St. Augustine grass and revenge of the bugs

Garden Line does not necessarily endorse any of the products or services advertised on this program. Welcome to Katie r h. Garden Line with Skip Ricord's shoes, crazy Gashrim just watch him as so many girl. Thanks to see Botasy gas not a sound credits Gas Sun Beamon of tweet are welcome back. Welcome back to garden Line. We're glad you're with us this morning. Congratulations by the way on getting up right and early. Joe and I hope you got a

cup of coffee in your hand or whatever whatever it. Get those eyes open and get ready to go. We got another decent day today. I'm looking forward to getting some things done after the show that I got to get done. It's a little warmer by then. But the way it is on weekends we do garden Line, we don't do gardening in the morning, at least not early in the morning. I'm your host, Skip Richter, and hey, our show is a call in show. In other words, it's for

you to ask the questions you might have. If you like some advice or direction or ideas or identification of something, give us a call seven to one three two to one two KTRH seven one three two to one two k t RH. A little tip too, by the way, that usually first thing in the morning, especially on Sunday morning, the boards are a little quieter, so it's easy to get through. And we have a question, you have to wait very long, So just a little tip there if you're interested.

I was driving by some neighborhoods and noticed a common in the yards that I'm starting to see and that's a yellowing in the turf. And some of you probably have had question, well you have had called into garden line about things related to this. But you look at a green lawn and you just see sort of some irregular yellowish areas, you know, where it's not round, it doesn't have a shape or anything. And what that is is iron

deficiency. Now, if you want to see it up close, you just grab a blade that's yellow, pull it up, pull it off, and hold it up kind of to the sky, and you'll see green and yellow stripes going up and down through the blade that's iron. Because iron causes what we call intervenochlorrosis. Okay, that's too that's too much, too many words for this hour of the morning. But my point is that the parts of the leaf that get the iron last have the least, and so that would

be between the veins and veins being the supply lines. When you see that in your lawn, you can say one thing that grass doesn't have iron in it, like it needs iron in it. But then the question is why is it because there's no iron in the soil? Most likely not. It could be true, but usually it's not a lack of iron in the soil. Well then why, Well, it could be because something is tying up

the iron and making it unavailable. Iron changes form in the soil. Some forms of plant can get, some forms of plants can't get, so it could be that the iron is tied up. On the other hand, it could also be that the plant lacks roots. Iron is taken up at the tip of the roots. So when take all root rot or drought die back causes that grass plant to lose its tender, new, fresh, active roots

system, then you're going to see iron deficiency on the plants. So it's gonna be one of those things you kind of have to work your way through it. A soil test will tell you if there's iron in the soil. A soil test will also tell you if you're like your pH and phosphorus are both very high, then that means you're going to have an iron efficiency. So that in and of itself would explain it from a soil test. So you can get your soil tested by going to soil Testing dot TAMU dot edu.

Soil Testing dot TAMU, dot edu. Choose the urban soil test. I don't care if you're listening on your computer and Marfa, Texas eighty miles from the nearest whatever urban sooil test. All the urban means is it's for your yard and garden. They should have called it that, not urban, but anyway, it means it's for your yard and garden. In other words, here comes the sample from roses or vegetables or a lawn or whatever, and not from a pasture where I'm growing grass for cattle or something. That

urbanoil test. Okay, put it out, send it in, see what they say, and then we take it from there. If it is take all root rot, then you have to deal with that disease. And that is on my schedule at gardening with skip dot com the pest disease and we'd management schedule has that information on it and you can decide or look on there and see what products are my options and what time do I make the applications. But anyway, iron efficiency, that's something that we often deal with.

It's pretty common, especially on Saint Augustine, a lot of other grasses that don't have it. Well, let's do this. Let's go on out to the phones and we're going to head out the fairfield and talk to Marty. Hello, Marty, Martin Skip. I wondered if it's too hot to repot some plans. I've got some really pretty pots and I wanted to, you know, I'm just concerned about the heat. I know we're having a little bit of rain today tomorrow, and thought it might be a good time to

redo them. I'm sorry what it was you were redoing. I'm repotting some plants on my patio and I wondered if it's too hot. Oh, okay,

no it's not. If there's going to be significant root damage in the process, then I would pot them up, immediately, water them in, and move them to as bright of a shade as you can so the direct sun doesn't bake down on them, and just give them a week or so to kind of recover and get their roots back going Again, if it's just a matter of pulling it out of a pot, maybe teasing loose a little of the roots on the outside that are circling around, or minor damage,

then you can just do it as you would at anytime. Is there a better time to do that to do repotting, Yes, sir. It depends on the plants that you have. Some things, you know, if they're more tropical, I'd probably do them in the spring or in the summer season.

You can really really redo it time you want. You know, if it were something that we're going to die down to the ground in the cool season, I'd try to get it done then because it's easiest, or go into some sort of a dormant state that that's the easiest time, there's the least stress on the plant then. But I just repotted several We just repotted a little indoor ficus tree the other day, and we've repotted several other plants recently. About to do a rosemary that needs to have a new home.

Okay, all right, Well, these are firecracker plants and they're out in the sun sun, but I wanted to put them in this prettier pot. They're a little bit bigger as well, and those usually go into the landscape. Right. Yes, fracker plant is a very heat and humidity tolerant plant.

It does need water though it's not you know, it's not a succulent and some people assume because it thrives in the heat that maybe it's a little drought tolerant and you need to keep it adequately moist for best results with that one. Okay, all right, well, thank you very much, have a good day. All right, Marty, thanks for the call. Thank

you. How you get thanks you're listening to garden Line. Our phone number is seven one three two one two k t r H. If you'd like to give us a call and talk about some things that are of interest to you. Just a reminder I was talking about oron efficiency. Well agouh. Nitroposs Superturf is a fertilizer designed for year lawn in the summertime. And what do I mean by that? Well, number one, it has a three one two roughly three one two four one two ratio is what we're looking for

in our fertilizers. This will be more like a four one close to a four to one two ratio. So that's got a lot of nitrogen, but it's half of it at least is in a slow release form, So you're going to get a gradual release of the nitrogen over the coming months. You do the super turf, now you don't need to fertilize again until we get

to the phone fertilization. The nice thing about feeding gradually is it doesn't create this sudden increase in your mowing frequency because your grass has grown so fast, you get a nice, smooth, even growth. Another thing is you get a good root system development. Did you know that if you overdo nitrogen you get a lot of green top growth, but at the expense of root growth. Actually, an overfertilized lawn with nitrogen will have less of a root system

than an adequately fertilized lawn. So that is one of the things I like about these slower release products. They gradually feed over time, because I'll tell you that's how grass eats, if I can use the word eats for talking about grass. In other words, it takes up a little nutrient every day, just like we eat every day. We don't need a month worth of food and then not eat for thirty days. And so gradual release products like

nitropos superturf or excellent for the summertime. You're going to find Natropass supertur if it Bearings. We're both the one on this and out the one on West Timer. You're going to find it out at Enchanted Forests down in the Richmond Rosenberg area, Kdace Hardware and Ace Hardware at Sinco Ranch. Lots of places you can find this product. Remember it's easy. It's the silver bag that's

the one you're looking for. You're listening to Garden Line. If you like to talk about gardening, maybe ask a question seven to one three two one two kt r H. Right now we are going to take Bumper music. I have trouble staying in my chair. I just, you know, love to get up and move around a little bit. Hey, listen, we were talking before we went to break about a couple of things. I was talking about lawn fertilizing and dealing with lack of nitrogen or lack of iron in

the soil. The things that cause grass to stay green are nitrogen and iron, and sulfur is a big part of that too. Magnesium has a huge function in plants, and because it's part of the chlorophyll, molecule fun fact there. But anyway, our goal is to make sure plants have all the things they need in order to stay healthy, to perform well, to do well. There are things that are very tiny that are needed in very tiny amounts, like iron, and that's one reason why you hear me talk about

azimite. Asmide is a nutrient product that is mined out of the ground in Utah and it contains all kinds of trace minerals. So here's the deal with trace minerals. They are about twenty minerals that are essential. If the plant does not have any one of those, then it's not going to be able to function and grow and do some of the things that plants do in terms of their physiology and fruiting and flowering, all that kind of thing that it's

essential. But some are needed in huge amounts, and that would be things like nitrogen, phosphorus, potassium, the three on the fertilizer bag, the three numbers. Then there are some that are needed in medium amounts like sulfur and like magnesium for example, calcium. Then there's some that are needed in trace amounts. That's what azemite's all about. Things that you never think about like, who have you ever heard of someone say I'm going to go out

and put some molybdenum on my yard. I'm going to go out and put some selenium on my Those tiny little elements zinc and iron and all of that essential and asamite is a product that you can put out and I recommend about once a year do a soil test and see exactly what you need. That would be the best way to go. But in absence of that, about once a year an application of asmite. You don't use much. You don't want to use much. It's a trace mineral. Don't overload the soil,

just use the amount recommended. You can find more information at azimite Texas dot com and learn more about it. But I can tell you this, you can find azemite pretty much anywhere you would go and shop. It is widely widely available. Let's head now out. We're going to go to the phones and talk to Sun in Missouri City. Hello, Sonya, Hi, good morning, good morning. I have some aztec grass in my front bed and it shares a bed with the boxtail ferm and it's just not doing anything.

It's you know, I water them just a little bit, because I know they don't like a lot of water. Some of them have been there a year from last year. Some of them are new plants, but they're just not growing. Is there anything I can do that I need to fertilize them? Or Well, that's actually a pretty darn tough plant. You sure it needs water, but I'm amazed at how well it does under less than ideal water conditions. If you overwater it, you will get rots and decays.

But you just see the plant declining and dying when that happens. If it's just sitting there, I don't know. Do you think your soil could be very compacted and tight in that area? It could be, yes, Okay, well maybe if I could look at a photo of it and see if I see anything else on it. But it just doesn't have major problems. I've grown that plant for a while, and it's an excellent plant, and it's a good combo with your ferns, A boy, the foxtail fern.

I think you said us an excellent plant for going along with those. The only thing I would do, maybe is, assuming there's no other symptoms on this plant other than just not thriving, I probably would take a little spading for it and go straight down in the ground, just kind of wiggle it a little bit and do that in a different places kind of around the plant. Sprinkle a little compost over the top, and watered in maybe a little bit of fertilizer or two to just give it a boost, and then try

to try to give it a good soaking about once a week. That ought to be sufficient. How much sun is this in? It gets about five hours morning sun. Okay, well that's eight to one. That's almost ideal to have it can grow in less sun than that, but to not have that afternoon sun. Yeah, that's that's what I think there, Sonya from based on what you're telling me it's doing. Okay, I'll give that a

try. And then I had one other question thanking to the fall for gardening, I would like to do container gardening for like some tomatoes, like cherry tomatoes and some pepper plants. What's the best soil to get for container gardening for that? I would get probably a vegetable and herb mix. How big

is your containers going to be? Let's see, they're like two feet across about two feet high, and then they narrowed down at the bottom that okay, all right, yeah, I would get like a vegetable and herb mix. Heirlin Soils makes a vegetable and herb mix that is excellent. You are in down a South Missouri City area, You're going to find it at your ACE hardware stores down there. They generally will carry it. Missouri City. I'm trying to think of who else would be the next closest to you for

done in that area. You're not too terribly far away from Sienamult. They have it as well there. But anyway, that's the one that I would use for that particular situation. Okay. And what was the name Heirloom Soils vegetable and herb mix. I think they say veggie and herb mix. You might find also, you might find one from Nature's Way. They sell it by the bag too. They're up in the toward Conroe area, so on the other side of town from you. But they also have a vegetable and

herb type soil mix. Both of those will be excellent, excellent products. Okay, all right, thank you very much. All right, thank you appreciate that call very much. Let's see here, Yeah, I uh, this this past week I've been doing some things just to kind of enhance our birds in the backyard, our collection of birds, and I'm telling you, they just keep coming. We put in a little bit of a little kind of a bird bath type of fountain, and the birds they hear that sound

of water and it brings them in because look, it's hot outside. Can you imagine hanging out all day, flying around the neighborhood looking for water somewhere to get a drink. So you put it in your yard, especially when there's some sound with it. It doesn't have to be birds figured out, they'll be there and they're going to hang out there. And the other thing

is to have a quality feed for them. It is season one still we've got birds that are nesting, birds that are molting, two different things that both require a good special quality blend, like nesting super blend. That's the one that while birds makes. I use that one myself sometimes I'll mix it in with some of their other mixes just to get a little bit of sunflower

some other things in there. But it is packed with sunflower, chips, peanuts, dried meal worms, bark, butter bits, tree nuts, sapphlower, calcium carbonate, just all the things that a bird needs, and warbirds feeds are high quality. They are the kinds of seeds the birds want to eat. And you buy these cheap bird seeds full of the red bebes, and yeah they are cheap, but take all the bebes out because they aren't gonna eat those hardly at all. Maybe some doves will. And what do

you got now? How much did you pay for that food? And that's why I love warbird feed I love their seed cylinders. If you're going to take a vacation and be out of town for a while, you can just put one of those up. It takes them a while to get the little seeds pecked out of those little solid, hard cylinders, but they do it, and it gives you a chance to watch them a little longer too.

