Watering and Fertilizing Your Lawns for the Summer

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to Katie r.

Speaker 2 (00:02):
H Garden Line with Skip Richter.

Speaker 3 (00:05):
Shoes the crazy here in the bass and gas they
can use a shrimp.

Speaker 4 (00:13):
You just watch him as world.

Speaker 3 (00:16):
The grasses and gas can you did.

Speaker 5 (00:19):
There are so many good things to soup uppers in
the bay, bringing the brassies like gass and.

Speaker 3 (00:25):
Again you date almost become back again. Not a sound
the glasses and.

Speaker 5 (00:32):
Gas can you.

Speaker 3 (00:35):
The sun, themon of.

Speaker 6 (00:39):
Ding in the glasses a gas can usual.

Speaker 7 (00:43):
First starting and treats in the basses.

Speaker 8 (00:47):
Like Gasca you did.

Speaker 5 (00:50):
Everything is so clean you can see and everything is
Sunday and.

Speaker 9 (00:58):
The tree Mary.

Speaker 3 (00:59):
So all right, we're back. We are back. I've been

(01:28):
waiting a week to talk to you, folks. I tell
you we got plenty of gardening things we can visit
about now, and we need to do that. This morning
we're gonna do that. We have special guests today. We're
gonna have Ian Ferguson from Nature's Way Resources with us
during the eight o'clock hour and we're going to talk
about how compost gets made. And you're thinking, I'll tell
you how compost gets made the natural way. Leaves fall

(01:52):
on the ground, piece of the bark tree falls in
the forest and it just decomposes and becomes soil and
everything grows better. That's that's right, that's why it's called
Nature's Way. But we're going to learn the details about
how do you make composts, how do you speed things up?
You know, you can go to the tropical rainforests of
the world and see beautiful soil that's been in process

(02:13):
for decades and decades, not centuries, just going all the
way to that humans stage where the soil is teeming
with all kinds of microbial activity and stuff. Well, what
do you do when you take a pile of green
waste stuff that is maybe it's somebody else's trash, it
certainly is nature's treasure. And how do you make it

(02:34):
into compost? And what are the things that you want
to make sure and do so that it is quality?
And then we won't talk about some stuff like that.
But anyway, we've got the incoming in here at eight
o'clock to day Nature's Way. You know, for those of
you who have not been out to Nature's Way, it
is a prem air green waste recycling facility. I mean
they bring in quality materials to turn into quality materials

(02:58):
for your garden. It's whether it's mulches, or whether it
is a compost product, whether it is a bed mix,
whether it's their remntalizer remineralizer product that puts the trace
mentals down into the soil for you. They've got it
all there, and they have for a long time, where
a lot of things we talk about now were born

(03:20):
out there at Nature's Way resources. Now there's those of
you who have never been out there. Well, it's out.
If you head a forty five. If let's say you're
coming from Houston, either way, coming up forty five right,
War fourteen eighty eight comes in from the left hand side.
If you're going north, you turn right and go across
the railroad tracks east of forty five. That is where

(03:43):
you will hit Sherbooks, Sir Books, Brooks Circle. That's easy
for me to say, and when you get there you
will see what we're talking about. There's lots of quality materials.
You can get it by the bag, you can get
it by the bulk, you can have them deliver it
however you want to go about it. The main thing
is just go about it. Because Nature's Way products are
made with time and with care, and that's the bottom line.

(04:07):
So you get something that truly is the kind of
product nature would make itself if it were doing it
just in a very efficient manner, in nature's way. So
y be in on here and do that in the
morning times here on garden Line, I always you get

(04:27):
to talking to you about plants and gardening and things
like that, and I got to tell you, I get
the itch to get outside. You know, by the time
garden Line is over with, we've been talking gardening so
long and I've been sitting here not gardening that I'm
ready to head outside and get some things done. And
it is a good time to do that.

Speaker 1 (04:47):
You know.

Speaker 3 (04:47):
This isn't a time of day when it's cooler, when
it's safe to be outside, you know, summertimes hot. But
I'll tell you this, we have some wonderful hours early
in the morning to get out there and to enjoy.
You don't have to do it all, you don't have
to do it all at once. I've been chipping away
at some irrigation systems. I've got several things that well,

(05:10):
I'm at my house. I've been working at my sister's
house getting her irrigation up and running. We're putting some
new microsprinkler irrigation in and I tell you efficient irrigation
is well, it makes sense. Number one, you're paying for
drinking water to squirt on your plants, water that's been

(05:31):
made so that we can drink it safely, and so
we're squirting it out there on the ground, on lawns
and on gardens and trees and shrubs and so on,
and so you want to divvy that out efficiently. Know,
too much water, too much waste of water, It just
doesn't make sense, and it causes plant problems. A drip

(05:51):
irrigation system is a great way to do that. And
when I use the term drip, as do a lot
in the industry, we're referring not to a little drop
that drips out of a pipe. We're talking about all
kinds of low volume irrigation. So there's a thing called
a shrub lur shrub lur and it's a little steak

(06:14):
and water sort of spits out in coarse droplets in
all directions. You can make it wet in area oh
I don't know, maybe six eight inches across somewhere like that,
or even less. As you turn the top it puts
out more or less water, but that's one that's a
type of drip irrigation. Another type, and the kind I've
been doing a sister splace is a what's called a microjet,

(06:38):
and water squirts out in different directions, very low to
the ground. The little steaks I'm using are probably eight
inches long or six inches long, and they just squirt
down there, real low to the ground. But what's a
bigger area? You know, if you just drip water in
one spot. If it's a sandy soil, it tends to
go more down than side. If it's a clay soil,

(07:01):
it goes equal in terms of sideways and down pretty
much close to it. So the way we describe it
as a sandy soil drip wedding zone looks like a
carrot okay, it goes out not much but then mostly down,
and a clay soil when you drip irrigation on it,
it looks more like a turn up. The wet zone

(07:22):
goes sideways and down about the same ratio. So when
you use a little micro jet, you wet a bigger area.
And you can do the same by putting a whole
bunch of little drip emitters all over the place around
the planet. But anyway, that's something we do and it
makes sense. I've been using the micro jets because they

(07:43):
are again a way to what a larger area, and
it does it a little bit faster. And so I'm
going to talk a little bit more about drip irrigation
as we go through this morning. Right now, let's take
a little break and we'll come right back if you
do have a question. Seven one, three, two, one two, five,
eight seven four. Back to the garden line. Good, heavy
with us. So now that it is so blazing hot,

(08:06):
we are needing to keep our soil adequately moist for
the roots of the plants for them to get by.
We have a lot of plants that can take the
heat just fine, but they have to have moisture. Without
the moisture, they're in big, big trouble, which is common sense, right,
But how do you water properly?

Speaker 5 (08:22):
Now?

Speaker 3 (08:23):
Most people sprinkle irrigate. They put a sprinkler out there,
or they have a sprinkler system to irrigate. And for lawns,
that's by and large the main way that irrigation is
done for various reasons. But when it comes to garden beds,
when it comes to vegetable gardens, herb gardens, or even
around fruit trees. Drip irrigation or micro irrigation is a

(08:46):
much better way to go, and it's because you put
the water right where the plants want it, which is
on the soil, not on the foliage of the plant.
Every time you wet foliage, you increase disease problems. And
every time you wet foliage, you leave the foliage wet
after to the irrigation cycle and it evaporates away and
it makes use to more humid which we don't need
anymore of that, right, and so it's a waste of

(09:07):
water to wet foliage, it just is. But to wet
soil that makes sense. So how do you do that? Well,
you can do it with little pipes that go along
the ground, tubes, plastic tubes that drip water. There's a
number of ways to do that. It's you can buy
do it yourself kits. I find the kits are helpful,
but typically never quite fit what you need to do,

(09:29):
and so you're always gonna have to buy some things
to go with the kits to fit your situation. Like
maybe it's a fifty foot long irrigation kit and you
got a sixty foot long area of garden beds that
you need to water, or maybe it doesn't have quite
enough emitters or the right kind of emitters. You can
do it all with a kit, or you can put
it together yourself. It's not that difficult to do. You

(09:49):
can go online and learn how to do it. But
the bottom line is here is where you begin. You
start at the faucet. If you're doing a do it
yourself a little system. You can hook these up if
you want to your irrigation clock, but that's a whole
other thing. You're probably going to need some folks that
really are in the industry and know how to do
that to do it. But if you just want to

(10:10):
hook it up to your hose, you come out of
the hose and first thing you're going to need is
a backflow preventer. And that's because of any water in
the tubes, there are ways that it can be sucked
back into the system, and especially if you're going to
inject fertilizers into your irrigation system and stuff, you definitely
have got to have that backflow preventter. And that is

(10:33):
a very simple, little inexpensive device. This crews onto the
end of your hose, and most people have them anyway,
just because it's in a lot of areas. It's a
matter of the law to have those on there, so
backflow preventter coming out of that. There are several components,
and the order that you do these is not as critical.
I have my own preferred way of doing it, but

(10:55):
there's different folks will use different order. But one thing
you're going to want is clock that determines how long
the water comes on and when it comes on. Another
thing you're gonna want is a filter, because when you
start getting into these irrigation tubes with the little tiny emetters,
little pieces of lime or iron deposits or sand or

(11:17):
all kinds of other things can actually be in the system.
If you're in a well water you can often have
some sand or something in it. But you want to filters.
I don't mean a little screen like you know you
see at the end of a garden hose. Sometimes there's
a little cone shaped wire mesh in there. I'm talking
about a filter that filters down smaller than that and
better than that, and so a filter. Before you get

(11:41):
into the systems, you're gonna need a pressure regulator. I
don't know what your pressure is at your house. Mine
is really high. I mean we have pressures like way
up in the sixties if not seventies psi, and it'll
just blow out. A drip irrigation system it's not made
to operate at that pressure. Drips operating typically at a

(12:01):
you know, eight to ten or a little higher pounds
of pressure at least to do that. So pressure regulator.
So we've got a clock to till it wind to water. Well,
we have the backflow prevener. We got a clock, tell
it wind to water. We have a filter, and then
we have a pressure regulator that is on the system.
And sometimes people will add other components in there, but

(12:23):
that basically is what you're looking at. Going from the
hose the faucet on the side of your house into
the drip hose. Then you can send that hose wherever
you want. And any of you who remember playing with
Tinker toys, you remember those that was before legos. You
just pop them together and you can build anything you want, right,

(12:44):
This is kind of like playing with Tinker toys.

Speaker 5 (12:46):
I have it.

Speaker 3 (12:47):
Mine goes out and from the faucet and it splits
into two directions. One is over to a patio for
some watering of containers, and another one is off to
the go vegetable garden, and then from there distributes out
in all the lines. There is some understanding that it
is helpful to do it. You know, if you try

(13:08):
to run five hundred feet out with a little half
inch drip hose, the pressure at the end is going
to be too low to do a good job. But
in general, you know, you can learn about this online
and how to do it, and there's a lot of
technologies out there on the market now and you can
buy it and stores. You can buy it online. There's
online places and it works. And once you've got it

(13:32):
set up my clock, I can set it to water.
Let's say I wanted to water the garden three times
a week or twice a week or something. I can
set it well. On Monday, I want you to come
on at six am, and I want you to water
for an hour because drip irrigation puts out water in
a slow rate, so you water a little longer than
you would your lawn and stuff. And then I want

(13:54):
you to go off. And I could be off on
vacation and it's watering for me. And that really makes
a lot of sense. It makes it easier. And then
you just get out there and check the lines. Remember,
don't assume nothing. You know, everything's fine. I like to
have the lines up on top of the ground or
I can see them so I can check them. But
however you want to go about it, you can do it.

(14:14):
I typically will throw a little mulch over my line
right and get access to it, but where the sun
doesn't bake down on it, because the water gets kind
of hot sitting in a line like that. Anyway, it's
not difficult to do, and you can learn about it.
And then, like I said, there are kits available and
a lot of other things, but maybe you just start
off with And here's where I get tired of watering

(14:35):
as containers. I love containers. I grow food and containers,
I grow flowers and containers so on, and I get
tired of water and all the containers every day, sometimes
twice a day if the container is too small and
the plant's too big. And so you just have a
little tube that goes along the ground and then there's
a little skinny tube ay out the size of a pencil,

(14:55):
about a quarter inch, that goes up into the container
with a little steak and it drips that container and
you have to schedule accordingly. But I can have it
water once or twice a day, or every other day
or whatever I want to do. And those containers with
a drip system also, and that is very handy. Even
if you don't have a timer and you go turn
the faucet on for a while and then turn it off,

(15:18):
you're going to forget, but I do. At least it
makes sense if you've got a If you are a
hose dragger and your irrigation is done by hoses all
the time, I still do it. I turn on a hose,
I go, yeah, I'm going to come back in about
fifteen twenty minutes and move it. And I forget. I
get busy, and it's two hours later and I've just

(15:40):
wasted water. You can even buy little timers that are
the equivalent of an egg timer. You just you know,
you just twist the knob and it click click click click,
counts down for however many minutes you twisted the knob
for and then it turns off automatically. So if you
want to do that, that's a good thing. I can
tell you that in the past before I start using timers.
I'd wake up in the morning and the neighborhood kids

(16:02):
will have their kayaks and canoes out in the street
just having the best time in the Whitewater river that
I created for them because I forgot to turn my
water off the night before. You may have done that
before yourself. Anyway, Drip irrigation makes sense, whether it's actual
drips emitters, or whether it's a microjat or a shrub
wants something called a shrubler that you use. Anyway, check

(16:27):
it out, try it out. Make life easier on yourself.
I hope that makes sense. O. Speaking of watering, when
we water our soils and they get wet, they swell up,
especially if they're clay. Clays are the worst. And then
when they get dry, they shrink up, and that movement
cracks foundations. It heaves up sidewalks, It heaves up driveways

(16:50):
as well. And when you see cracks in the brick
or in the sheet rock inside, it's time to call
tie at fix my slab. TI Strickland been doing this
a very very long time, very long time. He knows
this stuff, and he'll come out and he'll assess things
for you. You know, you see a crack, well, that
means something moved. But stuff's moving all the time with

(17:13):
the soils we have around here. The question is how
much is it moving and what do you need to
do about it? And I understands all that, and he'll
be able to shoot straight with you. He shows up
on time, he does what he says he's going to do,
he fixes it correctly, which is very important, and he
charges a fair price. That is That is really all

(17:33):
you would ask of someone who's coming out to do
service on anything around your house, that they show up
on time, they shoot straight, and they fix it right.
And that's fix my slab, fixmslab dot com. That's the website,
fix myslab dot com. If you want to give ty
call two eight one two five five forty nine forty nine.

(17:54):
He'll do a free inspection. Tell him that you heard
about it on guarden Line and have him come out
and have him check out. And he can do all
kinds of things. He can repair. You know, if you've
got a driveway that's all cracked and heaving and uneven,
you don't have to rip it out and pour a
new one. Talk to Tye, ask them what they can do.
They have a way of it. I call it floating

(18:17):
the driveway back up. It's like it brings it back
to level and smooth again. It's pretty cool stuff. Foundation stabilization,
foundation repair. They inspect, they diagnose problems, all kinds of
good things that a professional knows how to do and
ties a professional fixmaslab dot com two eight one two

(18:37):
f I five forty nine forty nine. Have him take
a look at it out in the lawn and garden. Hey,
if you haven't fertilized your lawn this summer, it's still
okay to do that, you know. I had a call
the other day someone said, well, I missed my fertilization. Well,
you may have not done it when I would recommend
you do it, but it's okay to still do it,

(18:58):
you know, to get out up there and get it done.
Night Foss has their simple and easy product called Superturf.
It's a silver bag, so it's easy to see. It's
only silver bag I've ever seen in stores nineteen four
to ten. Fertilizer gradually releases to your lawn and you
put it down and you don't worry about it. I
did one in my front yard in spring this year,

(19:21):
and the lawn just keeps looking good because Superturf's out
there giving it a little bit of nutrition every day
as the weeks and months go by, and that makes
a lot of sense. Night Foss Superturf's available all over.
You're going to find it at Enchented Forest on FM
twenty seven fifty nine, just not three miles or so
south of great Wood in the Richmond Rosenberg area, Langham

(19:44):
Creek Case Hardware on five twenty nine on the backside
of Copperfield for those of you in the Cypress area,
and then Ace Hardware City on Memorial Drive on the
west side of Houston also carries night Foss products like
this Superturf. And it's time to get it down. If
you done it, still okay to do it, go ahead
and go for it. We're going to take a little

(20:05):
break this morning. If you have a gardening question, we'll
be right back, but give me a call seven one
three two one two five eight seven four seven one
three two one two k t RH and you may
be first up when we come back from the bottom
of the hour news stick around. We were talking about
drip irrigation and some tips for that. A little bit earlier.

