A swarm in May is worth a load of hay...

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Good morning, everybody, welcome back. I'm Ron Wilson, and you are
in the garden here on news radiosix to ten WTVN eight two to one
wtv IN eight hundred and six toten WTV and talking about yardning. Moving
our way right through the month ofMay. Can't believe next weekend is Memorial
weekend. As I promise, sheis back with us this morning. We
haven't spent a lot of time withour Queen Bee, Barbie Bletcher, kind
of find out what's going on.What happened to those bees over the winter.

(00:22):
Now we're looking so far, andlots of other questions as well,
ladies and gentlemen, The one,the only, the Queen Bee, Barbie
Butcher, Good morning, good morning. Yeah, there you go. Hey.
I first of all, I knowyour website is beesantrees dot com.
You've got to shut down right now. But I just want to put that
out there so someday you'll get itback up and running when it's like you

(00:43):
want it to be. And Iget that, but it's beesantrees dot com.
But good having you on the show. Let's get I got lots of
questions for us. Let's get started. First of all, looking at the
winter. I always like having youcome on. You know, sometime in
the spring, you look back atthe winter, you hear general consensus from
all that most of the beekeepers aroundthe state, how did we fare?

(01:04):
We did very well. All ofthe adjacent states as well. We had
good survival over the winter time.So for the most part, looks like
it came because you know, sometimesyou've been on our show. I remember
you've said, you know, wehad a fifty percent loss or we had
whatever I mean or more, whichis devastating. And you told me one

(01:26):
time, what was it like.If it was stayed like twenty or twenty
five percent, that's not too bad. Yeah, before before varumites, it
was ten percent. It went upto twenty percent during the colony collapse disort
of stages. That was in theyou know, like mid eighties and well,
mid nineties, I guess it was, you know, sixty to eighty

(01:49):
percent was normal. A sixty eightypercent loss, which we can't do that.
We can't sustain ourselves. That's imagineeight percent of your cat all.
Yeah, no, and it isexpensive to start all over again or to
ramp those back up again. Soyeah, that's a major loss, So

(02:10):
that's a good thing. Then wecame through looking pretty darn good. Is
that why we're seeing so many swarmsthis spring? Yes, sir, we
had good winter survival, even thefire will be seemed like they did pretty
well. So we're having swarms galorebecause the colonies obviously they survived the winter,

(02:30):
so they've grown really full, thoseand those hives, and they got
to go. They gotta split.That's how they reproduce, just by swarming,
just like ants would do. Andare we still in swarming season?
Yes, we are, so themonth of June is worth the silver spoon,
so we should have, you know, lots of swarms still to go.

(02:53):
Okay, so what is the monthof June? Is the silver spoon?
Yeah, a load of let's seea swarm in maze worth a load
of hay. Right, swarm inJune is worth a silver spoon. Gott
it. Swarm in July? Itis not worth a fly? Why is
that? Because usually they're small swarms, so they're what we call after swarms.

(03:19):
So your colony, you know,so the bees produce a new queen.
A new queen kicks out the oldqueen, which is what your swarm
is sometimes the colonies will produce fiveto ten queens or more just one in
succession, so every swarm is goingto have fewer bees. So you can
have like three thousand bees in aswarm, that's a good size, good

(03:42):
sized swarm, and you can youknow, harvest or collectose and get a
nice honeycop even that year. Ifthe swarms are smaller because you've got like
the sort of fourth queen, youonly have a couple of hundred, usually
have to combine it with another hive. Interesting, So for folks that are
listening that maybe a swarm would showup in their yard or on the side

(04:06):
of their house or in a treeor whatever that should be, obviously,
don't panic because they're looking for aplace to set up a new home.
But if they stick around for acouple of days, it is worth calling
someone to come and collect those correct. Yes, Ohio State Beekeepers dot org,

