much.
Thank you. Super turf from nitro foss is an outstanding
product for giving you a long term nutrient release of
that nitrogen and other nutrients for your lawn. And I
mean so it takes like four months for all the
super turf to be released out of the out of

(01:16:00):
the product, so it goes a long time. You're gonna
find super turf at places like plants for all seasons.
Right there on Luettah, you are gonna you know two
forty nine in Luetta right where they come together. Uh,
you're gonna find it d and de feed up in
tomball Fisher's Hardware on Southmore down in Pasadena, as well
as the one on Broadway and Laport. Many places carry

(01:16:23):
nitrophoss products likes the super turf. Let's see, We're gonna
go down to Spring and talk to Fred. Hey, Fred,
Welcome to garden line, Good bonning, mourning help.

Speaker 5 (01:16:38):
Yes, sir, I'll send you a picture of some Saint
august thing that's called it yellow it maybe lime green spots.

Speaker 4 (01:16:46):
Yeah, I had developed last year and I.

Speaker 14 (01:16:50):
Spry some.

Speaker 5 (01:16:53):
Iron liquid, you know, Hosing iron on it last year
didn't seem to do anything to it. Okay, Now it
looks like I'm getting spots, little spots all over my yard.
So I don't know what you know.

Speaker 4 (01:17:10):
I mean, I've read that it's an iron deficiency, but
I don't know what do you think.

Speaker 2 (01:17:15):
What I think is it is an iron deficiency because
roots are being killed and iron is taken up at
the tip of roots. So when you don't have new
root growth going, you're going to see iron deficiency in
Saint Augustine. The pattern of it in your lawn, it
does not look like there's a lack of iron in
the soil. It looks to me. My first guess would

(01:17:37):
be a disease called take all root rot that kills
root tips. And if you go to my schedule for
lawn pest disease and weed management, I've got take all
listed there in the disease row across the January through
December schedule, and it tells you what to use and
when to use it. So that would be the first

(01:17:59):
thought that I yeah. The second possibility would be if
something was done in those areas that added a lot
of phosphorus or raised the pH like And this isn't likely,
but you know, if you had dumped lime or in
that area, or if you'd put some extra hyphosphorus fertilizers
just thrown it out in those areas, that would do it.

(01:18:20):
And and that is very unlikely that you anyone would
do that. So I think the takeoll root rot is
going to be your culprit. But if you go to
gardening with Skip dot Com gardening with skip my Scouts
on the page download.

Speaker 5 (01:18:36):
I have your schedule pulled up here.

Speaker 6 (01:18:38):
I just got it.

Speaker 2 (01:18:39):
Okay, good, So what you'll see is we do a
little take all treatment treatment in the spring, and we
do a little take all treatment in the fall. What
you might want to try to do is there is
a fertile loan product and the exact name escapes me
at this moment, but it's a fertile loan product that
has micro nutrients in it like manganese and iron. It's

(01:19:01):
a gray bottle, it's a micro nutriant. You mix it
up and I would spray that on those areas and
see if it improves. I think it will. And then
you if you get a little bit of shredded shredded
peat moss, not the sphagnum, the you know, big long
strings of peat moss, but the shredded up and you

(01:19:23):
put it about an half inch deep over those areas,
I think you're going to see green up and that'll
carry you into the fall season. When you would apply
the product for take all root rot, I think you'll
see a results. And I would like to hear back
from you if you do one or both of those,
as to how that's looking on your long care of

(01:19:44):
take all. Okay, so on the law, not long care,
but long pest disease and weed management. It's the second
schedule that's on there, Pest disease and weed management. Go
across to October on the disease row. All right, hey,
the music says, I gotta quit talking. Good luck with that,

(01:20:04):
but do send me a picture if you do, either
the pete moss or that fertile on micronutrient alrighty, welcome back,
Welcome back, on a beautiful Sunday morning. I hope you

(01:20:25):
have some plans this afternoon to go visit a garden center,
pick up some of the wonderfulness that's available this time
of the year to make your place beautiful and bountiful
and everything you want it to be. There's all kinds
of plants out there and all kinds of things for
every situation where you're trying to grow to have success.
So get out there and have a good time. Okay,

(01:20:48):
that would be nice. Hey, Nature's Way resources visiting with
Ian the other day, Ian who now runs the place there.
You know John Ferguson a lot of y'all know John.
He started Nature's Way many years ago based on the
principle of how do we cooperate with nature do things
the way nature does to make plants successful. And if

(01:21:08):
anybody knew that brown stuff comes before green stuff, it
was John Ferguson. You take care of the soil and
the plants do good. That's what that means. Brown stuff
before green stuff. And he created all these things that
were born at Nature's weall, you know, rose oil and
leaf more compost just examples of things born in Nature's Way.
Well intront in the place now and him, him and
the whole he and the whole team out there in

(01:21:30):
Nature's Way continues that tradition and the products. I was
out visiting. We looked some products and things. It just
as good as it always was. And uh, you know,
I've tried a number of Nature's Way products and they
just work. Now. Everybody knows about rose oil. Roaset soil
is famous.

Speaker 13 (01:21:46):
You know.

Speaker 2 (01:21:46):
The Houston Roase Society helped design that particular mix and
it's just as good as it ever was. But they
have the leaf mole compost in a fine and a
course texture. If you're going to do some do it
yourself aeration and top tre seeing, well, get their fine
textured leaf boll compost. It is the one you want
to use. They also have a fungal compost which you
can use for compost stop dressing two. By the way,

(01:22:08):
you can and the fungal compost is on sale every Friday.
It's called Fungal Fridays. Ten percent off bags, twenty percent
off bulk. You can go pick stuff up at Nature's Way,
which is located on Interstate forty five North, just before
you get to Conro. Just before you get up to Conro,
fourteen eighty eight comes in from the left, that goes

(01:22:29):
off to Magnolia. You turn right and go across the
railroad tracks and that's you're going to get to Sherbrook
Circle right there across the tracks and you'll see Nature's
Way resources. Now you can do that. You can go
to stores where they sell their bags, and you can
find them around town. A lot of high quality stuff
and available by the bag in town, or you can
call them have it delivered for a reasonable fee. You know,

(01:22:52):
it costs money to hold bulk products. I don't care
what kind of bulk product you're dealing with. You try
to get it delivered somewhere, and there's a signific that
an expense for the company trying to get it to you.
It just regulations and all kinds of things, but it's
worth it. You buy a book, you get it delivered,
and you know If you're going to just do a
few bags here and there, that's fine. But if you're

(01:23:13):
going to create a bed for growing things, if you're
going to top dress the whole lawn, if you're gonna
whatever like that, you need to do the You need
to do the bulk route of it. Nature's Way Resources
dot Com is a website, and here's the phone number.
Nine three six two seven three twelve hundred nine three
six two seven three twelve hundred. My wife and I

(01:23:35):
were sitting outside on the back patio yesterday just watching
birds coming to our feeder, and we had some interesting
things going on. First of all, we had some beautiful redbirds,
male and female redbirds were coming. A few other species
of birds were coming to the feeder. And then I
looked over in my vegetable garden and I saw a robin.

(01:23:57):
And I have to tell you what this robin was doing.
By the way, I have a apb out on that
robin right now. It will be arrested and brought to justice.
But anyway, the robin was eating my cherry tomatoes, just
picking them off my cherry tomato plants. Well, you know,
I get enough of them. I'm not too worried about that,
so we sat and kind of chuckled and watched this
marauding vandal bird steal my cherry tomatoes. Anyway, it just

(01:24:24):
reminds me. You know, if you love birds, or if
you want to learn more about birds, wild Birds Unlimited
is the place to go.

Speaker 13 (01:24:32):
It is.

Speaker 2 (01:24:33):
I mean, wild Birds Unlimited has the experts that can
answer any question that you have about birds, and they've
got the products that you need to have success. You
can buy cheap birds eat out there, full of those
red bebies. By the time you look at how much
do I actually get that the birds eat, it's not cheap.
It's not cheap at all because they kick most of

(01:24:53):
it out. Some of those cheap seeds are just anyway
waste money. Anyway, the folks at wal Unlimited have a
perfect blend for right now. It's called Nesting Super Blend.
It's only available at Wildbirds Unlimited. Nesting Superblend has got
all kinds of stuff that birds salivate overs. I mean,
we're talking about dried mule worms and peanuts and sunflower

(01:25:15):
chips and save flower tree nuts, bark butter bit. It's
got that extra protein and it's got the calcium that's
needed during this nesting season, and they are nesting right now.
So when you're forming shells to lay eggs, when you're
creating a skeletal structure for bird, it takes calcium to
do that and the protein that is so important. You
can buy Nesting super Blend and loose seed bags. You

(01:25:37):
can buy it in the little compacted seed cylinders that
the bird has to peck the seeds out of. You
buy it either way, but the main thing is just
buy it now. You're going to find Nesting super Blend
at any of the six Wildbirds Unlimited stores here in
the Greater Houston area. That includes the Kingwood Store in
Kingwood Drive, the clear Lake Store on El Dorado, the
Pearland Store on East Broadway, if you are in Cypress

(01:26:00):
area on Barker Cypress, if you are in the south
central area of Houston, well there's one on bel Air
and there's one on Memorial Drive on the West side
as well. That's six six Wildbirds Unlimited stores. Why are
you there? Pick up the Wildbirds Unlimited high perch hummingbird feeder.
Yesterday is the first hummingbird I've seen at my feeder,

(01:26:22):
and maybe it's just because I was sitting out at
the right time. But I loved that feeder. It really
really works makes it easier to see the hummingbirds too.
All right, let's do this. We are going to head
out to Meadows Place and talk to Jim. Hello Jim,
Welcome to garden Line.