(20:28):
I'm telling you it is easy once you just read
up on a little bit learn how to do it.
It's not that difficult. It is really really easy to do.
I hope you'll give it a try. So, Uh, we're
talking about things of summer too, you know, the heat
that we're dealing with right now, the way our soils
are moving back and forth when they get when we

(20:50):
get a gully washer rain and then it dries out,
which right now we're in the dry out. For sure,
we could sure you some rain, but it may be
a little bit here on that. Uh, they're talking about
little bit coming in today. Possibly if you're fortunate enough
to get some, that's good because your plants sure could
use it. But you know, even during this time, we
get these little spells of rain and things, and mosquitos

(21:10):
pop up anytime they're standing water for a matter of
a few days. Mosquitoes have the ability to lay an
egg in it, hatch out, become a larva, become a pupa,
become an adult mosquito, and go after again the little
blood sucking vampires all over, six legged blood sucking vampires.
That's what a mosquito basically is. And you can take

(21:32):
care of that when you have bodies of water that
you can't drain out with mosquito dunks. Mosquito dunks are
little doughnuts that one dunk will float. First of all,
they float, you toss it in a little pond of water,
of water that's not moving. That's what mosquitoes like. If
water's moving, mosquitoes aren't able to go through their you know,

(21:54):
lay eggs and do the life cycle there. So you
want to put a mosquita dunk in it. A one
dunk covers a square feet, so let's say ten by
ten roughly, and it'll last about a month. It slowly
just decomposes away and releases a disease of mosquitoes. Not
a disease that affects dogs, cats, birds, lady beetles, anything

(22:15):
else out there. It's mosquitoes that this works on. And
they're so simple to use. I was doing some in
a couple of areas I had where there's a little
bit of standing water. I've got a little fountain, and
we were going to be gone for a period of time,
and I didn't want to, you know, turn the fountain

(22:36):
off and just have it sit stagnant. But I just
do a mosquito. A little bit of a mosquito dunk
got broke off in there and that way. You know,
when we came back, there were no mosquitoes in it,
and just of course I dumped the water out at
that point, but I hadn't bred any mosquito. If you
got a pond, if you've got a bird bath, those
kind of things, If you've got a rain water collection
device like a barrel, mosquito dunks, that's what you need.

(22:57):
They're available everywhere, feed stores, gardens, ace, hardware stores, Southwest fertilizer.
Everybody carries mosquity ducks. And you should have money. And
for this kind of season. What's that out with the phones? Now,
we're going to go to sugar Land and talk to
Michael this morning. Hey, Michael, welcome to the GAG.

Speaker 7 (23:16):
I'm have two questions for you. I'm the last several
months or so, I've been trying to start a crop
of beets, but once I get them in the ground
and they sort of come up, then they, for whatever reason,
seem to die one No Number one, can you tell
me what I'm possibly doing wrong there? The second question
is do you know of any solution that will struck

(23:38):
lizards because they're all over my garden, all over my backyard.

Speaker 3 (23:43):
M Well, lizards, there's not a lizard side. I can
insect as I did you put out, and you wouldn't
want to do that anyway. Lizards actually are there their
predators and they're eating insects and things like that, and
so they don't hurt anything other than just being everywhere basically.

(24:04):
But I don't know a way to get rid of lizards.
The fact that they're there means they got something to eat.
So there's some bugs there that they're feeding on. Let
me go to that beat thing. Beats are really closely
related to Swiss chard and both of them. You want
to have a well prepared soil, not really like hard unprepared,

(24:25):
but something with some composts mixed in. You want to
plant the little beat seeds about a half inch deep,
maybe a quarter inch, not too deep, keep them moist,
and give them plenty of sunlight. Now charred can live
with a little bit of shade because it's not trying
to make that carbohydrate rich beat root, but beats themselves

(24:47):
are and so if you want to have the beat
not just the beat greens, you need to give them
as much sunlight as possible six hours as a minimum.
For that, you want to space them out at least
as wide as the beat you hope to harvest. So
let's say you're hoping to get a little beat that's oh,
I don't know, a little bigger in a golf ball

(25:08):
or up to a tennis ball or something. Well, then
then you would need to have the beats spaced out
because if they're crowded, they won't develop the roots very well.
And then just keep them moist and right now that
that would be mulching. And to be honest, beats are
better off in spring and fall than they are in
the middle of summer.

Speaker 7 (25:26):
So you basically actually doing I think I would probably
making a mistake is they come up maybe about a
quarter of an inch from the from the soil, and
I have them in direct sunlight. Could it beat that
I'm exposing them to too much sun might.

Speaker 3 (25:42):
Not necessarily too much. If they're germinating and coming up,
then you've got you know, that's a good sign. Of course,
I don't know. After that, keeping the soil too wet,
letting it get too dry either one would be devastating
to a little seedling. That still doesn't have that extensive
root system it needs to survive. I might even give

(26:06):
them a little bit of a shade break late in
the day because of the intensity of the sun that
we're having right now. Like I said, beats are something
I think of more as planting them in late in
the winter early spring to get a crop, or maybe
doing it in the fall as well. But adequate moisture

(26:27):
and adequate sunlight. But that excessive heat of the late
day sun may be a little too much for them.

Speaker 7 (26:34):
Thanks so much, Skip, have a great day.

Speaker 3 (26:38):
Thanks Michael, You take care. Appreciate you call very much.
Appreciate that. For sure. ACE hardware stores are really they're ubiquitous.
They're all over the greater Houston area. I mean we
got Ace Hardware stores all the way from Orange, Texas
down to Portoransas and you name it really in all directions.

(26:59):
If you want to find Ace Hardware stores, you go
to ACE Hardwaretexas dot com. Don't forget the word Texas.
Ace Hardware Texas dot com. Find my local Ace Hardware
stores there stores like All Star up in Magnolia or
K and M. There's one in a task A Seeda
and one in Kingwood as well. How about Kilgore's Clearlake
Lumber on East Main, Katie Hardware on Penoak and Old

(27:20):
Town Katie Port, Lavake, Ace on in Calhoun Plaza, Child's
Building Supply and Orange. Let's say Victoria Ace on Navarro
Street down in Victoria and a Champions Ace on Spring
Cyprus up in Spring. Those are just some examples. They're
all over North, South, East, West, and central. Your local
Ace Hardware stores are going to be set up and

(27:43):
ready to go for everything you need for summer, all
your gardening, from products like fertilizers and sex sites. We
control all of that, to the tools that you need,
to the products that you want for enhancing the growth,
the fertilizer and whatnot. ACE has got you covered. And

(28:03):
then while you're out there, and I was just out
and yesterday late day had some family over. We are
enjoying some barbecue from the barbecue bits that I got
at Ace Hardware Store. Ace Hardware has quality Ace Hardware
Texas dot Com. Find your local ACE Hardware store. Check
them out. Let's take a quick break when we come back.

(28:23):
Jim and Jersey, you're the first up. Listen with the
heat we are having now you need to make sure
your plants root systems are ready to go. And there's
a product on the market. It's fairly new product. It's
called mighta Grow and it says on the bag you
can see the low word says might have grow, but
the big word says is not dead yet. And that

(28:44):
is true, It's not dead yet. Mighta Grow is not
a fertilizer. It is something that helps strengthen and enhance
plants extense extensive root system development that is so important
for this. It has be itemins like B one, B three,
B six to help plants handle stress, to help them
bounce back. It has microorizel fungi that have a relationship

(29:08):
with the plant roots to make them more efficient and
even to protect the roots in many different ways. That's important.
And it's got seakilp that has both macronutrients, got amino
acids and proteins in it very important. And it has
iba iba is a naturally occurring plant compound that signals
plant root growth at the cellular level. All in mita

(29:30):
Grow incredible formula. Each of these yes, I know, each
of these things does what they claim to do. Of course,
you put them together in one formula and you've got
something that can be used in various ways. I would
recommend you put new plants in the ground. You water
them in with a mitagrow solution period. Start at the beginning.
Get that in the roots. There's are living things in

(29:51):
many cases that we're talking about, like the micariza, to
get that root system established. If you've got stressed plants,
you can still come back in with my to grow.
That's why it says is not dead yet, and you
can do your best to give it a good chance
to save. And I've seen it make the difference to plants.
It does make a difference.

Speaker 1 (30:11):
Now.

Speaker 3 (30:12):
It just kind of like watering plants. Is it better
to water them well all the time, or is it
better to wait until they're almost dead and then water
them and bring them back well. It's the first. Of course,
you might have grow at the beginning, but if you didn't,
when a plan is struggling, make sure that's part of
a good drench of the root system to bring that
plant back might have grown. It's not dead yet. It's
available all over the place here in the Greater Houston area.

(30:35):
We're going to go now out to Jersey Village and
visit with Jim. Hey Jim, welcome to garden Line.

Speaker 1 (30:41):
Hey, good morning, Skip, Thank you for taking a caulser.
Had a question I heard you mentioned just a bit
ago about the summer fertilizer. Well, I did mine the
day before Dad young Bertha hit and put it down.
It was the silver bag like you just mentioned, and
watered it in. But then we had three point four

(31:03):
to two inches of brain that next day. Do you
think then fertilizer stun or do you think it kind
of ran off.

Speaker 3 (31:11):
It stuck unless you had what we call sheet erosion,
where there's just like a sheet of water just washing
everything off the surface of the soil. If you physically
wash the granules away, then a lot of it is gone.
But I suspect that's not what happened. Even in that
amount of rain. I suspect the granules are still there,

(31:34):
and it's designed. Part of the slow release is it
doesn't just get wet and dissolved like sugar or saltwood.
You know, when water gets on them, the superturf is
gonna slowly turn those nutrients loose, so they're still in
the granules. As long as you got the granules on
the ground, you're good to go.

Speaker 5 (31:54):
Shot it.

Speaker 1 (31:54):
Thank you much, appreciate your input as always, skiptable.

Speaker 3 (31:58):
All right, Jim, you take care. Let's go now to
Bill in Spring. Hey, Bill, welcome to garden line.

Speaker 10 (32:05):
Hi Skip, thank you so much for taking my call.
Our house is kind of east west oriented. In the
front door is the sidewalker on the west side, so
that its full sun in the afternoon and shade in
the morning. We're interested in planting some flowering plants in

(32:26):
the bed on the either side of the sidewalk in front.
And we're just wondering what, if any plants we could
plant it this time in the heat that might survive
and do.

Speaker 3 (32:41):
Okay, okay, Well, Madagascar periwinkles we call them vinca here,
but there are other plants called vinca, so I prefer
to call them Madagascar periwinkles. But anyway, bottom line a vinka.
They take the heat. It never gets to hot. Tavenka's
long to As long as there's moisture in the soil,

(33:02):
they're fine. Pentas if you've got an area that's got
some sun, but not that western sun, pentas would be
a good choice. They can take the heat. They just
need maybe some morning sun or dapple very bright dapple
shade in the afternoon. And then probably the king of
the summer flowers right now is the angelonia. Angelonia comes

(33:26):
in many different colors, from purple to pink to white
and so on. They have upright spikes. You probably see
them all over town. Another name people call them a
summer snap dragon, but they're not snap dragons. I'm not
real crazy about that term for them. But those would
all be good flowers that you could depend on. Plumbago.

(33:48):
Plumbago has sky blue flowers or white flowers. You can
buy it in either color sky blue or white, and
it makes a little shrub that's a perennial, dies down
in the winter, comes back in the next year if
you molted a little bit, and so that would be
another good choice that would do well for you.

Speaker 10 (34:06):
So those are a few, Okay, now we have planned
advank it before. We like those, so maybe we can
go back to that. You said going down the list, Pinta, angelina,
and columbago, are those your recommendations.

Speaker 3 (34:23):
Those would all be good recommendations. I've got angelonia and
penta in my front yard and it is full brunt
of the sun and they're doing just great. They are
holding up well. Now one another group of plants or salvia's.
There's many types of salvia, and you go to a
good garden center, independent garden center, they're going to be

(34:45):
able to point you to a number of different salvias
that are also excellent choices.

Speaker 4 (34:50):
Okay.

Speaker 10 (34:51):
And those were who would all be able to be
planted at this time in the heat?

Speaker 3 (34:57):
Yes, yes, they sure could. Okay, And then you know,
there's really there's a bunch more. I mean, it's hard
to know where to stop on naming plants, but if
you're looking for betting plants, those some of those are
smaller stature than they would be good for that.

Speaker 5 (35:13):
Okay.

Speaker 10 (35:14):
I sure enjoy your show especially Yeah.

Speaker 3 (35:20):
Okay, well I'm sorry. I'm sorry that you have such
a bad sense of humor, but well I'll take it.

Speaker 10 (35:27):
Thanks, okay, thanks, bye.

Speaker 3 (35:32):
You take care, bye bye. You know where you can
get all those plants I just mentioned. I just realized this.
You can get them at Nelson Water Gardens and Nursery
out there in Katie, Texas. Nelson Water Gardens and Nursery
out in Katie, Katie, Fort Benroe, just north of Iten
there they've got all of that. You know what they
also have. They've got butterfly plants of all kinds of

(35:53):
appendas or butterfly plants, but they have the butterfly weed,
the Sclepius to barosa. They've got those right now. They've
got swamp milkweed as well. So if you wanted to
bring monarchs in, they've got some plants for those as well.
How do you get there? What's Katie fort benroad Go
ahead to Katie Nelsonwatergardens dot Com two eight one nine

(36:13):
three one forty seven sixty nine. And hey, what about
the sound of water for a hot summer day? Oh? Man,
enjoy it. I love my fountains, by the way, you
would too, Nelson Watergardens dot Com. Well, the music means
we somehow just finished an hour and I don't know

(36:34):
how we did that, but we did. Uh, here we go.
We got three more to go, folks. You got a
gardening question? How about giving me a call? Seven one
three two one two five eight seven four seven one
three two one two kt r H Was it with
you about those things? I'm at a number of things
I want to talk about, but I want to hear
about what you want to talk about I think we

(36:54):
helped you have success, a more bountiful garden and a
more beautiful landscape. Let's talk good morning, good Saturday morning. Well,
we are getting what is supposed to be called a
cold front, and that is in quotations. I should say
this for Sunday, and it's not don't take the word

(37:14):
cold out, just say less hot front that's coming in.
That's basically about what it's going to amount to. But
I'll take it. I will definitely take it. I want
to talk just really quickly about the dangers of being
outside and working in the heat. And I'm not gonna
be your mom, but just listen to me a minute.

