Ktr H Garden Line does not necessarily endorse any of the products or services advertised on this program. Welcome to ktr H Garden Line with Skip Rictord so Trim just watch him as anything. Clubs back, but not a sign. Well, good morning, Sunday morning. We're looking forward to talking about things that you are interested in this hour. We are fortunate this hour to have my old friend, Jay White, my old friend, my friend of many years.
Otherwise it sounds like Jay, I'm calling you old and I think that the pot cannot call the kettle black, right, So we're gonna not do that. But seriously, Jay White is the owner the publisher of Texas Gardner magazine. We've been friends a long long time. Uh, Jay Goes Goes goes way back in time when it comes to Texas Gardening. He's been He's very familiar with the Houston area. Certainly he has spent many years here. Jay, Welcome to garden Line. We are so glad to have you today.
Thank you, Skip the very very happy to be here. Yeah, that is that's good to have you. I mean, I feel fortunate Jay. I mentioned this a little bit earlier, but you in Texas Gardener as the new owner, not new. How long have you been doing Texas Gardner now, so exactly a little over five years. July third was our fifth anniversary. Seems like yesterday too, I know, it really does. It's flown. That's good. You know, people don't realize that they're no longer
state guarding magazines around. You know, there's not a Louisiana Gardner magazine, Oklahoma Gardner magazine. I think there's some maybe that some national or statewide plant
society may do or something there. As far as we can tell, there are five left that but they have sponsors and so, like the California Gardener is sponsored by the Floral Association out there, okay, Pennsylvania Gardener is sponsored by the State Hoarded Cultural Society, Okay, and so but I think, you know, we're the last one's left that there's a for profit magazine.
And I really do believe we're going into our forty third year. And I think what keeps us going is the people that write for us, like you, well you you have a great slate. I'm telling you. The folks that contribute to Texas Gardner, Uh, they know what they're doing. And you know, the bye line is four Texas Gardener by Gardeners, by Texas
Gardeners, and that is really true. I know, you know, when I read a vegetable article from Patty Er, I mean that lady she's been hands in the dirt for a long long time and she knows what she's talking about. And that is true. I mean, you got Greg Grant writing, so I don't know how you pull that one off, kind of like I pulled you off. He was here when I got here. Oh oh, so you had you had compromising photos that he didn't want to see. Now that the light of day is that, you know, I think this
is this is kind of interesting. Greg's been with us so long. I know, You've been with us twenty five years. Greg's been with us in that time frame, twenty eight something like that, and he actually took the place of another gardening icon. I just think it's funny how many people have come through Texas Gardner, but Howard Garrett he had that that spot that Greg Grant took over twenty five thirty years ago. It is going back a long
long time. Yeah, the magazine really has run some of the best through Jerry Parsons, doctor Bill Welch. Yeah, so all good names and Randy Lemon I remember that. Yeah, Randy wrote for some too, so well, that's good. Well, it's good to have you here. We're gonna talk all things gardening today. If you got some gardening questions you'd like to visit with Jay about feel free to call in. It looks like the phones are lightening up. Jay. I don't know you've you've got a little following
coming on here. Let's let's head straight out. We're gonna go to Southwest Houston and we're gonna talk to Anthony. Well, good morning, Anthony, welcome to Guardenline. Thank you, sir, my guarden and your plants. Brook quick history. About three weeks ago, the plants leaves were getting guilty and about four or five branches just brown dead. You can't bring dead back to lie, so I cut them out and everything, and they were looking
well. And I'm noticing again about four branches on one plant and two on another are round. I would say the dead or dying. Is it okay for me to them in its heat? Well, I don't want to old water. When you when you continually wet the foliage and keep it humid and wet in there, you're gonna have more disease problems. And guardenias can get some foliage, leaf spots and other things. I would check the soil moisture content, check your sprinklers, turn them on, walk out there and look.