(04:26):
Central Ohio Beekeepers dot org. Mostof the beekeeping cubs are going to
have a list of people who collectswarms or do cutouts. So yeah,
we need those bees. We needevery colony of bees we can get because
we don't have enough even now todo all the pollination that we need,
right, So, and if youdon't collect those up and they go and
they find a home in a treeor unfortunately in the side of your house

(04:53):
or a wall in your house.I mean they just that just they just
continue on. But unfortunately it's justnot in a high life, right,
it's a lot more work. Youknow, in a in a tree,
that's fine. But if they're inthe side of a house, you're going
to have you know, you canhave pounds and pounds of honey. And

(05:14):
you know, we've seen houses withthe whole side of the house is all
bee come because every year as theyas they you know, mature, they
just keep moving or our colony willdie and another colony will move in.
So you just the amount of beeswax just continues to grow and and but
but if it's in the in yourwall of your house, obviously you don't

(05:36):
want them there because if something wouldhappen and there's a lot of honey in
there. Even though honey lasts forever, it does eventually start to those combs
fall apart, right, and thenit starts to mildew or whatever, and
not a good smell and not agood thing inside your wall. And you
don't want to plug it up fromthe outside, and you don't want to
kill the bees because the bees arekeeping that wax cool. Once the bees

(06:00):
are dead, that wax is goingto melt and the honey's gonna run,
and then you're going to have asticky mess. So if people do see
bees flying in out of a holeof their house, they need to call
a beekeeper as soon as possible andlet somebody come in, yeah, and
determine whether or not, you know, if it needs that cutout. As

(06:21):
a matter of fact, I knowJoe Boggs and I had worked with someone,
the young lady who had that happen, and she was able to get
a hold of somebody through one ofthe groups. So that you ad meant
because you gave us the information whoactually was a carpenter as well. So
when they came, they were ableto detect where the hive was and then
they cut a nice hole in thedry wall, disassembled it, got it

(06:44):
out of there, collected up allthe bees, collected up the comb,
and then was able to seal itback over and put it back like it
was, you know when they gotthere. Yeah, And quite a few
beekeepers are good carpenters. We actuallyhave what we call a beevax, is
a vacuum cleaner just for so wecan suck up the bees without harming them,
cut the wax out, and sealthat hole back up. But you

(07:06):
know, people need to be patientbecause the ones that do these cutouts,
they have a waiting list. Reallyyou may not do you're not be able
to come out, you know,you know in a week's time, it's
going to take a while, andusually by July, August, September,
you can't. You really can't getthat colony out. There's a lot of

(07:30):
honey, a lot of bees.It just ends up being a sticky mess
and the bees usually die anyhow.So you want to do it late late
winter, early spring. That's thebest time to get those bees out.
So if somebody realizes this is happeningin the fall, you just leave them
in there over the winter and tryand go after them in the spring.
Yeah, they're not going to doany any harm, and they're actually going

(07:53):
to consume all that honey that they'vemade, right so by his fall,
you know, by late late winterthey can too most of that. You
don't have as many bees, soyou're more successful at cutting those bees out
and getting all that wax out.Talking about Barbie Butch running everywhere, yeah,
that would be a mess talking withBarbie Butch or she's our queen bee

(08:13):
and of course has always provided uswith great bee information. You know,
I this morning was kind of foggyand all, and you know here and
there and the cooler temperatures, andI remember I used to say, you
know, if you're gonna spray,you know, spray. We used to
say this all the time. Sprayearly in the morning or late in the
evening when the bees are inactive.But I swear I can go out in

(08:35):
the nursery sometimes and see bees atsix point thirty in the morning buzzing around
on some of the flowers, bumblebees and that type of thing. How
really do honey bees come out ofthose hives? I mean, is it
based on temperature? Sunrise? Yes? All the above. Okay, so
usually by sixty five something the beesare flying. The sun is their hive.