At the feeder. They don't just grab a byte and fly away. Hey, go to WBU dot com forward slash Houston and that's where you'll find WTU dot com forward. It's sleash Houston. That's where you'll find all the wallbirds, six of them here in the Greater Houston area to choose from. It'd be a great day to get out and just check out some of our wallbirds. We're going to take a break now it's time for the news. I'll be right back. The number if you'd like to call in seven one three

two to one. Maybe you'd like to give us a call and talk about things related to your garden, your landscape. The number is seven one three two one two kh RH seven one three two one two k t R H. Well, we've got a hurricane sitting out there in the Gulf, and for all apparent assessments, it's going to be bringing us a little bit of rain. That's something we certainly do expect. Hopefully it'll be a moderate amount

and not too much. We've been there before. I remember I was in Houston during the Tax Day flood way back when, and certainly during Harvey. Uh, and wow, that's rain. What we're looking for, though, is some relief for our summer landscapes. We've been water and trying to keep them going, and a good soaking would be really good for setting us up for at least a week or so of not having to just turn the water

on every day trying to keep things alive. Remember that if you get a gradual rain over a period of time and get that water in the soil, it does last a good while. And most people when they water, they water too little, too often. The sprinter comes on, it squirts for a while. What's the grass? What's the that starts to wet the soil and then goes off, And so everything that's in the thatch and everything that's in the grass can evaporate off and contribute to Houston's humidity. Thank you very

much for that, by the way. But what goes in the soil is what's in the bank account to be drawn from. So what if instead of turning it off at some point of irrigation, you let it go longer, and now all that grass and thatch are wet, and now the water's run down into the soil more. And so it's in a sense it's the end of the irrigation cycle that's doing you the most good, right if you think of it that way, because once the water goes off again, whatever sitting

there with that's going to dry off anyway. Just something to think about. If you can get a half inch to an inch in the soil, then it'll soak in like an inch of water will wet a clay soil probably six eight inches deep, a sand soil even deeper than that. But once you have that in the soil, now you cannot worry about water in for a while, and it will gradually dissipate as plants take it up, but it'll provide you a nice long feed and then oxygen comes back in the soil as

the soil begins to dry out. Just makes sense to water that way. It's a water efficient way of going about things. Let's see. You know, I was I was talking about soil the other day with somebody and we were just we were discussed organic matter and particle sizes and things. They had a lot of questions about, well, what's the best kind of compost And there's a lot of answers to that, you know there. In other words, that leaf mo compost is awesome. It's it's absolutely high quality stuff.

If you get a quality made compost that is blended properly into something like a veggie nerve mix or a rose soil uh, then those are also excellent blends. The idea is to get organic matter back down into the soil, and that's what nature does over a long period of time, and that's also what you can do when you contact Nature's way to get some of their products. I was talking to Ian Ferguson out there a while back about some of the

products they have and things, and I believe in their products. They work, They absolutely work, and Nature's might have been a leader in this for a long time. You know, when I when we use terms like rose soil and leaf mol composts, those are things that were invented Nature's Way. Not that no one ever had a leave more compos that they made before, but I'm talking about the concept of making that and using that and the benefits

of that and everything. They perfected it. And you know, Nature's Ways you can go They're closed on Sunday, but they're open Monday through Friday from eight to five and Saturday from eight to two. You can find their products and stores. You can go to Nature's Way and you can buy bag by by bulk or you can have them deliver it to you. I mean, there's a lot of ways to reach out and to get information at Nature's Way. So all you got to do is just give them a call. Go

by there. They're on Interstate forty five or just off Interstate forty five as you head up north toward the Conroad direction. The actual address is one of one's Sherwood Circle, but they're basically where fourteen eighty eight comes in to forty five there. If you'd like to give them a call, the number is nine three six three two one sixty nine ninety. Let's go back now, we're going to head to the phones and talk to Debbie and Northwest Houston.

Hello, Debbie, Hi, Yes, I just sent you an email. I have a tree. It's not very old and when it was planted it was during the drought that I watered it and the bark it's just falling off. I just sent you an email. Okay, I can get over here too. Three pictures. What kind of tree it looks like. It looks some kind of oak, Okay. I don't know if it's the water of the leaves or some small So if you can get your compass in your head

out and go stand by that tree. Is those for those gaping splits and openings where the wood is exposed, Are they on those southwest side of the tree or on the east side. On the east side, Okay, that may be a freeze crack from a long time ago. Uh, it looks like that because it's a vertical. But The goodness is it's a young tree, it's got good vigor. And if you look at that really thick rolls of kellus coming back, it's going to close back. It's on the process

of healing. There's nothing to apply to it. We certainly didn't want that to happen. It's not good to have the innerwood exposed to decomposing microbes. But I think it's going to be okay. Just continue to give it good care and that the bigger of a multary you can give it, the happier that tree will be okay. Great, Thank you so much, appreciate it. All right, you take care. Thanks for the call, you two.

Thank you boe by bye. All right. Well, hey, do you need supplies for your garden, for your landscape like I'm talking about, let's say some fertilizer, or let's say you need something to kill insects or to kill diseases or pass Maybe you are fine with synthetic products and that's what you want to use. Maybe you are an organic gardener and you're only going to use organic products. The one place you all can go and accomplish all

of that is Southwest Fertilizer. They're on the corner of Abyssinett and Renwick and Southwest Houston, and they stay stocked up. If a new product comes on the market, you're going to find it as Southwest Fertilizer. They just they stay on top of things and talk with Bob all the time about Hey, what do you think about this product? You know what? We just we just talk shop when it comes to the different things out there, what's working, what's not working, what's new? Uh, And it's it's really a

one stop shop. You walk in there with a sample, with a photo, just with a question and Bob or his team are going to be able to help you and point you to the product you need to do the job. If one's needed. They won't say you something you don't need, but if there is a product that'll do it best, they'll not only say here's the one you need, but they'll tell you how to use it and any specific things you need to know. And that is important so you go home

home, you use it properly and you have the results you need. Southwest Fertilizer, corner of bus Nutt and Renwick UH seven to one three six six six seventeen forty four, or just go to the website Southwest Fertilizer dot com. See, we are gonna I'll tell you what. I am really close to a break here, Bunny. I'm gonna come to you right after the break because I want to be able to have adequate time to handle the question

you might have. Uh just remind you that my my website, Gardening with Skip dot com holds both of my schedules, the lawncare schedule and the lawn pest Disease and we'd management schedule, as well as a few other timely things I've posted up there over time. Working on several new things to go back. I'll tell you more about those later when we get them ready to load up. But the website Gardening with Skip dot com. All right, here's

a break. I'll be right back your summer get away from the huge dat We're going to head straight out and find out from Bonnie in Spring. Hey, Bonnie, good morning, get back. I've sent you some pictures and I wonder if you can diagnose a crape myrtle that has some white spots to howdery mildew Oh, Bonnie, I've got uh, Saint Augustine, is that yes, that's one of them. I have three different pictures there. Let's see if I can find the rest of them here. They're they're kind of

embedded in. It's hard for me to it's hard to see. But we could start with the grass. Let's do that. So uh on your turf? What what I see there? Then? You know doing describing pictures over the radio? Is I know? Uh? Yeah, You've got little spots on your grass blades. And the spots have a border with a tan center, and that's called gray leaf spot. Gray leaf Spot's a fungus are taxing augustine, and it lovest humid and moist, very moist conditions, and it

likes shady area. It seems worse than shady areas. So I've told people before, if you don't know what gray leaf spot looks like, go throw a piece of plywood over your lawn, leave it there for a week, pick it up, and you'll see gray leaf spot because it's everywhere. It's as you created the perfect environment for it. So from our standpoint, from your standpoint taking care of the thing, you need to not overwater. While ago I just kind of went on a spiel about give it a good soaking,

let it dry out, don't squirt it every other day. Yeah, and the more often you wet it, the more problems with this you have. If you overdo nitrogen, it makes it worse. Also if you overdo the nitrogen. And that's it. Now. One other observation earlier, and for those of you listening this morning, I talked about how iron decency shows up because if you pick up a leaf blade and hold it up to the sky, you see vertical stripes of green and yellow. What it means on

your grass is speckles of green and yellow all over. They're not stripes, they're just speckley spots. And that is Saint Augustine decline, which is a virus and it attacks older types of Saint Augustine. So the new improved types, the varieties and things are all bred to be resistant to it. And so what do you do, Well, you can do nothing. A lot of people have had long This lon's been here for a long time. I guess, yeah, And so you could do nothing. It's just it weakens

the lawn a little bit, but it doesn't kill the lawn. Secondly, you could plug in a resistant variety, so if this one gets weaker, the other one has a chance to kind of fill in. I'm about that option, but that is an option that you can do. But there's no cure for the Saint Augustine. Now, as far as the take all undertake all gray leaf spot, that one, it's very fungy sides and that will

help bring that into control that you can stove that from happening. But again, don't overfertilize, don't water too frequently, and most lawns don't have to be treated for gray leaf spot. Most don't. Okay, So there's a time when it's wanted to spray, but not just because the disease exists, because it's ubiquitous. It's everywhere. I also sent a picture as a weed that is driving me crazy. It's growing up on my neighbor's side at the fans and over the fans, and now it's coming in the yard and my

flower beds as well. It's just bustop. I don't see a weed. I just have to turf and a crepe myrtle. The weed is inside the turf meat well, not to get in the yard. It's a little bitty It has a reddish stem and little be pointy leaves. Oh I see it, okay, all right, so that is that is called peppervine. Pepper vine. A lot of people see it and they go, oh, I've got poison ivy. Now you don't, uh, the poison ivy looks quite

different. Pepper vine has uh these that pattern to the leaves, but it has it has more of the leaves than poison ivy does than they're they're smaller. Pepper vine is very difficult to control because things that kill it may hurt your Saint Augustine as well. If you can get a product that contains trichlope here tri I c l O p y R, and just wipe it onto the pepper vine and let it translocate down and kill the vine itself. And wherever it's coming up, it'll be coming up in your lawn or your flower

beds wherever. Yeah, it's everywhere, but everywhere it's coming up. You just stay with it every time the shoot comes up, and then you wipe some triclope here right on it, and it will it will kill it. Okay, just now that it's on the lawn, it's gonna be a little more tedious. Is there any way to handle it? Because it's coming up over the fence in the backyard. It will. Yeah, it hangs over the fence. So I've cut back those parts so it's not hanging over my

side. But it's a neighbor lives over there. It's a neighbor. Yeah, okay, Well, if they won't control it, you're kind of just get left with cutting it back and then the shoots come up underground unless they will entertain a conversation with you about Hey, this is a problem for both of us. Yeah, okay, well we'll have to deal with that. And the white spots on the crepe myrtles, yeah, that is powdery mildew, and powdery mildew is a common disease of crape myrtles. It shows up

as a little like a white dust on top of the leaf. Listening, they can't see this picture and it causes deformation of the leaf and stuff. You can do a couple of things. You can ignore it, you can spray with a product containing belaton belaton to control it. Or and you don't want to hear this one, but I have to say that you can get rid of that crape myrtle and put in a variety that's resistant and then forever more going forward, you don't have to worry about it anymore. So those

are your well, it's a fairly new quite myrtle. I got it from the Arbor Foundation. They just well, you send the money and they send you trees, and so that was one of theirs. So I really don't know what trying. It's a pretty Boston Well. Those are your options, bunny, and you can decide how you want to go with it. If you go to a good garden center and say I need a great myrtle that doesn't get powder, and they'ldew, they can put one in your hands.