(37:37):
When I was young, I was invincible. I mean I
just pretty much could do anything to my body, throwing
myself at anything and not worry about it because I
was invincible, or at least I thought I was. And
then one day, in some excessive heat and not drinking
enough water, I experienced what was called heat exhaustion. Now,

(37:58):
the worst, one of the worst thing that can happen
is a heat stroke. And we're talking about kill you
stuff there, right, I mean that's serious. But heat exhaustion
knocked my feet out from under me for a good while.
I mean, it just flat. It got my attention and
I realized that I wasn't invincible. It took a few
more lessons, not with heat but other things to discover

(38:21):
I wasn't invincible. But anyway, bottom line is, yeah, that's
not something to mess with. Drink plenty of water, Folks,
avoid being out in the heat. Wear things to keep
the heat off of you. You know, a nice hat
to cover years in your neck and everything. A cap
is fine, but sun damage to your skin is cumulative.

(38:43):
And again I said, I know you're thinking, oh my gosh,
if I wanted a lecture, I would have called my mom.
No seriously, though, it is cumulative, and it's not like, oh,
well I didn't burn bad today, so I'm okay. No,
Well do that day after day after day.

Speaker 1 (38:56):
You pay for it.

Speaker 3 (38:57):
Take care of yourself. We want to keep you around
as listeners, that's for sure, at the very least. But
you know, respect the fact that it is hot out there,
and take good care of stuff, Take some breaks, work
as much as you can during the morning hours, early
morning hours, best time of day, late day it's still
pretty hot. Even if the sun goes down, but it's

(39:17):
not like when the sun is baking down on you
at all. So you know, get your stuff done, of course,
but please be careful. This is serious stuff. This is
often a matter of life and death. So there you go.
That was your Your mom called and made me tell
you that. She said, would you please lecture them? They

(39:38):
quit listening to me? Okay, anyway, you get the idea.
Serious stuff, And I know you know all that, but
it's not what we know or don't know. Sometimes it's
whether we think about it and pay attention to it
and heat it right, That is the way it is.
Oh my gosh, Siri, somehow that was funny. Just that

(40:04):
is hilarious. That is so funny. You know, we know
that our phones and everything are listening to us. I
didn't even say serious name what a nosy little Okay, anyway,
you get the idea. Let's go back to the show. Meanwhile,
back in the gardening, listen, we were talking about superturf

(40:24):
while ago, and someone is asking, can I do it?
Do you need to do it now? After it's rained
so much, somebody got a gully washer of rain and
the thing about a superturf type particle is that it is.
We're going to release that nutrient slowly, so instead of
it just dissolving like you get a lot of water
and the particle sits there. That's not going to make
it all release. Some of it will because it's a

(40:46):
gradual release, but some of it it just takes time,
and that's part of what being a slow release fertilizer is.
And now be a fine time to put it on.
If you haven't put the silver bag on nineteen four ten,
you can do that. Now that's a nitrophossis silver bag superturf.
It's easy, easy, easy to do. And the nice thing
about a gradual release like that is you do it

(41:07):
and you're done for a long time. It takes care
of you for a good while to worry about fertilizing
every month or something. Now you're going to find super
turf at places like RCW Nursery on Tomball Parkway. You're
going to find it at D and D Feed Up
on twenty nine to twenty in Tomball. You will find
it at Enchanted Gardens on FM three point fifty nine

(41:28):
out there in Richmond Rosenberg, as well as Court Hardware
on South Maine in the Stafford area. They all carry
night Foss products like the super Turf. Maybe I should
just ask Siri, you know what, This would be funny,
but probably not worth going out over the air on.
If someone asked me a question, I should just say

(41:50):
I don't know, hold on just a minute, and I
should ask Siri that question and see what Siri says.
I think. I think that's not a good idea, although
it would be it would be fun to try.

Speaker 1 (42:04):
Well.

Speaker 3 (42:04):
Since I'm on that topic, let me just mention that
there's a lot of information online that is just not true.
And one of the things that drives me nuts. Drives
me nuts is going online to social media outlets and
looking at what is posted there as being plant fact,

(42:25):
and a lot of times it's not usually not always.
Usually it's based on a truth, but it's not true
where we're located in our climate whatnot. Or it's stretched
to a point where it's not true.

Speaker 5 (42:42):
You know.

Speaker 3 (42:42):
For example, fertilizer is good for plants, it makes them grow. True,
putting ten times as much fertilizer as you should as
good for plants because it makes them grow. False, that's
not true. See what I mean. It's applied in the
wrong way. Fertilizer burns your plants. It could be true

(43:05):
if you put too much of a salt based fertilizer
on your plants, But fertilizer burns your plants. No, I'm
gonna say, not true, because not all fertilizers do, and
even salt based fertilizers put in small amounts are not
going to burn your plants. So it just drives me nuts.
But it's what's out there. And the news. Can I

(43:25):
gripe for just a minute. We need to have a
category justin called skip rants. And I just would like
occasionally to be given permission to rant. I was looking
at the news this morning, and or an app rather
not not actually the news itself. And as I go
through here, I see these things and if it says

(43:49):
like everyone agrees like something was we ask ten gardeners
the best plant for summer, and they all agreed on
and no, that is not true. They didn't all agree.
Nobody ever agrees. That's not true. Another one, another thing
that you see is if you're not doing if you're
not planting this plant in your garden, you're doing it

(44:13):
all wrong, you know. Or if you're not yeah, whatever,
And so much of the gardening media that we see
on our phones as it comes from other parts of
the country anyway, and it just you know, if it's
north of the Mason Dixon line or east and west
toward one of the two coasts, chances are it's not
going to be applicable here because we live in the

(44:35):
south the south slash southwest in our area, and it's
a very unique kind of growing environment. So please take
that stuff with the grain of salt. Call me if
you want, we can talk about it. I don't mind.
I won't I won't fuss, but it just drives me nuts.
And there's so much of that stuff out there in
the news, and I just yeah, okay, well that was

(44:58):
a somewhat of a rant. I think, tell you what
I need to do. I know what I need to do.
I need to put it on my on my social media.
I need to pick stuff out, put it on social
media and then just say why it's not true. And
I think that'd be interesting maybe. So anyway, there we go.
All right, Well, I just used up my segment there ranting.
We'll be back. I promise not to do that again

(45:20):
this morning. Have you have you been to Arburgate lately.
If you haven't, you need to get out there. This
would be, in fact a good day to get out
there and enjoy the arbor Gate. Arborgate is it's just
the kind of garden center that it's a gardener's garden
center as a way I would put it, when you
go out to the arbor Gate, you're going to find

(45:41):
every kind of plant you're looking for it. But you
know the I think the single most important thing in
a garden center is to have knowledgeable staff that are
there to help you and friendly staff of course, and
that is the arbor Gate. They absolutely have that down
very very well. They take their time, they walk you through,
they help advise you, they help you to have success.

(46:03):
They want you to be happy with the plants you have.
They want you to have a bountiful garden and a
beautiful landscape. And they've got the plants to do it.
That's not the question they do. I mean, fruit trees
year round at the arbor Gate, house plants, nice selection
at the Arborgate. You got a shady area you don't
know what to do with, they got a whole area
of plants just for that at the Arborgate. And then

(46:24):
they have their one two three completely easy system that's
a soil for anything with roots that is a composed
product as well. And you know that really when you
just put this way, if you want to have a
turn key success job, you get a plant from the Arborgate,
because those plants are going to grow. They're going to
do well here. Absolutely. You get their food that feeds

(46:46):
anything of the roots, that's a fertilizer that's organic. You
get their soil for any application that they have, and
then you get their compost that improves any in all soil.
And they put the expanded jail in that too, which
means in a clay soil going to get longer term
benefits than you do from organic matter alone. And it's
all there at the Arburgate. And by the way, if
you want to buy those last two bulk they can

(47:08):
deliver for you too. You just talk to them about that.
But the bottom line is go out, get inspired, get advised,
and get the kind of plants that are going to
thrive here. And that's at the Arborgate, which is west
of Tomball on twenty nine to twenty not too far
out of town on the left hand side. If you've
got a gardening question this morning, give me a call
seven one three two one two five eight seven four

(47:32):
seven one three two one two five eight seven four.
By the way, tomorrow, tomorrow morning, at eight o'clock, I'm
gonna have Beverly from the Arbigate Beverly, Well, it's gonna
be on. We're going to talk about all kinds of
things regarding plants and the heat of summer, some of
the best plants, some of her favorites out there, uh,
and the ones and the practices rather on how do

(47:53):
you have success? It's still someone called earlier and they
asked for what are some plants for hot hot hot
hot air is? And I gave him some ideas and
there's a way to go about planting those and the
way to go about caring for those to help them
have success. And I'm going to pick Beverly's brain on
that tomorrow morning at eight o'clock, so make sure and
stay tuned for that. Meanwhile, this morning at eight o'clock,

(48:14):
we're going to have Ian Ferguson from Nature's Way. The
EN's going to be here, and we're going to talk
all about the soil, and you know that it's all
about the soil, about the soil. I need to call
Megan Trainer justin. Can we get Megan Trainer on the line.
We need to We need her to Instead of all
about the base, we need all about the soil. That'd

(48:35):
be a good song. It's all about the soil, about
the soil. Anyway you get that, maybe we'll play them
anyway you get the idea. But really it is all
about the soil. And Ian's going to talk about the
ways that they make soil products in order to make
a quality product. Nature knows how to create quality soil.
It gets better and better and better year after year

(48:56):
when we're not messing with soil. But nature is Nature
knows how to do that. But when you're making quality
products so that you and I can go and instantly
have gardens success because we took care of the brown
stuff before we dropped in the green stuff. That's what
we're going to talk about with Ian this morning. So
I hope you can make it out there. I just

(49:18):
want to remind you we are in officially in storm season,
the hurricane season specifically of course, Houston is storm season
almost twelve months out of the year. And Affordable Tree
Service Martin Spoon Moore's company. They know exactly how to
take care of your trees. They know what's needed. Martin
will come out. He will assess your trees, take a
look at them, check them over, see what what is

(49:41):
the branch strength, what is the structural integrity and strength
of that plant? What does it need? And he will
advise you on that and he'll come out and get
it done. But you got to give him a call
because he's already booking for fall right now, and that's
a season where he's out doing a lot of work
on these trees. Seven to one, three, six, nine, nine six.
Give Martin a call. You're going to talk to Martin

(50:03):
or his wife, Joe or his mom. Those are the
only three people that answer the phone at Affordable Tree Service.
And if you call and you get somebody else, hang up,
you do all the wrong number because there are people
out there trying to pretend that their Affordable Tree Service
take advantage of Affordable's reputation. You got a call seven one, three, six,
nine nine two six sixty three, talk to Martin, his

(50:23):
wife or his mom and they will get you all
scheduled for Martin to come out. And now he does
a lot of things. You know, Martin can do tree removals.
He do deep root feeding, You do root barricading, stump grinding,
and so on, planting and pruning maintenance. Right now, you
need to make sure those trees are storm ready. And
as a tree grows from the day you plant it

(50:44):
until the day the storm arrives thirty or forty years later,
let's say you are making that tree strong. If you
know what you're doing, and Martin knows what he's doing,
have him come out. Don't trust your trees. Just anybody
affordable tree service seven one three six nine nine six three.
That's important, absolutely important.

Speaker 11 (51:05):
So I was.

Speaker 3 (51:07):
I am a student of soil and a student of
microbes and a student of beneficial insects, and I'm always
learning because research and science are continually learning. These are
topics that are really popular right now, and we are
learning so much about plants and all the things that

(51:28):
go on in the soil. For example, did you know
one plant can talk to another just as if it
had a telephone line going from one plant to another,
the telephone line being microizel fungi. And they have done
studies and I just think this is the coolest thing
ever where they have two plants. Let's let's just say
I you know, it was two tomato plants, for example,

(51:51):
or some other kind of plants. But they're separated where
no air can move between them. The roots are not
touching each other, they can't connect that way. But there's
micorizal fungi that are connecting the roots. One plant. Let's
say the plant on the left gets chewed on by
a particular kind of caterpillar and it releases things into

(52:13):
the atmosphere that bugs can, for lack of a better word, smell,
and they're brought that Beneficial bugs are brought in because
that smell tells them this plant is crying for help
and there's a caterpillar eating it and they know it's
a caterpillar because of the saliva and the insect makes
the leaf and the plant do a reaction that signals

(52:37):
for the things that eat that insect. I'm gonna say that,
so gun for a minute. Is that amazing or what?
And then the plant on the other side that there's
no air moving, those smells are not going to the
other plant. That plant starts to prepare for caterpillar attack
by doing things in its leaves and things that make

(52:58):
it less palatable for a caterpillar. How did it know?
It knew because through a microhizal network, one plant talked
to the next one and told it that that is
cool stuff. And microbes in the soil. They rule the world.
They absolutely do. And you know, you hear me talk
about microlife fertilizers all the time. There's so many great
products out there for the folks at microlife, but they're

(53:21):
built with the understanding that microbes rule the world. Micro
Life means exactly that. That's why it's called that. And
there's so many good products. You're going to find microbes
in all other products, I mean pretty much all the
multipurpose sixty four fertilizer for the lawn and all the
other lawn fertilizers, you're gonna have microbes in them. And

(53:42):
then there's some products that specifically are for inoculating with
beneficial microbes that are going to help that plant be successful.
For example, there's one called micro Grow Liquid AF Bioinoculant
Liquid AF. Just remember the letters AF, Albert Frank. It
is a maroon colored, burgundy colored label. It's got several

(54:05):
different types of beneficial bacteria and fungi that benefit plants
in ways we already know because the science is out there,
it's proven, it, it's known, and you can use it
on your plants to inoculate and to increase the numbers
of these beneficial microbes and let them do what they

(54:26):
do in nature out there. For the plants from microlife
micro grow liquid af but for all the other products,
go to microlifefertilizer dot com microlifefertilizer dot com, click on
a product and read about it. It is fascinating what
is going on in the world of microbes and therefore
also in the world of microlife fertilizer products. Pretty cool stuff.

(54:50):
I just find that interesting. I really I can do
a whole month of shows just talking about specific microbes
and things they do, things we've learned about them, like
I just did before. You know, when you talk organic
and you say chemical warfare, that doesn't sound like it.
That sounds like a contradiction, but it's not. Plants engage

(55:11):
in their own type of chemical warfare, and I just
describe one little corner, one little slice of the pie
like that. Speaking of insects, the ones who want to
get rid of pestbros. Is a company that knows how
to manage the pests that you have in the safest
possible manner. I don't care if it's termites, or if
it's fire ants, or if it's it's cockroaches chasing your

(55:32):
mother a law around the house. Give them a call
at Pestbros. Have them come in, have them do their work,
talk to you about your options. For example, with termites,
there is a product that is injected into wood that
the termite eats and takes back to the colony, just
like fire ant bait would work. Right, there's a product

(55:53):
like that from the folks at pest Bros. Very very safe.
They have another product that they put in the ground
in a little trench and termites. It's a barrier for
them to get to your house. And it works. It works.
Here's the phone number you need for pest Pros. Two
eight one two O six forty six seventy. You want
to control mosquitos and the safest possible manner, same thing.
Two eight one two o six forty six seventy. Hey,

(56:16):
welcome back to garden Line folks. You got a gardening question, Well,
here is a phone number you're gonna want. Seven one
three two one two five eight seven four seven one
three two one two fifty eight seventy four. Down south
of Houston is a special low place called Ciena Maultch.
I love going there, and you will too, by the
way they treat you really, really well. Ciena Maltz has

(56:38):
got every kind of soil product you're looking for, and
they carry products from other folks, like heirloom soils and
like the ground up. For example, they carry every fertilizer
I talk about on garden Line. It's there at Ciena Mulch.
If you're looking for bed mixes and mixes for specific
kinds of plants, you know, like vegetables and herbs, for example,
they've got all of that. They have common post, they

(57:00):
have mulches, and then they also have all the other
kind of hardscape materials that you're looking for. Maybe you
want a dry creek bread bed with some river rock.
They've got that gravel, decomposed granite. You want some flat
paver stones to make that nice little petty We made
ourselves a nice little pettio in the backyard. That way.