Maybe there are plant parts from other gardenias or other plants that are blocking the spray. And there are certain areas that are not getting adequate water. I would check for that. I would dig down about three or four inches and feel the soil, see if it's moist I think this is a root problem in guardenia's demand a constant supply. They don't want to be in a
swamp, but they want to constant supply a soil moisture. And I tell you they will croak in a heartbeat if you don't if you don't give them that these are in pots. Okay, oh wow, Okay, well now yes, so now it's even more so a confined root system and easy to easy to dry out. So just something to think about for alady. So they get about two and a half three hours of direct sun and the rest
of the time they're in the heat. But what I did was pull them out of the direct sun under my patio cover is that bad, No, not at all. They in fact, they don't want to be out in the full direct sign. They would like a little morning sun to be okay, but a bright, bright, bright shade is a happy place for ann. Do that all right? Yes, sir, thank you very much. All right? Will you take care appreciate. So, Jay, we're we're talking about all kinds of different topics and plants and whatnot. I've got a
fellow this called in. I want to go to that call, but after we come back, I'd like to have a little tomato discussion with you. You know, tomatoes or the king of the garden. They are. And it's almost time to start over. Yep. We always say the three tas that make the garden line phone ring, the extension office phone ring, or trees, turf and tomatoes. Nobody ever calls me about their cale, Robbie, tomatoes are popular. Let's go to the woodlands now and we are going
to talk to Earl. Hello Earl, Yes, go ahead. How can we help today? Okay? I am building a small garden in the back in my backyard. And what I did last year I bought some dirt and I it was absolutely awful. I almost turned to see. Man, I dug it all out, and I want to know what kind of soil to put in my little garden. Okay, Jay, do you want to address that or high earl? What I mean? What kind of soil do you have in the yard? Well, the one in the yard, I don't
know. I just have it's mostly bermuda grass and in the yard. But in the backyard, I'm building this little little garden spot and and I don't know what tap soil to put in it. Okay. So yeah, And when you say little, I mean I understand when people start building these gardens, these raised beds, they understand that bag soils are kind of expensive. So I mean, how how large of a small garden are you talking? It's probably about ten by tans something like that. Oh yeah, I'm sorry,
Yea'll go ahead. No, that's a very ten by tens of very manageable size. So are you in a neighborhood, yes, yeah, So a lot of times in the neighborhoods, you know, you really don't know what soil is right under that layer of top soil, and so that's why they always recommend that you go up. So if you're going to build a garden, you need to come up at least six to twelve inches if you
can. And then you want to go back and like to say, if you've bought top soil or something like that from somebody and you just dump that in there, you're gonna find out a lot of times it will turn into concrete or or something very much like it. So you're gonna want to get something if you're gonna improve that, you're gonna want something that's a lot of um organic material in it. But if you've removed it and you want to start from scratch, just go back with a high quality bed mix like Heirloom
Soils is. They're one of our advertisers and they really do make a nice product. And so because what you need is you need drainage, you need tilth, and you need nutrition and you're gonna high quality betting mix will have that. Yeah, hey, earl, can you hang on just a minute. I've got a hard break. I'm facing here and we'll come back to you if you can hang on, sure, sure, all right, just do that Our phone number seven one three two one two five eight seven four.
Well, good morning, you are listening to Guardline. I'm your host, skip Ricker, and we are fortunate today to have my friend Jay White here with us in the studio. Jay, thanks for coming and sticking around. Thanks. We're gonna try to hang on to you for an hour and pick your brain. If that's okay, look forward to it. All right, good, we're on the head back out now. We were in a conversation earl. We're in a conversation about garden beds and things like that.