Speaker 8 (01:26:39):
Hello Skip. We talked about a week ago. I've got
my tomatoes growing. I've got five plants. Two I bought
as a plant, three I raised from seed, primarily cherry tomatoes.
And I've been using Job's Organic, which is a two

(01:27:01):
five three tomato and vegetable fertilizer. They recommended itself with fertilizer,
and I've also been applying a little bit of coffee
grounds EPs and salt and baking soda compound every other
week that was recommended. Is there anything I should be

(01:27:24):
doing different? I'm a little disappointed that the plants are
doing well. They're producing tomatoes, but the tomatoes are very small.
They're not growing very big as I think they should.
So am I doing something wrong? Or do I need
to change what I'm doing?

Speaker 2 (01:27:41):
Jim? What's the color look like on those plants? Is
it deep deep green or is it kind of a
light sharp truish yellowy green or where is it?

Speaker 8 (01:27:49):
No, they're all deep deep green.

Speaker 2 (01:27:52):
Okay, Well, tomato fruit size is a function of getting
as much sunlight as possible and of the way you
prune tomatoes. Now, if you were to take a tomato
and cut every sucker off of it and just have
a single trump coming up a steak, you would have
larger tomatoes. If you let it be in a cage
and you take off almost no suckers, you have more tomatoes,

(01:28:15):
but they're going to be smaller. So that's one factor
in there. Other than that, the tomatoes sound like they
look good. The stuff you're putting downs, I'll find. For
the tomatoes, I just wait and give a little bit
more time. But maybe taking out some more of those
little sucker shoots that come out everywhere tomato produces a leaf,
it also puts a shoot right there, and that may

(01:28:37):
help a little bit. But those would be the two
tips that I would give you.

Speaker 8 (01:28:41):
I've been working on that since the last time we talked,
checking the suckers and every book. I just wanted to
tell what's doing needed to do something different.

Speaker 2 (01:28:50):
I think that's it, other than sunlight. But hey, I'm
up against a hard break, but thanks for the call
and good luck getting those tomatoes, and that my advice works.
You know, you got to bring me half the free
that you get and drop it off at the station.
We'll call it you bye bye, you bet. I'll be
right back all right, welcome back to the guarden Line'm

(01:29:10):
glad you are with us today. If you have not
been to Arburgate recently, you need to go. Arbor Gate
is a destination. It just is. And by the way,
I'm going to be at Arbrogate next Saturday. This will
be the last appearance that I do for the whole

(01:29:32):
spring season next Saturday, so it's like last call, folks,
come on out and see me. I will be there
on Saturday. I'll give you even the date of it, Saturday,
May tenth. I'll be there from twelve to answering your
gardening questions. They got some great giveaways. They're going to
have a peach ballini machine right next to me, so

(01:29:53):
you got to come see me to get a bellini
unless they're planning on moving at ors up it anyway,
that is a fun place to go and they have
lots of good stuff. By the way, on May seventeenth,
that's the Saturday after this Tropical Dazzlers talk with Angela Chandler.
And Angela is an expert on all kinds of things plants,

(01:30:14):
and she brings a class that just it just goes
into all those bold, almost gaudy, beautiful things that we
can grow here in summer. There's tropical, you know, allocacious
and colocacious, he may say, elephant ears on plants, kalladiums,
and dance of soma. The zanthosoma especially pretty too. If

(01:30:34):
you love showy plants that really thrive in the hot,
humid climate in the Houstern area, this is your class.
Now you've got a register. You got a register for
the class. It's ten dollars per person and only forty people.
There's only room for forty, so don't mess around. Give
them a call two eight one three five one eighty
eight fifty one two eight one three five one eight
eight five one for the class two saturdays from this weekend,

(01:30:59):
so May seventeenth, next Saturday, they tenth, I'll be at Arburgate.
Come on out and see me. You got to see
the stuff that they have. The selection is incredible and
bring people with you on this. If you've got a
non gardener friend. They will love the gift shops and
they will find a plant that they will become a gardener.

(01:31:19):
When they go to Arburgate, they'll get excited all the
different products that are carried, all the different plants that
are carried, and you know, here's here's probably the best.
I don't know. It's hard to say the best thing
when there's so many good things. But one of the
very best things at Arburgate is you show up and
people that know what they're talking about greet you, and
they take time even to help you shop if you

(01:31:41):
need that, if you want somebody to you know, put together.
You say, I need a group of plants to go
in a flower bed, and I want I kind of
like these colors, and what would be good going into summer?
What can I do right now? They'll take in there,
show you that it's not like you're on your own.
Remember to park in the back. It's off Trischel Road,
goes around behind Arburgate. There's a parking lot back, perfect
place to park, lots of space, easy safe access. It's

(01:32:04):
the only way to go. The main thing is right now,
oh wait, right on on your calendar. Next Saturday the tenth,
the tenth of May, I'll be there at Arburgate for
the final appearance that I'll do this whole spring. Come
on out to see me. It is a plus plus.
Let's just put this way. Everybody who shows up, I'll

(01:32:24):
buy you a pink a peach Bellini. Not that I'm
having to buy them, they're free. Come on out, let's
have some fun at Arborgate. That's not hard to do.
You are listening to Garden Line. I'm your host, Skip Richter.
We are here to help you have a successful garden.
The way I like to put it is a more
bountiful garden, more beautiful landscape, and more fun in the process,

(01:32:46):
because gardening should be fun, and it can be fun
when you take care of your plants, when you do
the things that plants want you to do. If you
have not been recently to an Ace hardware store, you've
not been to an Ace hardware store. This is not
your grandfather's hardware store. Yeah, it has all the stuff

(01:33:07):
grandpa's hardware store had, you know, things for lighting and
things for electricity, and things for plumbing and all of
that like a hardware store. Right, tools, but Ace, oh gosh,
the tool lines that they have are amazing and I'm
I am a big fan of power tools and I
love those things. And Ace's got an excellent selection of

(01:33:27):
all of the you know, we're talking about top brands,
main top brand, but when it comes to your yard
and your garden, fertilizers a good selection. If you're organic,
if you're synthetic, it doesn't matter. Ace has got products
for that, controlling pasts and diseases and weeds, all the
things that want to mess up your plans out in
the garden. They got this stuff for that. They got

(01:33:48):
quality tools, garden hoses, you know, I mean the garden sprinklers.
And then one of my favorite parts, and I've just
gotten to become more of an outdoor living person, is
yours go. I think I love to go out on
the patio and set and we got a string of
those lights. I call them beer garden lights, but they're
basically there's little strings of a not so bright lights

(01:34:10):
that glow and create that ambiance. It is so nice
out there when you have that. And right now they
got their barbecue pits on a special deal. There's certain
certain varieties I sound like a plant person. There are
certain brands of barbecue pits that have really good specials
on them. And ACE carries all the big brands, the
ones you can't live without. They're there at Ace harborre

(01:34:32):
Go to ACE Hardware Texas dot com. That's the website
you need to know. Ace Hardware Texas. Don't forget to
put the Texas in there dot com. So, for example,
if you're done in Deer Park, we got deer Park
Lumber Ace Hardware on Center Street. If you were in Orange, Texas, Hey,
shout out to all you folks out there in Orange

(01:34:53):
Child's Building Supply on Sixteenth Street. Maybe you're up in
Crosby at Crosby Ace Hardware on FM twenty one. Or
how about this Cyprus Ace Hardware on Jones Road. There's
another one. I mean, there's a lot of great Ace
Hardware stores out there, and you can find yours by
going to ACE Hardware Texas dot com. We're gonna head
up to Conroe now and we're going to talk to Bill. Hey, Bill,

(01:35:15):
welcome to Garden Line. Do we have a bill? All right?
I'n put Bill back on hold and I'll come back
to your bill. We'll try to get you back online.

Speaker 15 (01:35:28):
Here.