(09:01):
They could be active and flying beforethat, but typically early morning they're
just out to defecate, to pee, and then they'll fly back in.
But they'll start they'll start foraging assoon as they're you know, sixty something,
high sixties in the sun is hittingthose hives. They'll be out foraging,

(09:22):
but native bees are up before theyare. And then what about nighttime,
I mean, are they like chickens, they want to be back inside
before it gets darker. They typicallyare back in before dark or by dark.
But a really hot day, thosebees are outside the hive. They're
fanning the hive trying to stay cool. Because you figure that hive there's you
know, five thousand plus bees inthere, or yeah, fifty thousand bees

(09:46):
in there. That's a lot ofbees crammed into that little box. So
they're outside fanning, trying to staycool. So even like eight thirty at
night, if it's a hot day, there's bees all over the outside of
that hive. So when you're positioningyour hives, when you want to put
them where they get afternoon sun orshade, you want them to get as
much sun as possible. We've found, so we've been doing this honeybee health

(10:11):
survey for multiple years. No,by the what beekeepers do, the bees
are in the hives are in fullsun, they get they have fewer pests
and lower disease, so they needthat sun. Yeah, So you so
that you want them to get isthat the winter time to them? Because
if they're in the full sun inthe summer, that means they're totally exposed

(10:31):
to the harsh winter conditions on theopen as well. And you can put
them in a place you want toprotect them from the north wind. So
if you have them out on theedge of a field, you move them
out far enough so they're getting sun, but they're getting that wind, that
buffer from the from the wind tothe north wind. Interesting. All right,
We're gonna tell you get them upoff the ground and that helps a

(10:54):
lot too. Talking with Barbie Butcher, she's our Queen Bee. More questions
for bar B after the break hereon news radio six to ten WTVN.
Sure and Barb, you know flyinglike today, they're doing what they are
flying like jeps today. So they'reloving the weather today. Huh oh yeah,

(11:15):
perfect. You know when you whenyou and I really we started talking
about the colony collapse disorder and thenwe found out, you know, there
were all kinds of factors that werecausing all these problems, and so much
research has been done today. It'sbeen fantastic. We've learned more about bees
all of us over the last tenyears or so that I think ever,
But you know, this vera mightcontinues to come up as still one of

(11:35):
the major issues with bee keepers.Weren't wasn't there a lot of bee breeding
going on at one time to tryto find a better breed of bee that
was more resistant to this? Orwhere do we stand with the mite situation?
Yeah, we have what they callmight fighters and gold biers, and

(11:56):
it's called the vera since to bees, but it doesn't seem like that.
That is, it's a recessive traitand it just doesn't stay in the bee.
So you can read these wonderful queens, but once they've swarmed a couple
of times you've got a new queenin there, you've lost it. So
you have to keep buying a newhygienic queen every other year or so,

(12:22):
and most of us just can't dothat, right, So where do we
stand on this thing? I mean, is the focus now becoming more of
a mita side to try and culturalpractices to keep this under control or suppressed.
Yeah, we're trying to get awayfrom the chemicals in general, using
more cultural techniques, more physical techniques. Maybe we started using screen bottom boards,

(12:48):
I don't know, maybe fifteen somethingyears ago, which helps a little
bit. We can do drone trapping, which sorry, but we kicked the
drones out. It's especially made.We're all now we don't do anything anyway
but hang out and eat the honey. So yeah, so the drones are

(13:09):
roamite magnets. So we'll have theyou know that particular frame and they're a
drone frame. So it's all fullof cap drones and we take that out
and free them, knock them allout and put them back in again.
So that helps control it, andwe make splits. We make lots of
splits, and that helps control theruramite. So yeah, we're trying to
get away from at least the heavychemicals, right, So trying to get

(13:31):
away from chemical control, more culturalpractices and the bee breeding to be more
resistant to it is out there butjust hasn't been that effective. Yeah,
there's there's still trying. We canget Russian bee and that first generation of
Russian bees is pretty good at controllingmight, but once they swarm, we