All right, thank you so much, I think spine you bet you take care in Channa Gardens out in Richmond is one of those garden centers that I like to call destination garden centers. In Channa Gardens is the kind of place you want to go and take your friends and family when they come visit in town, and a lot of people do that. In fact, people drive for a very long way Austin and other places that far away to come over to Richmond to see this place, because it really is outstanding. Their selection

of all kinds of plants is wonderful. For example, if you like the tulip gingers the kirrkkuma. They have an awesome selection of those right now, and that is an amazing plant that is very beautiful. The blooms can be cut as cut flowers and last a long time. It is you just have to go see one. It's called a tulip ginger or a curcuma ginger. They do well. And Chantic Gardens just got in their stock of tomatoes and peppers the Herst shipment for fall. Do you know now, I know hot

outside, but now's when we're planting our tomatoes for the fall crop. This would be midsummer tomato planting season. Scott of water and they'll be fined. They're not gonna fruit until things cool off. But if you don't plant them now, you won't have a good sized plant. Then it does cool off enough to start setting fruit. So anyway, just something to think about. Lots of selections of really nice milk weeds there and one of my favorite underutilized

plants. I was just has this spicy any Welcome back to the yard line. Good to have you with us today. We've got more talk about. If you like to give us a call and talk about something of interest to you. I have a question or something, give us a call it seven one three two one two k t r H. Seven one three two one two k t r H. As simple as that. We're going to go out to Tumball now and talk to Mel. Hello, Mel, Hey, good morning. I have two about fifty foot tall magnolia trees growing side by

side in the county yard right up to the house. One of them is looking kind of sick, got some dead limbs on the things. And I guess that what a treat ord he called what an arborist. I was wondering who you might recommend. I would recommend you go ahead and call Martin Spoon Moore. He's at Affordable Tree Care of Affordable Tree Service. Uh and do you have a pin or paper pen and paper handy. I just give you a couple of things to reach out to him. I'm writing it right now.

Well I can hardly hear you. Hang on old all right, okay, go ahead, all right? Set seven one three six twenty six sixty three seven one three six nine nine twenty six sixty three. Martin knows trees here, and without a doubt, he would be the one you want to have come out there. A F F tree service dot com is his website. Okay, Magnet, Okay, I'm sorry, go ahead aff tree service dot com. Start. I'm still writing, hang on it, o' get. Yeah, that's fine, that's fine. Okay, go ahead, Tree

Service dot Com. So Magnolies took a big hit last summer. We flat lost entire trees during the heat and drop in the summer, which is not something that happens a lot around here. Now, there are other issues. There's genetic differences from one treating another. There are usually there is always the possibility that perhaps there's something strangling the roots of the tree or the trunk of the tree at the base, maybe a root going around it, or something

that can cause it to be set back. The leaves are smaller, the old leaves fall off and whatnot. But I think in general, probably it's just some late results of that cold damage or the heat damage rather that they suffered. Right now, what have As far as expensive goes, When he did what he did, he charged for coming out, and then yeah, I think he'll charge you like one hundred and fifty to come out. And that's just from running all over town because people are curious about a bug in

a tree. Or something. And then if you if he is able to do something, whether it's a deep root treatment or whether he's doing some printing or whatever is needed, then that one fifty would just go into your cost, so you're not out the one fifty if you have work done. All right, well, I feel like I'm going to be spending somebody because I hate to lose it. I mean, yeah, yeah, yeah. The one right next to work to it is pretty doing pretty good. All right,

I appreciate it. Thank you, skip all right, good luck with that, Mel, Thanks for the call. You take care of them, all right, bye bye, all right, tree for sure, bye bye. All right, there we go. Yeah, trees are they're the most valuable plant in your landscape. They really are in terms of what they can do. Number one, takes a long time to grow a big tree,

so to start over, that's going to take a while. On the other hand, or in a to that, whenever a tree, whenever someone's going to buy a home and you've got beautiful trees, it adds value to the house. But it also helps the house to sell. In other words, you know, the people come and they look at it, and they I want this house because you've got that beautiful set of trees, and so it

is worth taking time to do several things. One thing is, if you're going to plant a tree, plant one that is a long term investment, not grow fast, die young. You know, the grow fast, die young. The old Arizona ash, the Arizona ash we used to have in neighborhoods everywhere that just pretty much ever build or seem to stick one in the yard when he built a subdivision. Then we get three decades in and they're

falling apart. We're having to take them out, and now those homes are starting over when they should have the most beautiful trees in the world if they'd had all those thirty years to grow. So pick a tree number two planet right. Make sure it's planted properly. That is important. And then the third thing is take care of them. And basically taking care of a tree.

Ninety percent of treecare is early pruning in a train in a way to train the tree so that later pruning doesn't require a chainsaw all the time. The second aspect of it is it creates the form that you're looking for in the tree, and then provide that tree with adequate water during extended summer droughts, that's important. Now we can fertilize our trees, that's fine, that will help with growth, But nothing is as important as during an extended drought.

Alleviating the stress with an occasional good deep soaking. That that's important. And that's the secrets to success. You plant the right kind of tree there, and don't be like I want the fastest growing tree you have. Remember so fast, die young. That's that's the thing with trees. Now we do have some pretty fast growing good trees and moderate growing good trees that we can speed up with proper care. But a tree is so valuable. Take care of the ones you have, and if you're going to plant one,

now's the time to make the right decision. They say that society grows rich when old men plant trees under the shade under which they will never set. I think that's interesting. I probably butchered that that. That's the gist of the of the sentiment. You're listening to garden line, and I am here to answer your gardening questions. How do we make you have a more bountiful garden and a more beautiful landscape? More bountiful garden or beautiful landscap. That's

our goal. You know, gardening should be fun. We really it shouldn't. It's not rocket science, and we need to not stress over it. And don't worry if you plant a plant and it doesn't survive. Listen, you gotta you gotta kill a lot of plants to be a good gardener. That's just the way it is. I say it that way to kind of give you permission to try things and if they don't work, well, now you learn something. Don't do that again. But there's a lot that we

can learn to avoid loss of plants. But at the same time, just have fun. You know, it's a plug and play deal. I know we think of landscapes as you know, you put in this landscape and now you're done well for a while, maybe, but landscapes evolve and there is no shame in the world in changing things up. I mean, have you ever like got to maybe you moved into a house that was built in I don't know, nineteen sixty or something and the hold decor and everything just wasn't

right. And you know, you pull out paneling and you put up this, or you put up you know, you do all the things. You paint inside because you want it to look different. You can do that in your beds and your landscapes and things. You know. You pull up trees, of course, but you landscapes are a forever changing palette. And don't

be afraid to change some things out. If your landscape is twenty years old or older, I guarantee you there are some better plants to fit some of the spots currently in your landscape, because we're constantly coming up with new wonderful plants to use to use for that. We're gonna take a little break right now. That was my little soap box. I guess uh seven one three two one two k t r H. Give me a call. We'll talk when we come back back to garden line. Good to have you with us.

I'm your host, Skip Richter, and we are here to help you have a more bountiful garden and a more beautiful landscape. If you got any questions you'd like to visit with me about, just dial seven to one three dial See that, I just I just aged myself right there. Call just call seven one three two one two kt r H. How many of you out there listening know what a dial telephone is? Remember those I mean some of you probably know, but you've never stuck your finger in one before.

Well that's yeah, it's still in my head. Sorry. I was at an ACE Hardware store the other day looking at some of the products that they had for things currently going on in the lawn and garden, and they there was a supply of things that are effective against take all root rot, and that is a big deal we're dealing with right now. There was kelated arm products for your soil. They had fire ant baits and individual mound treatments both

there. They had mosquito dunks, the ones you hear me talk about on Garden Line. They had the mosquito repellents. They had fogging machines for you know, knocking them out of an area of the backyard. Just everything you could think about. Maybe we were just yesterday out on our patio and we got this little string of I call them beer garden lights, but it's a little you know, black cord of lights with the little bulbs hanging down, very dim bulbs, and it's just so nice and you can get out at

Ace Hardware too. It creates such a beautiful outdoor on beyond setting. Because you know it's not safe to go outside until it's almost sundown or because it's so hot these days here, but oh my gosh, in the evenings. What a nice, enjoyable place to create. And ACE hardware will help you do it. And if you need to fertilize your lawn, maybe you're an organic gardener and you're looking for microlife. ACE hardware stores are going to carry

microlife as well. As you know microlife is. It's a widely available product and it's a wide range of products. It's not just the green bag that we put on our lawns for fertilizing. It's the humans plus the purple bag that is concentrated compost in a bag. They have a Microlife acidifier six two

four. I've recommended that I recommended somebody for a lawn this weekend because one of the things takeof Patch does not like is acid conditions, and so anything we do to push this surface of the soil, the runner zone into more acidic conditions is helpful for that. Of course, it's good for azelias, camellias, blueberries, acid loving plants. There are many many microlife products that are out there on the market. I like some of the liquids, the

super seaweed the ocean harvest. You know, organic gardeners for a long time have had the words fish emotion and seaweed come out of their mouth. That is the if you want a liquid feed product for your plants and your gardens, whether you're raising seedlings or whatever, that is the version for organic gardening is fish emotion and seaweed. Microlife also has one called Biomatrix that is excellent. It's a seven to one to three liquid. I use it a lot

for my houseplants. It's not because it's just a houseplant fertilizer, but I like to use it because you know, if you use a fish based product indoors, you often can smell that, and so I for indoors, I would use the Biomatrix for example, But it's excellent. You can use it outdoors. I use it in transplanting. You get the idea. Microlife products. Go to microlife for laser dot com. You can find out more about microlife products where to get them near you, which is pretty much everywhere they

are. They are very widely available. Let's do this. Let's go back out to the phones now again. The number seven one three two one two k t R h we go all the way to Beaumont and talk to Gordon. Hello, Gordon, Hello, sir. Uh, my question is about Nema toads, especially on the okrah roots system that causes knots and uh then the plant depleinishes from Then what is the best source that you have for the

destruction of these nema toads. Yeah, well, Gordon, I got I got bad news for you and for me because I just pulled up a bunch of plants in a bed that I had Okra in and uh, there is nematods all over the roots. There is not a magic bullet for nematodes. There are things we can do to suppress them, and I'll say, manage them if you will, so the damage isn't so excessive. And there are a couple of products out there that I've not seen the research on to know

that they work. But Monterey has one for Nema tod control, and then I'm trying to think of the name of the other one. Anyway, they're supposedly suppressive. They're based on saponins or soap like substances from yucca and other things. I'm trying them this summer to see if they work. But I don't know that they would. We're going to find out. What I do for nematodes is number one. When I know I have them in area, get the roots out as much as I can, and I do not plan

anything that gets nematodes back in that spot. There are a few plants that are resistant to them, and that's what has to go in that spot. If you allow the soil to dry out, like you roto tillot in the summer and the sun bakes down on it, and then you rote a tillo it again the sun bakes down. That's not great for the soil, but it does cause a lot of the nematos to desiccate and die. There's also the ability to put in a trap crop the little tiny French marigolds, not

the big pump pum types, but the small flower types. Yeah, i've got drop crop. I've got them, yep. Yeah, But you got to plant them wall to wall, not like a marigold beside your chucker plant, tomato plant. Yeah, just a solid path. You want every cubic centimeter of soil to have a marigold root in it. That's the way you need to think about that. Then in the cool season, switched to cereal rye grass, the rye, the grain type of rye, not the lawn

overseeding rye, the grain type of rye. And that is a trap crop in the cool season. And then so the crop rotation, if you can give it at least three years before you come back to that spot with a susceptible species of plant like okra. Yeah, that's what I went. I went years without planning anything there. And yeah, a thing like their producing I you know, thirty plants. So they produced me about four hundred pounds of okra per year, and I was just was looking for something to get

rid of the nematode. Okay, that's a lot of okra after my own heart. Uh yep. Well, yeah, so that the crop rotation, the trap crops, you could try some. They just know there are products there that are you can give them a try. I am not recommending them because I don't know yet for them. No, thank you very much. I appreciate your time. All right, thank you for the call, Gordon. I appreciate that. Those nematodes, I tell you we we've got them.

I've got them. I posted something to our Guardline Facebook page a while back. I dug up some boxwood that were in a spot I did not want them. Remember I talked about redoing gardens. Is okay, Well, I redid a bit that someone else had planted. But anyway, when I pulled them up, Nema toad's all over the roots. There's a lot of plants to get fig trees. Oh my gosh, Nemo toad'sil walk a mile

to get to a fig tree. They love those things. So you got to just watch the plants that you put in, and once you got them, it's a matter of managing, not eradicating. The one thing that I did not mention and I should have to Gordon if you're still listening, Gordon is solarizing in the summer season, Putting clear plastic over the soil and solarizing it for about four to six weeks will also reduce the nematode numbers. Not eradicate, not control nematod six inches deep, but in the top three or

four inches. You ought to be able to get pretty good control with solarizing too. Let's see, I'm gonna go now to who's next up here garden oaks, and we're gonna talk to Pat Hello, Pat Inning I've got a question on my asparagus. They've been in for about four years, and each year I seem to get more of them, but then they start putting up a little small, not the asparagus sized plant, and then they bush out. Do I cut those things down or do I just leave them alone?

