Try New Things

Kat r H Garden Line does not necessarily endorse any of the products or services advertised on this program. Welcome to kt r H Garden Line with Skip Richter's crazy trim. Just watch him as we may give teas the suprasy gas bag not a sign India gas You well, good Sunday morning, and I'd like to be the first to wish you happy Daisy Day. Yes, today is National Daisy Day. Well, uh, that's a cause for celebration. I hope you're planning a party at your house and gathering all your gardening friends.

Hey, you're listening to garden Line. I'm your host, Skip Richter, and we're here to answer gardening questions. That's what this is all about. If you would like to ask a question, give us a call. Seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy four seven one three two one two five eight seven four. Boy, the elephant in the room this week has been the rain. It has rained, and it has rained and has range.

It's rained a lot. I was telling yesterday, I was talking to folks up at Anti grosing Forium up north, just north of Brunham and Independence, and they had fourteen inches a lot of folks around. Even as you go a little south of Houston, we're in the five six some some places four inches of rain. That's a lot of rain. It's a lot of rain. And whenever we have a lot of rain, well, we have

a problem with standing water. Plants don't like wet feet. Now, there are a few plants that can take soggy soil conditions, but most plants want good drainage, or they do best with good drainage. And so when that

happens, you got to do something to fix it. And I put a Facebook post on garden Line Facebook if you if you haven't, if you don't follow garden Line on Facebook, you ought to just just go hun us down at garden Line and put a post up about five things that you can do when you have poor drainage in an area, and one of them is to have somebody come in and re route that water fix the problem. There's a

number of ways we can do that. You might have down spouts that are pouring all the water into this one spot where it tends to stand, and you can look up things at the bottom of the down spout to redirect that water. You can move the water directly from the down spout into an underground drainage pipe. Something like a French drain can also be used where you have

perforated pipe in a wet area and it works opposite. Some of you remember how the old septic systems worked, where you know, the sewer the equivalent of the sewer went out into what they call a drain field or a leech field, and there were pipes with holes in it and it leaks out into the soil out in that area. So you're moving the water from inside the house out into the soil in the field or in the area around the home.

Well. A French drain works the opposite of that same setup. You've got pipes with holes in them, but this time it's taking the water that's standing there and it seeps down into the drain and then drains out to a lower spot. And pierce scapes can do that for you. Pear scapes can do pretty much anything you need to do in your landscape, but they're very good at taking an area that's wet and finding a way to drain that water away. You can redirect water, or you can drain the water that's gathering

there, and pier scapes can do exactly that. Some of your properties, though you have a low area and there's no area that's lower to drain it to, you know, to have it go into a pipe in the ground, it's got to go off somewhere where gravity can take it to a lower area. And if you don't have that, pier Scapes can come in. They put in a little box with a pump that whenever water. When that box fills with water, physically pumps it out even uphill off to another area

where it gets it off your property. And however you want to go about it, just let them come in. Don't delay on this. I guarantee you right now, a lot of people are going, hey, folks, help me with the drainage. Get an appointment. Call them up at two eight one, three, seven fifty sixty. While they're out there, you can also ask them take a look at irrigation systems to set up a time to come do that. You probably have some broken irrigation heads here and there,

misaligned heads, just systems that aren't designed well. Unfortunately, way too many irrigation systems are really inefficiently designed, and Pierce Caapes can fix that. Of course, they do a lot of other things go on the website Piercescapes dot com. Piercescapes dot com. I want you to take a look at some of the jobs that they've done on outdoor patios and barbecue areas and outdoor lighting. It's an outdoor water feature. They can do it all there at

Puerscapes. Right now, the name of the game is how do you get rid of water? All right? Well, you know, in agriculture, if you're farmer, rancher, and certainly in gardening too, it seems like we're either complaining about too much water or not enough water. You know, it's like, oh, it's so dry and rained in ages. And then now we're going really, I mean, are we going to have fourteen inches

of rainfall? What are we going to do with that? I would like to put thirteen of them in a big bucket and draw from that in July and August when we definitely will need it. But unfortunately we don't have that option to be able to be able to do just that. Oh well, look at this weekend, we've been talking about all the rain. But did you see yesterday I was out at the in for Ben County at their Bresis home and garden show out there, and thanks to everybody that came out.

Boy, you guys wore me out. That a lot of questions and we had a really good time out there. But you know, you're out and about and the gardening fever is starting to hit people because we had a good day out there. By the way, it's a little bit of cloudy, but it wasn't rainy today. The sun is going to shine and that is the day to get outside and enjoy the garden. I hope this afternoon you'll consider getting out and getting just enjoys. Maybe just a walk through initially,

walk through the landscape, look at things. What do you want to change, Where do you need more color? This is a good thing to do sooner rather than later. What beds have just not performed. Maybe you need to spruce up the soil with some additional bed mix to raise that level up for better drainage, and to add all that additional composted material in the soil. You know, compost goes away, it eventually heads down toward humus, so you can have a nice let's say, have a bed a foot high.

It's not going to be a foot high two years from now or three years from now, it's just going to continue to oxidize down, so we're always sprucing it up. Maybe you've got areas where plants struggle in soggy conditions, and so the question to ask there is, well, why not some different plants? Why not something that likes to grow in a bog or a swamp. There are plants like that. That's another option. Maybe you have thought about gardening in terms of a vegetable garden, but you've never done it

before and you just kind of put it off. Why not this year, get you a bed like a vago bed or something, put it on the ground, fill a full of quality mix, and literally in a few hours you were ready to go in garden. I mean that is like quick turnkey right there. What new are you going to grow this year? What new plant? What new kind of gardening? Have you had a garden that you've never had trellises in and you'd like to bring things up vertically? What are

you going to do different this year? Let's talk about that some today. Hey, we're going to take a break right now and i'll be back, and our phone number in the meantime if you'd like to get on the boards is seven to one to three two one two fifty eight seventy four. Welcome back to garden Line. I'm your host, Skip Richter. Let's talk gardening. What's of interest to you? Give us? Call it seven one three

two one two fifty eight seventy four. I was just talking before break about trying some new things, and uh, at our house, whether we have been watching a lot of cooking shows. I don't know if you've I normally and not a watch cooking shows guy, but uh uh, you know, my wife and daughters and stuff are all into watching these various cooking shows,

and some of them are quite amusing. But one thing, the reason I'm bringing this up is it was a show that I won't mention specific shows, but where they were talking about decorating a plate and that you know, they use a little drizzles swinging back and forth across the plate and setting a little tiny flower pedal in a certain spot. It was quite amusing. Anyway, they're using flower petals and doing some decorating with it, and it just reminded

me that a lot of flower petals are edible. And so when you think about a salad, you know, do you want to just have iceberg lettuce, slice of cucumbers, slices of cucumbers, and maybe some chunks of tomato. Is that a salad? That's that's the salad I grew up with, But that's not the salad I eat now. Lots of wonderful, flavorful greens that can really flavor up that salad. And then you add things like edible flowers that have a really real beauty to them in it. It really stands

out. You can do, you know, pansies or an edible flour. There are squash blossoms from the vegetable gardener, an edible flour, there's a lot of them out there. But always when you're going to use a flour for a salad or for food, always make sure it hadn't been sprayed with a pesticide. You don't want to eat something that just got sprayed with a pesta side and so just kind of be a little careful with that. But colendula is another one. Plants for all seasons had a bunch of colendulas out

showing off there on their tables and it just reminded me about colndila. Colondila grows through the cool season. You can use it in fall, winter, and spring here, and it's primarily it's kind of like marigolds, and that it comes. By the way, Miragoles is another edible flower. It comes in orange and yellow blooms, and they're very attractive, but it really is. In fact, I believe pop marigold is one of the names for colendula, and I think about it, but it would it'd be very attractive.