(13:54):
lose that gene and they're back tothe same old might be with bad night.
One thing we have learned is byre cleaning every couple of years,
they're usually stronger colonies and they canfight fight better. Some of the older
queens they just don't seem to havethe strength of stamina, of the sensitivity

(14:16):
to control nights. Interesting. Solooking at Barbie butcher our queen Bee talking
looking at this spring season so farbeen a good spring for bees. For
honey bees in the most part,it's been challenging because it gets cold and
then it gets warm and cold andwarm, so we've rain doesn't help.
Today everything's flowering and the bees arebringing in all kinds of nectar and pollen

(14:43):
that it's cold for a week andthey're stuck inside. And I think that's
partly why we have so many swarms. And they're stuck inside, they can't
get out, and they say,hey, this is too crowded, I'm
out of here. Wow. Sothat's what that's why. And again you
said we'll keep our eyes open becausethese swarm could continue in Obviously the June
swarm is the one you're looking for, but through June with no problem.

(15:05):
Yeah, yeah, and please callcall bee keeper. Don't spray them or
try to chase them away. Callbee keeper. Yeah, and they're not
coming after you be The be attackthing is a rarity that happens, and
usually if they're provoked, but otherwise, I mean those swarms I have and
I've told you this before. I'vewalked up there, and I know you
have to. You can put yourhands up against the swarm. They can

(15:26):
care less. They could care lessabout you because their goal is to protect
that queen and get to where they'regoing to go to to make their new
nest. But you could put yourhands up there. And I'm not telling
folks to do that, obviously,but I have done that myself, and
it's just they don't you know that'sYou're not a concern of this right there
is you say, the only interestis to take care of the queen,

(15:48):
so they're not aggressive at all.Got a couple of minutes ago and you
and I I got a hold ofyou about three or four weeks ago because
I had somebody had a very interestingquestion and God, both of us looking
at now, I think we needresearch so just to find out for sure.
But somebody was questioning the fact ifif bees are collecting the pollen from
let's say, like a poison hemlockor from laurels or rhododendrons that have cini,

(16:14):
you know, is that a badthing? Does that wind up in
the honey? And I was like, well, I have no idea.
I can't imagine because we've never hadany cases of people dying from that.
But of course I went to you, and and course you went to some
other folks as well to get alittle bit of feedback. And what did
you come back with. Yeah,it's really interesting because I could not find

(16:34):
specifically that that, like the cyanideit's in the laurel, is actually in
the nectar. And certainly the plantsdon't want to kill their carrier, so
they're not going to have high enoughlevels anyhow to kill the the one that's
helping them reproduce. I talked todoctor Reed Johnson, who's the Ohio State

(16:55):
University eight years and he said thathe he has he collects honey from people
for tought. Then he finds thepollen from poison ivy on a regular basis,
but yet it doesn't make us sex. Is what happens is when these
are coming back to the hide withtheir loads of pole on our nectar,

(17:15):
is they don't just put all thatload in one or two cells, they
spread it out all over you know, a couple of frames, so there's
never a hind of there's anyone sellto either feed the bee or that for
us to make us sick or makethe bees sick. Interesting, but I
still think that I think that wouldbe worthy of getting some kind of a

(17:37):
funding to actually do an official researchon how that all works. Yeah.
I talked to a botanist too,and he didn't really have any more to
add, but it is, itis interesting, and there might be some
therapeutic effects you know, by havinga load doses of that stuff in there.
Hmm. Interesting. So yeah,I think it would be. It's

(18:00):
one hundred thousand dollars grant to pursue, So I should go out there and
look for that. Yeah, absolutely, I encourage you. Okay, I
will do that. Hey, wegot to go. But I got a
lot of last question for you.If somebody's obviously it's spring and we're out
planting our flowers and our perennials andthings like that, and we obviously want
to keep pollinators in mind, beesincluded in that group, mis planting things