You know you're in conro right now. We're in the in the woodlands. Oh, in the woodlands. Oh wow. Okay, Well, if you if you just head up the street street me and I forty five, you've got Nature's Way Resources right there where fourteen eighty eight comes into Interstate forty five, and they have got a couple of really good quality mixes that would fit
your garden bed plan that I've been hearing you described there. So one would be called Garden and Flower bed Mix and another one would be called garden mix Light. You can go either way. I mean, you've got a rose soil in there too, but one of those two is probably going to be your best bed. You can either get a bolt delivery dumped on the driveway or you know, you can go buy and pick it up if you happen to have someone or you or someone has a little trailer, or you can
just buy a whole bunch of bags of it. But at ten by ten area, that's going to take a lot of bags to fill that up. So you kind of have to do the math to figure out which is a better way to go. But do you know, I think I'm this that's where I got my soiled the first time, I think, But I it was a poor, very poor grade of soil well that I got. I've never heard that about Nature's way. So I they high quality sta it's right off of forty five on the east side of yeah, SAMs and all that.
It's or they have all the different types of dirties. That's when you're talking about Yeah, that's it. That is it. They are the originators of Rossau, They're originators of leafmold compost, and they, I mean, when it comes down to the science how to make good soil. H John Ferguson knows how to do that. And then and I and his son who's running the place is Uh is also very knowledgeable. I would grab a little bit of your soil put in a little sick and carry it in there and
say, here's what I'm looking at. What do you what do you have? What do you recommend? And I'm seeing their products and they're they're very very good, excellent And the name of the place is right now, Nature's Way Resources. Yeah, yeah, that's that's where I went. But I just got a poor or grade. Well, I don't I can't answer on that one, but I can tell you that they've got good stuff. So go see them and check that out. You know, Jay mentioned heirloom soil,
they had good quality stuff as well. I mean, we're fortunately here to have options. But gosh, this is just down the street from you. I sure would, I sure would talk to them, take some of your soil in, talk to them about what your experience has been, and I know they'll they'll make it right, okay. And and that's where I get it. All the you know, the bed all fix what is the good? Something that's good I can plant right now? Like you cum version
what else? Oh gosh, well, you can plan a lot of good things, Jay, what do you what would you recommend planning this? You can always plan, okra, Yes, you can lots of okra. I'd grow okra in the winter if I could find a heater big enough. No, I know, cucumbers is a good time to plant cucumbers this year, isn't it. Yeah, here's the thing. You know, cucumbers are gonna take about forty eight fifty five days to hit maturity, and so you want to count back. You would like him to do that at the end of
September. You know, that'd be a good time. So if you come backwards, that's going to put you, you know, in August doing that cucumber planting for the fall. Okay, and August fifteenth is typically a good time to plant your tomatoes. You're smaller tomatoes too for your fall. All right, that's what I'll do, Dan, I hear. I really appreciate your information. Man, Well, thank you, thank you for listening to the show, and appreciate that call. Jay. I want to talk about
tomatoes a little bit. That is a topic, and we're gonna we'll talk a little while. We'll go to a call here and then come back and continue. But you know, nothing inspires the vegetable gardener like a vine ripe tomato. Right, that's right. It just read I read a stat one time when they interviewed gardeners across the world that they found out that eighty six percent of people that have a vegetable garden have tomatoes in them somewhere. Wow,
that's impressive. That is impressive. That was not the truth. That was not the same stat for eggplant. I can promise you, well, that's good. Yeah, And there's a lot of work being done on breeding. Of course, the professional breeders with the companies have been breeding tomatoes forever. I don't know what we would do if we had a gardening season without at least five to ten new tomato varieties. I think the world would come to a halt and stop turning on its axis. But we always have lots
of new ones. I want to talk to you. We're gonna take a call here when we come back. I want to talk about some of the home breeders. You've got some good information on some things being done by amateurs. That's right across the country. Right now, we're going to head out to Liverpool and talk to Trish. Trish, are you talking about the home of the Beatles or what here? What's Liverpool? No, No, Liverpool, Texas You get where that Texas twining. Um, I've got watermelon bed.