And yeah, so asparagus, we're a little far south for the best results with asparagus. I'm not saying you can't grow asparagus here. You absolutely can grow it here, but a further north it grows those fronds all summer captures lots of sunlight, puts a lot of carbohydrates down in the root system,

and then it goes dormant because it gets so cold there. And then in the spring when the new growth begins, you have these nice thick spears coming up, and they lost a while before they start to dwindle in size. Here we don't have the weather to kill it back to the ground and to have that garmant period, and so it's like it's still burning carbohydrates and stuff on into the winter time, and so we have a shorter harvest and sometimes

not as many nice, good sized spears. But that's just part of living in this area, you can grow it, but it's a more limited production. Okay, well, I didn't know if there was something I could. Should I just let those continue to grow. Yeah, as much as you can let them grow. You got to be able to keep the weeds out, So keep it really well malted and stuff, because asparagus can become really

weedy. And yeah, that's it. If there are some varieties that are better than others, but other than picking the best varieties you can get, and that's that would be my advice. Okay, thank you so much. Yeah, Pat appreciate that. Thanks to the call. Well, here we are, it's time for taking a little break, Lisa and Seabrook. You're gonna be our first up when we come right back from break. Our phone number is seven one three two one two k t r H. Seven one

three two one two k t r H. Give us a call. Chris will get you on the board and we will talk to you when we come back. You have you with us. You've got plenty of things we can talk about right now. Hey, you the the one thing I want to mention is if you are looking at your landscape and you see the sea of green, I refer to it as a sea of green because it's green grass, green ground cover, green shrubs, green trees, green green, green green. That's fine. I like green. Green's a pretty color. It's

not the only color. And just because it's summer doesn't mean that we have to give up on color in our landscapes. If you give the folks at Pierscapes a call, for example, they can set you up for quarterly bed maintenance and that means they come out. They do things like trimming and weeding and fertilizing and irrigation inspection, make sure your irrigation system is working right. And they just because they once worked right doesn't mean they still are. The

aeration seasonal color changes. You switch out those flowers that aren't thriving in the heat and put some things that will thrive in the heat, mulching in the beds. This is all part of what Peerscapes does, but it's not at all all of what Pierscapes does. They do irrigation, drainage. They do drainage systems so that when we have areas that are too wet, maybe a natural stone river bed to just let it naturally drain out of an area.

Plus it's kind of esthetically attractive. I think, how about a subsurface drainage system. They can do that. Do you need borders around beds or do you want to go all out? Just have them redesign a landscape. You will not believe the work they do. You got to go to pierce Scapes dot com Piercescapes dot com and check out. Just just flip through there,

look at the pictures. See the kind of work they can do. Give them a call seven or excuse me two eight one three seven oh fifty sixty two eight one three seven oh five zero six zero, and let Piercecapes make your place a showplace that is colorful in addition to green all through the hot

blazing summer season. You know, we got a long time until we start planting cool weather things, So now's the time to make sure these things are it's established effectively and taken care of and just I don't know, makes your place a lot more beautiful. Let's go out to Sebrook. Here we're going to talk to Lisa. Hey, Lisa, welcome to Gardline, Good morning, Thank you. We have been using compost top dressing instead of mulch.

It was recommended because we had our home tweet for termites, but it seems that the weeds they just go right through the compost. So I'm just saying, do you have any recommendations or do you have any thoughts on that? Yeah, you can use composts as a mult Usually we don't pile compost that thick, you know, an inch of compost. There's a lot of composts to be adding, and so what you would have to do is get a

little rake and kind of stir it up. When you see little seedlings just starting to go, just kind of stir it up a little bit, and that sort of takes care of them pretty well. Otherwise you're going to need to go with maybe a maultch that the termites aren't as interested in, like a cedar mulch for example. I'm not a termite expert. I'm not a pest control operator either, but I would not worry as much about the multch

as I would be about covering up the wheepholes. If you have a brick siding in your house, those little holes where things can go in, making sure you can see access to those. So if termites tried to build a mud nest or a mud trail, up there. You could absolutely know it and move quickly. There's a lot of wood in nature the termites are eating, and so every time a limb falls in the forest, that's a potential place for a termite to get its next meal. And so I don't know.

I would still malt myself. But if you want to switch to one that's less inviting, like cedar, than you could do that. Thank you, you bet. I hope that helps. Thanks Lisa, thanks for the call. All righty, well, yeah, I need to one of these days. They need to get like a termite PCO or something like on the show. We can kind of pick the brain and learn a few more things about it. I think I'll make a note try to do that. I

like that idea. So out in the garden and out in the landscape right now, the temperatures, of course are hot and there's a lot of stress on things. Just remember that proper watering is so very important. You need a moist soil so that you can have good root development and root health down underground. You also need to make sure that the soil is not too soggy wet, because when you are under high heat stress conditions to have the roots

excluded or oxygen excluded from the root system. Is it's just a recipe for quick death and so overwatering in the hot, blazing summer season and continuing to keep that soil too soggy is not a good thing. Let it dry a little bit and think of it a good soaking. Good soaking followed by drying up very important to do for all of our plants. Remember this too. When you plant a container, maybe it's a shrub or tree, and you put that in the ground, I want you to play a little mental game

for me here. Imagine that you put the whole thing in the ground in the pot. That black, round pot goes straight down in the ground, and then you bring up soil around it, mulch over the top, and water it in. The reason I like that image is because for a long time, that's where all the roots are going to be. If you knew there was a pot in the ground, would you water two feet away from that plant now there's no roots out there, You'd water where the pot is

because that's where all the roots are. So just because you take it out of the pot and put it in the ground doesn't change the fact that all the roots are still in the cylinder, and they're gradually going to move out into the soil around and with each month, with each week, with each month, with each year, that plant becomes better and better rooted in with the resilient root system that you don't need to pamper along because it's resilient.

So if you just do that, I'm going to picture this as my roots are all right there, and water that area where the pot is, or was the area just beyond that a little bit. If you focus your water on there, you can help that plant not only sustain and stay healthy, but even grow faster and do well. And so when you water, just in your mind with new plants, just picture that that plant is still under

sitting in a pot, but the pot's underground. And if you water like that, that of course is a little bit of an overstatement, but if you water like that, it will help you avoid losing that plant. Because listen, in moist soil, that tiny cylinder root ball will pump dry in a day, depending on how big the plant is and how big the root ball is, and you've got to be able, you've got to be able to have some resilience there. So take care of the roots that are there.

As it develops roots beyond there, it's time for me to take a little bit of break here. We are going to head to that. I want to leave you with the phone number if you want to give Chris a call, get on the board seven to one three two one two KTRH. Seven to one three two one two kt r H and welcome to garden Line. Welcome back to guard Line. I'm your host, Skip Rictor, and we're here to help you have a more bountiful garden and a more beautiful landscape.

So how can we do that? Well, it starts with a phone call seven to one three two one two k t r H. And we'll be happy to jump in there and help in any way we can. Folks at plants for all seasons. Stop about the Flowery Family. They've been around since so nineteen seventy three, and it's the Garden Center on Tomball Parkway. That's Highway two forty nine. As you're heading from Houston toward Tombol direction, you exit Luetta and it's right on the other side of Luetta, just about

a block or so, not even a block up the street. There on the right, you're going to find every kind of plant you can imagine there they're going to have right now. Some of the baskets that they have are just stunning, just really beautiful. But remember, just because it's hot outside doesn't mean we can't be playing things. Go ahead and get them established.

If you got them here in the middle of a landscape renovation project and summers, find time to go ahead and make some big changes that you need to make. Well, go ahead and do that. Just pick some plants that are going to survive the heat and do well. Remember, we got months of summer ahead of us here, and there's no reason for us, not for you not to have color in your landscape. Plants for all seasons can help with that. When you have issues and problems, you can take samples

into them. They know what they're talking about and they've got a selection of products for pretty much anything that you're going to encounter in your Houston area garden. Now. For example, they also have fertilizers. They got sweet Greens. Sweet Greens that product from nitroposs It is an organic type product, eleven percent nitrogen made from a molasses base. That's where sweet comes in from the

name sweet green. Any organic gardener knows when you put molasses on the soil emulates beneficial microbes, some of the bacteria the good guy at bacteria that help plant roots to thrive. Sweet grain will dissolve away release into the soil for a summer application. Here's how I suggest you do it. Get the sweet grain, look at the labels how much you apply. I would cut that in half and apply it now, and then about six to eight weeks from

now, do it again. Make another application of the other half of it, and that's going to gradually provide those nutrients over a longer period of time here in the summer. Swee Green's a wonderful product, smells wonderful, and it's from nitroposs So it's going to be widely available places like plants for all seasons. We're going to have it. We're going to head out now to Magnolia, Texas and talk to Ronnie. Hello, Ronnie, how are you. I'm doing good. I'm doing good. What's up? I guess I

need to turn it radio all. Hey, Google, turn off? That's the pictures. Yeah, and you'd called me back or sent me a message that there's cabbage worms and give you a shout. We could discuss them. Okay, I'm having trouble hearing Ronnie and run he are you at a distance from your phone or is this something on our end? Yeh? Better? A little bit better? Yeah, okay. So the question was cabbage worms.

Yeah, I remember your picture of that. Uh, the cross striped cabbage worm is what that is. And it's got the little horizontal black and white stripes across its back. Those are really common for all the cucurbits or cruciferous or cabbage family plants. So that would be broccoli and cabbage and cauliflower and cole robbie and oh collars and kale. You know they like those kind

of plants. And the best pardon absolutely yeah. So the best way that I'd recommend managing as with a spray containing bt B as in boy teas in tom. It's a natural caterpillar killer. Now, it's only gonna last about a day or so out there in the environment before it breaks down. So if you were to spray it today, I would check back mid week and look and see or did you miss any Are they still alive? And it's not gonna kill them instantly? They eat it and they get very very sick.

And die, but don't be afraid to spray it again, and you know, anywhere from maybe three or four days later or a week later, and then you can do it a third time even if you need to. But you can get ahead of them that way. But the sooner you get it on them, the better, because young caterpillars are much easier to kill than older caterpillars. Got you got another question for you for a run off?

My corn plants, man, they didn't grow and last for two years straight, about maybe three four foot in the kernels about one inch of cross and four inches long or not kernels, but the cobs any ideas on that? So how long would you plant them? Right? Well, I planted them the early part of this spring, and then last year it happened the same way. Some boy small cobs. That's a that's kind of unusual. What happens with corn is well, First of all, the varieties differ a

lot. There are types of corn that when they're three feet higher putting ears on, which is not normal, and then there are types that gets seven feet high the field corn and whatnot. So the size of the ears is going to also be part of that genetic difference but when there's narrow and spinley as what you're describing, that's unusual. The pollination that occurs as the pollen falls on the silks of the ear sticking out of the end of the ear,

that helps all those little corn kernels develop on the cob. So the kernels were fine. Pardon, the kernels were developed. They just wouldn't. The ear wasn't very big at all. Yeah, that's very I don't know. On the ear, some of the secondary ears down the stalk will often not develop as far along as the primary ones we get up top. But I would I would try. Do you remember do you remember what variety you put motok or mon tap and a and a honey bun and then a hybrid.

Yeah, go ahead, that those that's the only three names I remember. I went and ordered support and I've just reached this. I don't know those I don't know those varieties. I don't know. My suggestion and based on the fact that there's not some common thing that I'm aware of that would cause the ears themselves just to be spend late but still have good kernels on them. Uh So my suggestion would be to switch varieties. There is one called gen ninety that does very well. If you can find that one,

get g ninety. There's one called Honey and Pearl that does well. So you are up in the Magnolia area, I would you can do. You can go buy garden centers and find packs of seed on these. If you're going to need a larger quantity, if you're planting a pretty big patch, probably mail order is going to be what you're into up having to do for that quantity up in your area. Well, okay, my friend appreciate it. Well, good luck with those. Yeah, I'm gonna I'm gonna look

into that because that's a that's a new one. Well, you know, and I'm out soul and now this is arbigate soul. It's a rose and uh mulch and uh uh huh. So you know, I ever finding else is just fluent. I mean, I've got tomatoes and beans and peas, it all just flourishing. But this series got me stymy. Yeah, it is unusual. I just want to blame it on the variety. But yeah, arbigate soil is excellent soil, and obviously everything else is doing well in

it, so it's definitely not a soil caused problem in this case. Okay, sound like you need to go on break. Yeah, they're playing the magic sounds out there, so I gotta do that. All right, take care. Well, here we are top of the hour. We will be right back. I'm gonna do a little research on that one they for the top of the hour and see if I can come up with some solutions. That's a that's an You know, it's funny be in this thirty five years