So imagine you're creating a beautiful old flower. You're having a dinner at your house or something. You're creating a beautiful salad and adding a little bit of edible unusual things like that. How about making sure your garden always has some herbs and flowers and things that can be used for decoration. I enjoy doing that myself. I think it adds flavored, adds interest, and yeah, so speaking of plants for all seasons. It's one of those garden centers.

They're there just north of Luetta on Highway two forty nine. If you're going let's say you're heading up toward tom Ball, it's on the right hand side. You cross over Luetta and it's right there, and it's one of those garden centers that you go in and you know you're going to get service, and you know you're going to have knowledgeable folks, and you know you're going to get plants that belong here. Now, that combination, as I like

to say, that's worth the price of admission. I mean that to not go home with some plant that hasn't been taken care of, that it shouldn't need to be planted here. And then people that don't know what to tell you other than green side up. You know, there's a lot of these box stores and whatnot that are not really mom and pop garden centers, and sometimes the best advice you can get is well, put the green side up when you plant it. Well, that's not going to happen. At Plants

for All Seasons, they know what they're talking about. You can take pictures in there, say what's wrong with this plant? Or hey, I saw this in a neighbor's yard. Do you have any of these here? And they'll tell you. And they're going to carry a wide variety of things. It's just as easy as that. Go to Plants for All Seasons dot com or call them two eight one three seven six one six four six, and while you're out there, grab some of those edible colendulars. Do a little

search learn about some of the other flowers that are there. Today's theme is try something new. This is an exciting gardening season. I'm really pumped. I'm telling you. I'm sitting there and it's been raining all week, and I am on my computer. I'm looking at stuff, you know, just checking out this new thing here, or make a list of edible flowers to grow in the garden this year. I'm working on the plants that I have indoors, and I'm starting from seed a little. Tomato plants are up doing

pretty good right now. I've got some of about four inches high. I got leaves on them, and they're doing well. By the way, here's a tip. If you're going to grow vegetables indoors in a still air environment, you need to move them around to strengthen the stems. In nature, wind moves plants, and the bending and stretching and twisting makes the stems, whether it's a young tree's trunk or whether it is a new seedling, makes them stronger. And so my tomatoes and my peppers and other things that I'm

growing indoors about twice a day. However, many times I walk by. I'll just take my hands and with my fingers just sort of I don't know how to describe it, tickle the tops of the plants. Just wiggle them around. Brush your hands over the top and just bend them around a little bit. I mean, you don't have to, you know, manhandle them,

just move them around. Some people one of my daughters uses a little fan that oscillates, and as it goes by the plants, it moves the stem and then goes on and comes back as an oscillating fan, and that's what she uses to strengthen her stems. I just like to go out and pet the plants. So think about maybe growing some transplants yourself. But that's one way. Good life is absolutely first importance. But just moving the stems is one way you can do that. And if you want to be,

let's say, the horticultural cliff claven remember that guy from Cheers. If you're going to be the horticultural cliff Clavern of your neighborhood and among all your friends, write this down. Big mo morphogenesis, that's your nerd alert for the day. Big moo morphogenesis is a slow developmental change in a plant subjected to continuous mechanical stress. That's a fancy way to say when the plant, when

the plant bends, it gets stronger. Like we go work our muscles out right, you wear them out at the gym, and what happens, They get stronger and stronger plants the same mechanism in life, big mo morphogenesis. You can thank me later. Your friends will not appreciate me later, that's for sure. I was out by a Spring Creek feed store which is up in Magnolia on FM eight, stopping in and visiting with the folks there and Kelly and the others, and they have a great stock of all the fertilizers

I talk about they have. They also have a little bulk seed area where you can get scoops of seed, and those scoops of seed are the most economical way to buy seed. Seed packets are great. I buy seed package all the time. But if you're just looking for what is the most economical way to get seed, it's to go to a place a feedstore place like Sprint Creek Feed that has these little bulk containers and they have little tiny scoops

you buy hard money seed you want. It's very economical, and they've got it there. They've got the products that control weeds and diseases and insects and so on. Of course, they've got pet food and livestock food, hay and shaving and bedding and all kinds of things like that. Sprint Creek Feed is on FM twenty nine seventy eight, just minutes away really from Graham Parkway

Highway to forty nine, and they will deliver. So give them a call, come out, say hi when you go by there, And boy, they are just about to get a lot of new plants and supplies in. Really, this is a season where our great garden centers and feed stores and others like that are just on the verge of some big shipments. Everywhere I've gone and talked to our sponsors, it's like, yeah, the trucks are about to be crawling all over this place. So I'm excited about that.

I can't wait to get pick out and see that kind of thing. I love going out and seeing new things. That's one of the things that I think is just the best, the coolest about gardening is the learning process is the wonder process. You know, you get in there and you learn something new, you try something new. That's the motto for today, try something new, and there is so much to see, and sometimes it's just stopping and smelling the roses. Have you ever grown a passion buying there's several types

of row really well here and then studied the flower. I mean, just sit there a minute and just look at it and look at the intricacies that the incredible beauty and design and order and everything in creation is just amazing and something like a passion flower. If you really are observant, you could literally sit there for fifteen minutes just looking at it and learning and just being amazed

more and more at how intricate it is. You know, we get busy in life and we just zip by things and we kind of half see them, and we sort of become blind even to our own landscapes. You know, you're going in and going out each day and have the driveway, and you're just not noticing things that are out there. I think it's good to whether they say stop and smell the ros isn't it? Yes? Indeed, to stop and smell and observe the roses too. You can learn a lot

from that. So that's what we're talking about, learning or trying something new, that's the theme of the show today. I normally don't have themes. That's the thing that we have a theme trying something new? Yep. Have you never grown roses out? Roses, herbs in a windowsill? Have you never grown roses in your landscape? Have you ever tried a climbing rose over an arborer? A something new this year? There's a bizillion things out there that you can do. Yeah, yeah, And it doesn't matter what you

like or some people are like I don't care for herbs. I don't like herbs. Other people live for herbs, right, whatever it is, Try something new, yes, because not only will they grow, so will you? There you go? How about planting things that bring in butterflies and birds? Oh? Yeah, wouldn't that be cool? You got an outdoor, you're sitting on your patio and looking around and just a whole new thing to enjoy. You got it? All? Right? Well, there we go.

We're about to take a break here and turn the microphone over to Nikki for the news. Our phone number is seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy four. When we come back, Tracy, you're gonna be our first up. But we invite you to call get on the board with Josh and we'll talk to you after that. Yeah, there we go. There's the horticultural Cliff Cliffing of the neighborhood. I always got to kick out of out of Cliff. He was the expert on everything, a legend in his

own mind. As they say. Anyway, you're listening to garden Line. Welcome to the show. Seven one three two one two five eight seven four. We're going to now go out to Liberty and I'm going to talk to Tracy if I can find the button. There we go, Hey Tracy, good morning Skip. I've got a quick question about booginvillias. Is it gonna hurt to hit him with the Nelson's plant food this time of year. No, it won't hurt at all. I bet they won't accomplish a lot immediately.