I didn't think it was going to do very well, but all of a sudden exploded. And I've got several in different stages of maturity. There's one that I know that it's going to be ready to pick, but i've you know, it says if you want it to be sweet, you need to cut back on the watering about a week before you pick it. But with this heat that we have, if I cut back on the watering, the other melons are going to suffer from it. Okay, So well, let me let me just do idea. Yeah, let me make some comments
about that claim. Uh, watermelons need a lot of water. And you know there are some melons like cantaloupes that if you just get gully washers of rain and it's been dry, but then you get gully washers, they tend to fill up and be a little less tasty. Also, rain means cloudy
weather, and cloudy weather means they're not making carbohydrates. So I don't know how much of it is the rain and how much of it is the lack of sunlight, But as far as you're watering, I would water them as to what they need sunlight and healthy leaves are gonna are gonna make a sweet watermelon, Is that right? Okay, well, then I'll make sure I give it another good saturation today. Yeah, and make sure it's miss about
three or four days. Yeah. Good. Well, if you if you don't water them regularly, watermelons can get blossom en drought like tomatoes do, where the calcium doesn't make it to the end of the fruit, and so an ariatic watering system can cause those problems. But the main thing is picking it at the right time. And there's a lot of ways we go by trying to figure that out. But you pick them too early, and they're not going to be fully If it's a red watermelon, not gonna be red
all the way to the outside. Uh. If you pick them too late, they get mealy and oh my gosh, mealy watermelons, or they used to hang in touches for serving mealy watermelons. Well, the tendril, the little tendril that's that's associated with that particular watermelon, the very tip of its
starting to dry out. Okay, well, when the when the whole tendril needs to be dry, that's that's one trick Another one is to turn them over, and where that watermelon sits on the ground, there's going to be a spot that's not as green as the west of the watermelon, and it's going to go from that to kind of a chartruse green, uh and and
kind of to a whitish color. And but when you start to see kind of a creamy color, I don't know, not not fully like them Manila folder, but in that direction, that's a sign that it's getting ripe too. Yeah, it is it the white, it's I think it's turned into that color, the creamy color, but it's not quite there yet. All right, Okay, well then I'll just give it a few more days. All right, good Jay? You have any other thoughts on watermelons or did
we cover it there? I don't know. But it's been a good year. We got some in Himstead the other day and it was the best watermelon I've ever had in my life. So that's saying a lot. So I think that's encouraging for your caller. There you go, Hey, Trish, thank you so much. I appreciate that. I want to go back to this tomato thing. Jay, tell me a little bit about what you've what
you've been learning. I mean, I know in Texas Gardner there's article way back when about this, but about hobby breeders and tomatoes, right, I mean probably we back I can't remember. They all kind of run together after Wall. But after two or three years ago we were in an article called Dwarf Tomatoes, bicontinent breeding, Bear's Big Bounty, and it was time.