Speaker 2 (01:35:29):
Guess what I just did yesterday. I just attached a
three sixty tree stabilizer to a tree in my landscape.
I I you know I talk about I don't brag
on products and talk about products I don't have personal
experience with. Well. I've got two citrus trees right now
that I have tree stabilizers on them. And when I
first planted them, I came back the next day and

(01:35:51):
those trees were at a forty five gangle because the
wind blasted through there. Not anymore. They got tree stabilizers.
It's going to hold them and it holds them in
a way that lets them move, which is important. Movement
creates strong trunks. Movement creates good anchorage with those top
roots that help anchor that tree in. These trees are

(01:36:11):
gonna develop strong and they're need They're not gonna need
the stabilizer forever, but when you need it, I got it,
and they last forever. You're gonna find them at RCW
Nurseries at jorgesed and Gardens Don in Alvin. You can
go to Siena Multch down the Siena area and find
the three sixty tree stabilizers and the heights Buchanans on
eleven street carries them and guess what the arborgate where

(01:36:34):
I'm gonna be next Saturday. Come on and get your
tree stabilizer three sixty Tree stabilizer out there. This is
a great product. It just really it makes it easy.
You don't got the wires to trip over. You're not
cutting garden hose up into sections, so the wire didn't
cut into the tree. Just get you one, Get you
one and you'll like it. All right. We're gonna go

(01:36:56):
back out and try Bill again. Here, Hey Bill, are
you there?

Speaker 17 (01:37:00):
I am done?

Speaker 19 (01:37:01):
Yeah?

Speaker 2 (01:37:01):
Thanks quick.

Speaker 19 (01:37:05):
The rain is coming.

Speaker 13 (01:37:06):
Should I do the fun aside before or.

Speaker 2 (01:37:07):
After the rain? After? What are we spray in.

Speaker 19 (01:37:13):
Garden lawn?

Speaker 2 (01:37:15):
The lawn? Okay? So uh yeah, wait until after it
rains and then put your fun aside down. Uh if
we were to get a gully washer kind of rain,
it could wash outuct and and that includes soluble fertilizer
too away. So yeah, I would wait, and I think
you'll be better off. But do it right away after
the rain, because that wet conditions is where diseases thrive,

(01:37:37):
all right, right?

Speaker 13 (01:37:40):
Or has to grow? Is there a differences to grow
on versus they.

Speaker 2 (01:37:48):
Complimentary they're complementary uh asites, micro nutrients, strictly, strictly micro nutrients.
It's a granule has Medina has to. Twelve four eight
is a primarily putting on for the big three the nitrogen,
phosphorus and potassium that you're going to get from that,

(01:38:09):
so you can use us both. All right, did you
have too much potassa phosphorus? Thank you?

Speaker 5 (01:38:16):
No?

Speaker 2 (01:38:17):
Eight it no, it's an it's an eight two.

Speaker 17 (01:38:22):
Two.

Speaker 2 (01:38:23):
Okay, this is right. No, No, it's a twelve four eight.
I'm sorry, my brain is not clicking here this morning. Yeah,
twelve four eight is the one in Medina hast Grove
for lawns, and that phosphorus is the middle number. It's
the lowest number. That's how you want it to be.

Speaker 8 (01:38:38):
Okay, okay, very good, thank you very much.

Speaker 2 (01:38:41):
All right, you bet, thanks for the call. I appreciate
I appreciate that very much. Enchanted Forest is a wonderful
garden center down there in the Richmond Rosenberg area. In fact,
if you were in Richmond and you were heading up
sixty nine towards sugar Land, it'd be off to the
Riot on FM twenty seven to fifty nine. Write this

(01:39:05):
address down this web address. You need to see their website.
It is outstanding and it gives you a big picture
of everything. You'll find out what's going on there because
there's weekends where you're gonna want to go out and
hear somebody talk or whatever, or maybe they got a
new kind of plan in which are always getting in.
It is enchanted Forest Richmond, TX dot com entented Forest Richmond,

(01:39:29):
TX dot com right now. They are loaded as als are,
with pollinator plants and with plants, you know, to attract
butterflies and hummingbirds and things like that. They have a
selection of Salvius. I think it's something like ninety salvius
that they carry ninety Salvia variety. I believe it's ninety one.
In fact, Salvi's my favorite genus of plants, and they

(01:39:51):
are loaded with them. They're and enchanted forest herb selection,
incredible vegetable selections, incredible flowers everything, and big beautiful giant
pecan trees. Just the shade. It is so nice to
walk around and shop under those kinds of trees. Really

(01:40:11):
really nice to be able to do that. I am
coming up here on a heartbreak for the news, and
when we come back we'll come back to your questions
if you'd like to give me a call seven one
three two one two kt RH. In the meantime, don't forget.
I'm going to be at arbor Gate Garden Center this
next Saturday from twelfth to two, and I hope you

(01:40:33):
can come out and see me. There you go. I
just had to let that play a little bit. Nothing
like homegrown tomatoes, you know, in the garden tomatoes or
the Queen of the garden. Nobody ever calls me about
the Cole Robbie. We get a lot of questions about tomatoes.
We're gonna go to one right now. We're gonna head

(01:40:53):
out to Cyprus, Texas and talk to Matt. Matt, welcome
to garden Line.

Speaker 6 (01:40:59):
Good morning, Skip, and thank you. I send you a
picture of email about ten minutes ago about.

Speaker 5 (01:41:08):
I got it good good.

Speaker 6 (01:41:10):
I believe, I don't know for sure. It's only one picture,
but it has I believe it's called frass on it,
which is a doo dooo of some sort, or maybe
it's a that was a lead.

Speaker 2 (01:41:24):
No, you're you're right. Frass means insect poop. Doodoo means
insect poop, and it's insect poop on that lead and
what a lovely thing to talk about on a nice
Sunday morning. Sorry, you know, no, that's okay. Interestingly enough,
we can have some fun, a little bit of fun
with this. There are entomologists that specialize in bug poop identification,

(01:41:49):
because sometimes you don't see the bug, you just see
the poop, and believe it or not, they can identify
bugs based on their poop. I am not one of those.
I know a little bit about it, but not much,
but they look at it. Caterpillars have a very unique
poop and that it often has ridges in it. And
the most delicate way I can put this Sunday morning

(01:42:14):
is you remember those Plato machines where you put plato
in and you press the handle down and you could
get star You could put a star hole in front
of it, or a half moon crescent and it would
make that shape coming out. The back end of a
caterpillar has similar mark, similar things, and they can look

(01:42:34):
at that bug poop and they can tell you this
is that kind of caterpillar or whatever. And they're used
in like crime scene identification. You know, a body is
found in the woods and they find this little bug
poop on it and they can look and they go, oh, well,
that's this bug, and therefore that bug occurs at this
time of the year in New England, and so this
is anyway, all right, I'm going too far with it,

(01:42:57):
but you get the idea. Your yours looks a little
bit like caterpillar, but it's it's extremely soft. I would
look for some other pieces that are a little bit firmer,
like little pellets. More so, to be sure on that one,
I think you're dealing with a caterpillar that's feeding on it.
It is possible that something else just came by and

(01:43:19):
happened to stop on the leaf above it, or on
that leaf, and that's why you have it. But I
think that's a sign that you have some caterpillars. I
see in the top right corner the.

Speaker 6 (01:43:30):
Skip, I don't see anything, and I get up pretty
close with my glasses. I don't see a warm at all.
Someone the black frost is like a little beebe and
I just flick them off. There are holes in some

(01:43:51):
of the leaves.

Speaker 2 (01:43:53):
Yeah, well, I'll tell you what else is. If you
look at the picture you sent me in the top
right corner, you never even notice it. If you weren't
studying the whole picture. But there is a leaf that
has been caterpillar chewed, the edges have been chewed off
of it, there's a caterpillar feeds in from the sides,
and I still think this is a caterpillar. What can
happen is the number one caterpillar predator in the garden

(01:44:16):
and landscape or paper wasps. Paper wasps the ones that
build the nests under your eaves, that sting us. That
is what they primarily eat is caterpillars, and they are
flying through your garden all the time. And whoever poop
this poop is probably paper wasp food right now if
you're not finding a caterpillar on your plant, so I
would not worry about it. If you're not seeing significant

(01:44:36):
loss of foliage, I wouldn't think twice about it. Nature
has a way of taking care of these things. Okay, yeah,
one more question.

Speaker 6 (01:44:46):
Could it be flea beetles with holes and the leaves
you know, round holes?

Speaker 2 (01:44:54):
Not this poop. This poop is not that, and I
don't Flea beetles are primarily when a planet very young,
they can do damage, but that plan out grows them
in time. So I know. I don't think so. I
think we covered all we can about it. And thank
you for this venture into entomological scatology today on garden Line.

(01:45:15):
Thank you very much. I appreciate that if you're looking
for an organic fertilizer with eleven percent nitrogen that dissolves
away in your lawn and gives you a pretty quick
release the nutrients get the nutrients. Microes get a hold
of it and they turn the nutrients loose from it
to feed your plant. The nutrients primarily nitrogen that's in't

(01:45:35):
that is Sweet Green from night. Sweet Green is widely
available in the Greater Houston, Aario. You're going to find
it at an ACE Hardware on Sincle Ranch as well
as ACE Hardware up there in the Woodlands. You go
onto Hiding and Feed on Student or Airline or RCW
Nursery on Tambo Parkway, and you are going to find
nitro fross products like this, like this quality product Sweet Green.