They're not going to want to grow till it warms up. But the fertilizers my question. Yeah, the fertilizer in the soil is not going to make the boogainvillia grow in winter. You see what I'm saying. When the temperature is right, it'll start growing and you'll you'll have the nutrients there. So it's up to you, and they're going to fertilized an hour later. But I just don't overdo it. Don't overdo it. I don't normally do

it until it warms up. But you know, after our little cool snap, they lost all their little pretty pretty color and I was trying to get them to maybe do a little bit. But you say it's not going to until it gets warm. Yeah, it's it's not now. The temperature controls a lot of biological processes, including up taking nutrients and movement through the plant and growth and all that. So yeah, either way, but it's not gonna it's not going to speed it up a lot. Okay, all right,

you have a good day, Ski. Well, enjoy those moving. Hey, by the way, these in containers that you have since you're up in Liberty, I suspect they are, Yes, sir, they're in container excuse me, and containers where I can move them in and out dearing the cold. Good are very good. Well, glad to hear it. Enjoy those, Tracy, and thank you for calling. Thank you you have you as well. Well. We are we are here today talking about well, let's see, the theme today is try something new. The theme today is

try something new. So what does that mean. That means I encourage you. I'd say I challenge you, but that's corny. I encourage you this year to do something you've not done before in gardening, because gardening is a world of wonder. I'm telling you there are literally a bazillion that's an actual number. It's even more than a trillion, by the way. They're literally a bazillion things that you can do in gardening to try something new. Okay,

let me give you an example. Have you ever tried planting herbs and containers? Have you ever put herbs at the end of your vegetable garden rows? You can do that. Have you ever used trailing herbs like time and oregano and marjoram? Have you ever used those as a groundcover around plants? Have you ever done a row of like chives as a border around a bed? Yeah, you can do that absolutely. Why not try six new flowers

that attract butterfly and hummingbirds this year. It's easy. There's lots of beautiful options. Add some butterfly attracting flowers to your landscape out where you can sit and enjoy them by the patio or something like that. How about putting in drip irrigation and a faucet timer to make watering easier. You know, remember last summer, Yeah, we do, well, how about this summer having a timer? Then you can tell it. I want you to come on three days a week. I want you to come on every day. I

want you to come on twice a day. I want you to water for this long. You got a little faucet timers you can buy that, do that and it just takes care of it. I have to have that for my containers because I just forget to water them or I'm gone for a day and they don't get watered and it's one hundred degrees and you know what I'm talking about. Why not try that this year? How about three new vegetables you've never grown before or even tasted before. I talked yesterday about a green

and that. You know, there's a thousand options. I just use as an example something called chi jemsi. It's a brassica. It's a coal crop like broccoli and cabbage, cauliflower, mustard. It's in that group and it's a new thing, new in the last few years, and it's very nice. It's very different. Have you ever grown bakchoi before. It's fast, it's easy, it's fun. How about grape tomatoes? Have you ever grown

a grape tomato? Maybe you don't even have a garden. Get you something that holds about ten gallons of soil and try a grape tomato this year. They are really tasty, they're very productive, and they even set better in the heat than slicer types of tomatoes. How about a different kind of pepper. I tried last year some really large jalapenos found I had to grow them from seed because these are you know, there's only ten billion varieties out there,

and any garden center it's not going to have all of them. But try something new, something different that you haven't done before. How about a house plant? What is your favorite house plant? Have you ever grown a zz plant? Z z plant? It is one of the most tolerant houseplants of our mismanagement that there is out there. It likes a lot of light, but it'll put up with lower light. It doesn't want to be soggy. But you can have it a little wet or you can have it a

little dry, and it's okay with both of those. And it's very different, very unusual. Looking, and there's a lot of houseplants like that, try something new. What are you going to try new this year? If you like, give us a call. I'd like to hear about it. What are you going to try that's new this year? Maybe you need some suggestions, give me a call on that. We'll talk about that as well. But every gardening season is a world of wonder and there's no reason to

just do meat and potatoes year after year after year. You can always try something new. In fact, I think it's a good policy and I do this in my vegetable garden is always have the main stays that are proven, but also have some things that you've never tried before that are experiments, because what you're going to find is that new tomato that you try may become your favorite after this years of trying it out. Celebrity is my standby. It's

the one that has lots of disease resistance. It's got nematode resistance, which almost no tomato hardly does. And Celebrity is one I always grow, but always in try and three or four other new ones. And I think that's a great way to grow because you learn things, you find out new things you discover new things when you go to our mom and pop garden centers, they're going to tell you. And when you say, hey, look, I want to try something kind of new and different, what do you got?

What would you suggest? It's a flower, it's an herb, it's a vegetable, it's you know, maybe a new kind of rose that you've never grown before. I encourage you this year, why not try something new? You know, if you're going to start your own seed for example, that would be something new. You've never grown your own seedlings. Well, just grab you some of the forty pound potting soil that Landscaper's Pride has. That's a good one for all kinds of things. It's very budget friendly,

fully customizable, meaning that you can mix it however you want. It's got age, pine bark and sand and blended organics and so on. You can mix it in into your soil to improve your soil. You can use it as a standalone potting soil if you want. You can use it as a seed starting mix. It works really well for that. So what are you going to start indoors from seed this year that you haven't tried before? New? So grab a holes and that Landscaper's Pride, that forty pound potting soil.

They've also got a rose mix. By the way, they've also got a black velvet mulch. It's not dyed, it's just a beautiful color. So how about that front bed that's really the show bed. Why not try it the black velvet as a mulch in that It just for a real visual impact. It's a high quality material. You know. Landscaper's Pride has been around for twenty years, since two thousand and two, actually over twenty years, and they had twenty seven different products and bags. They also have bulk

available. All you need to do is go to this website Landscaperspride dot com and you can find out where all the stores are carry their products. They're widely available, easy, easy to find with Landscaper's Pride. So try something new. We're going to take a break and that's not new. Just to have to do that. Our phone number is seven one three two one two five eight seven four. I'll be right back. Welcome back to garden Line. We are going to have a beautiful Sunday. I'm telling you it's on

the way right now. It's side it's dark still dark. I haven't made the light yet. By the way, if you look over and see your neighbor's house and the lights are off, it's all dark, and they're go bang on the door. Tell them they're missing garden line. They will rise up and call you blessed. Maybe not today, they'll call you something else today, I bet, but in time they will thank you for turning them on the garden line. We we love to answer your gardening questions. We'd

love to talk to you about ways to have success. Because here's the deal. Gardening is the best hobby that there is. In my opinion, I am biased, but that doesn't mean I'm wrong. Gardening is the best hobby. It gives you physical health, it gives you mental health. It just gives you a sense of well being. There's so many ways to do it. Maybe you don't want to go outside and plow up the back party and you know, work and sweat and dig and whatnot. Okay, that's fine.

Do you have a houseplant? Do you want to start some seeds indoors? Do you love herbs and you just want some containers of her There's a thousand ways to go about gardening. Have you ever have you ever planted a fruit tree. Now there's something new. Are there any fruit trees you'd like to grow? Maybe a citrus? Maybe something gets you a container with a

lot of soil, something the equivalent of a half whiskey barrel. And I don't use a whiskey barrel because the wood rots out, but something that holds quite a bit of soil, and put a little citrus tree in it and enjoy that. And oh, my gosh, when citrus blooms, the flowers are heavenly. Oh, such a nice fragrance. Absolutely a nice fragrance.