I still run into situations, but hadn't come across that one. You have to hunte that down. Thanks for listening. By the way to garden, we're gonna take our low break from the news. Seven one three two one two k t r H is the number if you like to call and get on the board. In Charlie from Western USI are first time. Well, probably not the problem. I mean, if it is compacted. I think that's what you mean by when you're saying the DNS. It's going to limit

root development, and so aeration would be helpful, helpful. The problem with aeration is you have so many tree roots in that area that you're almost gonna have to do it by hand. You can't run a machine through there with all those tree roots. Up at the surface. You could use a spading fork and kind of wiggle it straight down in the ground and kind of pull back on it a little bit and then pull it straight back up again. You know, you're kind of creating holes that way. It's not the best

way to do it, but it is a way to do it. I think probably what you're looking at though, when I when I see your scamp your photos is it could be a combination of things. Number one, a lot of shade and Saint Augustine just can't get the energy that it needs to make good density when there's a lot of shade. Uh. That's a factor. That's why you're seeing some weeds coming into it. The compaction of the soil certainly is not helping, so aerrating would be helpful there. You may

also have take all root rot going on. That's really common disease in our area. And I as looking at the the photos, I can't diagnose the disease from from just the photo, but the way the grass looks the effects of it remind me of what take all root rot would do. And so that would be one where you would actually use a fungicide containing something called a secesstrobo to be able to do that. But let me you don't have to worry about writing that down. Go to my website gardening with Skip dot com,

Gardening with Skip dot com and on. There is the lawn pest, disease and weed management schedule and the disease row Across the page you'll see when to apply things. For take all root lot, I would go ahead, even though this isn't the best season. I would go ahead and do it now, but definitely come back and do it when we get it to October again. Those are the things that are in your power in the meantime. Because the plant is lacking a good root system, you're going to have to

water in more frequently in smaller doses. It's the opposite of what I've been talking about today, where we try to develop this resilient plant by not watering often, but watering well. When we do. This little shallow root system is not going to go far between watering. So be ready to water a little more often until you get your grasp back to good health account. Okay, and the I guess as you say, it's a fung de side to take care of the take all right, do I put that order or is

that on your website. It's schedule, my schedule on the week. It tells you exactly when the plant. But I'm saying you won't see it it listed for July. But go ahead and do it now in your lawn in this situation, and then just get back on the proper schedule for it. If you take, if you take compressed peat moss, spagming pete moss,

it comes and compressed they call them bales. It's a plastic wrapped but it's been squeezed down so tight that it's shaped like a giant brick, I mean, a very giant brick three point and break it up, loosen it up, and put little piles of it everywhere and spread it out as thin as you can, and then water it in. That will also help. We're doing a number of things in this recommendation trying to help move the plant toward

health and away from the disease having the advantage. Okay, I'm saying, what is the name that pete moss against staying him bagging and pete moss compressed bals. You're out there west, you you know what I would just run out to. I would give them a call itself US fertilizer best and that yes, too far from you. And they they're going to have. If they don't have it, they can get it. I bet they already have

it on hand, but just talked about or someone out there. A three point eight cubic foot bag covers about a thousand square feet at the very shallow depth. Ok okay, all right, good luck with it, and in the meantime, try to keep the foot traffic off as much as you can. Okay, A right doesn't get a luck, Thank you very much, skipping. Yes, you take care well, I tell you, take all the right. We need a miracle cure to come along for that. It is. It is a difficult disease to deal with. And I've seen it

this summer, uh, just in many places and in many situations. And the thing we need to remember, I'll use take all as an example, but this is true of plant disease and to some degree human disease too in general, and that is that when the patient gets stressed, diseases are more likely to have the ability to go in and to cause illness and in some cases of your low death. And so with our bodies, what do we

do we exercise, we eat right, we get plenty of sleep. All those things right, that helps you be more healthy, so you're more resilient. When it comes to a turf plant, when you stress it with compacted soil, with shade, with damage from some sorts of weed killers, you're gonna find take all root rot shows up. All right, We're gonna take a little quick break here. I'll be right back in just a moment. Maryl is in the Gulf of Mexico approach the Texas coast. Ue. Welcome

to have you with us today. We've got a lot of things to talk about. I wanted to mention sometimes I get there's a common question I get sometimes people wonder, why aren't my flowers blooming. I've had flowers, but they're not doing well. Why aren't they blooming? And one of the reasons is a lack of nutrient. One of the reasons could be stresses from lack of water or whatnot. So another reason could be the flower doesn't like that time of year. In other words, if you have a petunia outlet,

let's go all the way. If you have a pansy and you have it out in July in Texas, it's not gonna be blooming. In fact, it's gonna be dying in the heat that we have. But within our power is making sure they are adequately watered and that they're fertilized well. I like the products that Nelson Plant Food is put together that are in the Nutristar line. For example, there's a nutri Star for hibiscus and really any flowering tropicals.

You know, there's lots of different kinds of plants icera and others that just do really well with the hibiscus and flowering tropical version of nutristar. There is an indoor plant Nutristar specifically designed for indoor plants. And whether you have a Chinese evergreen agli anema, whether you have a Kalitha Diffenbakia drasina, all those common houseplants, fiddly fig and on and on and on if it's a houseplant. In other words, this is a quality plant food to help produce

healthy growth for it to succeed and do really really well. And then there's a color Star line for our flower beds outdoors. Color Star itself is just an outstanding fertilizer. All from Nelson Plant Food, All from Nelson Plant Food and then remember too with your lawns. Turf Star slow and easy, that's the season we're in. Carries you all the way to fall with a gradual release and even a little bit of an acidifying effect, which is very,

very helpful for the things our lawns are struggling against. Right now, we're going to go now out to Brazoria County and talk to Bob. But Bob there all right, Bob, I think I have you. How can we help the day? Are you the yes? Ree u? Two things? Want to comment about your statement about the wheepholes, plugging them for because the termite possibility, right. You don't want to plug them with anything that's not poorous. You want to put something in there like fiberglass or a stainless stil

wool. Because those wheapholes are there to breathe. Oh yes they are. Listen. If I said plugging them, I misspoke. No, you you want to leave them open. What I was trying to say was don't pull the mulch up over them, because then termites get in and you don't even know it. I have a little exposed foundation below the wheephole. If I use the word plug, if I said that, I'm glad you brought it up, because I do not know do not plug the wheepholes? That was

question I have giving off that topic. Have a lot of volunteer oak trees. They're like three inches tall and they're in clusters around the yard, and I haven't been mowing over them. What is the best way and the best time to try to plant transplant them? Should I do it now or wait till they get a foot tall? Or you know what? Should we do? What I what I would do is starting. You could start now, definitely want to do this as we get into September October. But take a

shovel and go down straight into the ground. Let's say, what would you say as a trunk diameter on these trees right now? Are we talking about your thumb or we talking a pencil or what? What was that again? You said, Diam, Yeah, the trunk diameter on the trees. Is it more like a pencil or your thumb? Or how big? Is it small? Half the size of a pencil? That they're just starters right now? Oh? Tiny? Okay, Well, I'm going to take back the

shovel thing just so you know what I was saying. For in case you have bigger plants to transplant. I will often cut the roots. Oh you know, maybe, depending on the size of the plant, could be eight inches away or foot away from the trunk in several places, not all the way around, because that causes them to branch. So when you do dig it, you have a more active root system right around the base of the plant. But I would wait until November and would I would pull them,

dig them up and move them in November. Put them at the same level they were growing before, water them and really well, put them in the soil they're gonna grow in. Don't put potting soil in the hole or anything like that. Just whatever they're going to have to live in, that's the soil you put back in the hole. Very good. I appreciate it. All right, sir, you take care, Thanks for the call. Thank

you, Yeah, alrighty, yeah, you're listening to guard Line. I'm your host, Skip Ricker and our phone number seven one three one two fifty eight seventy four seven to one three two one two five eight seven four. As easy as that. I have talked about in the past, enchanted for us that in Richmond a number of times, and I always mentioned several things about it number one in the springtime. They got all kinds of programs all

the time. I ever seemed like every weekend there's something going on out there. If you're looking for a quality, uh selection of things that attract butterflies or birds or humming birds for example, things that attract pollinators, and Chanted Forest has got you covered. In fact, I was joking with any a good while back. It's it's funny. They they have these larval food source plants like milkweed for monarch caterpillars, or passion vine for gulf fritillary, or

pipeline swallowtail like caterpillars like pipeline plants. And if you buy a plant, they'll give you a caterpillar to say home. So you got your own little kind of like a sour dough starter. You go home with it. You got your own starter there to get you going in the butterfly business. Well, they have a lot of other things. Do you're not enchanted forest? They have got an excellent selection of every kind of plant that you would need.

I don't care if it's a vegetables, brand new vegetable thing they built this year a vegetable structure herbs outstanding selection of herbs, really very impressive, tree, shrubs, roses, no matter what it is, they've got it. There. A nice little gift shop also very very nice. Now they're on FM twenty seven to fifty nine, So if you're in Richmond heading toward Houston up fifty nine, it's off to the right FM twenty seven fifty nine

in Richmond again. Enchanted Forest, Enchanted Forest. The the nice thing that I am One of the nice things that I enjoy about Enchanted Forest is being able to visit with the folks that are there, that are there to help you to have success. Very friendly, just very helpful in every possible way

that you can imagine, and that is important. You can go shop a lot of places that plants are not what they're all about, but they got some plants, and you are not going to find knowledgeable people like you'll find at Enchanted Forest. Enchanted Forest. Excuse me, let me let me give me one second. Here, just's track of something I'm looking for. All

right, there we go, Yeah, ententted Forest. The website. If you like to look at the website, I suggest you do because you're gonna find a really good selection of all the things they have there and you kind of get some photos and a picture. When I talk about it being such a cool place to go visit, you kind of get a glimpse of that. If you go to the website and that is enchanted Forest Richmond, TX dot com. Enchanted Forest Richmond, TX dot com. Go buy there,

check it out and you'll see what I'm talking about. Our phone number if you would like to us a call with some sort of a question you might have about a plant or having success with a plant on garden line seven one three two one two k t r H seven one three two one two k t r H. Ciena Mulch is our go to place here on garden line for any kind of soil based products down in Siena, Texas. So if you go down to Sienna, it's north of Road Sharon. It's on FM

five twenty one. That's the easiest way FM five twenty one, near where Highway six and two eighty eight come together. Cienamultch is open Monday through Friday from seven thirty in the morning till five Saturday seven thirty two. Closed on Sunday. They'll be back open again first thing in the morning. And I think when you go there, you will agree with me that it is one

of the well stocked, neatest places that you're going to ever see. They're going to have things like, for example, they carry heirloom soils, Veggian nermex They have Vegi nerm mix there. They have high quality mulches, high quality bed mixes. What do you want to grow, They've got a bed mix to put it in. Do you want to do some stone? Maybe you want to create a dry creek bed for drainage away from the property. Maybe you want to get some flagstones to create a little patio area. They've

got that every kind of stone. You can imagine things we never even dreamed existed. And when you say I need some patio flagstone, they're going to say which one because they got about seven of them different kinds of flagstone. Maybe more than that. I just know there's a lot when I go visit. Everything you need to make your plants thrive. Remember on garden Line I talk about brown stuff before green stuff, right, brown stuff the soil.

They've got all the soil blends you need. Plus they have every fertilizer I talk about on garden Line. So everything you need to set the stage, the foundation, the soil. The success of plants is there at Ciena Mulch. Check them out, go buy there cienamultch dot com website. I'll help you find them, phone numbers and everything else you need. Ceenimulch dot com super quality products and super friendly people too. By the way, we're going to now go out to Sugar Line, Texas and talk to Bill. Hello,

Bill, good morning. I called you before about my sago palms with with yellow spots on the leaves, and the apps and salts has solved the problem looks great. Now I have clouds of white flies in my viburnum, which is about eight feet tall and real bushy, and I'm calling to see what should I spray with to kill the white fly. Well, there are

a number of insecticides that will kill white flies. If you wanted to go with a little more organic type approach, using a horticultural oil, spray upward from underneath the plant so as to coat the bottom sides of the leaves. I will kill any larva and pupa larva or pupa that are on the leaf and not killed the adults flying around. So you can do that and stay with that you can also use a number of insecticides. Products like acifate, which is our theene, for example, will kill white flies. A lot

of things will kill white flies. The problem is that when you do, you kill their enemies, and you end up with a rebound of white flies. I'm gonna have to take a break here for the news. Bill, will you hang on and I want to finish this discussion because there's a few more things that'd like to share with you about. There'll be fine, yeah, And when we come back, we'll be back with Bill and Flint out in Santa Fe. You'll be right afterwards, Baard line with us. We're

gonna jump right back into the phones here. I believe we were in the middle of a conversation with Bill and sugar Land about white flies. So Bill, the thing I just want to point out is that I've watched a lot of people try to spray and control white flies, and then it's like you get on a treadmill. When you kill all the things that eat the white flies, now they're all your job to manage, and so you end up

spraying more to keep controlling them. I'm not saying don't spray. I'm just saying to be aware that when when you take out the natural enemies, that is a problem. Oftentimes white flies may have a flare up, but then there's things will settle down as their natural enemies kind of bring things a little more into balance. So that is also a possibility. You may you know,

maybe you wait and wait and you're not seeing that happen. But if it were mine, I would do everything I could to avoid spray in and if I had to, then any good insecticide of synthetic periphthoids for example, are going to be effective against the white flies. Okay, you mentioned spraying with the oil underneath the leaves, how how is that done? And what

kind of oil? Horticultural oil, not Dorman oil. So you get you get a horticultural oil, and you're going to be able to find you know, you're done in sugar Land, whether you go down to one of the enchanted nurseries down southwest from you, you've got some really good ace hardware source and the Sugarland you're right next to Southwest fertilizer business Renwick. I would turn over there and just say I need a horticultural law and they'll understand. They

know that they've ever sween their oils and stuff. Here's the way that works, though, is the white flies lay eggs that hatch out into larvae that then become pupa, and the people look like little tiny fish scales under the leaf. So if you looked and you see these little flecks that are the size of a lowercase typed o, that's a white fly pupa in a plant that's invested with wildflies. That's what the pupa look like. And the oil

coats them and smothers them just like it would do scale. Now you want to it early in the morning. You don't want to put oil out when it's sun blazing down ninety five degrees and whatnot. You burn plants like that. But and also coverage is critical because well it's not a poison. So to the degree you coat every underleaf surface is the degree you're going to shut

down that those two stages of the whitefly. Yeah, it seems like it would be difficult to spray on the underside of the leaves because if this is a real bushy plant and I can hardly get to the imperior, well in that case, then it's just not going to be practical. Tell me remind me, did what type of plant did you say it was? I burn them, burn them. You know, another option it would be to put a systemic in there, like something that can contains a meddo cloprid or dinotepheron,