(18:21):
that you know, flowers that theyall like. But if there's one flower
out there that I think I'm thinkingabout that I think that has the most
overall benefit for pollinators and wildlife andthe bees, and research has proven this
just as of recent Would you haveto agree with me on this one,
that it's a sunflower? Absolutely notonly it has action packed, it's got

(18:44):
the nectar and the pollen for thebees. They found it actually has some
synergistic effects to keep bees healthy.It's good for the birds, the finches
and such. And you know,as we say, you know, you
just smile if you see a fieldof sunflowers. But yeah, it has
a lot of benefits for honey beesand other pollinators too. So the one

(19:06):
flower that just kind of covers allof it out there, including you and
me, because it makes us smileand everybody knows what a sunflower is is
to plant a series of sunflowers sothat they're blooming off and on right into
the fall season and would really benefiteverything all of the above. What a
great dinner in the show sunflowers canbe Barbie Blecher, always a pleasure.
Again. The website's down right now, but it's beesintrees dot com. Be

(19:30):
sure and write that down. Wewill talk to you. Let's get into
the summer a little bit and we'llget back in touch and find out what's
going on. Thanks for supporting thebees. Hey our pleasure. Take care
Barbie Butcher, our queen Bee.Quick break, we come back. We'll
jump back into the gardening phone linesat eight two to one WTVN. Here
on news radio six to ten WTVN. I promise that I would tell you

(19:53):
real quick about worm tubes, becauseI was talking about pampering your worms.
And we'll get right back to theguardening phone lines and I'll send you I
have this, I think I stillhave it, a tip sheet on how
to do this. But it's veryeasy to do and it's a great way
to get rid of like all ofyour kitchen waste that you would put in
a compost pile. Is to takelike you can go get the pre drilled

(20:15):
PVC pipe that's a drain pipe,the hard PVC and get it to six
eight inches in diameter, and getpieces that are about twenty four inches long
and use a post hole digger andsynk that down into the ground with about
six inches sticking up out of theground, and get the lid that goes
on top of that. And whatyou do is just take the lid off,
put your kitchen waist in that,drop it down in a little bit

(20:38):
of soil on top of it.The earthworms move in from those holes on
the side. Go inside and enjoywhat you threw in that worm tube and
take it back into your soil.I've also done it, and I like
doing it with This is a fivegallon like those pickle buckets. Five gallon
buckets. You can buy them atthe home improvement stores in that and they
also sell a lid that snaps onthe that unscrews, which makes it really

(21:02):
nice. And you pre drilled.You drill the holes in there, do
them about an inch inch and ahalf in diameter, about half the way
two thirds of the way up,so that the top a couple inches or
so doesn't have any holes. Allright. That way, critters up at
ground level don't get into this wormtube. But do that, and then
you unscrew the lid. It givesyou a little bit more room to work.

(21:25):
You put your again, your yard. You know, you could put
yard waste in there, but youcan put in there again the lettuce and
things left over from salads and peels, and all that kind of stuff.
Put it in there, a littlesoil on top. Earthworms start using it.
You wind up doing vermic composting inthese buckets, which I call worm
tubes. And you can do twoor three or four of those in your

(21:45):
vegetable garden right in the rows.You can also do one outside the kitchen
porch or kitchen door, out bythe porch, down in the landscape,
bet or whatever, and use thatfor your composting down in the ground.
Let the earthworms do the rest foryou. It's another way to pamper your
worms. So the ardening phone lines, we shall go. Jeff is back.
Jeff, good morning, Yes,good morning, Ron a long time,

(22:08):
first time. Oh my question.My question goes back to your topic
on earthworms. I live on athree quarter acre lot, and I would
say I've got a lot of old, very large trees. I'd say seventy
five percent of my lawn is inshade. I don't experience any insect problems