When I try that this year. If you've got a sunny spot on a patio, all you need is a little doll where you put a strap around the pot and you can move that plant anywhere you want to put it. We're their son, and you don't have to bend over and break you back doing it. Why not try that this year? I think that'd be fun. Well, well that's our theme today. By the way, try something

new. We're going to give you some other ideas. If you have ideas of some things new that you would like to try, or that you have tried recently that really have become now part of how you garden. I'd like to hear about it. We're going to start off by going to the Woodlands and talking to Paul. Hello, Paul, Hi, how you doing ski? Want to try something new? Yeah? The Nelson Turf Store. We made it. Yes, where can you find it? Oh, it's widely

available. There are a number of different places that have it, you know, off the top of my head in the Woodlands. I'm not sure. You might try an ACE hardware store check down. You don't have it. They don't have it, Okay, up there, Yeah, a lot of our aces will I would I would go to the Nelson's, go to their website and just see where you know where you can find it there. You may just need to give them a call directly to get to the to the

bottom line. I'm going to look and see if I have a listing of available places, and if I do, I'll say it on the air for you here in a little bit. Yeah, tell me a little bit to hunt that down. Maybe during a break or something like that. Okay, thank you're looking at the Turf Star right the weed Nader. All right, Yeah, you need to get that done. If you're going to do that, you need to do it, you know, in the next definitely in

the next four weeks. I would probably get it done in the next three weeks or so if I could, because you want to catch those weeds before they get too big. That's important. Good enough, all right, sir, thank you, thank you. I appreciate the call. Yep, I need to hunt that down. In fact, if somebody from Nelson's happens to be listed, let me know exactly where to get that word out because people won't know where to get those things. I was giving away some of their

new product out there. They've got a new product that you mix into putting mix. So let's say you're going to repot a plant. You know, you're going to go in and take what you know, a plant moving into a larger pot, and you need to provide some nutrition in that soil. Well, that is exactly what their Nutristar Genesis Transplant Mix does. It's a six to one three fertilizer granular and this is brand new, absolutely brand new. I saw it for the first time last week. I've already got some

I'm already messing with it, trying it out. I always like to play with these products, get experience with them, so I understand how they work really even better. It has beneficial bacteria. It's got endo microiza ectomycuriza. Those are two fungi that live with the root and make the root do better, take up nutrients better. It's got humates and it's got other nutrients to encourage enzymatic production, and it just enhances overall the biological activity of the soil.

And that is the nutri star genesis. It's in a little jar like other Nelson products are. They have the bags and they have the jars Nutrishar genesis transplant mix. And again, when you're going to bump up, let's see, buy some four inch pots and you're gonna put them in gallon pots, or let's say you're going to plant that citrus in that half whiskey barrel sized container I just was talking about. You just mix the nutristar genesis into

the mix as you're doing the transplanting, and it's there. It's going to release over time and be available to enhance that root system. Because there's a lot that we do for roots. It goes beyond just the nutrients too. By the way, that microbial activity is really important and anything we do to help with that is going to help a plant to survive even better. I was pretty excited about that. Peive they got it done in Fort Benn did

some give They were pretty excited about it too. We were trying to figure out how to give it away, you know, like, okay, who drove the furthest Someone said, you know, well, who's the oldest here? And I said, I learned long ago not to go into that territory. So we came up with other ways, other ways of doing the giveaway.

But we had a good time the Fort Bend. By the way, Fort Ben County, if you go to Fort Man County's website, the Extension office website, they you can find information on the Regional Vegetable Conference they have going on down there, and that's Fortbend dot Agrolife dot org. It's on Thursday, February eighth. It's an all day deal. You just need to go check it out. Lots of good information that's coming on that Buchanans.

I mentioned talking about Buchanans yesterday, and Buchanans is just it's the kind of place where there's always something new and cool going on. It just Buchanans, there's always a new plant, there's always some new like a native plant. That's what they specialize in. There's some new houseplants. They have one of the best house plants selections I've ever seen. They're on the eleven Street in

the Heights. Most of you probably been there, but if you haven't, you need to go in This afternoon be a good time to do that. East eleventh Street in the Heights. You just go to Buchanansplants dot Com. So I was talking earlier about you got a soggy area that doesn't drain, well, go to Buchanans and ask them if they have a button bush or

Louisian iris or anything. Say I've got a wet area and I'd like to know what native plants do you sell that thrive in spots sometimes that don't drain that well, why not turn lemons into lemonade with the native plants for Buchanans. That's just one example of the many reasons you would want to go to Buchanans Plants. I always love it to go by there and a visit. Well let's see here, I believe we just ran out of another hour. That kind of went fast. Our theme today is try something new. I'd

like to hear from you. What have you tried new recently that has just been a new addition now for your gardening? Is like I tried that, I love it? And what do you want to try this year? What have you never done before? There's a lot of new things out there to do in the garden. Do you want to try a new kind of product? Do you want to try a new kind of a bed? Do you

want of those eggo beds that they have? Do you want to try one of the Perhaps a new irrigation method like grip irrigation make it easier for yourself. I bet there's a plant that you've never grown before. I can come up with some suggestions if you don't, if you need some lots of great plants that we can try. New gardening is always hopeful, it's always new, and next year's garden is always going to be the best ever. We'll

be right back. Katrh Garden Line does not necessarily endorse any of the products or service is advertised on this program. Welcome to Katie r H Garden Line with Skimp Rickard shraya trim just watch him as well. Give it peace. The seabot Bazy again not a sor Welcome to garden Line. Welcome to garden Line on what is going to be a gorgeous, gorgeous sunday. I can see the glow in the sky. Here we go. Day is on the way. It is time to make your plans for this afternoon. What are

you gonna get out and do? You're gonna go by and pick up some supplies from one of our local garden centers or other product suppliers to be ready to go. Remember, we're going to be fertilizing the lawns coming up here, and no need to wait until that day to try to go find fertilizer. If you're out and about, grab some, pick it up, bring it home, be ready to go. So whatever day occurs, plans change, or whatever, you got some time, you can just go right out

there and fertilize your lawns. Simple as that. Well, I uh, the theme today is try something new? What are you going to try new? I'd like to know what you are going to try and do, and I'll give you some suggestions for things that you may want to try that you haven't tried before. Have you ever planted a flowering vine? I'm talking about it could be a perennial vine. It could be something like you know,

Wisteria is a common flowering vine people plant. There's several different types of whysteria. Some of them are a bit of a challenge, so I'm just using that as an example. But a flowering rose, a vining rose, for example, something like a Lady Banks. That's a very vigorous ning rose, very beautiful. It's either white or yellow. Yellow form is more common. The white form is more fragrant. So both of those they're almost thornless. In fact, they are, I would say they are thornless, very easy

to grow. Make a really good plant to put over a large arbor, you know, don't put this over a little thing. This thing wants to take over the world. It's a very big, vigorous plant, so give it some room to grow. That would be a good one. How about a perennial flowering vine. The coral vine has the clusters of pink blooms that are really popular with pollinators. It blooms really heavily in the late summer fall season, and it is also one that wants to run, so you need

to give it a confined area. In other words, if you put it on a fence that'll run down the fence, that'll climb up a pole and it'll head across the power line. It just it has something to grab onto. It's going to keep going, so that's a catch on it. It's a perennial dies back to the ground each year. But oh my gosh, it's a great vine. It's an absolutely great vine, really pretty. Then there's annual vines like hycinth bean that likes the warm weather. You wait a

little bit to plant it, it grows really well. We can just go on and on lots and lots and lots of vine options. Do you have a western wall where the brick heats up when the hot late day sun shines

on it, why not put a little trellis on that. It could be something as simple as a cattle panel that you put up on iron posts, the little fence posts that you drop hammer into the ground, and you put that vine on it, and it makes a wall of foliage that shades the brick and it will make a difference in your utility bills because all night that hot brick wall is going to be radiating heat on summer nights into your house. Why not try that this year? Have you ever had an arbor before,

A little pergola something like that. You can build one. You can hire somebody like Fier Scapes to come into a professional job building you want, but create some sort of a covering over a patio area and then put a vine on it. Something beautiful. I've got a oh gosh, I can't even say the name of the rosebush Martin, Peggy Martin Rose that is on my pergola. I put it in there. Peggy Martin's a tough lady.