(01:45:57):
Let's head out now to Magnolia tech Is and talk
to Jerry.

Speaker 10 (01:46:01):
Hello, Jerry, Hey, Hello, how are you doing this morning?

Speaker 2 (01:46:06):
I'm doing well. How are you doing? Yes, sir, I
am How can we help.

Speaker 10 (01:46:12):
My wife just discovered some green nodules on our pecan
tree leaves that Google identified as Pontana, and I was
wanting to know how to get rid of them.

Speaker 2 (01:46:29):
On palm tree leaves, green nodules con oh oh, those
are called Phyloxa phylocera.

Speaker 8 (01:46:40):
And what it is.

Speaker 2 (01:46:41):
It's a little insect. It lays an egg in the
leaf and the secretions cause the leaf to grow that
little cancery cancerous looking bump on the leaf, and the
insect grows up inside that and then flies out. Most
of the time, phylocra are not worth treating. Nature has
a way of keeping them in bounds. If you had

(01:47:02):
a very young pecan tree and you had a severe
philoxtra infestation, then I would say, okay, let's get out
and start on a regular basis spraying it and try
to break this up because it's taking away from the
trees bigger on good growing, healthy pecan trees. Some philoxa
here and there not worth it. They're not costing you
anything on tree growth or production.

Speaker 10 (01:47:24):
Last year, we have three picone trees to pretty close
proximity and two of the three or eight aproal bad
fast kind of worms. Is that part of this.

Speaker 2 (01:47:38):
No, no, unrelated. All this insect does the only you
don't even see the insect. It's very tiny, like a
gnat size. All it does is cause the tree to
expend energy growing that philoxra gall and taking away from
the that area where the tree could have been making
carbohydrates with the leaf out in the sunshine. So if

(01:48:03):
you got annual severe infestations, yeah, go ahead and spray them.
You've got to put a product on them. If it's
a non bearing tree, you could use something like a
bifendren product labeled for use in landscape. But if it's
bearing pecans, I wouldn't I wouldn't do anything on it.

Speaker 10 (01:48:20):
Okay, okay, thank you so much.

Speaker 2 (01:48:22):
All right, good you bet, thank you for the call.
Appreciate that a lot, interesting call. We see quite a
bit of philosprah around on our trees here. Hey, Quality
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(01:49:48):
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(01:50:08):
protecting you and making sure you're not left in the dark.
Time for me to take a little break here, I'll
be right back with your calls. All right, welcome back
to garden Lines. Glad to have you with us this morning.
Thanks for listening in on this lovely Sunday morning. I
hope you're having a good time looking forward this afternoon.
Maybe get out and do a little bit of nursery visiting,

(01:50:30):
if not a few chores about the landscape. You'd like
to go that route, you know, the one of the
I talk about the every day is a good day
for gardening. And I say that because even if it's
pouring rain outside like it was recently here, you can
still garden indoors. And what do I mean by that, Well,
I mean there's all kinds of ways with garden indoors.

(01:50:53):
You can grow orchids, you can you can start seeds,
you can start cuttings for propagating plans. I mean, there's
all that is something to do for gardening. Another thing
is African violet. I remember when African violets were the
things like, eh, but I had African violets, and then
it kind of went out where people just weren't as enthusiastic.
But I'm seeing an interest in African violets now and

(01:51:15):
I just noticed must nursery done in Seabrook got a
whole bunch of them. In beautiful African violets. And they're
easy to grow. Again, like any plant, you give them
what they want and they grow. If you've tried to
grow one and it didn't work, it's because you didn't
give it what it wants. It's not that difficult to do.
But swing by moss if you don't have one, and
they again, they're gorgeous. They got all the kinds of

(01:51:37):
the purple and the pink and the reddish and the
white and all that. And they're also fun to propagate.
It is weird that some plants you can just break
a leaf off and that leaf will root. And at
the base of the leaf, an African violet leaf is
like a spoon. You know, in your spoon, you got
the little little metal rod or whatever that's holding it,

(01:51:59):
and then you got the round spoon on the end.
That's like an African violet leaf. And if you put
the petiole of the leaf that is the equivalent of
the little handle of the spoon down into the ground
so that the base of the leaf touches the soil.
It will form babies right there. It will. It works,
it's fun to do. So if you haven't tried Africa Votives,

(01:52:20):
just go to Moss Nursery and while you're there you're
going to find a lot of good stuff. They have
so many cool types of pottery, and right now they've
got some of the small landscape fountains on sale. As
a matter of fact, these would be jars. They look
like a container, but then you go look at them
as like there's a little hole in the top and

(01:52:41):
the water circulates around. And it's easy to do. You
just take them home, set them up. Not very difficult,
not huge, easy to do. But go into the greenhouse
when you're there, we're talking about indoor gardening. Of course,
Moss has everything for outdoor gardening, but I'm just focusing
on indoors for this moment. They've got some beautiful Epiphylum
orkid cactus and these are big. They have flat you

(01:53:03):
would call them leaves, but that technically they're not a leaf,
but beautiful hot pink blooms with a whole lot of
pedals on them. They're just gorgeous begonias. The house, their
house plant greenhouse has got one of the best selection
of all kinds of plants for indoors or tropicals for

(01:53:24):
using outdoors that you're going to find anywhere. They're excellent.
While you're there, stop in grab one of Jem's whimsicle shirts.
Gem comes up with these these really fascinating designs and things.
He has something called the eyeball Plan. If you haven't
seen that, go say I need to see Gem's eyeball
shirt eyeball plant shirt, and they'll show it to you

(01:53:47):
there at mos nur Shoe. They're located in Seabrook, Texas. Seabrook,
Texas uh and the website moss m aas nursery dot com.
The phone number eight excuse me two eight one seven
four gosh, let's try that again. Two eight one four
seven four twenty four eighty eight. One more time two

(01:54:08):
eight one four seven four twenty four eighty eight. That's
must nursery done in Seabrook, Texas. Eight acres of Wonderfulness.
Take a friend and allow yourself some time, because there's
a lot to see down there. Out west to Tomball
is one of our favorite feed stores, D and D

(01:54:30):
Feed and Supply. They're about three miles west of Highway
to forty nine on twenty nine to twenty. You just
head out twenty nine to twenty about three miles look
to the left, you'll see D and D Feed. D
and D has got you covered on what you need
for your law and your garden and your landscape. And
I'm talking about fertilizer products from nitrofoss and from Microlife

(01:54:50):
and Nelson turf Star and Medina products as well, and
azamite as well. Uh, if you want the jars and
Elson plant food, they got that. Two they got soils
from Heirloom Soils, and that is a really nice thing
to have. Just drive up there, grab them and you're good.
Dandy Feed the phone number is two eight one three

(01:55:11):
five one seventy one forty four. Now, if you're dealing
with any kind of pest from rats running around outside,
to bugs on your plants, to spider mites, to diseases
on your plants, to weeds that you're preventing or weeds
that you're killing because they are actively growing in your garden,
D and D has a product for everything, and they

(01:55:34):
can tell you how to use them and how to
have success with them. Dandy Feed and Supply three miles
west of Tombol and two forty nine. You need to
go check that place out. I love that place. I
always like going in talking to Jeff and the team,
the Dover family there. You know, they've been I guess
they've been around since what nineteen eighty nine that they
first opened up, and a big expanded store that they

(01:55:56):
have now is really really nice for shopping and of
course high quality pet feed too. When you're in there,
I was looking over some of the products that Microlife
carries and yeah, I don't know how to say it
other than just they have everything you need. That is

(01:56:16):
probably the easiest way that I can put it. If
you're looking for granule fertilizers, you know, like they're six
to four, they've got it for your lawns, and I
use that on everything. I mean, it really is good
for everything. If you have acid loving plants, they have
got a fertilizer product for acid loving plants, if you

(01:56:36):
you know, like I said, I use the communities and
blueberries and whatnot. They're fertilizers are not salt based, so
they're not going to burn your plants. You use a
lot of it, that's not going to hurt your plants.
Then they have their liquid product line. One of my
favorite in the liquid line is the orange label, the

(01:56:57):
excuse me, I can't talk right now, the micro Life
orange label. So if you've not used that product before,
it's called Biomatrix and it's a seven to one three,
so it's an extra boost of nitrogen. So any of
your foliage plants, especially or anything you're trying to give
a boost of nitrogen to. This is a good product.
And all our house plants basically are foliage plants, almost

(01:57:18):
all of them, so it works really good in the house.
On houseplants, they've got their ocean harvest and their super seaweed.
Now that our ocean harvest and super seaweed, that's essentially
what we would call fish emulsion and seaweed. You know,
organic gardeners have long known you mix fish emulsion and
seaweed together, and that's your organic equivalent of like a

(01:57:39):
synthetic the emix and water turns the water blue or
green or whatever. It's the equivalent of that kind of
thing and it works. It absolutely works. So check them out.
You're going to find Microlife products garden centers, feed stores,
ace hardware stores Southwest for They're all over town. They're
easy to find and the products work. And I say

(01:58:00):
that because I've used them, you know. I that's one
thing that I try to say it here on guard Line,
but I think sometimes people just think, oh, well, you know,
they're just a sponsor. Now, I don't take sponsors if
I don't believe in their product, and if the product
doesn't work, if I haven't used it or seen research
on it or something like that. So I'm telling you something.