And I'll spell those out if you want me to. You, Yeah, I am, I am, I d O c l O p are id. So I'm gonna it's spelled like it sounds, and I'll sound it out. In mid dough clow prid, in mid dough glow prid, and drench it on the soil. It's taken up by the roots and it goes through the plumbing and things that suck the juice is out of the plant, like white flies and soft scales, for example. They're at that poison and it kills them. It makes the plant of bait station in a sense.

Okay, So you just want to remove any blooms that might form. There's several different types of I burn them. Some of them we see the balloons on them, and you don't want bees and butterflies coming until next summer, because yeah, I've never seen any many blooms. I've never seen any blooms. So then I'm gonna take back some of the other things I said, and just suggest that I think that would be your best approach to these Okay, okay, And how about well, if it's a systemic we're going to

have these big rains coming, should I wait until Wednesday or so? You know, I would. Uh. You're just wanting to wet the surface of the soil, not the surface, but a few inches down so the roots pick up the product and you don't have to spoil far and wide. You follow the label. The label will tell you exactly how to do it. There are is another product. If you end up going into Southwest Fertilizer, Bob or just tell them, tell them what we talked about, and that

there is another product, the one that's dino teferon. Just think of dinosaur. That's how it starts off. Uh, And it also works for this. But they may, they may, they probably have both of them. Okay, excellent, Okay, all right, sir. I really appreciate your health. Thank you very much. You bet, you bet, Bill, thank you. I appreciate your call very much. Let's see here. Why don't we run out now to Santa Fe, Texas and talk to flint Hey Flint Hey, Hey, My question for you is, I've got a garden.

It's about forty by fifty is in size, and we've been planting there for many, many years, and it's got to be a bowl. Well, I elected to bring in some sand to raise the level up, and now I'm having real trouble getting anything to grow there. What would you recommend as to add to it to maybe help the nutrients for the garden, or what should I do? So about how many inches of sand do you think you brought in? Ooh? I would say at least six to eight inches? Oh wow, okay, a lot. And it truly was sand,

not sandy loam or top soil. Least I bought half and half. It was half and half. It had quite a bit of clay in it. Okay. The first thing I'd do is the plants that aren't doing good, I would go pull one up here and there and look at the root system, get a shovel underneath it, kind of shake it so you don't break all the roots off when you pull it up, and look for nematod symptoms on those roots. Nematods love sandy conditions and they that since it was doing

okay, and then you did this and now things aren't growing. I would check that first, just to make sure, because if you have that, you need to deal with those. But assuming that's not the problem, I would get a high quality compost material. It could be a bed mix like a veggie and herb mix, or it could just be a finely screened quality compost and you can just run. Basically, all you have to do is run across the street to see in a mold, so they're not far from

you and they have it. They'll deliver within twenty miles. If you want a bulk a delivery of it, or you can go get it with a trailer, or you can pick up bags of stuff. But I would get a quality compost, put it about. I'd put it two inches deep, maybe a little deeper and mix it in as deeply as you can to try to add a lot of organic materials into that well. I think that will

be enough to help things do better. There are a lot of reasons plants would might not be growing, from droughty conditions to poor drainage, which I don't think you have that uh, to certain kinds of root diseases, the particular species of plant, and the season that it's in like, for example,

broccoli in this heat is not going to be very happy. So there's a lot of reasons plants wouldn't do well, but for a whole bunch of different species to not be doing well, it come sounds like, you know, you planted this whole garden and a lot of it is just not doing good. That's probably okay. Yeah, it's everything comes up like I'll get everything coming up and everything looks like it takes off really good, and it just like it fizzles out. They just like run out of gas. And

there we were just concerned. Yeah, yeah, I was gonna says around the guess, let's dig one up. Let's look at the roots. If you see it and you're not sure what you're seeing, get your camera, takes pictures of it, and call back in here to guarden line and you can send me pictures of the plants, the samples showing look at this sick plant, what's what's going on. Here's a picture of the roots or whatever. And I'll be happy to take a look and maybe i'll see something that's

not occurring to me as we're talking about it. Okay, And what was the name of the place, you said for the for the soil Sienna Mulch Bienna mulch okay, and where they at of well there they're in Siena, Texas, heying. I'm gonna give your dress. I don't have the actual location. They are A ninety six fifteen FM five twenty one, so they're they're nearbur Highway six and two eighty eight come together north of Rose, Sharon.

If you go to here's the website cienamultch dot com. Go there and there you can learn all about everything you need to know from where they are, that the phone number and everything else. All Right, I'm all right, sounds good. I appreciate it. Yeah, thanks, appreciate the call. Flin all right, we're going to take a quick commercial break seven one three two one two kt RH. I'll be right back. Yes today, you know, the hurricane's coming looks like it's kind of bending over, making

a little bit of a b line for our direction. So the good news in that as you get some rain, we hope we do. The bad news is we don't need the wind. That is for sure. If you are wanting to do any kind of a treatment to your lawn. The thing about rainfall is you don't know how much is going to occur. So if you're going to put down a fertilizer that's not a slow release, then it

could easily dissolve and wash away if we get excessive amounts of rain. If it's just an inch, well then that's perfect, but you know who can predict exactly how much you're going to get. If it's a slow release, it tends to stay in place unless you just literally get so much water sheeting across the lawn that it picks up the particles and carries them away. That's the nice thing I like about slow releases. It gradually releases, that it

doesn't just dissolve away in water. The other thing to keep in mind about all of that is if you put on a pesticide, the same kinds of things can happen. And so I would recommend letting this rainfall get by, just so we know where we are, because otherwise, you know, I get the calls that like, hey, I put it on such and such and I got three inches of rain or three and a half inches of rain, and do I need to reapply it? And that's always a tough call

because whether it's a weed killer or insect side or fungicide. Usually you would have to reapply it, but not always, and so it's I would rather just wait once we get past this hurricane. Let's put that down now. And that'll include things like Nitrofoss bug Out Max. That is Nitroposs's product for

insect control in the lawn. It's a granule. You put it out and then you want a little water on it to hit those granules and wash that insecticide off the granule and into the surface area of the soil that that and the runners in that zone right there. It's very effective. It works on a lot of things. If you've got ants and fleas, do you know fleas have a larval stage that lives in your lawn. So when that larva becomes a pupa and then an adult, the adult jumps on your dog when

it's heading back inside, and there we go. Well, nitro Foss bug Out Max will help control that. It also works well on chinchbugs too, by the way, which we're getting into chinchbug season, we're just waiting to see when we're actually going to have the outbreak. If we do have an outbreak this year, which many years we do, and You can get all these products from nitrofaus at ACE Hardware stores. For example. You know, there's what forty Ace Hardware stores in the Greater Houston area, so it's not

hard to find them. Nitropous bug out Max is widely available at ACE Hardware. And while you're at Ace Hardware, you're going to find all the other things that you need. You know, when you've got to. When you got forty stores in an area and it's easy to get to, it's just a no brainer sense that whatever you need to for inside the house but also outside you know, your patios, your lawns, your gardens, fertilizers, pesticides, herbicides, do you need to quote control fire ants? Do you

need to manage other pests in the garden? Ace Hardner's got it. They've got the equipment you need. A sprayer, for example. They can get you fixed up with that and they know how to do it, and they're so easy to find that it just makes it a no brainer. They also have mosquito products, like a repellent or like maybe a fogging machine. And they also have and this is one that I think everybody, just if you live in the Greater Houston area. Let's just say all the south east Texas

you need to have on hand some mosquito dunks. Mosquita dunks you may have heard. I had Bill from Summit Solutions on the other day on the show Some Responsible Solutions. It's a little doughnut about side of one of those little white dusted powder sugar little debbies kind of deals, you know, about that size. You throw it on to a body of water, It floats, It lasts about a month, and it covers about one hundred square feet of

water, releasing a disease that only affects the mosquitoes in your pond. It also works, by the way, on fungus gnats, and so you can buy it also by granule, buy little bits of mosquito bits, and you just toss a few of those around the surface of a plant where you're having problems with fungus gnats and watered in and then now the disease is in the surface of the soil, and fungus gnats eat that moldy stuff at the surface of the soil that's kept too wet, and it'll get them. It works

well. Mosquito dunks are widely available too. You're gonna find them at all the ace hardware stores. As I said, you can find them also at independent nurseries and feed stores. Not hard to find. Go ahead and grab some. Have them on hand. If you don't have the granule and you need some little pieces, just take a dunk and a hammer and break it up into little pieces and use it that way. Toss it up in that gutter that's sagging you haven't gotten around to fixing yet, but it holds water

and breeze mosquitos. Toss them into a bird bath wherever they're standing water. Mosquito dunks, you're not going to get a better way to control them. And listen the birds, the beneficial insects, the butter, you know, the the gosh I just went blanket, Oh your pets, your cat and your dog, and know everything like that wildlife. They won't hurt any of that. They're not a disease of anything but mosquito. Larva and fungus not larva. That's what mosquito dunks do. So that makes it real easy.

Yep. You gotta keep those on hand. Got to keep them on you because you never know when you're gonna After this hurricane goes through, you're gonna need them. We're gonna have some rain, they're gonna be some puddles and things like that. We're listening to garden Line and I'm your host, Skip Richter, and we're here to answer your gardening questions. Give us a call if you'd like to visit. Seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy

four. Seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy four. We're coming close to our break and so you may need to get on the board and when we come back, we'll answer your questions as well. If you haven't been to RCW Nursery, you need to run out there. RCW Nursery has an outstanding selections and an unbelievable self. It ends today. Listen. RCW

opens at ten o'clock when garden Line is over. RCW opens twenty five percent off Cajun hibiscus, I love my Cajun hibiscus, fifty percent off select roses, fifteen percent off all citrus trees, ten percent off all the trees in general, and boy did they have an excellent selection of trees that grow ore. Go to Rcwnursries dot com. They're the garden center that's there at Tamba Parkway to forty nine where it connects with Beltweight eight. Easy to get to

and lots of good stuff. Today's the last day of that sale, so from ten o'clock today you got to get over there and get to the best on all those things. Jar it just watching many things to set again, not a sign. All right, let's get going again here. We're entering our last hour of garden line this weekend. Be done by ten o'clock. Remember a garden line. For those of you who aren't familiar, haven't been listening for a while. I know a lot of you been listening for a

very long time. But if you're not, we start at six am and go to ten am on Saturday and on Sunday mornings, and you can call in and ask whatever kind of gardening question you would like. We're here to help you have a more bountiful garden, a more beautiful, a beautiful landscape. And that's what's all about. So give us a call of seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy four seven one three two one two five eight seven four. Well let's see here. We're going to go straight out

to the phones and talk to Mike and Brenham. Hello, Mike, Hey skip now you don't I appreciate the callback? Sure's u Uh? You sent me an email to I can give you a call back on the ground on the email I sent you yesterday on the what I thought was Johnson grass and my my courtyard. Okay, yes, I'm uh. Did you have a pick? Was there a picture? Yeah, there was a picture with this. So let me let me get that opened up here in front of me so I can comment on it. Okay, you had you had a couple

of different kinds of weeds. There's not johnsngrass in the picture. Uh. Okay, hold im just saying you sent me more than one picture, didn't you? I sent you to All right, let me get get here where I can them the little weed with the tiny leaves, the mouseier looking leaves on it. It's a warm season. It's a warm season annual, and