(22:29):
other than ants in those areas.But the twenty five percent of my law
and that does get mostly sun.And of course it's also along the drip
edge of all these trees and shrubs. I get grubs every year and also
occasionally sob web rooms web webworms.If I don't treat to keep those numbers

(22:55):
down, critters will come the onesthat like insects and just strip the sawd
off in these places overnight. Andmy question is by treating with chemicals to
kill those type of insects, amI also killing good insects like like worms
and lightning bugs I they believe comeup out of the soil. Yeah,

(23:18):
some of the some of the grubkillers can do that, There's no doubt
about it. And that's where you'vegot to read that label to find out,
you know, if they do ornot grub preventters, depending on what
that which one it is. Butsome of the grub preventters are earthworms safe,
and that would be something you wouldapply in the month of June in

(23:41):
all those areas that you seem toget hit pretty hard. Get it watered
in really well. And what thatdoes is then as the beetles would lay
their eggs in those areas, itactually stops those at a very small age,
so they don't even mature, theydon't even get a chance to start
feeding. But look at some ofthe grub preventters and read the But I
think there are most of those,if I'm not mistaken, should be good

(24:04):
to go as far as as faras being earthworm friendly, But read the
label to find out for sure.The other thing, and again that's you
know, if you can't spray oryou can't find anything to do for the
grub and the soid web worm treatment, doing other things like core aer rating

(24:26):
in those areas and when you said, like along the edge of the beds
and things like that, usually apretty tough area sometimes for grass to grow.
And if we can get more organicmatter down in that soil helps that
grass to root in a little bitdeeper. If you do have a few
grubs that show up in there,it doesn't cause much problem. As a
matter of fact, a good healthyturf can withstand ten twelve to fifteen grubs

(24:47):
per square foot without showing much ifany damage is whatsoever. So again trying
to get the go ahead, Idon't typically get long damage from the grubs
on damage from the critters. Yeah, here's the other thing to do.
UH. I have found and alot of folks have found that the product
called mill organite UH does a prettygood job at repelling UH and it's usually

(25:15):
skunks and raccoons that come in thereand dig and do that. From repelling
them from doing that, and we'llgo into areas that they start to tear
up, and obviously the grubs arethere, so you could put a grub
killer down and kill the grubs,but they're still going to be there for
two or three weeks, so theyjust come in and continue to tear it
up. So if you right exactlyso, if you come in with the
mill organite, uh, and dothat before you typically and now you probably

(25:38):
start to see them sometime in SeptemberOctober, right that they start to tear
that up. Yeah, yep,come in before that. They've done this
spring too well. They'll they'll dothat as the temperatures warm and the grubs
move up to the top of thesoil so that they pupay out into adults
and and so they're available again atthe top of the soil. So those

(26:00):
areas if you just try it sometime, try putting mill organite in that.
It's an all natural fertilizer. It'sa seven I don't know what the posteriors
is, and very low on theother two, but seven I think about
seven percent nitrogen, and that thatparticular smell seems to do a pretty decent
job to repel those. We've alsoused it around trees in that as a

(26:21):
deer repellent and does a fairly decentjob. So you know, if you
can't treat with chemicals, try themill organite, especially if you see it,
start to see some activity, getout there and sprinkle it. It's
going to feed everything that's there.And do a wide pass. So if
they're only in a six inch widepath, do a eighteen twenty four inch

(26:41):
wide path and sprinkle that down andsee and water it in and see if
that doesn't help. And if youdo that, Jeff, let me know
what kind of results you get.Okay, but it's called mill organite,
all right, I'll get online andresearch that and see where I can find.
All right, most of the mostgarden local garden centers should have the

(27:03):
larger the small bags of mill organd I most most everybody handles it,
so should be available for you tofind. All right, Thank you very
much, sir. All Right,Jeff, appreciate the call. We'll take
a quick break. We come back. We'll jump into as many phone lines
as we can at a two toone WTVN. Here on news radio six
ten WTVN talking. You're heardening yourown news radio six ten wtv And by
the way, I have to readthe label talking because now you got my