And here's why I put it in Like two years ago. My golden retrievers have chewed it, chewed it to the ground like a foot high twice. I don't know what possesses them. They let it grow a wild and then they become demon dogs and chew it to the ground. So I put a little wire cylinder around it, and now they can't chew it to the ground, and it is up it. Last year it grew up, it went ope on the trellis. It's got little vine. You know, shoots hanging

down everywhere in this spring. Just wait, it's going to be beautiful as those clusters of blooms are hanging off the top of that arbor where we sit underneath in the summertime and the springtime is when it does most of it's blooming. So try something new like that. What have you not tried before? Again, if you've never grown citrus, at least have a container with some type of citrus in it that you can enjoy the ballooms of and of course

the fruit and time as well. Whether it's a Meyer lemon, whether it's one of the limes that are so easy to grow and somewhat smaller stature, easier to grow in a container. I had a satsuma orange and a container that Satsuma is a really nice mandarin type orange. You know when you go in the store and you buy the box of those things but called qts, you know, the little real easy baggy scan, real easy to peel. Well, satsuma is like that. They actually get larger than that, but

it's easy to do and it's just a fun addition. Easy. What's new for you this year? Try something new? That's what I would suggest. Now. What is the rule on garden line for the number one tip for success with plants. Take care of the soil and your plants will thrive. That's it. Brown stuff before green stuff. Well, if you have bought into that, you're going to see the results of it, because when the soil is right, plants thrive and Nature's Way resources they were a leader historically

have been a leader when it comes to building good soils. They invented roast soil, They invented leaf mold compost for example. They have got a great supply. In fact, they have a thing called Fungal Friday's where on Fridays you can get ten percent off the bagged fungal compost and twenty percent off the bulk fungal compost. They've got a two acre nursery and garden center there with fruit trees, native perennials and all kinds of things. It is really a

great place to visit. Their products are sold by the bag in various locations as well, or you can order them by bulk. But you know this, when you go in Nature's Way, you're going to get a product that's made right. They take the time to do it right. That you can find what I would say would be a cheap mulch out there and it is not even worth what you pay for it because they rush it through the process. They leave it there long enough to turn brown, so it looks like

compost or whatever, and it's just not good. It's not going to work like a product that's they've taken time with, like Nature's Way does. And so I would encourage you if you're gonna take care. If you want a half plant, if you want a vegetable garden, flower, garden herbs, if you want to create a beautiful shrub bed, start with getting the soil

right. Call them at Nature's Way, Talk to John, talk to Ian nine three six three two one sixty nine ninety nine three six three two one sixty nine ninety A quality product for long, long, long term quality results. That's the way to go. The brown stuff comes before the green stuff, and Nature's Way knows how to make the brown stuff. You're listening to the guard Line and we're going to take a low break here. Our phone number is seven three two one two five eight seven four. I'll be right

back. Welcome back to garden Line. Today's theme is try something new. What are you going to try new that you've never done before? If you're looking for for example, if you're looking for a place to find something new, well, how about enchanted gardens in Richmond. Have you ever been out there. It's on FM three fifty nine. It's on the Katie Foolscher side of Richmond. I just head north from Richmond. Enchanted Gardens Richmond is the

Website's really easy to find. Enchanted Gardens Richmond. They're open by the way. They're open today from ten am to four Monday through Saturday, eight am to five pm. And they have something new. I guarantee you in any category of plant, you know, roses when you took it, vegetables and herbs and flowers and shrubs, they're gonna have something new you've never tried before.

The Lendermans have been part of that community since nineteen ninety five when they first opened Enchanted Gardens, and it's one of those mom and pop into dependence where you get quality plants, quality advice, and really really good guidance when it comes to picking a plant or when it comes to solving a problem like a pest or disease or whatever. They've got all of that, and they have a lot of really new and cool things. For example, have you

ever tried a fairy garden? You know? A little ferry gardens are little containers that have like a miniature scene in them. Well, they've got those and then tell you how to put one together, find the plants and the pots and everything. That would be something new that you could drive with. This year, they've got all the fertilizers I talk about on garden Line and the soil products that you need to have success with your garden at Enchented Gardens

that's out there in Richmond. That would be something new if you've never been there, there's another new you gotta go. You got to see it. It's pretty cool. Let's head out to south West Houston. We're going to talk to Jeff. Hello Jeff, good morning, Skip. I love your theme. This is that you're doing great. I tried a couple of new things last year and there were game changers for me. Speaking of the brown stuff, I'll do a plug for airloom soils, all right. I tried

there the works it's called in all my container plants. Huh, And I'll never go back. I invested in that in that last year and I'm already buying more this year. Well, that's a quality product, there's no question about it. It is very it's the best for container plants. I mean my peppers. I grew in containers last year, and I never had so many peppers. For those of you aren't familiar with that, he's talking about the work grows, yeah, potting soil. Yeah, And and I do

a lot of growth. I grow stuff in grow bags and containers. And it's easier for me. I can move it around when it needs more sun or less sun. It just helps me out a lot better that way. Yeah. Well good. Uh. And that's the fabric grow bags yeah, actually Walmart bags. Yeah, well those don't hold up very long, but they'll work for a season or something. They'll last for a season, and

they're fifty cents in there. They're very Just cut the handles off of them and fill them up with the works and and grow all kinds of even grow tomatoes in them. All right. So one other new thing I did last year. If you're trying to find a variety of beans, stream beans that I had never had much. I was never happy with the green beans that I was growing, and I tried a new variety I saw online called Contender. Oh yeah, I got I got in the bulk seeds that Southwest fertilizer.