it's just one we have to deal with in the gardens. Leaf flower is one of the names for it. But you can do one or two things if you just have a little of it here and there, just hand pulling them getting them out of there as the simplest. If you have to spray it you're gonna have to use a broad leaf we control product. And the danger with those is when the temperatures are above the mid eighties, which the mid eighties already today, so the the products can stress your Saint Augustine and

really really weaken it. And so I would you know, there's a product called Celsius that is not as bad. You still you want to use it earlier this morning, coolest time of the day. Yeah, but that'd be the one you'd use for it. The other I see these nuts edges in the lawn, and then I see some other grasses. There's more than one type. Looks like orchard grass, but it came in with the sod. It just really disappointed me when it came out. But yeah, no kidding,

no kidd. So you've got at this point this is a serious infestation. And I would you could just mow and ignore them and just do the watering and fertilizing and mowing regularly to help your sod. If you mow, the sod's going to get light. If you don't mow often enough, these weeds come up above the sod grass and shade out your Saint Augustine. So you gotta regularly, so the get light the well St. Augustine crowded out

or in time. But what's happened is there was a lot of gaps in there and where sunlight hits the soil, the seeds come up, and so that's what's happening. So too. Two ways just to cut to the chase on this MIC. You can mow regularly because it's an annual keep working on getting denser and denser Saint Augustine. Then next spring, follow my schedule at gardening with skip dot com. Okay, skip dot com the lawn weed disease

management schedule. That particular schedule tells you when to put the pre emerging out. And there's a producoal barricade that nitroposs makes you right, you know, follow the label very carefully, don't overapply it, don't underply it, make sure you water it in after you apply it. But anyway, the barricade will help prevent these from coming up next year, but it's not going to

kill the existing plants. The second option is to put a wiper applicator over the top of the lawn because these grassy weeds are coming up above the lawn right and so any kind of a sponge like applicator that has either a grass killer only or a glycys aid round the equivalent round up in it. It wiped over the top. It's going to get on those weeds and go down in and kill them and give you your mass a little bit better head start

than just mowing. Okay, I meant to tell you something yesterday that you might get a kick out of. I had. I got a beautiful white fresh peach tree that I had. The squirrels have written me off about two five years in a row when they're about half grown. This year, I took a paintbrush and painted a bonaro sauce in the trunk and at the base of large branches. I had a great crop this year. Really, the squirrels cannot handle the albanaro sauce. Well, I know they don't like the

heat on stuff they eat. I didn't know they wouldn't even crawl through it. That's they're not. They did not crawl through it. I was giving peaches away, all right, there you go. I'm not sure if Peter liked it, but well on, but then I think they get it on it. They get it up, Yeah, yeah, they get it on the on their paules, I think, and and if they lick it or you'll try to clean it off, it's but it kept them off the peach trees for about months. That's good. Good to know. Hey, Mike,

appreciate it. Hey, thanks a lot, take care you bet good luck with that. Yes, folks, remember wherever sunlight hits the soil, nature plants of weed. That's how it works. If you can just get that etched into the brain, then a lot of things make sense. I put in a flower bed and it's just full of weeds. Did you moultch the flower bed after you put it in? If you moltched it, those weeds coming from seed shouldn't have been able to come up. They can't.

They gotta have sunlight. When when a weed seed germinates, it's a tiny little baby plant that barely has a root and hardly has a leaf on it. And if that's in a shaded environment, it's gonna die before it ever gets established. And that's why mulching is so important. And we got all these quality mulches available here in the Houston area, we ought to take advantage

of them. They're excellent. They work, They absolutely work out. If you've got a weed that's like a perennial like nut sedge or bermuda grass. Well, there's probably three options for when you have a major nuts edge or bermuda grass infestation. First option would be to call your realtorn move. That's the easiest way to get rid of all of it, and that's option one. Tongue in cheek. Option two, hand dig it. Oh, you

don't hear that. But if you get all the nuts, all the rhizomes from bermuda grass, all the nuts from nutsedge out and you may have to rehand dig because you're not gonna get it all, they're gonna break off, but you can get it out that way. That would be an organic, no spray way. And the third is spray spray. It was something that will kill that weed. There's things that kill nutsedge and other sedges and kaylinga. There's things that kilber metographs that work. But those are the three options

really. First one being kind of a joke, but seriously, getting ahead of things is so important. If you wait until the weeds are well established, it takes all the fun out of gardening because you're out there in hot weather, the fire ance are crawling up your arms, while you're pulling weeds. It's just no fun at all. Right, get ahead of it. Avoid it. What if they say a stitch in time will save nine boy, I need to come up with a horticultural version of that, because that

is absolutely true. The earlier you start, the better off you are. I say this about insects all the time. If you want to use the least toxic ways to control insects, you need to be doing that when the insects are very young. Bet On young caterpillars is deadly by the time they're old enough to just about go into a PUPA not very effective, if not nearly as effective at that stage. And with stink bugs, the things we can do when they're in the nymph stage are much better than the things when

they're in the adult stage flying around. That's just basically what I'm trying to tell you. Hey, we're going to take a little break here. I'll be back with some more of that. Our phone number is seven one three two one two five eight seven four. Or if you liked a da by letter KTRH what once was forbidden? What did you say we now encourage? Don't you talk back to me? You now have permission to don't talk back. Tap the talk back mike while listening to news Radio seven KTR on the

iHeartRadio app about today before we wrap things up. If you're up in the Montgomery area or Lake Conroe, that whole region, Ana Plants and Produce is your hometown garden center. They're just right there on the east side of Montgomery. When you go to Ana Plants and Produce, you're going to find all the kinds of plants you would need for your garden, for your life landscape,

and you're going to find an excellent selection of soils and fertilizers. Every fertilizer and soil I talk about here on Guardline is at A and A Plants and Produce. So it's a one stop shop organic synthetic. You can get it all right there. They have it right now. They've got a Hot July sale that's a good name for it. Takes thirty percent off of all the plants that you purchased there now Hot July cell. That would include all kinds of plant material, like maybe you want to put in a little gem

magnolia, maybe a Sunshine lagustrum. That's the lagustrium with the yellow leaves. On. It really sets itself apart in that sea of green that is our summer landscape. Loriopy agapanthus, many other shrives and shrubs and perennials, A and A plants and produce again. On Highway one oh five on the east side of Montgomery, easy to get to. And don't just drive by, I know, going up and down one to five all the time. Just pull in check it out. Today'd be a good day to do that.

We are going to now head to the phones and go to a task Asida to talk to Thomas. Hello, Thomas, good morning. Two quick questions. One overnight, there's tons of gnats on my figs of purple figs, and I've never had this problem before. I don't know what to do with it. I don't want to put a poison on them. Gnats on figs, I don't. I don't. They look like ant I don't know what they are, but they're really small. Yeah, I don't know a fig

pest that that's that description. So maybe they're there. Well, are they on other plant parts or just on the fruit? No, just on the on the on the fruit itself. A couple of years ago, I lost the green fig tree. Overnight there were these small, small boring insects just bordering into the trunken and in two days the thing died. That's unusual. Well this is not that for sure, right, I would wait and watch.

I don't see a need to do anything. I mean, if I guess, if you wanted to, you know, to apply like a soap spray early in the morning, before the sun comes out and starts baking down. You could probably knock most of them out with that. But in general, I think i'd wait and watch. There's not a fig pest I know of that. That's that description. Okay, great second question. I have three climbing plants in my ad my backyard. Most of them they're in the

chasmin family. They've got the white jasmin that look like little stars. I've got orange trumpets and I've got a red one and none of them are blooming right now. And I've got quality soil. They get said the right way. I'm using a great liquid. What's the sunshine level of where they're growing. It's abtinute, well, late morning and early it gets pretty sunny out there, but they can't take that much sun. No, they can.

They need they need somen. I think the trumpet orange trumpets is probably called trumpet vine. That is a common orange trumpet type vine we have here. Very vigorous too. By the way, the jasmine could be one of several different types, so some types may not be blooming right now, others might. I think just avoid overdoing the nitrogen. I would do that because that pushes a lot of vegetative growth. You'd rather them settle in a little bit. They're vigorous or not, both of those as it is. I can't

remember what the third vine you mentioned was. Was it? Did you say purple? No, it's red, bleeding hot red. Oh, bleeding heart, Yeah, bleeding Heart's a little persnickety here. I've had some problems with getting that thing to bloom. I'm using the Medina uh liquid, and I use it about every four weeks. I use about I'm doing roots feeding at two ounces of gallon. Okay, okay, whatever the label is on whatever product you pick. There's a number of Medina liquids. There's a has to

grow, there's has to grow lawn. There's super grow. Uh, there's super It's it's a Supergirl. I'm using Supergirl. Okay, that is that a hookup to a garden house. No, no, it's it's a quart or or a gallon. Okay, continue to do that, But just anything with a nitrogen content, I would hold off. So if it truly is the only super Girl I know has a hosing connector, I need to check on that see if there's another one. It might I might be I might.

Okay, But but Thomas, if you look at it and it has three numbers on it, then it's a fertilizer And if I got the first number is a little higher, let's hold off on that one. If it's just a matter like it has to grow, typically is not going to have a big fertilizer charge in it. It's got a lot of ncrogen is about six I think it is. I think that's that's not too much. But you might just hold off a little bit, and let's let's watch and wait.

Plenty of sunlight is essential for blooms on those plants. Good plant health. It sounds like you've got good plant health, right. The plant is healthy the healthiest can be. Yeah, So that's that's why I was thinking, maybe they're too healthy, Maybe they're just been pushed into vegetative state. Other than that time. Uh, and it should be some of those should be blooming by now for sure, so that that would be my suggestion for those. All right, I appreciate it. You have a great show.

Keep it up. Thank you, Thomas. Appreciate your call very much. Let's see where are we here? We're going to go now to James in Is it carry Wood James H. Kingwood, keenwood Wood. Yes, well, good morning, and uh, well I've noticed that beside my driveway and a couple of places, I had this little uh on my Saint Augustine grass. I just noticed this little brown dead spot and it almost seems to be spreading a little bit. And then I know it's another one, and so

I've got about three of them. I'm not sure if there's some kind of fungus or what. It's just uh, you know, it's just suddenly it just appears dead, you know, and then uh, it might be spreading a little bit. It's not going real real fast. But you know, I'm is there something I need to do with that? Or do you know what that could be? Is the sun or shade? And uh, how long ago did it start? It's it's you know, it's in the full sun and uh, and it started probably about two weeks, three weeks maybe

three weeks ago when it started going back south. Did it start by turning yellow and then eventually dying out or did you suddenly just have a very soon, almost sudden browning of that area almost just kind of all of a sudden, it's just brown. Yeah, it just kind of came up all of a sudden. It was a small place and one of them looks like it's getting a little bit bigger. Okay, I could take a look at it. If you don't send a picture in that may be the best thing.

If it's if it's sudden and it's brown, that makes me think about things that are maybe toxic to the foliage. So for example, of course this is not what your situation is, but some people have leaky lawnmowers, and so wherever it drops a little gas when you stop for a while. Now you got this dead spot. Well, that that's that very quick dead spot,

right. I don't think we have a couple of we have a couple of golden retrieve that have become very good at creating brown spots in our yard where they go to the bathroom because one has to go and then the other one has to come comment on what the first one did with its own. And so we just have all these little brown spots as a result of that, but that those are the kinds of things that would cause the fast browning it. Let's do this. I'm going to put you on hold and have

Chris pick up the phone and give you my email. And what we'll do if you'll send me some photos of the overall picture of the lawn, and then some up close in sharp focus. And when you send them, don't embed them in the text, but attach them using the little paper clip to the email attachment. Attach them to sure, and I'll be able to see

them better and take a look. And if you're if I see any if you get them soon, you know we're running out of time here, but we'll definitely be able to talk about them maybe next weekend, or if I have a thought, I may send that to you. Sure. I appreciate that, Thank you so much. All right, well, good luck. I appreciate the call of thank you. I really appreciate it. All right, take care, okay, bye bye. Yep. See, seems like

it's always something when it comes to our lawns and gardens and landscapes. There's a lot of things that can get in the way of success. And part of what I do is play Sherlock Holmes right. But what does that mean? That means basically, I get all the clues I can and I try to figure out who done it right, who done it? And so that's

what we're about to do here. Photos are good for that. By the way, for those of you who are For those of you who listen to Garden Line and want to know, well, how do I get you a photo? How do I send things to you? You can call the show and get an email to send that to I generally don't just give it out because there's six million people that live around Houston in our listening area, probably

more than that, and I can't even begin to answer emails. So what I do is I try to ask that you send me a picture with a description and then call the show and let's talk about it. And there's time to be able to do that. You can tell it pretty sure, Hey, I just sent a photo to him and we need to do that. I need to talk to him about it and we'll take care of it that way. But that's that's how I'd like to handle it to help as many people as I possibly can. It's time for us to take a little break

for the news. The phone number if you'd like to call for as we move into the next segment seven one three two one two kt r H seven to one three two one two k t r H. And we'll be right back here in just a second with more of your gardening questions and Mike and Hockley, you will be the next one up Old Houston's News. Why they're traffic plus Breaking News twenty four to seven. This is use Radio seven forty kt r H Everywhere avoids IRF. More of what's happening now from the John

Morris Services Studios barrel on its way. I'm sure, Lewis. It's nine thirty on News Radio SEVENH. Welcome back to guard Line. Good to have you with us today, that is for sure. Listen, we were talking a while ago about has to grow and supergrow and different things like that. The Supergrow Plus that's a new product by Medina. It's part of the has to grow line. There's a regular has to grow, there's has to grow for lawns. There's now supergrow Plus. This is a green bottle green label.