(27:27):
brain work and you're trying more totry to think of the earthworm friendly.
I think a celepront which is reallystarting to make a presence. As far
as grub killers, a celebron Ithink is earthworm friendly. I think Grubbex
maybe as well. Don't use MilkiSport. You know, Milkie Sports still
out there on the market, andjust it's not it's just not that effective,

(27:49):
if at all, in our area. I do not recommend that,
and I think even an extension hasgotten away from recommending that as well as
an all natural by bio control ofgrubs. But there are several out there
that you can use that are earthwormand micro organism friendly. Just to have
to read the label and see whatthe garden centers have out there, but

(28:11):
they are. But I'm pretty surea celebrant is on that list. All
right, back to the gardening phonelines. Chris, good morning, good
morning, how are you today?I am great, and yourself great too.
I have a question about my fiddleleaf fig. Yes, I've had
it between three and four years,and it is now to the ceiling and

(28:36):
I don't know what to do withit. And it is in a south
east window. It loves the sunthere. One summer I headed outside in
the back and it did well theretoo. But now it's it's crawling up
my ceiling and I'm not sure howto handle this. I think that's what's
so fun about fiddle figs is thatif you get the knack of growing them
and it does well for you,the next thing you know, it's it's

(29:00):
done so well it doesn't fit inyour house anymore. You know. What's
interesting is with those, you canactually cut those back where they grow naturally,
you know, in the southern SouthAmerica and warmer climates and tropical climates
where they grow naturally. They actuallycan just cut those back like a big
shrub and they, you know,they break right back out again. So

(29:22):
if you look at your fiddley figlike when you first buy them, and
then maybe a single stock and thenbranches coming out, all they did was
they cut it off at that pointand multiple branches came out, and that's
what they did. And they mayhave cut it a second time to force
out, just like you would normallyprune a lot of plants to build that
structure. So you can do that, you know, and probably I would

(29:45):
look at it. The best timeto be doing it would be, I
would think anyway coming out of thespring into the early summer when you're taking
it outside, because then you've gotall summer for it to kind of sprout
back out again on those cut branches, and then go from there. Here's
what I would suggest you do.You can couple things. One is,
take a couple of pictures of itand email those to me. I'll take

(30:07):
a look at it and tell youwhere I think I would cut it and
prune it back if you're willing totake their risk, and there's always a
risk when you do it, butif it were mine, I could show
you where to cut it or whereI would cut it to prune it back,
or take those pictures, like toa local garden center, go to
Oakland or you know, Straighter's orDill's or Darby Creek, whatever, and

(30:30):
let somebody there that's their foliage experttake a look at it and they can
do the same thing and say thisis where I cut it. That's where
I cut it. And like Isay, you know, I would think
that doing it like now, thatgives you the rest of May, June,
July, and August September, evenbefore you bring it back inside the
house, and at that point hasprobably put out some new growth and starting

(30:51):
to look pretty good. So butbut they can be cut back. They
do respond to that, and Ithink it's always fun because you get to
that point like, Okay, nowwhat do I do put a hole in
the ceiling or what do we whatdo we do here? So and a
lot of a lot of times withsome of those you can even air layer
and start new plants as well.That's a whole nother story. But address

(31:14):
it's Ron Wilson at iHeartMedia dot com. iHeartMedia, yep dot com. Okay,
and we'll see what we can doto help you out. Thank you
so much. That was my husband'sthoughts. He said, I'm not cutting
a hole in the ceiling. Yeah, but yeah, they're they're cool plant
and they and when you, likeI said, if you get the hang

(31:34):
of it, they grow well foryou. Next thing, you know,
they did so well, they outgrewtheir their homes, so yeah, thank
you so much. All right,we'll help you out. Donald. Good
morning. Hi, Hey, howare you? I am good in yourself.
I'm doing very well, thank you. Good good. I have a
couple of English shrub roses and uhI planted them, got them bear root,