(57:20):
Use a little decomposed grantite and some riverstones. Excuse me,
some flat pavers that just really really enhance the place.
You can do that at Siena Maltch and more. They
also have garden beds like the Vego bed for example,
where you can just go instantly into a garden that's

(57:40):
very attractive. They've got beautiful landscape bling for the garden
and containers and tools from am Leonard and seeds, and
I was just you just got to get by there
and say hey to the ladies there at Ciena Maltch.
Cienamultch is the go to place down south of the
Houston area. Dow'm south of Houston near the Ciena area

(58:04):
near In fact, let me just do it this way.
Cianamultch is on FM five twenty one. On FM five
twenty one. Here is the website cnamults dot com. You
need to stop by there and check them out. Go
to the website. You'll see all the things I'm talking
about there. But the main thing is just do that.
They're open today, by the way, from seven thirty in

(58:24):
the morning till two I believe they're still there hours
close tomorrow, So go ahead and get by there. But
if you're going to have successive plants, you got to
start with good soil and for all of you down
there South Ciana, Maltz is the place they deliver within
a short distance for a fee if you need it delivered.
But I would suggest going by so you can see

(58:45):
these folks and see the stuff they have by the
bag that you can load up in your vehicle. I
was talking to somebody the other day about a particular
plant and they're on to know where can I find
this plant? Where can I find it? And my answer
was Buchanans Native plants because Buchanans they just have a

(59:05):
selection of some really cool plants that you're just not
going to find in a lot of other places. Now,
they have the standard stuff, you know, the basic meat
and potatoes, Yes, they've got that a Buchanans, but Buchanans
also has this great selection of plants that you can't
find just anywhere, and they specialize in that. That is

(59:28):
exactly what they have. And when you go there you're
going to find expert advice. They're very very helpful for
you whatever you're trying to grow. Now, if you're into
cool carnivorous plants, they've got a whole section of the
greenhouse just for carnivorous plants. By the way, the house
plant greenhouse is stunning from succulents and string ofs you

(59:52):
fill in the blank. They've got all of that to beautiful,
beautiful tropicals and things. They've got it. A Buchanan's Native
now here's what you need to do. It's in the heights.
It's on Eleventh Street, and you need to get by
there and go check them out. If you're looking for
something that can take the heat, if you're looking for
something to bring in birds or maybe bring in butterflies

(01:00:13):
or beneficial insects, they've got it all there. They know
about it, they know what they're talking about there. And
Buchanans Native Plants expertise, quality plants and just a fun
place to shop. Buchanansplants dot com. Buchanans Plants dot com.
Seven one three, eight six, one fifty seven oh two

(01:00:34):
seven one three eight six one five seven zero two. Well,
it's gotten kind of quiet on the phones here all
of a sudden. I guess people all got excited about
going outside and I'm putting in a drip irrigation system
or something. Anyway, if you do have a question, we'll
be happy to entertain that question. Seven one three two

(01:00:55):
one two five eight seven four seven win three into
five eight seven four. Night Foss has a product called
Sweet Green, and Sweet Green is basically a molasses based
product that's got eleven percent nitrogen in It dissolves away
as a like a think of a dried molasses granule.

(01:01:17):
That's not exactly what it is, but it's really close
to that essentially is what it amounts to. And you
put it down, you water it in those carbon chains
which we call sugars. The microbes get real happy, especially
the bacteria with those, and they turn them, turn the
nitrogen loose, and your lawn looks really really good. And

(01:01:37):
you can use it in small doses over time. You know,
you don't have to just do it once. You can
do it periodically and during the summertime when you need
a boost, or any time of the year. Sweet Green
is an excellent product for just doing that.

Speaker 1 (01:01:50):
Now.

Speaker 3 (01:01:50):
You can find night Foss products at places like Fisher's Hardware.
You know, there's one in Pasadena on Souphomore. There's one
of the Port on South Broadway. There's one amount Bellevue
on FM thirty one eighty, and then down in Baytown
there's official Shardware on Alexander in Baytown, and they all
carry nit to FoST products, as do many other locations

(01:02:10):
around Sweet Green because it's a sugar based product and
because it smells sweet too. One of the best smell
and fertilizers you ever gonna run into in your life.
It's a good one. So you're listening to Gardenline and
our goal is to help you have success with advice
on various types of things. I was talking about drip

(01:02:31):
irrigation earlier and how whether you want to do it
as a do it yourself which is buy and large doable,
or whether you want to hire somebody to come in
and start to revamp beds. However you want to go
about it, I would recommend you get going and get
that done. I like the microjets, as I was saying earlier,
because they put on water in a wider area. They

(01:02:55):
don't clog as easily as a dripline, and if one
were to clog, you could immediately see it when you're
walking by. Hey, that spring a little microjest not squirting
anything out, And you could open up the top reil
simply by unscrewing it and it blasts out the debris
and there you go, You're right back in business again.
So I'd recommend that you seriously consider that. Remember that

(01:03:16):
during the summertime it is warm in our lawns, and
if you're returning your clippings, they are decomposing rapidly. A
wet grass clipping is just like dropping a wet lettuce
leaf on the ground. I mean, it's going to rot fast.
And people are concerned about returning clippings because they don't
want to contribute to thatch that is not caused primarily

(01:03:37):
by clippings. Clippings decompose away fast, they don't build up,
which thatch builds up. What causes that is excessive amounts
of nitrogen and water in the summertime, causing that plant
to grow fast, fast, fast, lots of runners, lots of
nodes along the Let's say you have Saint Augustine just

(01:03:59):
as an examp. You've got the runner on top of
the ground. You've got the little nodes where the roots
drop down and the leaves come out. And those things
are types of organic material that decompose more slowly, slower
than a lettuce leave, more like a piece of wood,
but not quite that bad. And so when you overfertilize
and over water and just create excessive growth. Not health growth,

(01:04:23):
but excessive that's when you grow yourself into a thatch problem.
But returning clippings is not the problem. When you return clippings,
you're recycling free, free nutrient back into your lawn again.
So if you bag your clippings, listen to this. If
you bag your clippings, you're renting fertilizer. You buy fertilizer,
you put it on the ground, you grow grass clippings

(01:04:45):
with it, You cut them off, you put them in
a bag, and you pay someone to haul them away.
That's called renting fertilizer. Doesn't make any sense at all.
What does nature do with all the natural debris that
falls in the forest or in the meadow of the
grass leaves in the meadow. It rots them back into
the soil and makes those nutrients go back into solution
to feed the plants themselves. You should do that in

(01:05:06):
your lawns. It's very simple to do. All right, We
got to go to a break. When we come back,
Nancy and the Heights, you are our very first up.
Let's do this. Let's go straight to Nancy and the Heights. Hey, Nancy,
Welcome to Garden Line. Good to have you with us.

Speaker 12 (01:05:21):
Thank you, good morning.

Speaker 2 (01:05:23):
I have a question.

Speaker 12 (01:05:24):
I a few years ago a neighbor was getting rid
of a bunch of yucca plants, and I thought, oh boy,
pretty plants. They're on side of the road, so I've
got them planted them while they're they're getting real big,
and I thought, I need to get rid of these
because when I'm mow, I'm getting stabbed. So I started

(01:05:47):
researching how to get rid of them. And you've got to,
I guess, pretty much dig up all the roots or
try to. Is there another way? They talked about putting
an herbicide on it, drilling holes and put in an
herbicide down in the stem part of it, or what, oh,

(01:06:07):
I'm covering it up. I guess after you you get
rid of the yaka, then you put a tarp or
something dark down to prevent the roots from growing again.

Speaker 5 (01:06:22):
What do you recommend, Well, what I would do.

Speaker 3 (01:06:27):
There's an ingredient, okay, all right, So there's an ingredient
out there, and Nancy that is called triclope here t
R I c l O P y R okay, and
it's available over the counter. In garden centers and places
like that as a poison ivy killer or a brush killer.

(01:06:49):
It'll say like poison ivy or poison oat killer. But
that the ingredient you're looking for is t R I
C L O P y R. You want to get that,
you want to mix it, and I would use it
pretty much almost straight out of the container. But put
a little bit of a like vegetable oil from your

(01:07:13):
kitchen with it to make it easier to spray and
to make it stick, and you could spray it around
the inside of that whirl of leaves coming up in
the top. You don't need much, just about two seconds
of spray right in there, and that would do it.

Speaker 1 (01:07:32):
Now.

Speaker 3 (01:07:32):
You could also treat it by cutting the vine off
and treating the stump of it, but I think the
spray would be another option either way. But if you
use that ingredient, it will kill that plant and then
give it time to move down and kill the plant,
and then you can just cut it off and it's
not going to come back.

Speaker 8 (01:07:54):
Okay.

Speaker 12 (01:07:54):
Well, that trichope here, will it affect the rest of
the aid? Got a sheeeder tree there and a pecan tree.
Will it affect the other treeze if you don't around.

Speaker 3 (01:08:07):
The young spray them, Yeah you don't. You only want
to get it on the yukka. But but we're talking
about just a little bit of spray that's directed right
to the boat. We're not talking about a miss that's
flying through the air and drifting everywhere. We're talking about
just getting that whorld of leaves up in the top
of the yukka, getting that sprayed right there, and just

(01:08:28):
two seconds and you're done. I've never tried cutting it
off and doing the stump treatment. That may also work
just as well, but I do know the spray of
the foliage will and so that that'll do it.

Speaker 12 (01:08:44):
Just that little bit of tip that's in the middle,
you just spray that on there.

Speaker 3 (01:08:48):
Well maybe no, maybe, you know, you may be spraying
a eight or ten inch wide circle around, you know,
in that center part. You're getting it on the leaves.
You're not just getting it on You're not just filling
up that little open cup at the base or at
the top. Just spray the lead other things. Yeah, okay, okay,

(01:09:13):
all right, thank you, all right, good luck you bet
you take care. All right, there you go. Let's see here,
let's go to uh Tony. Hello Tony, Welcome to garden Line.

Speaker 8 (01:09:26):
Hello, good morning, sir. I had two questions, yes, sir.

Speaker 7 (01:09:32):
Good morning.

Speaker 8 (01:09:33):
One was on fines growing on an oak tree about
a fifty year old three or so. I mean, and
this is not poison. Oh, I'm just using that as
an example, but must have grown by itself there somewhere.
But anyways, timing up the tree and stuff, I was
just wondering, does that really affect the tree? I mean,

(01:09:54):
it's not really bothering me, but I mean it will
it hurt the tree by it growing on it? Because
he's already up probably about feet tall.

Speaker 3 (01:10:05):
The vine on the tree doesn't hurt the tree. What
hurts the tree is if the vine gets up on
the top and then it sort of becomes an umbrella
over the top and the tree leaves are starting to
not get light. A lot of plants, wild grapes and
kudzu and other kinds of vining plants can get over
the top of a tree and their leaves get the
light and it shades out the tree leaves and that's bad.

(01:10:28):
So uh, that would be the only concern. Yeah, they're
not hurting the trunk itself by growing.

Speaker 8 (01:10:35):
On it already. Okay, and my next question is I've
got my small pasture there. It's called devil claw weed.

Speaker 1 (01:10:47):
Yes, yes, how can you get rid of it?

Speaker 8 (01:10:51):
I've sprayed at you know, trying to stay as organic
as I can, but I mean I was sprayed. Yes,
that bender is soaked.

Speaker 1 (01:10:59):
You know salt.

Speaker 8 (01:11:00):
I'll spray that on it. It kills the leagues right away.
It seems to keep coming back.

Speaker 3 (01:11:07):
Yeah. No, none of that will do what you needed
to do for that plant. So what you're going to
need to do, uh is go to my website and
I'm gonna if you'll write this down gardening gardening with
Skip dot com, Gardening with Skip dot com. And by
the way, if Nancy, if you're still listening, Nancy, Yeah, Nancy,

(01:11:28):
if you're still listening, Uh, you need I should have
told you this too. So so when you get to
the website, there's a section called plant problems. Plant problems,
and if you click on that, you're going to find
in there a publication uh to to to to to.
I said, you're going to find a plant problem. Oh

(01:11:48):
you know what it's It's not going to be here,
It's going to be in miscellaneous not plant problems. Sorry,
Uh well, dad, gum it, it's gone. Hold on, well,
this is weird. No, it's implant problems. I'm sorry. And
it says controlling woody weeds in the Landscape and garden

(01:12:08):
Controlling woody weeds. It's a picture of a foam brush
painting a little tiny stump, and if you click on that,
it tells you about using the tricloppeer that I was
just telling Nancy about. It tells you how much vegetable
oil to put in there, and then you just treat.
You treat the stumps. Now, the catclaw vine that you're describing,

(01:12:32):
it doesn't have a big stump. It's got a little one,
but the oil the vegetable makes it stick to the sides.
And those stems are very green, but spray would just
roll off of them. But with the oil you can basically,
I'm gonna use the term paint. Paint that product directly
on to the bottom foot of that catcloth stump and

(01:12:53):
it'll translocate down. If the underground storage structure is really big,
you may have to treat it again later, but generally
one treatment is enough to get rid of it. Okay, Okay,
it's called s M I L A X. That's the
name of that weed, smilax. All right, so there you go.

(01:13:15):
That'll that'll do it. And then Nancy's still listening. Okay,
take care. All right, all right, you bet there we go. Well,
I think I got music coming here in a few seconds,
so we're gonna have shut this from down for the
for the hour. We got Ian Ferguson coming up next hour.

(01:13:36):
You need to listen in on this. We're going to
drill down into the nitty gritty of the organic materials
that we use and why I always say brown stuff
before green stuff, and how they build them. They're Nature's
weare resources. We're going to talk to Ian about that,
kind of pick his brain and talk about that, as
well as some upcoming up and upcoming event that we

(01:13:58):
have coming up in September. You do not want to miss,
so stick around and stay tuned for those of you
who were just hearing that and didn't quite catch what
I was saying about. The website Gardening with Skip dot
com is my website. That's why I put all these
things that are free that you I just don't have
time to fully describe them on the air. Okay, controlling

(01:14:20):
woody weeds, and the landscaping garden tells you how to
deal with everything from that pleasing ivy to the hackberries
coming up in the fence and you name it. Very simple, Bud,
to have you with us this morning, we are going
to get down to the ground, to the ground level,
to the foundation for success in gardens. This hour, we're

(01:14:43):
going to talk to Ian Ferguson from Nature's Way Resources,
and Ian and I are going to just have a
little fireside chat visit here talking about some of the
secrets of success with plants that begin basically in the soil.
And you know, how do you make a quality product
and how do you create the environment for a plant

(01:15:03):
to succeed. And it's from taking a tip from nature,
and that's why they call the place Nature's Way. Right
ever since John Ferguson created the place way back in
the day to now sun in running the same quality,
the same workmanship, basically the same Premiere Green waste recycling facility.
We're talking about how do you have success with plants?

(01:15:26):
And it all begins there in the soil. And I'm
gonna head out here and see if we can grab Ian. Hey, Ian,
are you there.

Speaker 5 (01:15:35):
Hey, Skip, how you doing.

Speaker 3 (01:15:37):
I'm good, I'm good. Welcome to Garden Line. I'm so
glad you took some time out for us today. Looking
forward to kind of talking soil with you. I hope
you're I think that's something you probably do a little
bit here and there. Don't you talk about soil?

Speaker 1 (01:15:52):
Yeah, that's right.

Speaker 5 (01:15:54):
Thanks for having me on.

Speaker 3 (01:15:55):
Look at you bet you bet well. One of the
things I say on Garden Line a thousand times a show,
it seems like, is brown stuff before green stuff, meaning
before you PLoP a poor plant into an unprepared plot,
get that so already, get the get the root zone
where it needs to be, so that the plant makes

(01:16:17):
you look good. And and I know you guys are
all about that. Uh, they're at Nature's way. I'd like
to visit, if we could today about some of the
ways that you guys go about making what you make, uh,
and some of the products that you have, and basically
secrets for success for gardeners that are out there wanting

(01:16:39):
to have a better a better a garden bed, a
more beautiful landscape, a more bountiful garden and so on.