That's right. People love that alliteration. But anyway, it's about a like you say, an amateur breeder named Craig Lajoie who teamed up with a girl in Australia named Petrina Newski Small and they are both amateur breeders, and they work together because of the opposite seasons, and so they breed. He'll grow out some in America. Six months later she's grown the same thing in Australia. And so they can bring a bunch of these tomato crosses to market relatively
quickly. And what they're trying to do or make things for the homeowner too, the patio gardener or whatever. These are tomatoes that are going to be smaller in stature, smaller fruit, but they're going to work good, you know, in a container on your driveway and this year, I actually tried four of their different or five of their different varieties, and I was quite
impressed they were. They produced some very nice tomatoes. They got kind of like the size of a determinant variety, but they acted more like an determinant on how they put their fruit on and everything. And they were very good. I mean, my favorite one was called Tasty Wine and it looks very similar and taste very similar to brandywine. And if you've ever grown brandywine, you know that thing can get six foot tall, six foot in diameter. And this one I grew in a what I call a lick tub or a
mineral tub, and it did awesome. And then out of the other ones that were the best was that was called Purple Heart, and it was kind of a small, smallish tomato, smaller than a celebrity, but it was not, you know, grape size, And this was a small tomato, but it produced very well and it is still producing today now not very much, but it's still got two or three little tomatoes hanging on, and it's got flowers in this heat. That is cool. You know, having that
northern hemisphere Southern hemisphere, I mean, you do double. I need find somebody in southern hemisphere to help me from my ocra, because that's right. I can only grow ocra one time a year in the summer, and maybe I could grow it in there in the winter and I could speed this thing up. You can only grow at one time in the summer here, but summer here last last time. It lasts all, so sometimes you get two
or three crops in that's true. That is true. Hey, if you are interested in birds and you just enjoy backyard birds, which I think everybody should, you need to check out a will Birds Unlimited. You know, this is the time of year, by the way, where birds need water. In fact, I was down at the wild Birds down at Memorial Area and talking to them the other day about all the different kinds of bird baths they have and the water the supply lines that you can have set up,
and it's really nice. They've got the super blend that you need to be feeding now too, and that is you know, our birds are about to go into molting in facts, I'm I'm already are, and they need a quality food during that time to keep their plumage in top condition. So all the way through August, the super nesting super blend they call it. Is the feed you need to put out there. You need to get a good quality feed or two. I have the squirrel excluder, and I have never
heard squirrels cuss like they do in my backyard. But they cannot get into that darn thing. It's horrible the language they use. But you need to get you one of those. Hey, go to WBU dot com forward slash Houston and you can find out about the wall birds nearest to you. Don't drive do the watermelon crome. The fans started fleeing watermelon Queen Jos can find
the music appropriate to the situation. You're listening to garden Line. I'm your host, Skip Richter our phone number seven one three two one two five eight seven four. We're talking with Jay White if Texas Gardner today. First thing we're gonna do right now, though, is go grab a couple of calls out there, John V. How are things in League City wonderful? Skip and mister White. Yes, I have a question about some land. I
would like to turn it into a rainforest. It's about fifty three acres of land, and I know it's a big project, but I just wanted to see about how I should start with the soil and yeah, well that's a boy, that's a challenge. So with that much land, you know, all these things we talk about in the garden where put composts down there and throw some expanded jail on it. You're not going to do that to fifty three acres. This is not going to work. What you probably need to
do is talk to the Texas Forest Service. They have folks here in town. In fact, the urban forester foresters here in town are they're geared toward, you know, trees throughout you know, an urban type area. They can give you advice on the species that are going to do the best for you so as you develop it. If you need to plant anything, they can give you some suggestions. When it comes to I've got trees, what do I take out? What do I leave? They can help and guide
you. They call that woodlot management, but they can guide you on, you know, how to make it the best forested setting you can, considering our local climate and soils. That that I would refer you to them. I don't have their phone number off the top of my head, but if you just do Texas Forest Service or Urban forest or Houston, there you're gonna be able to find them. Oh wonderful. I'm so thrilled and excited. Well, good, well, I hope you have a face. Sounds like
you got a heck of a project. There's a good luck getting it all together. Hopefully a couple of years will be open. But I'll take some time. Well it may take more than a couple of years, but you know a couple of decades. They take ten years before you can bring in some monkeys to swing from the trees. But thank you, John v. I. I really appreciate your call. We're gonna go out now and talk to Mo and Spring and Mo. I believe we're gonna talk about tomatoes.