(32:00):
planted on one in March, onein April. They seem to be
doing pretty well. Everybody says they'regrowing like crazy, but I don't know.
I don't know how high they shouldbe at this point, but the
leaves look really really healthy. Good. This morning I come out and there's
there's two mushrooms and they're both incontainers, and there's two mushrooms sticking out

(32:22):
of one of them. They've sincewilted, but no, they look good.
I hope I'm not watering them toomuch. The thing to remember about
in containers when you when you seethe mushrooms pop up. First of all,
mushrooms are coming from decomposing matter.It's whatever something in they're breaking down
organic matter of some type where itcould be the peat, a little bit

(32:42):
of wood bark that happens to bein there, that type of thing,
and it's got the right amount ofmoisture obviously for it to start to shoot
up the mushrooms. So to seeone pop up here and there doesn't concern
me, although it always gets myattention to take a look and see how
moist we are keeping those to createthat environment that that's good enough for it
to grow. And so I wouldlook at the Are these in pretty good

(33:06):
sized pots? Yeah? Is twentytwo inches across? That one is not
very very big, Okay, Yeah, way I'd be looking at it.
As far as watering is that youknow, you really want to soak them
well when you do water, andyou want to give them time to dry
out. I mean you really wantthem to just like you would in the
ground, to breathe a little bitand dry out. So it could be
a situation where like in the biggerwhen you may water really well today and

(33:30):
you may not have to water fortwo or three days four days down the
road, you need to monitor andsee how quickly it dries out and then
get in the groove. And ofcourse as it continues to root out,
it'll start taking up more moisture.And as they continue to grow and the
temperatures get hotter, they'll dry outa lot quicker. But I would really
look to letting it get close topretty well dry before you go back in

(33:52):
and soak again. And I thinkmaybe that will help to see if you're
having some mushroom issues, help toslow those down a bit. And again,
if they pop up, just justpluck them out and throw them away,
or just take something and stir themback in and they'll just break right
back down again. But you know, it doesn't necessarily mean you're overwatering,
but I will typically just kind ofpay attention to that for a little while

(34:15):
to make sure that we're not overwateringand that that's not the problem. But
anytime something's breaking down in that soil, there's always a chance you got to
get a little mushroom here in there. Now, I also observe you starting
to observe every now and then alot of ants, and one of them
has a bloom coming in, andthere was clustered with ants, and I

(34:38):
looked at the bloom and hasn't bloomedyet, but it looks kind of brown
there. Now there's a little bitof a cut there where the ants were.
Well, they really want beautiful flowers. The ants aren't The ants don't
cause you a problem on the roads, Okay, the ants are and could
be an indicator that you're having otherissues like aphids or other insects that they

(34:59):
actually like like aphens. They loveaphens and they actually graze them like a
cow. And the aphis could becausing problems to your rose buds. Aphis
are aphans love roses. Aphid lovesThey love them the new growth on roses,
and they love those buds as well, So watch for aphens on there.
Again, the answer an indicator thatprobably something else is happening. So

(35:20):
watch for aphids on there and youcan just wipe them off or hose them
off, but I would keep aneye on that as well. Donald,
we got to go run it outof time. If you have more questions,
email me and I'll get back toyou as quickly as I can.
Appreciate the call. All right,Thanks all our colors, thanks to our
sponsors. Thanks of course to Ella, our producer, because without Ella,
none of this stuff would happen.So Ella, thank you so much for
all that you do. Everything andyou're not fired. You're doing a great

(35:44):
job. Now do yourself a favor. Think about where you're gonna plant that
tree or two or three. Keepplanting those native plants and those native selections.
Be pollinator friendly, Pamper your worves, get your kids and dogs of
all the gardening, and by allmeans make it the best weekend of your
life. See uh