Yeah. And if if you don't want to be picking green beans every day. Don't plant Contender beans. I mean they I had more beans than I've ever had in my three little ten foot rows, and I had for four months. Well, you know, Jeffy, you referred to it as a new bean. Actually, Contender's been around a long time. Earlier I was talking about, Oh it was new for me. Yeah, celebrity Yeah, good, well there, that's all that counts, is what's new to

us. But Contender, I was talking earlier about celebrity tomato being an old main statement around a long time. Contender is the same way. If I'm going to try any kind of green bean, I always compare it to Contender because that is the that is the standard. It is an excellent, excellent bean. Well, good, thanks for sharing that. You spoke about one other thing, if I may go ahead. You spoke about grape tomatoes. I was. I bought some grape tomatoes at a dollar store in there were

the most tasty tomatoes ever had. So I saved some of the seeds and planted them last year, and it's my new favorite tomatoes. All right. Yeah, I like grapes a lot. I don't know why I like them more than cherry I mean they're both good tomatoes, you know, but I like grapes a lot. Hey, Jeff, thank you for that call. I appreciate that you take care. Yeah, Southwest Fertilizer, he mentioned it, and boy, you know they have that. In fact, I posted

something to Facebook about the bins. It's Southwest Fertilizer. For seed. You know, you can buy seed in packets, and I do. Seed packets are wonderful lots of very unusual things. But if you're looking for just an economical way to buy seeds and you go to a place that has bins where there's bulk seed and you just take a little scoop scoop them out, put them in an envelope, that is the most economical waiting buy seeds period. And you're not going to find the newest, latest, brand, new this

year varieties in bins. You're going to find the old standbys, which are a good way to go, and Southwest Fertilizer has those. I've taken a picture over there. It was visiting Bob the other day, and that's just fun, that's just cool. It's a good way to do it. And as with anything, you know, it's Southwest If they don't have it, you don't need it, because they have it. They have everything fertilizers and pests and disease control. They're about to get a lot of shipments in of

all kinds of new products. We're talking about some of the new things on the market coming out this year. And so if you need things to control best disease and weeds and whatnot, Bob's gonna have it. He's gonna have the organic stuff, he's gonna have the synthetic stuff. He's got all of it. There. Again, if they don't have it, you don't need it. Southwest Fertilizer, by the way, for those of you who haven't been, you need to go. It's we're driving across town just to see

the thing. But Southwest Fertilizer dot com. That's the website there on the corner of Bissinet and Renwick and Renwick and Southwest Houston. Let's head now up to Montgomery and we're gonna talk to Richard. Hello, Richard, good morning. I hope you're doing well. Thank you. I've got a three three roses and four doco roses in pots and if a new house, I want to put those in the ground this year. Could you tell me how I do it? What location you played? Question? Man? And good sunlight.

Those are the two most important things, sunlight being even more important sunlight. Roses need sun to really be beautiful. The more they lack, the more shade you move them toward, the less blooms you're going to have. And then drainage, building up a raised bed. If the area doesn't rain well, and boy, today'd be a good day. Go outside and look, I mean if you've got standing water, that there's your queue because it's been raining like crazy. And so a good rose mix, you can get

a quality quality rose mix. You're up there, you know, in the Montgomery area, you're not that far away from nature's way resources and they have they were the ones that created roase soil. They can deliver it out to you or you can go buy and pick up bags of it. But a good quality, a good quality rose mix to grow them in and sunlight, that's the key. How big are the containers and how long have they been in them? The true roses have been in them probably three years and they're

ten gallon containers. Okay, then knockle roses there one year? Okay, Well just move them right from the container, and Richard, I'd do it now. Right now. In garden centers, they're bringing in bare root roses. They just they hardly have, you know, just big old stubbed off roots on them. That's how bare root roses are. And they'll hit the ground and they'll get roots down and they'll do well. So if you're going to pull these out of containers, you got some circling roots, you want

to cut them and everything, get them ready. You can do that and it won't hurt them. And then you put them in the ground. Maybe do a little top pruning on them. If you've got some small branches, twiggy broken branches, you know whatever, do that and then get them in the ground. Do the any pruning you're gonna do. Water them in really well, and you should be off to a good start. Do you trim the roots in the pots of all when you take the pot sauce? I

do. I don't like circling roots going around and circles in a pot, and so I'll cut those and remove them. And again it's not going to hurt him, because like I said, there are roots. There are bare root roses coming in that have much less roots than you're going to have even if you prune your roots and so your trees or rose bushes, the tree form in the bush form are both going to be fine. Okay. Would you put any potty soil into the hole before you put no, I wouldn't.

I would try to improve the soil in a large area. So let's say you don't have a bed mix that you're growing them in. Put some down and spade or rototail or mix it into the bed area and then dig the hole, put the rose in and use the soil you dug out of the hole to go back in. Don't just dig a hole, because then it's an underground bathtub and you put potting soil in it and it just begins. When it rains too much, it's going to start decomposing without oxygen,

and that is a nasty mess. Okay, very good, all right, sir, Thank you, Thank you, sir. Yes, I appreciate your call. Let's see we're going to go to Cypress now and talk to John. Hello, John, good morning, sir. How are you. I'm doing well? Thank you? Hey, I heard you guys touch on planting potatoes. Yes, And I ran across these guys on the internet that are

planting potatoes and hay. Yes, in rate beds. Yes. And I've been using a mushroom soil for my compost okay, and I thought about putting that down and then planting the sprouts and then covering them with Hey, is that correct? Yes, you can do that. So when when you put a potato seed piece, we call it a seed piece, what it is is a chunk of potato that you've cut. It's got an I or two on it, and it's it's allowed to kind of the cut surfaces need time

to dry before you put them out there. Uh. And then when you plant it, the roots go down and the stems come up, and the potatoes come off of the stems. They're not like sweet potatoes that are roots. And so you the more you pile up around that stem, whether it's soil, whether it's hay, whether it's compost, you can do a lot of things. The potatoes will grow in that, and then at harvest time you will have a nice, clean potato that's not malformed because it's growing in

like a rocky soil or something. It's gonna be very very nice potato. But you can use old spent hay just make sure that that hay is not from a pasture where they use brush control in because that will see potatoes. At the end of the season, I'll probably end up with a bed full of nice green coastal Okay, well, well, if it's dry hay, it should not survive. But we'll see. But anyway, Yeah, that's a great way to do potatoes. Yeah, I'm gonna give it a try

and see what happens. And also you had mentioned to think about using a long fertilizer on them. Yes, I do you mean there's fertilizer correct, hier nitrogen, because because the goal is to grow shoots and leaves so that you can make a lot of carbohydrates, which is what a potato is. Hey, I've got twenty seconds before my break here, but John, thank

you for that call. Uh, and just just follow the guidelines. If you go to Aggie Horticulture website Aggie Horticulture, there's a vegetable section and a whole publication on how to grow potatoes. I'd encourage you. It's free, you just go look at it or print it out. I'd encourage you to go buy and do that. And again, thank you for the call. Well, it's time for Nicky and the News. If you'd like to get on the board with Josh, it's seven one three two one two fifty eight

seventy four. Welcome back to guard Line. We are glad you're listening in today. We're tired of all kinds of things. Whatever's of interest to you is actually what we talk about. You can give us a call. It seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy four. And of course I always bring some things I would like to talk about. Today. What I want to talk about is trying things new. What's new? Maybe you've been

gardening for years. May we kind of get in a rut. You know, you mow the lawn, you trim the shrubs, you plant the same vegetables or flowers or whatever, and that's all fine, that's fun, But what about something new? You're missing out. I'm telling you, I don't care if you're growing one hundred different things, there's ten thousand things that you're not growing that you could try. They just are. That's how it is for gardening. Have you ever done a cut flower garden? That's a new

thing for a lot of people. It doesn't have to be a huge area I could just be a small bed. I've got a little bed in my garden that's on one side where we're going to be putting some brand new cuts. I'm trying some new cut flowers this year in my garden. If you want like the simplest, easiest in and out cut flower you can grow, I would say it's probably zendias. Zennias grow fast, they're easy. You can start them from transplant or you can just scatter seeds out there. They

do have their problems. They get a little pottery mildew, a little leaf spot in things, but you know, they just live with it. You don't really have to spraym or anything. And zennias are fast, they're easy, they're easy to do. There's lots of other good cut flowers that you can grow. I would encourage you to give that a try. Why not try that this year? That would be a great, a great new thing to try in your garden. But what are you going to try new?