Speaker 1 (01:16:46):
Uh.

Speaker 3 (01:16:46):
Now, there's there's different ways of making composts on a
commercial scale there. You know, people talk about static piles
and they talk about windrow piles, and can you talk
a little bit about what's the difference between those, what
do y'all use it? Nature? And why do you do
what you do?

Speaker 5 (01:17:05):
Okay? Yeah, So there's two main ways to do composting.
You have the static pole method which we use, and
there's also the wind row method that a lot of
other companies use. We have different objectives in these two
different types of methods. The wind row method is really
good for volume reduction for companies that have a lot
of waste coming in a lot of times they're partnered
with the cities or municipalities, so they just have those

(01:17:26):
large volumes and their goal is the volume reduction. Unlike
the static polem method which we use, focused on the
biology the quality of the product. And it's a very
long slow process. Ours takes the minimum of one year,
are composted in about two years, and so if you're
getting large quantities of waste, it's not the ideal method.
And they both have their purposes. Neither one is necessarily

(01:17:47):
bad or good, but one does to produce a superior product.

Speaker 3 (01:17:53):
Okay, And so with with your static piles. First of all,
for people going what's a whin row? What's a static
A window folcus is like a long pile of compos
very huge tall pile that a machine runs down and
turns it outside the inside, and we're just looking at
huge long strips of compost. A static pile is a

(01:18:15):
pile that is basically kept there as a pile, and
I know you guys will move them around some, but
basically you're looking for a pile that has a a
quality time component in it, where the microbes that you're
utilizing that are there in nature can turn that into

(01:18:39):
something that is good for plants without some of the
problems like poor aeration like a soggy pile or a
pile that gets too hot, or a pile that you
know has too much water content. And you guys are
monitoring that stuff right.

Speaker 5 (01:18:55):
Yes, we have to monitor all the time.

Speaker 8 (01:18:59):
We are.

Speaker 5 (01:18:59):
We're looking for water roughly around fifty percent of water moisture.
We have to make sure we hit temperatures of a
minimum one hundred and thirty degrees to kill any type
of pathogens and weed seeds. And then we want our
piles for like a quarter of a year before we
move it. And it's that long period that looks like
the fungal high v and the biolog you really increase
in the pile because when you're turning them frequently like
you do with the window, you're just ripping all that

(01:19:20):
stuff apart. And that's where it makes it more bacteria
dominated compost.

Speaker 3 (01:19:26):
I see, Okay, And so the natural way in the
forest is going to be a it won't be a pile,
but it will be a static process where slowly as
you're talking about fungo, hyphie and stuff for growing through that. Now,
when I'm talking about Nature's way, I often refer to
your leaf moll compost, which, by the way, was born
there at Nature's Way resources. And now a lot of

(01:19:48):
people sell leaf moll composts and then versus a fungal compost.
What's the difference between like a leaf mold and a
fungal compost.

Speaker 5 (01:19:58):
So the ingredients in the time it takes to make it,
so our least mold compost, that's kind of what we
built the company off on. There's only four ingredients. It's leaves, grass, horse, manure,
food waste, and we mix that in two parts. Brown
your brown feed stocks would be your leaves and grass.
Then your green feed stocks would be like the horse
manure and your food waste. So we mix that together

(01:20:20):
and it sits about eighteen months. And to make sure
you're blending it properly, we have a phrase here that
we like to say, two parts brown, the one part
green keeps everything smelling fresh and clean. So when you're
making your piles and you're trying to prevent problems within
the piles, that's a good way to manage your feed stocks.

Speaker 3 (01:20:36):
I like that, and I've never heard that before. Two
parts brown, one part green. Okay.

Speaker 5 (01:20:42):
And then like our fungal composts, which we're having to
sell on right now, it's actually a multi derivative. So
we compost our mulches nine to twelve months, but when
it passes that twelve month part, it doesn't perform well
as a moult shore compost really, so we can go
ahead and let it compost out until we need to
sell it. And coming from that woody material, that makes

(01:21:04):
the fungus a lot more prevalent, and so that's why
we say fungel based composts compared to our leath mold.
So just because it has a higher ratio of fungus
in there, and it's an extremely mature problem. And then
you for your plants correctness to all amendments.

Speaker 3 (01:21:19):
Yeah yeah, and you screen it down too, what like
to different particle size. So you're dealing with initially, you know,
you're dealing with as you were talking about leaves and
wood chips and all kinds of different materials that could
be part of a of a of a decomposition process.
But then you screen it down and tell us a
little bit about like what size of a screen or

(01:21:42):
how tell us about the screening process, how that works.

Speaker 5 (01:21:47):
So we have these machines they're called Trammel screens. Its
purposes to separate the large material from the finished product
or the finer material. And we have two different sizes
that we screen our composts too. Specifically with our leaf
mold compost, we have a three eighth minus that's our
fine screen. That's great for top dressing your grass. You
can use that as a soil amend and also and

(01:22:08):
then our other size is three quarters of an inch
and that's good for a soil amendment. You have a
little bit larger material to provide a little bit more
aeration water can insert the soil a little bit better,
and you have more food for the microbes once it
is in your soil. So it's going to add nutrients
back to the soil a little bit longer than the
fine screen, just because it ads more of the larger
material of it.

Speaker 3 (01:22:29):
Okay, good, And so you mentioned you guys are running
a special what's your deal on the fungal compost right now?

Speaker 5 (01:22:37):
So our funnel compost is thirty dollars a yard. It's
normally priced at eighty. But we have an overstalk issue.
Back in twenty twenty one when snowstorm Uri came through,
we accepted a lot of woody material and so this
is just material for that and we need the space,
so we're trying to get rid of it so we
can take in more materials and more feedstocks.

Speaker 3 (01:22:58):
Wow. Well, it's a plenty of time to slowly go
through that natural process. So that's some pretty good stuff.
So I remember the storm and that sure created a
lot of greenways. So as I said, y'all are premier
greenwayte recycling facility. And so hey, we got to go
to a little break here in uh, we'll be right back,

(01:23:19):
and I got some more questions, folks. If you have
a question about how compost is made or any kind
of thing like that, feel free to give me a
call here on Guardline. We're gonna this hour stick our
questions to this composting process and the products and things
as we're talking with Ian Ferguson and Nature's Way Resources.
Here's a number seven one three two one two five

(01:23:40):
eight seven four give me coffee you have a question,
We'll be right back. Thanks for tuning in this morning.
We're visiting with Ian Ferguson from Nature's Way Resources and
we're just talking about kind of an inside view of
the composting world, how compost is made, the proper ways
to do it, uh, and the way they do things
there at Nature's Way uh. Ian, I want to welcome

(01:24:03):
you back. I appreciate you joining us this morning. Good
to have you with us. We were picking his brain
a little bit there on some various aspects of composting
and talking about leaf mode composts versus fungal composts themselves.
It's a you know, both products though, Ian are excellent,

(01:24:25):
and I know a lot of times we're using the
leaf mold for the compost top dressing. But you're saying
the finer screened your three eighth I believe you said
screen would be good for top dressing a lawn as well.

Speaker 1 (01:24:38):
Yes, that's correct.

Speaker 5 (01:24:39):
We screen it to that smaller size so it'll sit
between the grass floads much easier, and you won't see
any residual compost on top of your line after it
gets spread in.

Speaker 3 (01:24:48):
That's good, you know. Another advantage of having a go
ahead excuse me, go ahead, Oh, I.

Speaker 5 (01:24:56):
Would say, but it's not only just for top dressing lawns.
You could also use it as a soil. Make it
into your gardens. It'll work well there.

Speaker 3 (01:25:01):
Also, Yeah, it's sure wood, it sure would. Another advantage
of compost top dressing that isn't talked about a lot,
but it's the fact that when you put something on
the ground that falls in between the grass blades of
your lawn, it is shading the soil surface. Now it's

(01:25:22):
not like a three inch malt shading out weeds and stuff,
but it is helping a little bit. It is creating
a lower light level hitting the soil where when weeds
try to germinate and get started, they have a little
more difficulty in doing that. So I think that's another
cool advantage of it. I'd like to talk to you
a little bit if we could shift gears about composted mulch.

(01:25:43):
Now you go through a period of months there where
you are composting the mulches and stuff regarding weed seeds
or other issues that might be in the multi Will
you talk to us a little bit about the process
of composting mulch there at Nature Resources.

Speaker 8 (01:26:03):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (01:26:03):
So, I guess first of all, we get our feedstocks
from local landscapers arborous tree companies, and they're just bringing
trees they cut down or from their projects from around
the local area. And so the first thing that we
have to do is put it through our one of
our grinders, and that's like a pulminary ground or a
single ground, and that's the beginning of the mulch. Once
it's in the multipile itself, the next thing we have

(01:26:26):
to do is get water on it. Water is the
major catalyst for decompositions. So the faster we get water
on it, the faster it starts decomposing, and we can
sell the product about a year later because our process
is nine to twelve months. But there's a few reasons.
We compost our melt that long, so when feedstocks are
coming in, we don't necessarily know what's been on those trees,

(01:26:47):
if it's any type of herbicides, of pesticides, or if
they were diseased and that's why they're cut down. So
our process is that long to make sure those diseases
and pathogens are composted out so we're not reintroducing that
into somebody else's lawn. The half life those chemicals are
shorter than the pomposting process, so those are removed. And
then finally, we want to make sure our mulch is
adding nutrients back into your garden, but we still want

(01:27:10):
to perform like a mulch. We have another staying around
here that we like to say that this year's mulch
is next year's compost, So our mult is literally going
to feed your garden, so next year it will be
in a better position than it was this year.

Speaker 3 (01:27:25):
That's a good point.

Speaker 6 (01:27:26):
You know.

Speaker 3 (01:27:27):
I'm sometimes surprised and somewhat amused when I get a
question and this happens. People are talking about mulching and
they're thinking you need to scrape out all the old
multch when it starts getting thin and put fresh new
mulch in. That's the term. They use fresh new mulch
into the bed. And it's like, well, think about nature.

(01:27:49):
Nature drops leaves on the ground in the forest, and
nature doesn't rake out the old leaves just when they're
starting to get good and then put new leaves down
on top the next fall. It just the new stuff
on top of the old. And you get that all
the benefits of all the nutrients that are there. I
heard one time in that seventy five percent of the

(01:28:09):
nutrients a tree takes up during the year or in
its leaves, A lot of nutrients go to the leafs,
And so why would you get rid of stuff just
when it's starting to become really good for feeding the
plants in addition to that multing at the surface, And
I think you probably would agree, you don't get rid
of the old multch. That's just when it's getting good.
This year's what'd you say, this year's mult is next

(01:28:31):
year's compost or something.

Speaker 5 (01:28:34):
Yeah, that's correct. This year's mult is next year's composts.

Speaker 3 (01:28:38):
Yeah, that's good. Well, so you're getting rid of any
disease it might be there because there are diseases out
in nature, that's just part of things. And weed seeds
also are getting killed by that. How deep do you
recommend people mulch? And I know you have different kinds
of products with different sizes of chunks than the mulch.

(01:29:00):
How deep would you suggest people put mulches down?

Speaker 5 (01:29:04):
We always recommend two to four inches. That three inch
mark is probably a great media, and that's what I
use personally. If you wanted the little extra performance, you
can do four, but if you're doing a little cost saving,
you can get by with two. But you're really trying
to accomplish three main things when you're putting a mulch down,
which is weed suppression, water retention, and some erosion control.

(01:29:25):
So a little bit thicker of the ult kind of
really helps with that and create that insulative barrier which
protects your root zone of your plants.

Speaker 3 (01:29:35):
And I know when you when you shred up a
hardwood kind of material or a mixed material kind of thing,
that mulch sort of locks interlocks in itself. You know
that the particles and stuff aren't as prone to just
floating away as some kind of little little bark chips
might be prone to do. And it really stays in

(01:29:57):
place pretty well.

Speaker 5 (01:30:01):
Yeah, so during the grinding cross one of.

Speaker 3 (01:30:05):
Oh sorry, go ahead, go ahead, No, we got to
delay on my apologies, go ahead.

Speaker 5 (01:30:12):
I think part of the grinding process it rips the
tree trunks apart, and it makes it very fibers. That
helps it to interlock in holding place so it doesn't
wash out during heavy rains. Right.

Speaker 3 (01:30:25):
I get questions from people sometimes in about stuff growing
in the malts, like they'll they'll maybe stir the molt
or accidentally on like kick it with their foot when
they're walking by and they see this white strands growing
in there, and they're worried that they've got a disease,
it's going to hurt their plants, and when in reality,

(01:30:45):
that's that's actually nature's uh organisms that are used to
turn trees back into forest floor rich soil.

Speaker 5 (01:30:55):
Uh.

Speaker 3 (01:30:55):
And then sometimes we'll see the scrambled egg fungus on top.
I don't know if you've heard that term. I'm sure
you have, and other kinds of things, but that's all
part of nature and nothing to worry about. Any thoughts
on any comments on that or.

Speaker 5 (01:31:10):
Yeah, so the scrambled egg type fungus that you're mentioning.
We call it dog puke fungus because it's not very
appealing to look at, but it is a positive sign
that your multi is decomposing. When you move the top
layer of mulch away from your garden, you'll probably see
the white mycelium that is also a very beneficial fung guy.
That's that's in your mulch. So if you see that,

(01:31:30):
those are good signs that you have a healthy garden
and a quality mulch.

Speaker 3 (01:31:35):
There you go, that's that is that is true for sure.
So when we're putting the mulches out and we're topping
them off and stuff, you know, I have some ariaism
of my yard, and I've used a number of y'all's mulches,
and as I generally do, i'll use products from sponsors
and so I have first end experience on them and stuff,
and they do work very well. And I notice sometimes

(01:31:58):
when I let my mulch get a little I'll start
to see some weed seeds popping up through it, And
you know, it's it's not really a panic thing. You
can just take a rake and stir it up a
little bit. Those little tender seedlings can't tolerate that well,
and then throw some fresh mults up on top of
it and just just kind of keep going as part
of maintaining that mulch.

Speaker 5 (01:32:23):
Yeah, that's that's one of the easy things to do.
I know one thing you said is about fresh mults.
When I hear that, I think about young multch, And
you really don't want to put young multch on your garden.
If you have like a very raw moult it's just
been ground, it'll actually extract nutrients from your garden to
help decompose, and that's just gonna hurt your plants. So

(01:32:43):
that's another reason that we try and compost our multas
to make sure we're not robbing any nutrients from your plants,
and it's actually providing nutrients. I know I didn't mention
that earlier. I just want to throw that in.

Speaker 3 (01:32:54):
That's a good point. That's a very good point. And
even in bed mixes, sometimes when a company uses stuff
that's not fully decomposed, the first time people plant in it,
the plants look scrawny, they look yellowish, they lack vigor
because that nitrogen's being tied up. And I think you've

(01:33:14):
made it clear that you know that's one of the
reasons you guys take your time and let it hit
a further along the decomposition process before it goes out
there and goes in somebody's garden. So I think that's good.
Letick tell me a little bit about you guys have
a product that is called a remineralizer. What exactly is

(01:33:36):
you know what?

Speaker 1 (01:33:36):
Lee?