(01:58:22):
It's the results I've got from it. And I can
tell you that about these micro Life products because I
have music means I got to quit talking, and this
particular music means. We got one hour left in garden
Line today for the weekend. One hour left, So if
you'd like to give us a call and talk about
whatever's on your mind seven one three two one two

(01:58:45):
kt H, we will entertain questions about lawn weeds for
crying out loud. We even talked about bug poop this morning.
So I mean, it looks like nothing's inappropriate for garden line.
I don't know about that. I'm gonna I'm gonna read
that statement. There's a lot that's not going to talk about.

(01:59:06):
We'll be right back already there. We've got some fun
music coming up here in this segment. We'll we look
forward to that. But this is in the music show.
This is a garden line. We talk about gardening. What
kind of plant questions do you have? What do you
what do you wanna talk about? Maybe we can help

(01:59:28):
you have success. That certainly is what I would like
to happen, along with having some fun in the process,
but in order to really enjoy your landscape, you know what,
what kinds of tips and things can we provide to
help you have that kind of success. Gardening is supposed
to be fun, and it is. It is a beautifying thing, Listen.

(01:59:50):
I have often kidded different friends of mine that, including ministers,
that I have the one I am in, the one
profession that was created a design by God. How about
that for a high follutant statement. Yeah, that's right. Was

(02:00:11):
it the cubicle of Eden or what is it the
garden of Eden? You know what I'm saying? That's right.
Let's see, I'm gonna make man. I'm gonna make him
a gardener. That's it, all right, Well, the rest of
you can figure that out, do it at what you want.
We're having some fun here on garden line, but I

(02:00:32):
really believe that we are designed to have a green thumb,
to get out and enjoy plants, to enjoy nature. And
you know, there's so much psychological research to support the
idea of interaction with nature with plants. I've said these
things before, but patients in a hospital room that look

(02:00:52):
out their window at a parking lot versus look out
their window at nature, the healing rate measurably. In research
has been different. Kids in a classroom that struggle with
add ADHD and are trying to learn experiences with plants,
plants outside plants in their schooling life. It makes a difference,

(02:01:16):
and they're learning Folks as they get older, struggling with dementia,
people that are having trouble moving around. As they aid,
there are so many benefits of gardening mentally, physically, psychologically.
It really is significant and it matters. And I know,

(02:01:36):
as I like to say, I know I'm biased, but
that don't mean I'm wrong. In fact, in this case,
I know I'm right because research has proved it out.
I am because any of us who garden, we know
the feeling of going out and seeing the ability to
create something beautiful in your homescape, to change, to change

(02:01:58):
your lot in life to a place where you look
and you enjoy. You eat fresh food that you grew yourself,
so you know what has been sprayed on it or
not sprayed on it. You've grown it yourself, and there's
a satisfaction there. The way I like to put it is,
vegetables out of your garden are about fifteen hundred miles
fresher than the ones you're going to buy in most cases.

(02:02:19):
All Right, there's a little speech. Cinamulch south of Houston
is the place you go to set things up for success.
You start with the soil and you get it right,
and then you put a plant in it that wants
to grow here or in the spot where you're planting it,
and you're set up for success. And Cena Mulch is
the place that is the foundation of success. And here's

(02:02:42):
why I say that. They have mulches. They have composts,
they have bed mixes for all kinds of plants, and
they have the nutrients they go with them, so when
you drive away from Siena, you have the makings of
what it takes to create a wonderful place for plants
to throw. That would include fertilizers from Microlife and Nielsen

(02:03:03):
their turf Star line, as well as the jars, the
plant food jars, Medina products, products from nitrofoss asamite I've
talked about that today and airloomsol products as well. They're
all there and you can if you're within twenty miles
they'll deliver for a small fee. I just go to
Siennamultch dot com Ciena multch dot com. They're open Monday
through Friday seven thirty to five, Saturday seven thirty to two,

(02:03:26):
close today, close on Sundays Siennamoltz dot com. And I
promise you this. They are the friendliest, most helpful folks
that you're gonna find you will enjoy, I'll say, shopping
there at Cienamulch. We're going to head now out to
Lakeside Estates and talk to Maureene this morning. Hello Maureen,

(02:03:48):
and welcome to garden Line.

Speaker 11 (02:03:50):
Yes, I'm excited because I'm going to be a first
time owner of a salsonium plant. I've always seen them,
but just wasn't able to make a connection to buy one.
So here I am today. My question is, okay, would
it prefer a zalia soil or rose soil mix? And

(02:04:15):
the label said something about a high fertilizer value, so
not sure? Can you answer those for me so I
can get off to a good start.

Speaker 2 (02:04:26):
Yeah, you know you're not going to go wrong with
either of those soils for delfinium, It's going to do
well in either one.

Speaker 6 (02:04:36):
I I you know that.

Speaker 2 (02:04:38):
I love the big tall bloom spikes that they have.
They can you just need to give them a good
spot where they get a good sunlight. But a little
late day sun wouldn't hurt, especially as things kind of
get hot around here, you know that can that's a
challenge for a lot of the plants that we do.
But delfinium is not that difficult, not that terribly difficult

(02:04:59):
to grow. It can take take a lot of the
conditions we have, so I would probably give it slightly
acidic soil. Rose soil is a little bit on the
acidic side usually uh and the azalea types of soil,
of course, those those are acidic. But it's not like
an azalea or a blueberry or something where you just

(02:05:21):
have to have really you know, more acidic conditions for
it to thrive.

Speaker 13 (02:05:28):
Okay, and anything about.

Speaker 5 (02:05:31):
It.

Speaker 11 (02:05:32):
It's a big plant right now. The note dude say,
don't break up the root ball. So should I still
be using something to encourage the root to grow? There's
a lot on the market. I can't remember ahead.

Speaker 2 (02:05:49):
I would give. I would, Yeah, I would get the
Medina Medina product that I keep talking about all the time.
I just I just find it be Okay, I know
the yeah, great way to.

Speaker 11 (02:06:02):
Success every once in a while, but yeah, Medina is fine.
Medina has to grow the one.

Speaker 2 (02:06:09):
That you or yeah, I would, I would. I would
do the six twelve six has to grow plant food. Yeah,
six twelve six, and watered in with that and do
it again twice more about a week apart. And I
think that is about all you need to do initially
and then going forward, just moderate amounts of fertilizer. They're
not super heavy feeders. You know, you're not going to

(02:06:30):
have to go through uh, just extra fertilizing all the time.
They A moderate amount is probably what you want. They're
going to get pretty tall, so have you might want
to have some way of supporting those bloomstalks, and there
are different ways people do that, but if it's on
the spot, I.

Speaker 11 (02:06:49):
Have long pals, I have long coals and the real
skinny because I have orchards also, and so sometimes I
have to but maybe I'll have to even resort to more.
And so what's their blooming season?

Speaker 2 (02:07:04):
Primarily spring? Probably spring to early summer is primarily when
we see those bloom the ones that I've dealt with before.
Uh and by the way, I'm coming up here on
a break, Maureene, so I'm gonna have to go, but
uh it, congratulations on that.

Speaker 11 (02:07:23):
Yes, I'm very happy. Alrighty, I'm gonna give it a
good try.

Speaker 5 (02:07:26):
Thank you.

Speaker 2 (02:07:27):
All right, Well there you go, all right, take care,
ay bye, all right, I'm gonna take a break. I'll
be right back. All right, we're gonna leave that without comments.
I have been a while since I put some barbershop on. Wow,
interesting lyrics, right, welcome back to garden Line. My apologies

(02:07:47):
for the song, but we do play weird things here
ever now and then we're glad you're here. If you'd
like to give me a call, seven one three two
one two kt r H seven one three two one
two kat r Ah, let's talk about the things that
interest you. Nelson Plant Food in their turf Star line,
which is all their products for lawns, have something called
Bruce's Brew. Bruce's Brew is a unique product. I could

(02:08:12):
call it a hybrid, but in some ways that's inaccurate.
But here's what it is. It's a fertilizer that is
both a fast release and a slow release. Okay, so
there's some forms of nitrogen in it that are going
to release right away for a good greenup, and then
there's some forms of nitrogen that are going to take
two or three months to do their release over time.