It hooks up to a garden hose and it's a sixteen zero two fertilizer, so a part of that sixteen percent nitrogen is slow release. But then the thing that I think is really helps make this effective. In addition to the fact that it's got good nutrients and a low phosphorus number, which is very helpful, it is that it has also contains molasses which stimulates beneficial microbe activity in the soil, humic acid, which we know is good. That's

humic acid from leonardide is in this product. And then it also has a iron that's in a keylated form so that the soil doesn't just tie it up like it has your other iron. You probably have enough iron in the soil. The plants just can't get it. So when you put this to your garden hose and what are your plants with it, you're going to get it into those plants. You're going to get into the root system there where it can take it up. Seaweed extract also present in Supergrow Plus. It's one

of the many products from Medina and that work. And although it is sold primarily as something you'd put on your lawn, you can look it up to a garden hose and spray your flower bedch, your shrubs, your herb gardens. I mean, whatever you want to spray with. It's going to work. I've seen pictures of someone that did it on their tomatoes and oh my gosh, really good results from Medina has to grow supergrol plus. Just remember

souper grow plus from Medina and the green label. That's what we're looking for. I mean, head out now to Hockley, Texas and talk to Mike. Hello, Mike, how you doing. I'm well, Thank you good, great question. I had some hydrangeas on mutual them. Am I supposed to dead head the spent blooms or just let them fall off? You can do it either way. They're gonna dry and be kind of tan colored there, and so you know, if you don't like the look of it,

just deadhead them, take them out of there. Uh it. It really can can go either way. It doesn't have to be done, but you can. So if I dead head them, will that make them bloom again quicker? Or on a hydrangea they're probably not setting many viable seat in there, so I don't see a lot of energy going in to that point, I would just say, you're for good bloom production. You just want good nutrition in the soil and consistent so of moisture. Don't let them dry out

for a period of time. Hodringes are not built for that. Okay, good enough, there's my answer. I appreciate it, all right, thank you. I appreciate that too. Good luck with those. Let's run, let's see, let's run out to Pearland and talk to Pat. Now, Hello, Pat, Hi, I have what was gorgeous high viscus tall plant and it was producing really pretty coral of flowers, and then all of a sudden it's not and there's like a white dust on it, and I cut

several of the branches. I didn't know what it was, but it just keeps coming and now it's flowering very well at all. Is this I didn't know if is this tropical discus or is this the perennial hibiscus. You know, honestly, I really don't know. Okay, Well, let me that's okay. Let me. Let's do it this way. When you look at the blooms are the size of a dinner plate, and they're either pink or red or white, or are they smaller, furlier, with a lot of

other colors. Uh. Yeah, I've got two high discus plants. You know. One of them is like the size of the dinner plate, but this one is just thrilly and smaller. That's the tropical. It's leaves are going to be a little darker green usually uh, and sometimes a little bit not shiny, but a little slicker. The other ones are very dull, not colored leaves that are much larger on the perennial. So uh, if it stops, if it stops blooming, well it's going to be due to

some stress. I have some in a half whiskey barrel sized container, and if I forget to water them for a while, bloom production goes down. If I start watering again, bloom production comes back up. Good nutrition is important. The white on the leadens sounds like powdery mildew. That's about the only thing I know that creates a white kind of almost a dusty looking white surface on the leaves. Would that be how you would describe it? Yeah,

you know it's on the branches too. Yes, mostly it's on the branches, and it is on some of the leaves, but mostly it's on the branches. I thought it was like a worm at first, but it's not. When I think you do it, I think you're seeing mealy bugs. Let's do this. Let's not we guess and waste your time and money. I'm going to put you on hold. Chris will send you an email.

I need some good close up, sharply focused pictures that show it as close as you can get, and also one of the overall bush, and then attach them using the paper clip attachment for the email, as opposed to embedding them like cutting and pasting them into the text. So attach them and I'll take a look at it and we'll find a way to get you some help on this one. All right, thank you, all right, Pat

appreciate that very much. You know, I've been been doing garden advising from being a Agrolife Extension horticulture agent for thirty five years with Texas A and m Agrolife Extension, and now then I did radio and college station for a long time, and then now radio in Houston area. And in all of that, one thing I've learned is as someone describes something and I picture it,

it's not always the same thing. And I'm not you know, it may be the fault of the describer or the fault of the listener me not picturing or to conclusions, which I try not to do. Uh. And oftentimes I'll get a question and then I take a look at things. It's like, oh, yeah, well that's such and such. But my brain was going in a different direction when I was talking to the caller. And so that's why I do like to see photos. It just makes it better.

And gosh, you don't need to go out and buy stuff you don't need and waste your time and money applying it. We need to get you the right stuff. So that's what we aim for. Hey, we've got one more break here and then one last segment before we wind things up at ten o'clock. If you'd like to give us a call two to one three, two to one two excuse me, seven to one three two one two KTRHL be right back. Thanks, welcome back to Ouardline. Good to have you

with us, Great to have you with us. As a matter of fact, listen, we've been hearing the hurricane, the hurricane, the hurricane. Okay, we know we're gonna get wins, we know we're gonna be dealing with that, but listen, hurricane season starts in June goes through November. We're gonna have other storms, and there'll be storms that aren't hurricane related, like the one that knocked out power a few weeks ago, devastating to our

trees. You need to give a call to Martin spoon Moore at Affordable Tree and just have him come out and take a look at your trees. See what might be needed. Do they need pruning? Is there are there some dead limbs up there that need to come out, some narrow angle branches that have no good future. As far as being storm worthy, do everything you can. I cannot express enough the importance of proper treecare coming into this storm

season. It doesn't even have to be a hurricane, of course. Call Martin spoon Moore seven one three six nine nine twenty six sixty three, or go to the website Afftree Service dot com. Tell him you're a guardenline listener.

Martin stays busy because he does a good job and he has been for a very long time, and people know that his customers come back and so tell him your guardline listener, get up toward the front of the line so he can schedule a time to come out and do that for your trees again the phone number seven one three six' nine nine twenty six sixty three. Whatever kind of tree work you need, from pruning to deep roof feeding to

planting, proper training of shrubs or as trees as they're getting started. Martin does all of that, including advising you. You know you got to put a trench in near a tree. Oh my gosh, do not do that until you call Martin, have him look at it and advise you on what to do. And he knows how to handle that kind of thing. Makes it easy. We're going to now run out to clear Lake City, I believe, and talk to Mark. Hello, Mark, good morning, sir.

This may be one of the questions that's not a stupid question, but it's a stupid person asking it again with respect to I can no longer use my alias of Steve. You blew it for me a while back with Saint Augustine runners if they are if left unattended, just merciless it across the sidewalk or and anything get into flower beds and stuff like that. Can you pull those and scratch a shallow trench and lay them lay it in the trench fill

it up with dirt water and expect it to actually produce grants. Yes, yes, you want to do that. I would do it in the morning where the grass isn't already stressed, and maybe a little at a moisture deficit. Uh, and then get them in the new location, water them in really well and that'll be fine. You just have the water pretty often for a little while, just to make sure they have plenty to keep them adequately moist But yeah, you okay, Well, wasn't expecting a good answer like

that, but thank you very much. Yeah. Yeah, that's what we call catch and release. Augustine. Thanks take care or something you take care. Appreciate the call mark. Yeah, thanks a lot. Uh. If you can't as native plants in the Heights, they're on Eleventh Street and the Heights and you've probably been there before you can. Is just an outstanding place to visit. They specialize in native plants, but they don't just have nati

plants. They have everything. One of the best houseplants selections I've seen anywhere. For example, plants for shady areas, plant of flowers for sun, vegetables and herbs and fruit trees and all kinds of things. Buchanans Native Plants in the Heights something I thought about. They had to post the other day their social media which you ought to follow them. You also ought to get their newsletter. You can sign up for that on the website. The website

is Buchanansplants dot com. They have a thing on rain gardens, and here we come with more rain. I mean there're like nine inches in some areas and on down to little or nothing. But when you get too much water and that area stays soggy and it's kind of slow to get dry, well, you can install subservice drainage, have someone come out and do all that. Or you can turn lemons in a lemonade by picking some plants out at

Buchanans that love what condition and such as a Louisiana iris for example. That's a good example. A button bush can take that kind of thing, and there's many many others. Cannons can help you pick out the plants to do well. So take that area that occasionally is a little too wet for too long and plant something that can take it, or maybe even that loves it. There Cannons, for example, do you know cannis can grow in standing

water? They can. So if you've got an area it takes a while to drain, that's kena heaven, you can put it right in there. Pappers plant or various sedges and things, lots of good options. If Buchanans has those Buchanansplants dot com on a least East eleventh Street in the Heights. Well let's see here, we are getting a little short of time here for a call. If we got a quick one, real quick, we can probably get to it. But otherwise I'm going to just discuss a few things

that I've been wanting to get to and talk about today as well. Remember when you're putting a new plant in, give it adequate water in small doses to the area where the container was, and don't stop planting just because it's summer. The morning times are cool. First of all, the sun's not up very far and you get a lot of work done without shining on you. It's still cool. You can water a plant in and if you just give it regular water, take a little extra care of it, you can

keep it going. Remember we have three months of summer left. We got July, we got August, and we got September. For those of you who've moved here from further north. September is a summer month in Texas, especially in this part, and so what are you going to have for color until it gets late enough in the season where we start to put in cool season color. Why not plant something now? Many plants. Your garden centers

that we talk about here on garden Line are just outstanding. Welcome to the Houston area for those of you who moved here from out of state, by the way, and you are in a place with more great gardening options than any place I've seen, North, South, East, West, and central whell great garden centers here in the Houston area that have plants that right now could go to your landscape and give you easily three months of color to carry you on through that season. Let's do that. Let's not have a sea

of green. Let's break it up. Let's keep things flowing and rolling out in the garden so we can enjoy that. And you know, for those of us who are gardeners, we need our facts, right. I mean, you just got to get out, you got to enjoy, you got to get your hands in the dirt. There is a therapy to that. And I say that and I know sometimes when I go, you know, gardening is good for your health and stuff, people are like, Okay, come on, man, but it is. There's the physical activity, and

we have so many ways that we can help as people get older. Maybe a kneeling bench would be a good gift to help with that. It's helped meet a garden with les pain. I'll tell you that for sure. You can sit on the seat, or you can flip it over and kneel down on it. That's just an example. Ergonomic gardening tools, raised gardening beds so you don't have the stupid as far to get down to the plants. Many many ways to keep gardening going. But gardening is good for your health.

It's physical activity. But I think the best part of all is just the way it feeds your mind and your soul. The peace that you get as you get out in the garden. You're working in the soil, you're dealing with nature, You're enjoying seeing things grow. You're getting healthy produce and wonderfully smelling flowers to bring into a vase indoors. That is good for the soul. It really really does work. And I'm serious about that, and

I've talked to people that do research in this many times over. Doctor Charlie Hall at Texa A and M University is a leader in that field. And the number of trials, the number of studies that have been done is amazing. Kids in school with ADHD issues seeing plants out the window makes a difference in their test scores. Seriously, people that are in a hospital recovering from surgery. The difference between looking out a window at a parking lot and another

building versus looking out a window at a forested area and nature area. Things like that absolutely just wonderful, absolutely wonderful, huge differences, and those are the differences you'll enjoy too. And when you give the gift of garden, when you take a child out and teach them the garden and grow things, and you're setting them off to a life of healthier eating and certainly a peace

of mind. I'm telling you Nature has a way of doing that. And there's so many ways that that is happening that some parts of the area they talk about forest Baby and just walk through nature and enjoy that. However you go about it, enjoy it. There's garden centers right now that are your therapy centers. Therapy centers that are waiting for you to come out and walk among the planets. Hey, have a good rest of your weekend and a great week. We'll see you again next weekend. You're on guard.