Or what have you tried new in recent years that has become like your go to now? You know, just a little bit ago, we're talking about Jeff in Southwest Houston about a new green bean he knew to him the contender being such a standard, and boy, I agree, that's an awesome, awesome green bean and some other new things that he's tried. Fell in love with the potting soil. He just tried some growing in some bags that he sort of repurposed himself that wealth soiled to grow things in. You can try

all kinds of things. It's up to you. Listen. A garden is your playground. A garden is your sandbox. A garden is your plant palette. What do you want? What do you want to look at? You can do that. We have rules in gardening. You know, there's a color wheel where you're supposed to choose colors on opposite sides of the wheel, or you can do what they call tertiary, which is like a triangle across the wheel. Choose those three colors to put together. There's a lot of

rules, there's a lot of things. That's all fine. Those are good guidelines, and yes they do help make things esthetically more pleasing. But it's your garden. I've usted your whole backyard to be a zeny apache you could do that. I wouldn't recommend it, but it's your yard. You can do that. What do you want. What do you want to grow? Look at that patio, you got chairs on it. Maybe you got a little fire table. I don't know, chimney out there? Why not some

plants. Last year we added some new hanging black baskets around the edges of a little overhang that we have a little kind of an arbor area out in a sitting area. And boy, that was cool just hanging baskets. Or it's a vast way to come in with some really nice color. So are containers. By the way, what do you want to try that you haven't tried before? I encourage you to do that. So I think that's fun. It makes gardening fun. And listen, a lot of people are worried

about trying to garden because they're afraid they're going to fail. I don't know how to do that. Well, it's probably not going to work. Everything I plant dies. Don't think that way. Gardening is for experimenting. It's

for trying. Yes, get good advice, choose good plants. Go to a mom and pop nursery that knows what they're talking about, so they can sell you things that will grow here, and they can tell you how to do it and when you if you have any problems, you can go in and they'll help you with it. Give us a call on garden line. Let's help you. Let's help you have success. Don't worry about failing.

Doctor J. C. Ralston. I believe he is the one that said to be a good horticulture, she got to kill a lot of and that's true. Don't be afraid of failing. When you fail, you learn from it and you try again. And the analogy I use that dates me is the etcha sketch. I like that analogy. When some of you who grew up with etches sketches knew this a little thing. You have two knobs. One goes up and down, one goes sideways, and you draw stuff.

And invariable, invariably, when you're trying to go left, you accidentally go right and you mess up your sketch. What did you do? You hold it upside down and you shake it and everything goes away and you get drawing again. That's how it is. The gardening. Did stink bugs take over your tomatoes last year and just really disappoint you? Okay, grow tomatoes again this year. We're going to put some mesh netting over them. There's a

thing called garden mesh, and think of it as a window screen. But that's very small squares and very soft like it's almost like a bed sheet soft and you just it's super lightweight. Air goes through, light goes through. You put it over your plan to let them go all the way to the ground. Tomatoes do not need bees to pollinate them. They just moving in the wind will pollinate them. And then lift it up when you want to harvest, and you just create a screen ports keeps out stink bugs. That's

one example. One idea you learned from it. You got something new. Talk to your friends, talk to your your neighbors at garden learn stuff. Go to boy our nurseries and garden centers. They are having programs all the time, educational programs and it's just learn, learn, learn, have fun, meet people and try something new. That's what it's all about. I wanted to just mention something about especially it's been a Sunday morning start off.

Hope has been around for a very very long time here in Houston, changing lives. And for those of you who are compassionate, and I would say that all of you have compassion and you want you want to help people that are in need of help, but you want to help in a way that makes a difference, not that's just something that helps for a day and then it didn't do much else other than that. Star of Hope is that kind of place people can come in. They have a place to live, they

have food, they have training. If they have substance abuse addictions, they can get help with that. To break loose from that, they can get job training, they can get back on their feet. And I could just go on and on about all the ways that Star of Hope takes someone from

where they are and gives them the opportunity to change their lives. And there are a hundred stories of real change that happened that change that person's lives, I would say, almost more importantly, change the lives of their children and a future for those kids who are in the situation for no fault of their own. That's for sure. Star of Hope is so easy to do and

to help shmission dot org. Sohmission dot org. Go there and find out the many ways that you can help, including monetarily and get you know, it only takes what is it like two dollars and eighty cents for a meal. It's Star of Hope mission very efficient. When you give them a dollar, it's used well and it actually makes a difference in people's lives. That's

why I so strongly recommend that. By the way, if you'd like to give us a call, our phone number is seven to one three two one two fifty eight seventy four seven one three two one two five eight seven four. Listen. If you're out in Kingwood, you've got Warren's and Kingwood Garden Center right out there on your doorstep, and they are stocked up with all the things you need to help your plants recover that just got hammered in the

freeze we had. As they begin to grow, you're going to want to do things like drench an ocean harvest, drench over for microlife on those plant roots, or maybe add a six two four, which is the green bag of microlife on around the plants. Well, they out of Kingwood and Warren's Garden Center, they've got that set up all ready to go. They're stocked up and they're ready for you to get your plan that's going again. They've

got seeds for the spring garden. I was just talking about that, all of them at Warren's Garden Center and Kingwood Garden Center out in the Kingwood area. If you haven't been by there recently, you need to check it out because there's always something cool and new going on there. We're going to take a break right now. Our phone number again seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy four. Give Josh a call. He'll get you on the

board and you'll be first when we come back. Welcome back to Garden Line. We're glad you're here today, and we're talking about whatever you're interested in. That's kind of how it works here. Of course, I've got my topics I like to toss out there. But what's your question? Seven one three two one two five eight seven four. We're going to talk to John.

John. Are you in Colorado or Colorado County? No, I'm I'm at my Myerland home and I had a three removed and the stump ground down and to the ground as far as I could go, and it's formed this lovely maple syrup lake. Boy, that's not good. That's not no, it's not so. What are some remedies or ideas? How big is the area? How far across is it? It's six foot by ten foot. Yeah, I think I would. I would bring soil in and bring it up to the level of the soil where there isn't a lake around it.

Uh. Just just need to put anything, put anything in to neutralize the tannins. No, don't worry about that. They'll decompose, uh and it'll it won't last long that. That unfortunately, is just the case. And also when you get organic matter decaying in in anaerobic conditions, sometimes you'll get that kind of color too. But I would, I would bring the soil level up. I think that's your real solution. I would mound it up a little bit because it's going to settle more. How long ago did you

grind the stump? Uh? Two? We okay? Yeah? Yeah, So when you when you put this in, don't just make it level. Mound it a little bit there because it will settle down kind of like you know, if you ever dug a trench and filled it with soil and then later it was sunken in you know, as you're still settled, and that's what's going to happen, is that how long before I put a citrus in in the very same spot do it? I would, you know, there's no rush in getting a citrus out there. Once it warms up, you

can plant a citrus. So I would give it if you could. Let's just say today you got all the soil in there and leveled it out. I would say probably about a month from now then you would you would probably have some of the settling going on, especially as if you kind of tamping it down, a little bit of settling in so it's going to continue to

settle over time. So I still would have that mound, and with the citrus, even more reason to have the mound, because if it's sunk down and it still was a low spot, that citrus would be really unhappy in what you're describing right there. Yeah, I had orange that I set too low, and the orange is just I talked to Randy about this years ago. The oranges just had this funny smell to the juice. Oh okay,