(02:08:33):
And so when you put Bruceus Brew down, you're not
only taking care of right now with a good boost,
but you are taking care of a few months ahead
of you there as well. Bruce's Brew from Nelson's, part
of the turf Star line, is available in a lot
of places around town. It's easy to find and the
stuff works. It is a high quality product designed with

(02:08:56):
forms of nitrogen that not only feed the micro in
the soil, but provide that nice even release over time
to help you have a good result, a nice, beautiful
dnse lawn. And that's what we're really out to achieve, right,
I mean, that is our goal as we do that.
If you haven't been out to Enchanted Forest Garden Center,

(02:09:19):
they're down in the Richmond Rosenberg area, specifically on the
Katie Fulscher side of the Richmond Rosenberg area. So when
you go out to Ingented Gardens Number One, jaw's gonna
drop when you step out of the car and see
that place. It is an expanse of all kinds of
wonderful plants and pottery. I think the last time I

(02:09:40):
was out there was just recently. They had some of
their wire basket planters. And when I say basket, I
don't mean a thin basket. I mean a real heavy
duty kind of metal wire structure that you line with
like a cocoa cocoa core liner and fill it with
potting soil and you can plan anything. Then they have
some that stand, they're on stands and they're you know,

(02:10:02):
a waist higher. They have some that hang on chains
from underneath the trees there. It's an old rustic look
that is so attractive. They got plenty of those. And
Chris they have a lot of other kinds of containers.
When you go out there, you're going to find everything
you need. They carry the fertilizer products, they carry the
products for dealing with pests and diseases, and perhaps most

(02:10:23):
importantly of all, they know their stuff. The Liniman family
has been in business since what nineteen ninety five, I
believe when the Antended Gardens Burst opened.

Speaker 19 (02:10:33):
Uh.

Speaker 2 (02:10:33):
And you know Joey running the place now. He's just
just a wealth of information, very active in the bigger
nursery industry. And if you're looking for good answers, the
team has it out there. They're enthusiastic. They greet you.
You can bring them photos or samples or things that
you want help with, and they'll help you. They'll hope

(02:10:54):
you do that. They'll hope you achieve that, and I
hope you get out there and try it out. Gets
just some citrus, they some citrus trees on hand. A
really beautiful you know. One of the cool kind of
hot new plants is the blue butterfly pee. That's one
people love. It's got the deep deep indigo blue flowers
that when you dry them and steep them in tea,

(02:11:17):
it turns the turns the water of bluish color depending
on the pH you if you make it, I can't remember.
I believe it's well anyway. One one acidic I think
is blue and basic. I think it turns into a
pink color. But anyway, it doesn't matter which is which.
It just does it all. And it's a cool plant.
It's not one that you find in just ever place.
They're a biscus selection, super super hot, all kinds of

(02:11:40):
beautiful biscus, gorgeous cone flowers. I can just sit here
and go on and on. Do you like succulents and cacti?
You should see the collections that they have. They're really cool,
really cool. All right, Well, there you go, uh Enchanted
Gardens Richmond dot com. That's the website. Go check it out.

(02:12:01):
While you're there, pick up fertilizers from Microlife, Nitroposs and
Nelson plant Food, medina, soils from Nature's Way and Heirloom. So,
I mean, they got everything you need. When you drive
away from there, you got no excuse. You got the plants,
you got the supplies to go with them, and you
got the advice that you need. Now just go home
and do it and you can enjoy and create that

(02:12:21):
kind of miniature Eden right there at your place with
intented gardens and a Richmond. We had a lot of
storms last year that really hammered trees, took them down,
took out our power. It was horrible, just a lot
of devastation. You know, there's a lot that a good
tree service can do to protect a tree against a storm,

(02:12:43):
creating a good structure that has the best chance of surviving.
I mean, you know, you can't get a hurricane that
knocks over anything, right, but there's a lot you can
do with proper pruning and care. And Martin spoon Moore,
you know he started. I don't know how long ago
Martin's been in the business, but the fan it's ow
fifty four years in the tree business. Martin's a third generation,

(02:13:04):
I believe Affordable Tree it's a family business. When you
give them a call at seven one three, six nine
nine twenty six sixty three, you're probably going to talk
to Martin's mom. Tell her you heard of us, heard
about us on guardenline, because garden Line customers are their priority.
That's seven one three six ninety nine two six six three.
Whether you need just a consultation or whether you want

(02:13:27):
to have pruning done or deep root feeding, pest and
disease controlled. If you've got stumps to grind and listen
to this. If you're going to do any kind of
construction around a tree that includes sidewalks and driveways, anything
trenching for utility lines, call them first, have them come
out first and advise you. After the damage is done,

(02:13:52):
they can help, but you've taken a lot of the
good options off the table when you wait until after
the damage has already been done. And call them ahead
of time. Pre construction care with some consultation very very important,
and they can do it at Affordable Tree Service. That's
seven to one three six two six six three. We're

(02:14:15):
going to head now out to Spring and talk to Ruth. Hello, Ruth,
welcome to garden Mine.

Speaker 17 (02:14:21):
Thank you, good morning.

Speaker 20 (02:14:23):
We bought some drink goods at a at a box
and about three days after we planted them, the leads
started curling.

Speaker 17 (02:14:34):
The lengthwise of the leaf.

Speaker 20 (02:14:36):
Uh huh, not from a tip to thet so anyhow well,
I was concerned.

Speaker 17 (02:14:42):
We've watered them, and then we thought, well, let's hold
off on watering.

Speaker 14 (02:14:46):
But they still do it.

Speaker 17 (02:14:48):
Sometimes they don't, sometimes they do, but they're looking worse.

Speaker 14 (02:14:53):
The color is good.

Speaker 17 (02:14:55):
I was wondering the fungus that make us can get.

Speaker 2 (02:15:00):
It is not if it happened that fast in your bed.
That is a stress response, and so it could happen
if a lot of roots were damaged in the process
of planting, maybe they dried out, maybe they broke, who
knows what that could happen. It could happen if when
you watered after that, you didn't get that little root

(02:15:23):
ball that you put in the ground wet. You know,
that's all the roots are in that little rootball. So
if the soil is moist around them, the root ball
still can pump out the water and dry out and
go into a drop stress because it hasn't you know,
it hasn't got roots out around it in the soil.
So it could happen from that. Different kinds of stresses
can do it, you know. But if you just keep

(02:15:46):
taking care of them, try to keep the soil evenly moist.
Because too much water is bad, so idi wet no
oxygen in the roots, that's bad, but not enough water
is bad. And so when you water for a while,
make sure you're getting water right there in that root ball.
Well and the soil around it a little bit too,
but but mainly that rootball. Watch for that, and they
should work out of it. I think they'll pick up.

(02:16:08):
Unless the stress would were to lead to some sort
of a root rod or something, well then they're going
to go downhill and you can't stop that. But I
think they'll be okay, I think they should.

Speaker 10 (02:16:18):
Yeah, they're still green.

Speaker 17 (02:16:19):
Okay, they're still green and buds.

Speaker 2 (02:16:22):
But it's not okay. Good look that's that's just a
stress response and we get stressed and we live through it.
It's okay. Thanks Ruth. I appreciate your call very much.
Thanks a lot. If you're going to pot up any
kind of plant on the patio or indoors, you need
to know about jungle land distributed by nitrophoss. Outdoors, they've

(02:16:45):
got the flower and vegetable planning soil. Indoors, they got
the water saving planning sol Let's talk about that water
saving planning soil. It's got crystals in it. They to me,
they look like a little clear jello chunks, very tiny,
very small, but they whole water much longer than the
soil does. So when you forget the water, okay, you
don't forget the water. When your neighbor forgets the water,

(02:17:08):
and they their plants will have roots around those crystals
and they can get a little bit extra out of
that to carry them through until the plant owner remembers
to go back and water. Am in really good anyway,
That is jungle land, water saving, potting, soil a. Youre
going to find jungle land products or excuse me, nitrovoss
products many different places. You go up to Cyprus to

(02:17:30):
m and Dace or down maybe the Ace Hardware Copperfield
on FM five twenty nine Langham Creek Ace Hardware, or
go down to the Kadi area to both the Pinoak
location Kdace Hardware and the Ace Hardware Sinkle Ranch on
Mason Road. All kinds of places where you're going to
find nitrofos products. Let's head out now to Seabrook and

(02:17:53):
we're gonna talk to Lisa this morning. Hello, Lisa, good morning.

Speaker 8 (02:17:58):
I have a question.

Speaker 13 (02:17:59):
We want to landscape the entire of a U shaped
drive and we want to have a border of shrubs
and then white drift roots wood roses. But okay, we're
trying to decide on what to use for the border.
I know we could try something like boxwood, but I
had read that you could use rosemary as a border,
which you recommend that.

