Garden Preparation in Spring by C J Clawson

Photo CSU

In the Spring, a gardener’s fancy turns to planting beds, soil tests and amendments, and vegetable varieties.  No one wants to think about the pests and diseases that may come later – right now, life is a vision of a beautiful, bountiful vegetable garden.  But setting ourselves up for success includes giving consideration early in the season to the types of problems we might face later in the gardening year.  We must be pro active and vigilant from the very beginning of the season to protect our precious vegetable garden.  So . . . .

Use Caution with De-Icing Salts

De-icing salt applicator, photo courtesy overstock.com

Winter is in full swing in Jefferson County! Even though it's been a warm winter, snow and ice are inevitable. In addition to shoveling all that snow, many people also apply de-icing salts to make the walkways safe and passable. While these products can certainly help ensure safe footing in treacherous conditions, they can also damage the landscape plantings that they contact. So – what to do? Protect your footing or protect your plants? It’s possible to do both.

House Plant Problems: Rosemary and Powdery Mildew by Carol King

I received a nice little rosemary Christmas tree as a gift.  I was cooking chicken and decided to add some when I noticed it was covered with some white powdery dust.  It seems that my little tree had powdery mildew.

Christmas Tree Blight in Frasier Fir

I have not seen Fraiser fir Christmas trees in my small search in Wheatridge.  The local greenhouse seemed to have only Douglas and Noble.  However, I found this video  interesting even though this blight is currently affecting trees in North Carolina.  We know from past experience how quickly a tree disease can spread across the county.

Video - Christmas Tree Blight | LiveScience.com

Are Your Blossom Ends Rotting? by Carol King

It seems that all the tomato conversation lately has been about blossom end rot. I worked the Master Gardener booth at the JeffCo 4-H Fair and the questions there were about it in tomatoes. The Plant Clinic reports that numerous examples have come in concerning it in tomatoes, squash, eggplant, and peppers. The gardening hotline at the Extension Office is buzzing with rot questions. There’s obviously a lot of rot going around.
So what is this nasty sounding ailment? It starts at the end where the blossom was and begins turning tan, then a dry sunken decay sets in. The lesion enlarges, turns to dark brown to black and becomes leathery. Thus the blossom end begins to rot.
It shows up especially in the first fruit of the season and after the fruit is well on its way to development. In severe cases, it may completely cover the lower half of the fruit. Both green and red fruit develop it. It’s not a pest, parasite or disease process but is a physiological problem caused by a low level of calcium in the fruit itself. In other words, dear gardener, IT’S ALL YOUR FAULT!
Why? Several factors may have been at work.
1. You rushed the season. Transplants should be set out only when soil temperature is above 55 degrees Fahrenheit. If you put your plants in, in early May and didn’t warm the soil that helped to create conditions for poor root development predisposing plants to blossom end rot.
2. You damaged the roots. If roots are damaged during transplanting or by hoeing later in the season that will increase the chance for blossom end rot. Don’t till within 1 foot of the plant, and when you do cultivate make sure not to go deeper than approximately one inch into the soil.
3. You inconsistently watered: watered too much, watered too little, did not water deeply. Plant roots take up calcium and other needed nutrients only when dissolved in water, so irregular watering is often the culprit with blossom-end rot.
4. You didn’t mulch. If the soil is allowed to become too dry, calcium uptake is interrupted. Keeping the soil mulched is a good remedy to prevent blossom end rot
5. You used the wrong fertilizer. Fertilizing with ammonium nitrate can create conditions ideal for blossom end rot. This type of fertilizer (and that includes large amounts of manure) can compete with calcium for uptake by the plant. It also causes excess soil salts around the plants.
All right, so you know now that you messed up. What can you do this season to salvage some vegetables? Improve the soil quality around your plants by maintaining adequate, consistent soil moisture through mulching and watering properly. Avoid high nitrogen fertilizer using instead, a slow- release organic fertilizer high in phosphorus. A mixed fertilizer with a ratio of one part nitrogen: three parts phosphate: one part potassium is ideal. Many fertilizers marketed for vegetables come with this ratio. Cut the spots off the affected veggies and eat what you can salvage. No you can’t catch blossom end rot from your produce.
And so, enjoy what you can this season. Next season, I know you will do the right thing and avoid all this rot!

Embarrassing Weed Story by Carol King

Every gardener probably has an embarrassing weed story. An exotic plant pops up and is nurtured and later turns out to be a musk thistle. Or the new house has some gorgeous plant that resembles a sedum and is really myrtle spurge (on list A of the Noxious Weed Act of Colorado). The “morning glory” growing up the rake you left in the garden is not a piece of yard art but instead a neglected tool covered with bind weed!
My most embarrassing weed story to date happened last summer. I always let the sunflowers that pop up from feeding the birds grow, no matter where they are. It adds a sense of randomness to the garden that I like. Several came up in the front garden and started to grow, and grow, and grow. I knew they were going to be giant mammoth sunflowers; the kind that wins prizes and ends up in pictures of largest grown produce; next to the 1,000 pound pumpkin. I envisioned receiving the purple grand champion ribbon and could read the headlines: “Area Woman Grows World’s Largest Sunflower”.
All summer, I watered and fed my plants and was encouraged by the large leaves, the glossy green color and the height, my goodness the height. Toward the end of July, they actually grew taller than the eaves of the house and then flower buds appeared and did not look at all like sunflowers. I looked closely and saw that the leaves on my giant plants did not exactly match the leaves on the other sunflowers in the garden. I had the uneasy feeling that these might not be sunflowers at all.
Sure enough, research proved that my prize plants were Ambrosia trifida; and yes it is a member of the sunflower family (Asteraceae). I say this to redeem myself for feeding, watering, and tending giant ragweed all summer. At least I discovered my mistake before it bloomed. Each plant has the ability to produce about a billion grains of pollen. And because it is the greatest allergen of all pollens and the main cause of hay fever in North American, my three lovingly attended plants would have garnered the headline: “Area Woman Causes Sneezing, Runny Nose, and Itchy Eyes in Major Population Area”. And no purple grand champion ribbon either.

Preparing to Eradicate Giant Ragweed

Gotta Find a Home by Carol King

Let me tell ya a story about a hollyhock weevil: The gardener said to the weevil ”I see you’re on the square” Weevil said to the gardener, “yep my whole family’s there…..lookin for a home, gotta find a home.” The weevil said to the gardener”you better sell your machines, cause when I’m through with your hollyhocks you can’t even buy gasoline”. My apologies to Brook Benton but when ya got hollyhock weevils eating up your hollyhocks, ya gotta sing this song!

The hollyhock weevil is a strange looking bug that has a beak or a snout protruding from its head. If it were bigger, it would be one scary dude. I had to look closely at the blossom area (all eaten of course) to see them. In researching my hollyhock problem, I discovered that there are over 400 species of weevils in Colorado alone with 40,000 species worldwide. And I also discovered this bit of trivia: if every species of animal and plant were placed next to each other in a line, every 10th animal would be a weevil. And, yes, they are ALL looking for a home.

I used some organic insect killing soap which took care of some of them and then I thumped some of them off with my finger. The hollyhocks look really ratty but maybe I will still get a few blooms. In the meantime, if anything you have is being eaten up by something, go look, and if it’s got a snout you got weevils. Roses, rhubarb, sunflowers, strawberries, almost everything has its own special weevil.

Here’s some great information about weevils: http://whatsthatbug.com/Weevils.html.