Speaker 3 (01:33:36):
Ian? As I'm asking this question, I'm looking at the
clock and I have got a absolutely rock card stop
here at eight o'clock and eight thirty, I mean, and
so I'm not going to open that, but when we
come back, I would like to ask you about remineralizer
that you have. What does that mean remineralizer and what's
in it? And we can kind of pick our way

(01:33:57):
through that for those of you who are wondering what's
going on right now, Well, I'm visiting with Ian Ferguson
from Nature's Way Resources. Nature's Way Resources is up there
toward Conro up forty five. If you head up forty
five from the Houston area where fourteen eighty eight comes
in from Magnolia, instead of turning left to go to Magnolia,
you turn right, cross over the railroad tracks Shrbrick Circle

(01:34:19):
and you're there at Nature's Way Resources where you can
pick up stuff by the bag, by the bulk if
you got a trailer or something, or where you can
order for having them deliver it within a reasonable distance.
Out there lots of quality products right out there. And
we're going to be right back with Ian after this
news break. All right, we're back. We are visiting with

(01:34:41):
Ian Ferguson from Nature's Way Resources about all kinds of
things related to the production of quality products for your soils,
for your garden beds, for mulches and things like that.
We're going to start off right now. Ian, I've got
a here, uh, Steve from Deer Park. Uh, let's see justin.

(01:35:03):
Do I bring Steve in or do you need to
bring him in so we have them both here on
the same time. All right, we're going to go to
Steve and Deer Park. You're on the air with me
and Ann. How can we help s.

Speaker 11 (01:35:16):
Well?

Speaker 4 (01:35:17):
I had some questions just uh about making composts. I
have a compost pile and I was wondering, can you
a couple of questions if it's okay, do you have
to sift your compost all the time or can you
sometimes just like dig under the underneath it and get

(01:35:38):
that dirt and just dig it in with your your
garden spot or whatever.

Speaker 5 (01:35:48):
One. Yeah, so you don't have to sift through the
compost if you don't want to. Uh, you'll have a
little bit larger jokes in there probably, but again that's
just gonna feed the microbes in your soil, especially if
you're mixing it in with your garden beds. I know
when I was young my dad, one of my chores
was tending to our compost piles. We had a like

(01:36:08):
a four foot by four foot bind and we made
the bottom panel where it could flip up, and so
I just literally took the shovel and scooped out the
compost from the bottom. Then everything above it just kind
of settled down. We closed it back up and just
continued the process.

Speaker 4 (01:36:25):
Should you put fertilizer and water on your compost pile?

Speaker 5 (01:36:34):
Sorry I didn't catch that. Could you repeat that?

Speaker 3 (01:36:35):
Please?

Speaker 1 (01:36:37):
Yeah?

Speaker 4 (01:36:38):
Do you water your compost pile and do you add
fertilizer to it?

Speaker 5 (01:36:44):
You don't have to add fertilizer. The compost is actually
make the fertilizer. The nutrients within the fertilizer available, but
it's not going to help the composting process too terribly much.
What's going to be much more beneficial is keeping your
pile moist We here at our facility, we try to
maintain a fifty percent water moisture in our products for
often the composting. And as long as your your compost

(01:37:06):
is not in a hole, is kind of out of
the ground, so you can water it until you see
water coming out the bottom of it, and then gravity
is going to pull the excess out. Uh. And that's
going to be your best bet for getting your your
compost to speed up and compost correctly.

Speaker 4 (01:37:21):
Okay, I had one month more thing I heard you
say that you sell the compost by the yard? Can
you pick can you buy pick up loads? Or and
where are you.

Speaker 5 (01:37:34):
You can buy it by the yard? We do bulks.
We also have bags. We have about thirty five retailers
around the Houston area that spanned from here to Galveston,
Beaumont out to Katie and UH. We are located on
the north side of the Woodlands south conro off of
fourteen eighty eight or forty five. You can bring a
pickup truck, you can bring a trailer. We'll load you
up half yard full yard or as much as you
can carry.

Speaker 4 (01:37:56):
Okay, well, thank you for that that uh and I
appreciate it. You'll have a good weekend.

Speaker 5 (01:38:04):
Thanks Paul.

Speaker 3 (01:38:04):
There you go, all right, folks. Well there you have
it now, Ian, I wanted to get onto this remineralizer.
What is me remineralizer? What's in it?

Speaker 5 (01:38:19):
So the remineralizer is a trace element package just to
get all the micro nutrients back into your soil. And
it is a combination of three different mineral sands. It's
Texas dream sand, granite sand, and basalt sand. Texas Dream
sand is from the hill country. It was made a
few million years ago when Texas was an inland ce
so we got all the nutrients from that. Then the

(01:38:40):
granite sand and theasalt sands they provide other nutrients and
we blim that together and you get to use it
in your lawn or for your food crops. You spread
it like you would a fertilizer. You can put it
into your fertilizer spreader, walk behind it. You could throw
it out kind of like chicken feed. But again it's
trying to get the micro nutrients back in your soil.
So it's not something you do multiple times a year.
Like with a fertilizer, you do it maybe once a year,

(01:39:02):
once every other year, just to make sure those micronutrients
are in there. But it's it's great for a nutrient
density and food crop. And then if it's being applied
to your ornamentals or your turk grass, it's gonna make
it more resilient to pests and diseases. And if you
just have a healthier plant, you have a bug that
comes along and wants to eat it, it's gonna have

(01:39:22):
a little bit more lignian in the plant itself, and
so that's gonna be tough for the bug, so it's
going to move on to a weaker plant. So it's
all about nutrientdentity and trying to make your plants as
healthy as possible.

Speaker 3 (01:39:35):
That's good. And you know, I read from time to
time about the nutrient density of foods and and you
start to get somewhat of a depleted soil and things,
and it affects that and you know, these are the
things we're using the fuel and build our bodies, and
so it definitely makes sense. And I would encourage everybody
that's listening out there, you got to have your soul
tested from time to time, see what the nutrient levels

(01:39:57):
are that you have, and you're going to find that. Know,
every soul is different. Your garden and your neighbor next
door's garden may not have the same levels of things,
and it always helps to have a good stock. Ian.
I refer to it as the bank account of nutrients
and the soil that the plants can make their withdrawals
from on a day to day basis. And you want
to start off with the bank account being loaded up

(01:40:20):
with good things. And I know that's what your your
mineralizer does. I think it's cool that we actually have
these mineral compounds, these deposits here in Texas where we
can we can look at stuff like Texas green sand
or granite sand from Texas or basalt sand. I think
that's kind of cool. So that's that's good to hear.

(01:40:41):
Uh listen, uh. We talk about rose soil all the time, Ian,
and can you talk a little bit about your rose sail.
I know that nature's ways where rose soil was born
again like some other things. You know, other companies now
make something and call it rose soil or some version
of that. But it all began with your dad working
with the Houston Roast Society. Will you tell us a

(01:41:02):
little bit about your roast soil.

Speaker 5 (01:41:06):
Yeah, So, like you said, my father worked with the
Houston Roads Society. They were unhappy with some of the
soils that were on the market, so they wanted to
generate a premium one kind of using our products. So
it's the Houston Road Society formula using our products. It's
one of our our premium products. I call it a
true plug and place oil because we have the remntalizer
mixed in there. We also mix the micro Life fertilizers

(01:41:27):
in there, which is a great organic fertilizer. So all
you have to do is really you put your plants
in there, then mult on top. It supports not just roses,
but it's good for vegetables, other ornamentals. It's a very
good soil for all around.

Speaker 3 (01:41:42):
Yeah, that's that's true. I was talking to somebody the
other day and they asked me if this wasn't on
the air, but off offline.

Speaker 5 (01:41:49):
Uh.

Speaker 3 (01:41:49):
They asked me, can I use roast soil for growing vegetables?
And it just reminded me of like, you know, I
think it's a good name to call it roast soil.
Because that's what that's how it was born with the
with the Houston Roads Society. But in some ways it
makes people think, well, you can't use that on vegetables,
but you absolutely can. It's an outstanding soil for vegetables
and flowers and a lot of other things that people

(01:42:11):
might want to grow. So I think that's good. Hey,
we got to go to another break. We got one
segment left. I tell you the time flies when you're
having fun, and we'll be right back with Ian Ferguson
for our last segment of the day from Nature's Way Resources.
We'll stick around all right, folks. We're visiting with Ian

(01:42:32):
Ferguson from Nature's Way Resources and we're talking about all
kinds of things related to soil and multus and whatnot.
We just got through talking about the roast soil and
all of the things that are in it. Boyd's chock
full of all kinds of good stuff, as he referred
to it as a plug and play, meaning basically, you
just put it down. It's already got microlife fertilizerment, it's

(01:42:52):
already got very mineralizer in it, and it's a quality
organic blend of ingredients that it's going to give you
that success. When it comes to plants, Ian, I'd like
to talk a little bit about now the we guess
has got a very short time in this last segment,
but the retail nursery, your native plants and other things
will tell us a little bit about the plants out

(01:43:14):
there at Nature's Way.

Speaker 5 (01:43:17):
Yeah, So on the north side of our property we
have in the nursery, it's about two acres in size.
We have a wide variety of things. We have the
native plants, we have herbs, we have vegetables, a lot
of annuals and perennials. Of course, we've got citrus, trees
and shrubs at a little bit of everything, and so
we want people able to get some plants and stop

(01:43:38):
in and get some souls also. So it's kind of
like a one stop shop. But we like to think
of it more than just a nursery. We're trying to
make it a destination place. So we have a sandbox
for the kids. We have scavenger cunts under hunts for
the kids so they can stay busy. We also have
quite a few picnic tables in the back. So if
you wanted to come out here and have lunch. You
could do that. Bouls come out here and have some meetings, gardens,

(01:44:00):
plums come out here and need us well. Also have
kind of a I call it a breakfast note for
lack of a better word. But right next to our
waterfall that's covered. We have plants around that. Just a
nice environment. And so yeah, we want people to come
out here and see how our products work. They can
see the display gardens, they can see how we use
our products and what type of results you'll achieve. And

(01:44:21):
then you also get to see plants in their mature forms,
so you kind of see what they look like in
their in their pots and when they're mature.

Speaker 3 (01:44:30):
Yeah, and I've watched that garden grow over the years
and it is it is really a nice place to
wander through. In fact, I would recommend that people do
take time, bring the kids out there with the little
sandbox and whatnot, and just enjoy wandering through. You guys
have a lot of quality plants. You do focus on natives,

(01:44:50):
but you got things that aren't natives as well, And
I think if people need to there's also the possibility
of pre ordering.

Speaker 5 (01:44:59):
Is that correct, Yes, that is correct. We try and
encourage people to actually do some pre orders, so the
next time we're putting in an order, we can make
sure we can get any type of specific point if
it's specialty, or if you just need a certain quantity
for a project, so you can get everything at once
and you don't have to make multiple trips.

Speaker 3 (01:45:18):
All right, good, Well, I'll tell you one time when
people can for sure get their plants picked up out there,
and that's coming up September nineteenth. A certain radio show host,
you're truly it's going to be out there for your
fall festival. Let's talk about that fall festival a little bit.
What's going on with that.

Speaker 1 (01:45:37):
Yeah, So on.

Speaker 5 (01:45:38):
September nineteenth, we're having our fall Festival. It's just trying
to attract customers. It's kind of like a farmer's market feel.
Right now. We have twenty five vendors set up, anything
from bake goods to woodworking, landscape companies offering their service,
just anything that's kind of surrounded to the horticulture industry.
And we'll have live music games for the kids. We're

(01:45:58):
trying to make it a you know, family an environment.

Speaker 3 (01:46:03):
That is, and it really is I always enjoy Yeah.

Speaker 5 (01:46:10):
Then, yeah, like you mentioned, you're gonna be there also
kind of helping people the Q and A if they
have any type of specific gardening questions. Of course, our
staff is extremely knowledgeable, so we'll answer any questions possible.
Just yeah, come out and joy see what it's about.

Speaker 3 (01:46:25):
I'm looking forward to that. I always enjoy going out
to those because you do have a lot of great
vendors and you know, people that are selling things, but
also people that are just providing good information as well.
And I'll be in the back typically immy. Usually you
got me back there in the back underneath the big tall,
beautiful trees. It'll be a nice shady weather, no matter
what the no matter what the sky looks like. We're

(01:46:47):
going to have a good time visiting about all kinds
of things. And that's an opportunity too for people. If
you got a question with a plant or you need
a weed identify it or a bug or something. You
can put it in a plastic and bring it in
and we'll identify it and I'm gonna have some good
handouts as well there, So encourage people to come. That

(01:47:07):
is September nineteenth, the Fall Festival at Nature's Way Now
by the way. If you want more information, on Nature's Way.
I would recommend that you start at their website and
that is Nature's Way Resources dot com, Nature'sway resources dot com.

(01:47:28):
The address is there, the phone is there, the hours
of operation are there, information on all the different products
and stuff that they carry, or there and someone asks about,
you know, buying them. There's a little button at the
top of the website that says you know where to
buy the stuff, where to buy it, and you can

(01:47:49):
find the map and all through the region find out
where Nature's Way some of their products are going to
be available. So something you need to do is start
at that website. Please. A lot of good information in
any other things or anything maybe I left out as
we were talking. I guess we could talk all day
with all the things that are to talk about when

(01:48:11):
it comes to soils, No.

Speaker 5 (01:48:14):
We covered quite a bit.

Speaker 1 (01:48:15):
I guess.

Speaker 5 (01:48:16):
One other thing I'd like to mention we're very pet
friendly around here, so if you join us for the
Fall festival or any other time, feel free to bring
your dog out here. We have a couple of our
own that like to greet people, so just another way
to get out.

Speaker 3 (01:48:31):
Very good. So I want to remind you guys that
they're still having their fungal compost sale and it is
what did you say, thirty dollars a QP card. It's
a good pride, really good price for fungal compost. And
if this is a chance if you need to get
a bulk delivery and go out there and pick it up,
I don't know. Is that sale available for bulk delivery

(01:48:52):
or is that just for people that come by and
pick them up at that price.

Speaker 5 (01:48:57):
It's available for both. We still have several hundred yards
and material trying to get rid of our deliveries. We
could do one yard up to eighteen yards in the
same truck. If you do need more, we can get
in dump twenty five yards material. But yeah, we're trying
to get rid of it any way we can. But
the sale is only for the both materials because we're
trying to get rid of it in quantities.

Speaker 3 (01:49:19):
Okay, good And for anybody that's that's going to the website,
just check this out too. There's a lot of articles
in the article library that have been written really over
like I said, the years or the decades that are
really really helpful and informative, and so scroll down or

(01:49:41):
up at the up at the top there's a thing
called resources where you can see the article library. You
can see it by topics. If you want to read
more about mulches or about organic fertilizers or soil amendments
or whatever. Those are all categories there. And just remember
that they also have the soil coverage calculator. So if
you're thinking, well, you know what I need to do

(01:50:02):
a mult application, I've got a bed that's this wide
and this long. You just plug in the numbers and
you know exactly how much to have. They also have
information on the weight of the products by the yard,
how many bags are on a palette, you know how
many cubic feed are in a bag and stuff, so
you can figure exactly what you need, and that way
when you go shopping, you don't end up with too little.

(01:50:24):
I heard something one time in and it said that
when you're buying malts, you always need to take the
number of bags you need and multiply times too, and
that way you'll only be three bags short. I find
when I applied malts, I always need a little more
than I thought I needed. Thanks for being on Guardline today, man,

(01:50:47):
I appreciate it.

Speaker 5 (01:50:49):
Yeah, thanks for having me. I had a great time.

Speaker 3 (01:50:53):
All right, there you go, Nature's very resource. Theean Ferguson.
Good having with us today, folks. We're going to put
this one in the books and we'll be back for
the next hour of Garden Line. If you've got gardening questions,
we will open it up. Call about anything you will
talk about. Here's the number seven one three two, one two,
five eight seven four seven one three two one two

(01:51:16):
fifty eight seventy four and put that September nineteenth on
your calendar. Has a nice visit with Ian Ferguson from
Nature's way. Appreciate inn coming on and letting us pick
his brain about all kinds of things fertilizer, fertilizer, compost
and maltz. And I was thinking about the fact that
there rosa has that a micro life fertilizer in it.