Speaker 2 (02:18:23):
If the soil is very well drained. Rosemary makes a
nice evergreen shrub that you can use. Now there's times
when it gets looking a little ratty as it gets
older and you do a little trimming on it, but
it is an option. But with our rainfall here and
in that enclosed U shaped drive, I just question whether

(02:18:43):
the drainage would always be sufficient for it. But if
it is, rosemary is an option another. I would not
do boxwood. They just have a lot of They just
are having more and more problems with a couple of
diseases that affect them. You could do a orfeopon that
would be an option to put in there. There's some
there are some compact hollies that would do well in

(02:19:06):
an area like that as well, if you just want
a good green shrub, and of course there are many
other kinds of shrubs. But that you're right in the
back door of Moss Nursery, So swing by there and
they're going to have eight hundred options for you that
they could recommend for an area. I'm assuming it gets
it gets good son.

Speaker 13 (02:19:27):
Right, Oh, all day, all day.

Speaker 2 (02:19:31):
It's okay.

Speaker 13 (02:19:32):
It's a lot of sun. Yeah, okay, yeah, I wanted well,
but I read that they don't do good with roses.

Speaker 2 (02:19:41):
Well, it's not that they're with roses. They're going to
be shorter statued and they'll do okay. I don't know
where it said they wouldn't or what the reason was,
but hey, I got about five seconds until a break here, Lisa.
But thank you very much for the call. I do
appreciate it. All right, folks, I'll be right back in
just one second. Hang around all right, evoke you welcome

(02:20:03):
back to garden Line. Good to have you with us.
We're talking gardening and having fun here today, and I
am glad you're around to be part of that. Thanks
a lot for listening in. Uh, why don't we just
let's see where are we here? Yeah, we're gonna go
straight out here to Bay City and talk to Ross
this morning. Hello Ross, and welcome to garden Mine.

Speaker 4 (02:20:24):
Hello Skip. How are you doing?

Speaker 2 (02:20:27):
I'm doing well? Thank you.

Speaker 4 (02:20:30):
I've got a question.

Speaker 21 (02:20:34):
I've got about ten live oak trees, and I got
about three of.

Speaker 4 (02:20:39):
Them that just don't seem to be doing that.

Speaker 13 (02:20:41):
Good you know.

Speaker 2 (02:20:44):
And I was live oak.

Speaker 21 (02:20:45):
You said, yes, sir, live oak. And they're probably about
I guess. I planted them when they were very small.
Seven of them came up. I started from an acorn,
and uh, they're probably about twenty years old almost, I guess.

Speaker 4 (02:20:59):
But for some reason the last couple of years, I
got about three of them that just this seemed like
you're going downhill for some reason.

Speaker 2 (02:21:07):
Okay, and uh, maybe when you started them ross, did
you start them in a container and then transplant them
out or did you just go out in the yard
and drop an acron in the ground.

Speaker 21 (02:21:21):
I started them in a container and then once they
got them about three four inches tall, I stuck them
in the ground and kept them water and they did
fine for years.

Speaker 4 (02:21:32):
Three of them had bought from Lamar Evans.

Speaker 21 (02:21:35):
Uh he's an oak tree guy in Bay City, and uh,
well when I bought him to they was it was
just a solid block of wood.

Speaker 4 (02:21:42):
Because when I took the uh.

Speaker 21 (02:21:45):
The two or three gallon container they were in, they
were they it was down those are those you know
doing all right?

Speaker 2 (02:21:55):
But okay, you so here, here's here's what I here's
what I think is happening. This is my best shot,
based on the information that you provided, I think that
they have got a girdling root that is affecting the tree.
So here's what happens when you put a plant and
a container and it's the root hits the sides of

(02:22:18):
the container and it can't do anything but turn and
go around in a circle. And that little root is
the size of a piece of spaghetti, and the trunk
is a little bitty. But as that trunk gets bigger
and bigger, and as the root gets bigger and bigger,
the two come together and then that root becomes a
strangling item around the trunk. Then the trunk, as it

(02:22:43):
grows out and the root gets bigger, it just chokes
it in the root. It's like you put a band
of metal around the trunk, and you know at some
point it's going to be a problem. And it starts
not doing so good. It lacks, it's bigger, and you
even start seeing die back where the shoot ends of shoots,
you know, kind of die back. And the only way
to check that for sure, to see if I'm right

(02:23:03):
about that, is to go out and get you a
strong blast of water and maybe even a little hand
trowel and dig around the base of the plant, try
to get down about six inches deep and go all
the way around it and look for that. If you
find it and it's not too late, meaning it's not
so embedded that you can't fix it, you can take
a saw. You can take a hamorrhnaches or whatever, just

(02:23:26):
to cut a root and set that trunk free to
go to resume expanding outward and growing healthy. If it's
too far along, it's probably you're probably not going to
be able to save it. But that that's just a
matter of taking a look and trying. That's most likely
what's happening. The only other thing would be to give
it some nitrogen fertilizer, some lawn type fertilizer and water

(02:23:51):
it in really good and kind of loosen up the soil.
Put as big of a mult area around them as
you can to keep the competition from grasses and we away. Uh,
and also to keep the lawn mower in string trimor
away because when they hit the bark they do damage.
But that that's what based on what you said, I
think that's what we're dealing with.

Speaker 21 (02:24:11):
Yeah, Well, the ones that the three that were root bound,
I mean just a solid block of wood. This has been,
like I said, about twenty years ago, and they've already
got about a five inch trunk on them.

Speaker 4 (02:24:23):
And I had one tree that was my best and
for some reason the main branch is just started dying
off on me.

Speaker 21 (02:24:33):
And that tree is about dead almost, but it's got
a thousands of shoots coming out off the.

Speaker 4 (02:24:38):
Bottom and some are coming out of the trunk, and
I don't know those are healthiest.

Speaker 2 (02:24:45):
Yeah, that's a yeah, well you can. You can cut
it back to there that that wound is going to
leave exposed wood that will begin to decay, So that
will be a weak spot in the trunk of that tree.
If it were mine for lawn terms sake, I would
get rid of that tree and and and get a good, healthy,
fresh one and put it in there. So it's it's

(02:25:07):
not just a matter can you keep it alive. Yes,
you can probably keep it alive, but structurally you don't
need something that the next big storm that comes through,
when it's already a large tree, is gonna snap it off. Okay.
So that that's my two cents worth. That's about That's
that's all I know to tell you on that check
for the girdling roots and then give it fertilizer about

(02:25:27):
one or two cups per inch of trunk diameter, one
or two cups per inch of trunk diameter watered and
really good. And that's about what's within your power. Ross. Hey,
I got a run, but thank you very much. I
do appreciate calling, and I wish you well and getting
that getting that work. And let me know if you
do find some girdling roots that are embedded in the

(02:25:47):
trunk like an inn a conda strangle in the thing.

Speaker 21 (02:25:51):
Okay, if if I put armon hammered litter around the trees,
but that hurts the tree by any chance, you know,
litter arm and hammer Uh, litter litter from a cat.

Speaker 2 (02:26:02):
I don't, I don't. I don't know what all might
be in it. It probably won't hurt anything, but I
just don't know on that one. But thanks a lot.
I appreciate I appreciate your call.

Speaker 10 (02:26:12):
Hey.

Speaker 2 (02:26:12):
Uh, Buchanans Garden Center Buchanan's Native Plants Garden Center on
Eleventh Street in the Heights. You need to go buy
there first of all, go buy and check out the
new checkout area. I don't care if it's raining or
if the sun is blazing down. Now you've got a
nice protected spot as you go to check out. Uh,
and uh, it's it's wonderful. It is really really nice.

Speaker 5 (02:26:35):
Uh.

Speaker 2 (02:26:35):
They've done a great job on creating that. Anytime you
go into Buchanans, you're going to find outstanding plant selections.
You know, they specialize in natives, but they don't just
have natives. But I don't know anybody that's got the
selection of natives the Buchanans does. And they even designate
them down to like, I want something that's a native

(02:26:57):
in the Houston area, only you know, not a native
in San Antonio and Austin. I'm only a native here
in the Houston area. They can do that. And if
you want natives for shade, if you want natives per son,
if you want natives that attract butterflies or hummingbirds or whatever,
these folks know what they're doing and they carry those plants.
And you need to go to and bookmark their website

(02:27:19):
Buchanansplants dot com. Buchanansplants dot com. It is one of
the best wealth of information on lots of kinds of gardening.
It's all there on the website. Plus you find out
when they're having sales or when they're having events like
that the big Easter event and everything out there. You
get the you kind of get the early start on
that kind of information. When you go to Buchanans, you

(02:27:42):
get everything you need for success, including people that are
very very well educated, friendly and accurate with the information
they give you so you can have success. Buchanans, Native Plants,
Eleventh Street, and the Heights, simple as that. All right,
I gotta take little Brek Carolyn Conroe your first up
when we come back. All Right, The Wonders or if

(02:28:07):
you watch the movie That Thing You Do by Tom Hanks,
the Oneiders. That's a long story. You have to see
the movie. By the way, Tom Hanks wrote the music
for that movie is that amazing. I mean, it's like
you went back to nineteen fifties. The guys. He is
way too talented, way too talented. I was visiting with
Luis from Heirloom Soils yesterday out there at the Hardware