How are you doing? I like homestead tomatoes. Are there a lot higher plant on the outside instead of end my little greenhouse? You can grow homestead outside. It's an older variety. It's been a long time. In fact, I don't remember ever growing a homestead, but I know they've been around as long as I can remember. It seems like they've been homestead tomatoes. Well, I got to homestead beefy ones and the little cherry ones I've got growing right now, and I wanted to move them outside. I wonder if
this is a great time to do it. I would go ahead and do it. If if you've got them and you can plan them out, go ahead. I mean, you can put them out a little bit later. But homestead, I think it's gonna take a little longer in days to harvest. If I remember right, I believe it's gonna be up in the seventy eight day range. But I'm not sure of that. But I would rather get them out and get them growing, so when it finally cools off,
you can get some tomatoes off those things. Yeah. I have to find my neighboring his okra, all right, And I am highly allergy to okra and he knows it and it will kill me, so I have to stay away from me. Oh my gosh. Well yeah that's that. I love it, but it don't love me, Okay, all right, I get it. Hey, mother, thank you so much. I appreciate that call and the other question I had for you, Skip, I tell your friends I like his garden book. Well, I like his garden book. Two.
Jay, think you got a fan there. Thank you, Mo. I appreciate you. Alcome, Hey, thank you for the call. Mo. We really appreciate it. You have a nice day, you two, you two, you take care. You know, Jay As, you've been producing Texas Gardener now for a while and it's no news to you that people
are into tomatoes? Is it? That is correct? I mean, without making the sound like a shameless plug, Our biggest selling article are an issue of every year is what the January February issue is what we call the tomato issue. And literally this year we sold every magazine that we printed. We've
printed sixteen thousand magazines and we sold every one of them. And so so anyway, if you like tomatoes and you want to try Texas Gardener, January February is the article or is the issue you want to sign up for? Well, you know what, we haven't talked about this, but if just in a nutshell here, if somebody would like to check out Texas Gardner, what are their options and how do they go about that? Well, we've got the website Texas Gardner dot com, and so you can go out there
and it lists all of our products. But basically, we sell print subscriptions, we sell digital subscriptions, and then we have a thing that we call a planning guide, which I think is just awesome. It's kind of a day by day what you need to do in your garden, but it also gives you places to record what you're doing and like when the rain came and when the freezes came, and when the bugs showed up. So it's really a nice little garden journal. And so there's so many ways that you can
consume our magazine and the information in it. Some of our momipop garden centers here we'll even carry Texas Gardeners. Somebody wanted to sample one before they subscribe. You can go to a mom and pop, buy an issue and just check it out. That's right. It's not just the mom and pops. We're in a lot of the nurseries here in the Houston the Gulf South area, and we're very fortunate to be there. But we're also in HB. Barnes and Nobles, Walmart, Tractors supply all food central markets. All right.
So there's the ubiquitous Texas Gardener magazine. Easy to find, y'all. Lot to check it out. I mean, I know, I'm biased. Have been writing for him since pretty much. There's there's some dirt and soils and Texas that are not have not been around as long as I've been writing for Texas car not many though not many, But seriously, though it is, it is a great magazine and lots lots of good fun stuff in it. Let's see, we are going to head out nout to Jersey Village.
Hello, Bob, We've got about a minute and a half. How can we help? If if we can, we'll get it done in a minute and a half. Is Bob there here? All right? How can't we? Who go ahead? Gotta get you off feaker because that's not mood? Okay, yeah, that's right, all right, I'm the one to call it in about three waistbel about squirrels and tomatoes, okay, And I've been doing using pepper. I try to find some hot pepper oil. Couldn't find any, but I went by the mulating grow free Okay, they hands and
kneeme oil before I put that on the on my plants? Is it on a sore being to the plant and cost problems? Okay? I know it won't, but you've you've kind of opened a little bit of account of worms. So what I'm gonna do is start to answer and then if if I can put you on hold when we come back from break, we will continue that and we'll get j involved as well. How does that sound? Sounds great? All right? So the hot pepper oil is to burn the little
squirrels mouth. Birds hot pepper doesn't bother them, but but squirrels, it's their mammals there. You know, like as you stick a hot pepper in your mouth can burn you. The kneeme oil is not going to keep squirrels away. It is an insecticide, and so it can kind of soak into the tissues. And we'll talk more about that when we come back from break. But our phone number if you'd like to call in get Josh to get you on the board is seven one three two one two five eight seven four.