(01:51:39):
Brain shifted over there. You know, it's a it's it's
a good thing to start with the soil first, folks.
It's a secret of success. So I hope you enjoyed that.
I want to talk a little bit about some things
going on around and about and stuff. We we mentioned
that coming up in September. I'm going to be there
at the and Santon Gardens. On the excuse me, sorry,

(01:52:05):
September nineteenth, I'll be at Nature's Way. I actually will
be at Antenda Gardens also coming up, but on August
to twenty ninth, I'm going to be at the Montgomery
County Fall Home and Outdoor Living Show, and so that'll
be from twelfth to two. I'll tell you a lot
about more about that as we get coming, but all
of you up in the Conroe area in general, you

(01:52:25):
need to put that down September, excuse me, August the
twenty ninth, from twelfth to two, Montgomery County Fall Home
an Outdoor Living Show, so we'll be there as well well.
It at excuse me, at the Enchanted Forest. There is

(01:52:45):
an unbelievable supply right now of tomato plants, and it's
time to get those in. If you want to get
your tomatoes planet, you need to hurt up and get
that done. It is time, and they've got a good
selection of all the kinds of things you need. Their
herbs select is also still very very good. You're going
to find that pretty much every kind of herb that

(01:53:06):
you would want to grow is going to be there now.
If you haven't been to Enchanted Forest before they are
on FM twenty seven fifty nine, just about three or
four miles south of great Wood in the Richmond Rosenberg area.
Out south and east of Richmond Rosenberg Area twenty seven
fifty nine and Chenny Forest. Now, when you go there,

(01:53:27):
you're going to find a selection of every kind of plant.
If you want to create butterfly gardens, if you're wanting
to grow things that bloom and various times a year,
blooming trees, blooming shrubs, blooming perennials. There salvia collection is
it's just amazing how many different kinds of salvia as
they have. That's my favorite genus of plants that we

(01:53:48):
have out there. Well, there you go. It's right there
at the enchanted forests. You just need to get out
there and enjoy it. And today would be a good day.
They got nice tall shade trees make shopping such a breeze.
You're looking for some good plants for shade, they've got them.
They've got you covered on those kinds of things. And then,
like I said, the plants to attract butterflies, it's just

(01:54:11):
crazy with it's attracting the adults are feeding the young
as well.

Speaker 1 (01:54:16):
Let's do this.

Speaker 3 (01:54:17):
Let's head out now to northwest Houston and visit with
Greg this morning. Hey Greg, welcome to garden Line.

Speaker 13 (01:54:24):
Uh, thank you Skip for taking my call. I was
just I got on the show right at the end
of the last segment on the compost, and I've got
three yards of the fungal compost and I was planning
on using.

Speaker 5 (01:54:40):
It as mulch because it's got a lot of big,
you know, chunks of.

Speaker 1 (01:54:43):
Wood in it. So how how big should I put
that on?

Speaker 3 (01:54:50):
Just like well a mulch, you're sure it's the fungal
compost because that is screened down pretty good. There's a
there's a finer screen and of course I'm going to
assume you have a little bit coarser product.

Speaker 13 (01:55:02):
There probably thirty dollars a yard.

Speaker 3 (01:55:05):
I mean, it was okay, but that's a great deal. Yeah.
So so, uh, if you put it down about two
inches deep, that would be the minimum that I would use. Uh,
you could go a little bit deeper. The bottom line
is depth is only to block sunlight. So if two
inches blocks of sunlight, no sun's getting to the soil,

(01:55:27):
that's accud. If you want to put it a little
bit deeper, that's fine too, and then just let it
decompose and periodically add some fresh stuff on top of
it to maintain that light blocking.

Speaker 1 (01:55:37):
Okay, okay, all right.

Speaker 13 (01:55:39):
And then I've had lots of projects and I had
bought some drift roses and they've probably they've been sitting
on the side of my yard, were like, you know,
three months, but I've been watered, you know, religiously. But
then all of a sudden, one of them just lost
all of its leaves. I mean just nothing, no leave

(01:56:00):
it all.

Speaker 1 (01:56:01):
But it does have green at the bottom.

Speaker 13 (01:56:02):
Set I just trim it back to the bottom where
the green is and cut them just trim it up.

Speaker 3 (01:56:08):
You know what I would do. I would just you know,
start watering it and stuff, and then watch where it
starts growing and cut it back to there. Sometimes it's
alive a little further out, and I would hate to
overprune it. Uh, but yeah, it'll it'll bounce back. Main
thing is you need to get those in the ground.
You can plant them at anytime, as long as you

(01:56:30):
just treat them like they're in a container. You know,
when you put them in the ground, Uh, you're still
wanting to water them every day to keep them going,
because that root system is so very confined.

Speaker 13 (01:56:41):
Right, and and break up that roots ball too, right, Look,
just your spade or something, just kind of break it up.

Speaker 1 (01:56:50):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:56:50):
What I'll do is I'll take a box cutter knife
with a little one end change or blade on it,
and I'll cut vertically from top to bottom through the
roots cylinder in about three places, going around the roots.
And that'll do it adequately if you only use your
fingers to pull it apart. Just any root that's going
in a circle needs to get cut, and that plant
will re establish a good root and it'll be just fine.

Speaker 13 (01:57:13):
So yeah, all right, okay, well that's pretty much it.

Speaker 3 (01:57:17):
Thank you sir, Thank you, Greg, appreciate that call. You
take care. Nelson plant Food has a number of quality
products out there, and I always, you know, I always
want to we's running around and talk about now because
there's so many to tell you about. But now that
it's summertime and we're spending more time indoors, let's talk
about their indoor plant food. It's part of the Nutrient

(01:57:40):
Star group of plant foods at Nelson. The indoor plant
food has a slow release of nutrients as well as
a fast release of nutrients I'll combined in one product.
So when you're using it, you can use it every
month if you want. During the growing season. You know,
in summertime number one's a little bit warm, or even

(01:58:00):
indoors in summertime. But also the plants are just growing
faster because of higher light levels and so on, higher
light intensity, even indoors, and so you can gradually feed
month by month for a little bit. Now, if you've
got plants that are outside, I mean, you can use
this on them too, if they're in containers, maybe in
the entrance way. I've got some house plants so to speak,
that are outside my house in the front door, at

(01:58:22):
that little enclave where it's shady in there. But things
like a Chinese evergreen I have in that area.

Speaker 5 (01:58:29):
I have some.

Speaker 3 (01:58:32):
Well, I just have a bunch of different kinds of
houseplants sitting out front. It's a great plant product. Nutra
Star indoor plants from the folks at Nelson Now also
nutri Star boogin villas. People are asking how do I
make my boog and vidas boom? Well, part of it
is good nutrition for those and whether it's a Mougin
villa or by the way, just because it says booga

(01:58:53):
and villa. You can use it on your mandavilla. If
you've got cross vines, if you've got you know, honeysuckle
or jasmines, are all kinds of other vines. It's fine
to use on all of those things.

Speaker 5 (01:59:06):
Uh.

Speaker 3 (01:59:06):
And you want to feed them about every fourteen days,
just small amounts of that. Continue to put a little
bit in and watered in. Put a little bit in
and watered in, and you will be surprised at just
how well it actually works. It has a natural ingredients
in it, like apps and salts in that new starboobdia.
It's an excellent product to use. I would recommend it

(01:59:28):
from the folks that know some plant food because I've
used it and I know it works. Let's take a
little break here and we'll be right back with your
phone calls at seven one three, two one two five
eight seven four. Hey, if you're looking for a professional
to come out and give you some landscape help, we're
talking about design help. We're talking about fixing poorly drained areas,

(01:59:49):
or improving your landscape lighting, or creating hard scapes, or
just designing new beds, putting in the blend the attractive
planting of plants, the mix of plants and the words
that is going to give you success. That's Peer Scapes
peerscapes dot com. Our go to landscaper here on garden Line.
You will find that they just know what they're doing.

(02:00:10):
That just flat go look at the kind of landscapes
they've designed. You can go to the website peerscapes dot com.
You can give them a call two eight one three,
seven oh fifty sixty. Fall is the best planting season
of the year. Why not engage them now so that
when that season comes, you're already well on your way

(02:00:31):
to getting the landscapes and designs, the plans, whatever you're
needing to get done done. Peer Scapes is the place now. Also,
they do quarterly maintenance. So if you just need somebody
to come out, maybe you already have garden beds, but
you want somebody that's going to come out there that's
gonna check up, check the beds out ever quarter make
sure the plants, if anything needs trading out or replanting,

(02:00:53):
you know, whatever they do that, if any trimming needs
to be done, if any irrigation system, you know, issues
are happening, get those fixed. Get some fresh mulch down
so it looks good and it's keeping the weeds out.
They also do quarterly maintenance at Pierscapes Perchcapes dot com
to eight one three seven oh fifty sixty to eight

(02:01:14):
one three seven oh fifty sixty. Let's go now to Tim.
It says Massachusetts. Hi, you're calling from Massachusetts. Tim, Yes,
I am, and uh.

Speaker 11 (02:01:26):
Thank you for taking my call. What I've done is
I've take some cuttings from a butterfly bush and I'm
propagating them. I use the root known product there or something. Yes,
you had to get it to get started. Uh, well,
I have a I'm actually doing pretty good. I'm probably

(02:01:48):
seventy seventy five percent successful so far. But there are
a couple that are starting to wilt.

Speaker 3 (02:01:53):
That's good.

Speaker 11 (02:01:53):
Can I can I take those that are wilting and
uh just add some more in a liquid form the
root known or rootone. No, and if that would help?

Speaker 3 (02:02:07):
No, yeah, I wouldn't do that. I don't know why
they're wilting it. You know, if you move them into
more sunlight, that could make them welt. If they're not
quite ready, if they had two soggy of root conditions
and the roots they were forming started to decay, then
that could cause wilting, But adding more root hormone is

(02:02:30):
probably not going to do it. So I would just
make sure they're in an area where the it's dead
air space.

Speaker 11 (02:02:37):
You know.

Speaker 3 (02:02:38):
It's not like the leaves can desiccate and dry out
and wilt and things like that. Those are all in
your control. But butterfly bush or boodleia is a plant
that is you know, if you use the right kind
of cutting, it's very rootable, but it's not the easiest

(02:02:58):
of things to root. So if you've got seventy percent,
i'd say you're doing pretty good.

Speaker 11 (02:03:02):
Okay, So just be happy with that.

Speaker 3 (02:03:04):
Huh, Well, you know, I mean, if you're not trying
to make a living on rooting and selling butterfly bush,
i'd be happy with seventy five percent. Yeah, I'll always
do it. I always do a few extra cuttings of anything. Yeah, Okay,
sounds good, sounds like you know what you're doing there.

Speaker 11 (02:03:20):
Well I'm getting started just about, yes, But I just
have another quick, quick one with your compost. I've been
composting in a corner of my yard for years and
I've never turned it and whatever. So I just had
someone turn it this past week and the tops of
that is in there is just incredible.

Speaker 3 (02:03:40):
That's good stuff.

Speaker 8 (02:03:42):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (02:03:43):
The compost just keeps getting better, you know. I mean,
eventually it's going to be humous and so uh, but
it keeps shrinking down and so it sounds like you're
you're doing it good.

Speaker 1 (02:03:53):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (02:03:53):
We we have rules of composting, you know, like you
got to use this much ground green stuff, this much
brown stuff and all that stuff. Nature has no rule.
Just it sits on the ground, it composts, and he
composts away. It sounds like you're creating some black goal
there for your garden plants. Tom.

Speaker 11 (02:04:10):
Great, thank you very much for taking a call.

Speaker 1 (02:04:12):
Skip.

Speaker 3 (02:04:14):
Thank you, sir, appreciate you being a listener. You take care. Yeah,
that is the case. Hey, the ground Up You've heard
me talk about them all the time. The ground Up
is quality materials. You can get the ground Up from
any of their three locations right now. They've got the
spots on the west side of town primarily where you

(02:04:35):
can go pick up their things. They're still having that
twenty fifth Well no, wait a minute, I'm sorry, I
went a day too far. The molt sale looks like
it ran out yesterday. If somebody's listening from the ground Up,
if you've extended that, let me know, because my information
shows that it wound up just yesterday. You need to
go to the ground Up's website, the ground up dot Com.

(02:04:57):
That's where you can find out all kinds of information. Listen.
They've got mulches, they've got compost materials, they have bed
mixes you want to grow vegetables or herbs or roses
or house plants. For example, their regular Bohemian potting blend
is outstanding quality stuff. The Bohemian Potting blend that they have.

(02:05:19):
They also have the double screen compost and the leap
whole compost. And the ground Up is located well, let
me just do this. There's three locations. You've got the
brent Moore location, you've got the West Park location, and
you have the wind Fern location. Just go to the website,
theground up dot com. See the stuff they have. The
plants are located at the Brentmore location if you want

(02:05:42):
to stop by there. They have an outstanding selection of plants.
But not only is the ground Up going to provide
those soil materials and things for you. You can purchase tools,
you can purchase other supplies that they carry at some
of their locations. Just go check them out. There is
delivery available. You just need to call them and find

(02:06:02):
out the details of how that's done too. Eight one
nine seven oh zero zero zero three two eight one
nine seven oh zero zero zero three. Let's go now
to Kathy in Houston. Hey, Kathy, welcome to garden Line.

Speaker 10 (02:06:18):
How are you doing? Skip my question?

Speaker 3 (02:06:22):
Thank you?

Speaker 9 (02:06:24):
Okay? And my question was about old fertilizers or bug
treatments that you may have hanging around. I don't know
how long. I mean, they're all old. I mean, how

(02:06:44):
do you get both of them without putting them down
the toilet?

Speaker 5 (02:06:47):
Are in the.

Speaker 9 (02:06:49):
The drainage hole that's in the slidewalk, you know, the.

Speaker 3 (02:06:54):
Little well you're yeah, don't want there down the toilet.

Speaker 4 (02:07:01):
That.

Speaker 3 (02:07:01):
Never put them in the toilet, Never do anything like that.
Don't dump them at curbside where they'll wash off concentrated
into the storm, in the storm celler or storm drains
or the streams or things like that. The best way
to use a product is to spread out according to
the label. That's one even if it's not going to work.
But a product, it's like an insecticide or fungicides, is

(02:07:23):
ten years old depending on the temperatures that was stored in.
I think there's a very slim chance that it's still
a good product out there now. If it were a fertilizer,
that would be a little bit different. But bottom line
is you might want to call your county Agrolife Extension
office and ask them if they know of any upcoming

(02:07:44):
days where people can bring in pesticides. Each community has
their own ways of doing things like this, but many
counties there's a place periodically where they do a pesticide
collection and you can bring that old stuff in and
they dispose of it properly. But I don't know for
every community, you know what they would have. But here,

(02:08:07):
let me do this. I'm gonna give you the number
for the Harris County. Here we go, Harris County Extension Office.
If I can find it, come on, here's a phone number. Naturally,
I'm in a hurry to find it, so it's making
me wait today. There we go, uh seven one three
two seven four nine five zero seven one three two

(02:08:30):
seven four zero nine five zero Talk to the agriculture
agent or horticulture agent and ask them if they know
of any place uh you know, the pesticide collection and
proper district destruction of those things. That's what I would do.
So either applim according to the label over the specified

(02:08:52):
area or or or take them to one of these places.

Speaker 9 (02:08:57):
Okay, okay, great, thank you so much.

Speaker 3 (02:09:01):
Thank you, all right, thank you, appreciate your call. You
take care. All right, folks, you're listening to Garden Line
and we're here to help you have success with your plants.
By the way, wild Birds Unlimited. I was just reading
an article about birding used to be a thing for
like retirees, you know, people got older, retired, and birding

(02:09:22):
is just one of those really popular hobbies. Now I'm
reading about like twenty and thirty somethings and the popularity
of birding them on twenty and thirty something. There's even
like colleges that have organizations, you know, for students that
are into birding and things. I mean, it's really becoming popular.
And wild Birds Unlimited is the place you need to go.