(02:28:31):
City on Memorial the Ace Hardware Store, and we were
talking about some of the product and these have such
a line, such a broad line of products. I mean,
what do you need, you know, do you need a
potting soa. Do you need something for cactium's, cacti and
succulentce Do you need a product that you would put
out there as a landscape bed mix. Maybe you're gonna
grow veggies and herbs, maybe you're gonna grow roses. Each

(02:28:54):
thing I'm saying is a different product that they carry,
and it's a quality product. Expanded shield, mold, compost, expanded
shell with compost, you know, and then mulches, mulches, multius mulches.
If you want to take care of the brown stuff,
which is what I constantly recommend you do here on Guardenline.
You need to know about airloom soils and you need

(02:29:15):
to take advantage of it. Go to the website. It
is awesome heirloomsoils dot com. There's a great calculator there
for knowing how much to order. You can buy airloom
soil stuff by the bag all over town and beyond down.
I mean they extensive selection all over the place. Okay,
you can buy it by the bulk. You can go
get it at the porter location out there at Orange Rocket,

(02:29:37):
Mulch and Porter, or you can have them deliver it
to you and dump it on the driveway, or you
can have them deliver it to you in the neat
clean one Qbyard Supersack. That's right. They just pick this
big sack up, set it on your driveway. I've done
that before myself. It is neat clean and easy. I
love that way. Airloom soils great products, great options, great prices,

(02:30:00):
and most of all, they work. And I tell you
that because I use them, I know that they work.
Let's go out to Conra now we're going to talk
to Carol. Hello, Carol, Welcome to guard Line.

Speaker 22 (02:30:12):
Hi Skip, I'd listen every weekend. Glad you're there. You're
always so upbeat and exciting to listen to. I have
a question about coconut core bricks. I see those on
the Internet and various places, those brick shaped things you
put in water and it expands. Are they the same
from location to locations? You have to be careful where

(02:30:34):
you buy them as far as what else is in them,
or do they even work? Would you recommend using those
probably in a raised bed or even in potted plants?

Speaker 2 (02:30:47):
All right, good question. As far as I know, they're
about the same. Basically, they take coconuts and that shaggy
stuff on the outside of coconuts gets stripped off and
it gets formulated into the coconut core that we talk
about liners for hanging baskets made out of coconut core.
You can buy the bricks, or you can buy several
different products that have coconut core in them. It's a

(02:31:08):
replacement for peat moss because peat moss is a mine product,
and we do know there's not an unlimited supply of
peat moss in the world, and so people have been
moving away toward a more renewable product like coconut core
because your coconuts grow, you got more core, and so
it's one that we can use for that. It holds
water well, it drains. Okay, you probably would want to

(02:31:30):
use something with it, like a pearlite or a vermiculite
if you were going to make a potting mix from
the coconut core, but it's up to you. Yes, it works,
but however you want to go about it, it'll be fine.
It's already been rinsed and washed, so it doesn't have
the salt any kind of a salt content or anything

(02:31:52):
in it, and it ought to be fine for whatever
you're growing.

Speaker 4 (02:31:55):
Okay, all right, great, thanks all right, Thanks.

Speaker 2 (02:31:59):
For the call. Appreciate that. Appreciate you being a listener
to Guardline. The Nitrofus super Turf, I've been telling you
about it for a while. I'm gonna keep telling you
about it because all summer long. Nitrofus Superturf is a
product to put down. Now, if you haven't fertilized in
six weeks with anything like the fast release, like the
red Imperial Bag or whatever, you can put it on
the Nitrofas superturf. When once you put it down you

(02:32:23):
need it's gonna last. It'll last up to four months
out there in the environment. And so we're kind of
hitting a point now where putting it down may carry
you on through most of the summer and then with
the clipping decomposition, you're pretty good shaped there. I'll bet
you can apply it a couple times during the summer.
Usually I'll want to put it on sometime in April
and then probably come back in a little later in

(02:32:44):
the summer and do it again to carry into a fall.
But it works, and you can find it in a
lot of places. You can find it done in Chenny Forest,
in Chanet Gardens down to Richmond, Rosenberg area. If you
are near Plantation Ace Hardware, same area on FM three
point fifty nine, you're going to find night Foss products there,
Court Hardware and Stafford on South Maine. Let's see oh

(02:33:06):
Hiding and feed up on Interstate forty five North area
on Steuben or Airline another place you're going to get
night Foss products like that super turf and it really
does worry. It's easy to find two in the store.
Just look for the silver bag Night to Foss Superturf
silver bag. All right, let's do this. Let's go now
in the Houston area. We're going to talk to Kbob. Hey, Kbob,

(02:33:28):
what's up?

Speaker 11 (02:33:29):
Hi?

Speaker 19 (02:33:29):
Good morning. Someone had told me about a Japanese olive tree.
Don't know anything about them, but if I put it
close to the house, the root system is concerns me.
And they tell me that you could throw it into
a tree ten and twelve feet high, or you can

(02:33:52):
keep it a bush. Any information on that.

Speaker 2 (02:33:58):
Japanese are live? Was there any any more information on
the tag.

Speaker 19 (02:34:04):
I'm trying to This wasn't a tag. It was something
that somebody has at their house. It looked pretty and
they just referred to it as a Japanese olive tree.
Now I don't know if it's okay, I'm no Japanese
plum trees, but I never heard of Japanese olive trees.

Speaker 2 (02:34:24):
Yeah, I'm trying to think, well, there's there's olives are
native to the Mediterranean area, but olive. Uh, there is
a Japanese privet that is in the olive family but
is not an olive tree, and.

Speaker 19 (02:34:42):
That supposedly doesn't grow at a grows fruit, but it's
not really alas that it is an edible fruit. So
I've been told.

Speaker 2 (02:34:52):
I think, yeah, I'm pretty sure you were talking about
Japanese privet, that is my guess. Okay. Now, Japanese privet
is a plant that we worry about because of invasiveness.
It does produce little berries that uh you know, it's

(02:35:13):
a fruit of that plant, but a lot of the
a lot of the privets, it's a lugustrum. A lot
of the lagustriums and privets and things have the potential
for invasiveness, and and we're not real crazy about those.

Speaker 11 (02:35:26):
Uh.

Speaker 2 (02:35:26):
And so they are to the birds where the birds
eat the berries. Wherever they poop, they plant a tree.
And so I'm I'm not sure which plant you're talking about,
because I don't I don't know a plant that we
refer to as Japanese olive. Someone out there listening may
may call a plant that, But Japanese privet is a possibility.
I guess there's also an eliagnous. It's not Japanese though,

(02:35:48):
but uh Eleagnus is uh sometimes referred to as an
olive tree because that's what eliagnous means, but it's not
a true olive either. Uh So anyway, those are thoughts.
I just watch out for them if it's truly a
If you go online and do a Google search or however,
you search for a Japanese privet and see if that

(02:36:10):
looks like your plant. The only comment I'd have about
it is be careful. Those get kind of invasive.

Speaker 19 (02:36:16):
What about the root system if you're playing close to.

Speaker 2 (02:36:19):
The house, shrubs don't develop the same size and extensiveness
of a root that a tree would, and so I
wouldn't worry a lot about it as a foundation thing.
But here's the deal with roots around a foundation. Let
me just check our time. We're about to run out here.

(02:36:39):
Roots around a foundation, It's not that the root goes
under your slab and lifts it up like a root
would lift a sidewalk or driveway. It's that the roots
suck up all the moisture and so the ground is
very wet after a rain with the rain coming off
the roof, it's sopping wet. And then when it doesn't
rain for a while, the roots are all through that

(02:37:01):
area and they pump the little dry and that wetting
and drying creates shrinking and swelling, and that's what does
the damage to the foundation. So if you've got a
tree or shrub anywhere near the house, they're gonna put
roots over there because there's a lot of good water
that comes off the house. And so it's not just
that they're planted near the house that you're going to

(02:37:22):
have a root issue over there. And that would be
the thing I would be concerned about, and not the
size of the root. Thank you so much, Well, thank
you appreciate your final caller today. So congratulations. I wish
we had a door prize, but so we tell it.
Thanks a lot, Thanks a lot, Ky Bob, appreciate that.
All right, folks, don't forget where am I going to

(02:37:44):
be next Saturday for the final appearance of the Year, Arburgate, Arburgate,
Tom Ball, you got to go Arbrogate anyway, I'm going
to be there, and I'm told everybody tells me they're
going to have a peach Bellini machine. So I'm going
to set it to the side a little bit so
I don't get run over by you trampling me down
trying to get to the peach Balini maschine. Joking aside,

(02:38:06):
You got to come out Arbrogate looks beautiful right now.
They have so many plants, as they always do. Bring
your friends, let's make a day out of this. They
got great gift shops. I'll tell you this, if you
got a friend that's not into plants, you bring them
to Arbigate. We're gonna fix that because when they see
the kinds of plants and the options, next thing you know,

(02:38:27):
you've got a plant buddy. They're gonna be taking cuttings
from your house. You gonna have to run them off.