I forgot all about the sweating and dig and have the time I go out and big all the two things that true love. I love that song. Oh gosh, hey, we're back. You're listening to Texas to to the Texas Gardener radio show. You're listening to guard Line Radio. We got Texas Gardeners j White here and we are picking his brain today about some different kinds of things related to plants and tomatoes, and certainly want to hear more about the magazine. Bob, We're gonna come back to you now. I
think we had started talking about the kneem oil. So I'm gonna let you if we are hitting on your question. Let me know if if I didn't understand it, but please clarify. Okay. When I went to find some the hottest peppers I could find to make hot pepper oil, you can't really find it easily. The lady said, well, I have some neme oil mating nme seeds that would be bitter and kinslow the squirrels down, and so
I was going to try that. They said, well, maybe maybe that might not be the right thing to do, if you might soak into the plant. Okay, well neem does so again, but it is very effective as an insecticide against anything that choose up your leaves, for example, if it's a leaf feeding like a caterpillar or a beetle. Name is a good product for that, but it absolutely will not do anything to squirrels. You can, okay, you can get hot peppers and make your own oil,
but boy, that's a that's a chore. I would suggest you just go down and purchase them. If you go to a like a wall birds unlimited. They're gonna have products that they put in bird seed that keeps the squirrels out of the bird seed because the heat, believe it or not, doesn't bother birds one bit, but as sure gets the squirrels. You'll find it there. You can find hot pepper oil kind of things for sale, and and just that's the easy way. That's that's what I did when I was
trying to use something. But yeah, and the other option is you can put a little bag over the fruit. If it's the larger to mate that you need to put a bag over them. There's certain kinds of bags you can buy that just kind of you know, keep the squirrels and things away from them. Yeah, well squirrel squirrels can find their way through a baize like you wouldn't believe. I mean, if I all right, one other question, if I spray it with cam or something similar and then sprinkle uh
cay anne pepper, crash canne pepper, but that work is similarly. I have no idea the pam in the heat of summer, that oil you may get some what we call phido toxasity, meaning burning the plant. I don't know about that one. I mean there's a lot of home remedies are going about things, but it sounds like you're making a little harder than we need
to make it. I would just get you a good hot pipper. I'll just be willing to be ready to wipe it off, or your tomatoes are gonna be like you know, the rotels and the peppers for making a good SALTI cheese sauce, all right, All right, then sounds like a winter go Wow Birds Unlimited. I would give him a call and see, Yeah, there's there's one near you see your Jersey Village, Jersey Village, Jersey
Ville. I'm trying to bring that. Oh you're up north. There's a wild Birds Unlimited up in the Cypress area and you just go to WBU dot com forward slash Houston WBU for wild Birds Unlimited dot com forward slash Houston. You can find it, all right, Thank you very much, Yes, Sarah, thank you very much. Well, Jay Gosh, I told you the hour will go fast and does. We're just not too far from the end of the show here or from the end of this hour. H some
other things that you would find of interest. I don't know, you a little bit of a challenge you're dealing with this year in the garden or some some aspects of some upcoming things with the magazine. Well, I can tell you there has been a challenge. I think this has been a very unusual year. I think we've had two or three really unusual years. You know, we had such a nice, cool, wet spring, and then all of a sudden, you know, this heat's turned on and it won't turn
off, and I've got stuff struggling this year. That's really I've never had a problem with struggling. I mean, in fact, before I left, I've got an heirloom begonia that has been in my wife's family seventy five eighty years, and I'm worried about it, and so you know, I've moved it to the shade and i'm fertilizing it a little bit more. But it's just brutal out there. Yeah, And I mean the garden's about shriveled up. Got some tigger melons. If you're familiar with those, they're still producing.