(02:09:45):
That's where the knowledge is, that's where the products are,
that's where you get the bird houses and the bird feeders.
Their quality, like you don't want to feed the squirrels
because they're stealing all your bird seed. Go to Wildbirds
Unlimited and ask them about their eliminator feeder. I've got one,
and boy does it ever work very very well. You
want to get expertise on what birds are coming through

(02:10:06):
when or which ones are here all year, and what
are the blends to use and stuff. Wild Birds Unlimited
we have six stores in the Greater Houston area that
are part of my wild Birds Unlimited group. Go to
WBU dot com. That's for stands for wild Birds Unlimited.
WBU dot com, forward slash Houston and find the wild

(02:10:27):
Birds Unlimited store near you and get involved. It is
a fun, fun hobby, even if you're not into the
binoculars and walking around, you know, finding birds in the wild.
You just want them in your backyard. Wild Birds Unlimited
that's where you got to go. All right, We're gonna
have to take a little break right here. When we
come back. Let's see here, we've got Joeanne and Lake Conrod.

(02:10:48):
Joanne your first up, Chris and the Woodlands, and Marie
in Montgomery. Welcome back to guard Line. I'm your host,
Skip Richter. We're here to help you have success with
your plans. ACE Hardware stores are all over this listening area.
I mean, if you're hearing me out in Beaumont, Texas, Orange, Texas,
that area, there's an ACE Hardware store out there in Orange.

(02:11:11):
If you're hearing me down ways out toward Corpus Christy direction,
there's ACE Hardware stores all the way down toward there,
and of course all through this Greater Houston area. For example,
we got Alsar ACE in Spring on Rayford Road, we
got Deer Park ACE on Center Street, CYPRUSACE on Jones Road,
Single Ranch ACE on South Mason out there, and Katie
Patco ACE and Wes Willis it was just down there

(02:11:33):
in Alvin. And we've got Crosby ACE on FM twenty
one hundred. Just few of the many, many ACE Hardware
stores that you find at this website. This is my
ACE Hardware website. Make sure and include Texas ACE Hardware
Texas dot Com. Acehardware Texas dot Com. Find out what's
going on. What you're going to find is there some
great deals going on right now? By the way, If

(02:11:55):
you're not part of the ACE Rewards program, sign up.
It's free to sign up. It's easy and every time
you shop, you are getting an advantage in many ways.
For example, there may be specials that are available to
asher Words members going on at ACE Hardware Store. You
can get notified of things coming up that you will

(02:12:17):
want to know about at your ACE Hardware store. Whether
it's barbecue, whether it is equipment like power tools and things,
whether it is tools and garden hoses and products for
your garden, fertilizers for your garden. ACE Hardware Store is
ready to go. Go to your local ACE Hardware store.
ACE Hardware Texas dot Com makes it really, really simple.

(02:12:41):
We're going to now go to Joanne in Lake Conroe. Hey, Joanne,
Welcome to garden Line.

Speaker 1 (02:12:47):
Hey, go morning.

Speaker 11 (02:12:48):
Thank you.

Speaker 14 (02:12:49):
Say you know, I see lantanna growing beautifully all over,
including in the woods. Nobody takes care of it. It
just grows, and mine is suffering. I sent you an
email what is going on with my lantana?

Speaker 3 (02:13:05):
Well, in the email, there's several things going on, but
I'll just say this, whatever's happening to your lantana is
not keeping it from blooming, because that's that is actually
a minimal amount of damage that lantana should still bloom
very well with the amount of damage I saw. I
see a little evidence of some beetle or caterpillar that's

(02:13:26):
chomped on a few leaves. I see a little evidence
of some insects, probably lantana lacebugs, that are sucking the
juices out of the leaves. Those little tan light colored
specks all over the leaves. That that is a little
insect underneath that is sucking juices out of the leaves.
So there's that, but the degree of it is not

(02:13:47):
enough to cause a lack of blooming that you have.

Speaker 14 (02:13:50):
So very few blooms actually considering how large.

Speaker 4 (02:13:58):
The plant is.

Speaker 3 (02:14:01):
Okay, well, it's possible to overfertilize with nitrogen uh and
and get a lot of growth at the expense of blooming.
But I don't think that's likely that that's what's going
on with your plants, just in looking at them. If
you haven't fertilized them much, then I would give them
a little fertilizer because a little nutrition and boost is important.

(02:14:24):
They need good sunlight, they need adequate moisture, and they
need adequate nutrients, and they it's up to them then
to bloom. You're doing everything that's in your power.

Speaker 5 (02:14:33):
If you provide them what nitrogen. What fertilizer would I buy?

Speaker 3 (02:14:40):
You could use a lot of different kinds of fertilizer.
The fertilizers for any kind of flowering plants would do
well with your with your lantanas. If you have you
tried using some products, excuse me, if you tried using
some products from Nilsen Plant Food before.

Speaker 14 (02:14:57):
I haven't done anything with those plants. I haven't.

Speaker 3 (02:15:01):
Okay, Well, Nelson Plant, yeah, Nelson Plant for your products
are widely available all through the listening area. They have
one called color Star colors. I have that and color
Star okay, well that read the label on the back
on the jar and apply it that way. Periodical support

(02:15:23):
good strong growth and stuff. But sunlight, moisture and adequate
not excessive nutrition are what you need to get the
plantenas kicked back into gear.

Speaker 14 (02:15:33):
Then did you see did you see the succulent? Send?

Speaker 3 (02:15:38):
I did?

Speaker 7 (02:15:39):
Okay?

Speaker 14 (02:15:40):
Should that be brought inside?

Speaker 3 (02:15:44):
No, that needs lots of light, lots of light, so
inside it's not going to get adequate sunlight. Just don't
over water it. That succulent can put up with some
you know, uh, extended drier conditions. Just occasionally given it
just enough to moisten the soil some, but good good

(02:16:06):
sunlight is needed on that one. Looks like something's been
messing with that one. You know, if you have cat
or something.

Speaker 1 (02:16:12):
That was messing.

Speaker 14 (02:16:13):
The leaves are dropping off. I don't know why they
had little tiny, tiny black spots and Okay, I tried
to knock the spots off, but I knocked the leaves
off instead.

Speaker 3 (02:16:26):
Okay, Joe Anne, Well, good luck with those. I hope
that helps. I appreciate you giving us all on guard
line today. Thanks you bet you take you take care,
you take care. If you've not done your long fertilizing
in summer, super turf can still be applied. It's the
silver bag the nineteen four to ten from the folks
at Nitrofoss. Now you're gonna find super turf. Excuse me,

(02:16:50):
Adnia defeat up there in Tomball. You're gonna find it
at Plants for All Seasons on Highway two forty nine
on Tomball Parkway at Headen and feed Stupentor Airline carries
night Fosh products like Superturf, Lake Hardware and Angleton on
Velasco Lake Hardware and Clute on Dixie Drive. All places
they carry night fresh products like the super turf, the

(02:17:12):
silver bag, and if you're going to get it done,
get it done asap. It lasts a long time. We're
going to be talking about fall fertilization when we get
into October. So go ahead, if you need to do
some fertilizing, get that super turf down now and you'll
be good to go. Let's now head to Montgomery and
talk to Marie. Hello Marie, welcome to garden Line.

Speaker 2 (02:17:33):
Hello Skip, how are you doing.

Speaker 3 (02:17:36):
Doing well?

Speaker 11 (02:17:37):
Thank you, good skiff.

Speaker 2 (02:17:40):
I'm wondering if I'm chasing down a rabbit hole here.
I'm looking for a maple that can tolerate our brutal
western scorching sun in the summertime, and that grows no
taller than fifteen feet. The reason I say that is
because I have a dying Celeste big tree, so this

(02:18:04):
is an opportunity to replace it with an ornamental tree.
I've read about the maples. I understand I don't want
a diva, you know, So am I chasing a rabbit hole?

Speaker 1 (02:18:21):
Well?

Speaker 3 (02:18:23):
Uh, I think my concern on on the Maples is
just to get a maple that small. You're gonna have
to go with the Japanese maple. And the problem with
with the Japanese maple is it wants to be in it.
It can take our heat. It doesn't like it, but

(02:18:44):
it can't take it in full sun. It's going to
need to be in a in a very bright dapple
shade or maybe some morning sun location, uh in order
to do that. Now, there are there are a lot
of there are a lot of good maples that are
out there. The sin fully By maple, though, is going
to get too big for what you're talking about. Uh

(02:19:05):
And and so the folks at R. C. W Nursery,
which is where Beltway eight and tom Ball Parkway come together,
the maples of various Yeah. Now up up by you
out in toward Plannersville area is the Williamson Tree Farm,

(02:19:28):
same family, and they grow the trees out there and
they do sell I think it's on Saturdays. They open
to the public. And they do have Sam Philippe maple's
uh And. But I would talk to them about that
because I I just don't think I just I think
Sam Philippe's going to be too big. That's the bottom
line for for you said, tell me again, how how

(02:19:50):
tall was what you're looking for?

Speaker 2 (02:19:55):
I'm looking for the canopy that my stylist Big Tree divided.
So I'm thinking that a maple may not work. I
love to try them, but I don't want to be a.

Speaker 5 (02:20:07):
Slave to it.

Speaker 2 (02:20:08):
So I'm also considering alternative as well.

Speaker 3 (02:20:12):
If you have any recommendation, well, well, I would say
the east the red buds would be an option. Now,
red buds will get bigger than that in time, but
there's for a long time. It would be close to
or slightly above that fifteen feet level. So I would

(02:20:33):
consider the red buds. There's some gorgeous red buds out there.
I know that RCW has it's either hearts of fire.
There's several of them that I think they have hearts
of fire there that do really well for them, And
so that would be an option. I know, if you
head up a little bit more out your direction, Arburgate

(02:20:55):
Tumball is going to have some really gorgeous maple excuse me,
red buds with the colorful foliage that makes them so beautiful.
So you get the spring blooms, plus you get the
colorful foliage, and so I would talk to those folks.
The only other thing kind of close to those sizes
would be the what they call Texas Lilac vitext. The

(02:21:18):
vtexts agnes castis it's a purplish color. That would be
another one. And I'm realizing I'm up against a break here, Marie.
I've talked a little too far, but Vitext would be
another one to consider for that. Thank you very much
for your call. I do appreciate it, folks. You'll be
right back. We're landing the plane. Folks. It is just

(02:21:39):
about time shut down guarden line here and just a
little bit. But we got some things I do want
to talk about first before we do. First of all,
Southwest Fertilizer outstanding place to get what you need period.
You want a one stop shop Southwest Fertilizer. You want
the biggest supply of organic products in the region Southwest Fertilizer.

(02:22:00):
You want the biggest supply of all kinds of things
to control pests, weeds and diseases and fertilizers in the
region Southwest Fertilizer. Do you want a ninety foot long
wall of quality tools to do anything you need to
do out there in the garden. Southwest Fertilizer or the landscape.

(02:22:20):
This is the place corner of bis and Nut and Runwick,
simple as that, and they also can help you with diagnostics.
You know you got a problem you here's what you do.
You put it in a plastic bag or take a
picture of it, bring it in. Let Bob Aaron or
any of the team there take a look at it,
and basically what you're gonna find is they're going to

(02:22:41):
identify it and they're gonna tell you if you need
a product. Here's the product that you need, or here's
two or three options, because they're gonna have more than one.
Probably Southwest Fertilizer Corner bis, Nut and Runwick. Make it
easier on yourself, one stop shop, simple as that. All right,
let's see here will I did get Chris if you're

(02:23:01):
still listening, I got your email here, and if you
would like to give me a call real quick, hopefully
we can get you on and we'll tackle it. If not,
I'll just try to do it without the call myself.
If you're up in Tombol area and you head out
west of town, you come to a place called D
and D Feed. It's on the left hand side as
you go out twenty nine to twenty west of Tombol.

(02:23:23):
This feedstore has been around a good while, and it
is just a complete feedstore. You're going to find really
good selection of all the livestock feeds and the supplies
that go with them. You're going to find really quality
pet feed too, quality products that you know, our pets
are important to us, we won't take care of them.

(02:23:44):
Dandy Feed's got that. And then when it comes to
the garden stuff, from the lawn, for the trees, for
the shrubs, for the flowers, for the vegetables, for the herbs,
you name it. D and D feed has got all
those kinds of products, the fertilizers you hear me talk
about here on garden Line, you're gonna find a D
and D feed. They specialize in carrying what you need.

(02:24:06):
And then sometimes there's you need a specialty kind of
product that you can't buy just anywhere. Dan Defeed's gonna
carry it for controlling rodents, or for controlling mosquitoes or
anything like that. D and DE Feed three miles west
of two forty nine on twenty nine twenty in Tomball
two eight one three five one seventy one forty four.

(02:24:27):
I'll give you that again. Two eight one three five
one seventy one forty four we are now going to
go out to the phones and talk to Chris. Hey, Chris,
I got your picture.

Speaker 14 (02:24:37):
Oh thank you. It's looking very poor.

Speaker 3 (02:24:44):
Yeah, something has hit the bottom of that tree, and
now I see a lot of mult around it. So
I'm assuming you didn't use a weed eater around it
or a lawnmower. But that's kind of what that looks like.
Is lawnmower or damn it? The only other thing if
do you know, if you know out there in the yard,
just off the top of your head, north, south, east
and west, is that wound on the southwest side of

(02:25:06):
that plant. I think it's the north that north side. Okay, Well,
something physically damaged it and did a lot of damage
to it, and as a result, it's caused that huge
wound that now has taken away over fifty percent of

(02:25:30):
the trunk that moves water and nutrients down to the roots.
So there's nothing to just make it all go away instantly.
But the more you can make sure that it has
an adequate supply of moisture and that it has an
adequate supply of nutrients, you've got it. Nice moultch. That's
all good, And the bottom line is just weight and

(02:25:54):
hopefully it's going to close that area over. Now I
can only see one side of the trunk. If you
go around the other side and it it's all inner
wood only, then that tree will never survive. It will
die in time. But the side I see, all the

(02:26:15):
bark is swelling up and backed up above the injury,
and those nutrients need to get to the roots or
the roots are going to get starved. And if there's
not a connection on the other side, I don't know.
I don't I don't think there's a there's a good
chance for it. It may be something where you just
save yourself the time and trouble and replant.

Speaker 6 (02:26:34):
If it's and I'm looking at it right now, and
it's two more to the west, and it's all the
way around that gummit, all the where and.

Speaker 3 (02:26:46):
Yet well, now here, here's one thing. Here's what kind
of plant is that I'm looking at the.

Speaker 11 (02:26:53):
You know what?

Speaker 3 (02:26:54):
Oh, that's a vitex. Okay, Well, here's what you can do.
If you cut that off at the ground, you're gonna
get a lot of shoots coming up and you can
turn it into a multi stem bush, or you're gonna
have to buy a product called sucker stopper or sucker punch,
because Vitex suckers really bad. You're gonna get a hundred

(02:27:18):
sheets coming up, so you you cut them off and
you you spray the sucker punch on there, but you
leave one shoot to be the new trunk. I would
instead just let it become a multi stem bush and
it still blooms pretty. But either way you want to
go that Vitex is not gonna die. You can cut
it off at the ground and it'll it'll come out

(02:27:39):
like gangbusters, so you don't have to replace it.

Speaker 14 (02:27:41):
Okay, I will try to.

Speaker 6 (02:27:43):
It's going to hurt to solid down, but I'll do
that well.

Speaker 12 (02:27:49):
And to keep water in it, it's gonna have to happen.

Speaker 3 (02:27:51):
But all right, there you go. Hey, I'm glad you
got through with that photo. Thanks for your call. Appreciate
that