You don't know the tiger melons. Oh, they're a little like a Winnie the pood tiger. They're about less than one pound melon. They're yellow with orange stripes on them, white fruited, and they're awesome. Oh so it's more like a kind of a muskmelon or it's like a musk melon or a cantlope. But it's a smooth skin, it's a it's a lovely little plant and one and I love it because the grandkids love it. You know, you can get them to eat a cantaloupe if it looks like Tigger from
Winnie the Pooh. So but it's you know, so it's hanging on. You know, tomatoes are done and they were really done early. So I mean, this has really been a brutal, brutal year, especially for people growing in containers. I'm finding that more and more. In fact, I did a talk, did a couple of talks recently on hot weather garden greens. And if you go to places of the world that are as hot and humid as Houston, you know, I mean we're talking about the tropics.
We're talking about calcut India, you know, right, those kind of places. You're going to find some things that are very successfully growing there that do we here, Like black eyed peas, alcohol peas. They came from Africa and and so they get over here and are hot, hum humidity, and they just laugh and say, we're at home. Oh yeah, And I think we're gonna have to find more and more vegetables like that. We are going to end up with some very unique gardening seasons. I agree. I
mean, things really are changing. And just because things are changing doesn't mean you can't grow here. I'm sorry, Oh go ahead, It doesn't mean you can't grow here. But like you say, you are going to have to be more willing to experiment in your garden. Try different varieties, maybe
try something. You know, you've written several articles for us for the heat loving greens, and our heat loving periods are getting longer, and so you may need to start experiment more with some of this molochai or some of these other things outside of the traditional lettuces and spinishes kales that we think of. Yeah, because you know, when you say the word greens, I mean everything that comes to mind is cool season. You know, spinach, collards,
kale uh uh let us those kind of things. So the goal of our gardens is to always have something coming up that's right. And just because it's summer, we've got plants that can do it. You know, our tomatoes. Cherry tomatoes hang on pretty well compared to the big slicers. But you know, it's like the skin becomes cellphones. The quality degrades quite a bit, a little less, something not so much, something to write write home about. We were at a pool party yesterday and they had sun Gold,
which is an awesome tomato. Still doing well but like says a little tough, Yeah, it is good one. It is a good one. Well. I I so appreciate you guys, uh you know, publishing Texas Gardener, making it available for gardeners. I uh it it. I read it myself to learn and I mean when I mentioned Patty, I mentioned you know, Greg Grant. There's just a lot of good writers that you guys have writing for it is and I learned something every time. Keith Hanson for
Horticultures, the Igord Life up in the Tyler area. Oh yeah, excellent job and it is very informative. It is a good magazine. I think really like to say this fact that we're still here as a testament to those writers. And right now I think it's more important than ever because we have so many new gardeners in the state. But if you're new to Texas. You don't know how to grow like you write an activity checklist in every issue that tells you what you should be doing right now in your garden. If
you're new to the state, that's indispensable. Yea by step. Yeah, and you know the best thing of all, I know some people save these. I've had people that just have decades of Texas gardener. I think you need to take the staples out and lay the paper on the ground as a mulch, watered in and throw something on top of it, and that your garden will do better. Except if it's an article I wrote, don't use
that one because that has way too much of nitrogen in it. If you know what I mean, Well, you can burn your plants with that kind of bologny. All right, I go. Jay. It's been so good having you here. Thank you for coming in and visiting. I hope you'll come back again, so I'll come anytime you ask. That is good. Well, we've been visiting with Jay White from Texas Gardner Magazine. We got one more hour left in the books this weekend. We're here every Saturday from
six am to ten am and Sunday from six am to ten am. So we got one more hour. If you'd like to call, give Josh a call. It is seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy four seven one three two one two ktrh. He will get you on the boards and when we come back we'll talk to you. Oh and by the way, Jay, you and I both are going to be at Oba Palooza, which is August the fifth. That's a Saturday. That's next all day, next
weekend all day ten amazing organic speakers. Go online to Oba Online, oh A online, dot org, slash register to find out more information about that