Well, create a mound. I might even go you know, since that area is prone to standing water, you could even have a mound that goes up, you know, ten inches high above the soil around it, or twelve. And there was the tree mound was up about sixteen inches. Okay, yeah, so I mean we tear us down so the machine could get as low as possible. But it was a really big live Okay, well,

I'm sorry you lost that tree. That sounded like a good one, but I would Yeah, And you could also put in the soil to level it out, considering you're going higher than level for now, and then you could put a ring in around the ground and plant your put soil in it and plant your ceterrus in that. That could bring it up another foot. And that way, when you're mowing around it and weed eating, you know you're staying away from that ceterus. Thank you much, sir, Thank you

John. Good luck with that. Appreciate that call very much for sure. Yeah, and you know, when you're looking for a quality mix like that, I know John's down, You're done. South. I should have mentioned this Genrele you're on the phone. But Ciena Maltch is down there north of

Rose Sharon. They're on FM five twenty one near where Highway six and two eighty eight come together, South Houston, and they have all kinds of things that yes, they do have soil blends, they've got compost blends, they've got multch blends, and they do delivery within about twenty miles of their location down there. It's ninety six fifteen FM five twenty one. Or do this. Just go to the website Sienna Mulch and when you're there, you're going

to find the fertilizers that I recommend on garden line. You're going to find products to control weeds and diseases and insects and other things. Cienamltch just keeps everything in stock so for all of you down through that whole region near Brasispin State Park. You know, Meridian, Pomona, Manville, Iowa, Colony, Quil Valley, Riverstone, all those areas down there, Paarland, Cienamulch,

cinamultch dot com. That's where you're going to find it. And they carry again a wide variety of things moltz, soil, compost, sand, gravel stone, it's all there at CNMLS. I love to go visit there that It's just always fun. They I'm always impressed with the rocks too. This year I think I'm going to add a rock patio area outside my patio.

And this is not like concrete. This is just stone that is set down in a decomposed granite kind of base and get the stones out there, just to have a hard scale area where we can do some additional things outside. Let's head out now to Cyprus and we're going to talk to Bruce. Hello, Bruce, how are you there? Thanks for taking the call here. Hey, I've got i'd call them pot bellied Mexican ceramic type pots about putting half high and foot and half wide. They belly out in the middle.

Yes, And I don't know what's been in those for years, Probably a lot of potty soil, don't know anything about it. I thought I need to clear that out and start fresh, and I'd like to get some dreams started in there. Yeah, and looking for what I ought to put in those, the hole was quite a bit of soil. Whatever you put it would have drains at the bottom. So do you think they hold about

five five gallons soiled? What do you mean by quite a bit? Well, they're foot and a half high and the foot and a half across, belly out in the middle, we would hold close to gallons. Yeah. Well, uh, the folks at Airloom have something called the works. It's a potting soil that you could put in there with a pot that size. Sorry, what was the name of that place you just mentioned. Oh, Heirloom is the company that produces that out in Porter. But the bags of

potting soil are sold all over up there in Cyprus. You're going to find them. You got a couple of great two or three great Ace Hardware stores. Langham Creek's far from there, the one up on Jones Road. There's an M and D up a little further north than that. There are lots of good Ace hardware is just go to Ace Hardware dot com you can find them. But they carry those soils. Isloom the name of the body soil. It's the name of the company. The specific soil that I was first

saying was called the works and it's a potting soil by Heirloom. They also make something called a veggie and irbex that you know. I know it says veggie and herb, but you could even mix it in a little bit too, especially when you're getting a large volume of soil like that, because you kind of you're going from a little container of potting soil to a large tiner. You know that's going to have a little bit more chunkier mission. You put just all potting soil that one type in here? Do you put any

I just know, just use that potting soil. You want every square inch of that pot to have stuff the roots to live in. That's important. Now, uh, pig geraniums look good to me. Do you have to buy plants or do you start those from seeds? How do you get would I would just go, I would just go buy the plants. You're up close, you could. You're not far away from Arborgate and plants for all seasons, and they will have a wonderful selection of geraniums that do really really

well for you. Just just go and very good tip for me. I appreciate the information. All right, thank you very much. I appreciate your call very much. By the way, when you're doing any of these kind of plantings, you want to get you some Medina plus and Medina seaweed because you're going to drench it in around the plants when you plant them, and then as the as they begin to grow, you're going to spray the seaweed

on the foliage. Medina products a lot of them out there, But that's what we've been telling people about the way for freeze recovery and given those plants a boost. That's certainly putting in new geraniums that John was talking about. I would highly recommend that Medina Plus and Medina seaweed a good combination. I'll tell about more Medina products if we go through the spring that they have a

really good, good selection. Well, you're listening to garden Line. We're about to take a break for the news at the top of the hour. Our theme today is try something new. What have you tried new that you just found outstanding and now it's become a staple part of Haya garden. Is it a plant, is it a technique of gardening? Is it a particular variety or a particular type of soil, or you name it. We want to hear about it, and we'll be right back at seven one three,

two, one two, five eight seven four katrh Garden. It does not necessarily endorse any of the products or services advertised on this program. Welcome to Katy r H Garden Line with Skip Richter's just watch him as so many good things to supposing. Welcome back to guard Line. We're glad you have tuned in today. We're going to give you some inspiration that that is one of my goals on garden line is to encourage you to try things in gardening and

to enjoy your garden. Gardening is not rocket science. It is It is not something that only the talented and elite can do. It is not something that only people with green thumbs can do. Gardening is simple. It is life science and their principles. Sunshines on leaves and makes carbohydrates and fuels everything that happens in a plant. Roots take up water and nutrients, but need oxygen in order to thrive. Soil is the most important thing you do to

have success in gardening, making the best soil. You can see what I'm talking about. It's really not that difficult. And we can help you do that. And I want you to be encouraged. I don't want you to feel like, you know, I can't grow things. Other people go you can grow things. I promise you you can't. Let's help you do that. We're going to start off by going out to Conroe and talking to Jim. Hello, Jim, Hello, Skip, could you hear me? Yes, sir? Okay, Hey, yeah, I had that shutgun leaf disease

on my peach this year and it just kind of decimated it. Okay, wondering if it's worth saving or if I can go do something now to spray it with either a copper fund a side or something. Yes, what that's called is that's called shothole, and it is a fungus that for those who are not familiar with it, it causes spots on your peach leaves and as the leaf moves around in the wind, those spots have dried and they fall out and it looks like you shot a leave with a shotgun, as you

know, Jim, And that is a fungus. And copper sprays are one way we control it, but we put them on before the peach starts to grow, so you're applying them to the dormant tree. If you will contact your Montgomery County Extension office, talk to the master gardeners or Michael Potter, the horticulture agent there, they can get you pointed to a publication on the Homeowner's Guide to peach spraying. It kind of tells you what to use and

when. And one of those is dealing with that fungus by putting on a dormant copper spray and so that as the buds are coming out. The particular problem that's a ocurring. It takes care of them and it minimizes them. Some varieties are really bad about that disease. The old Sam Houston peach is really prone to that problem, But in general it's it's mainly something that's a

nuisance and not a big deal. Now, if your tree is just hammered by it and struggling, I would think about maybe doing a little extra fertilizing and getting a little more vigor in the tree so that it kind of outgrows the problem. You know, you're going to lose some spots here and there, but overall you're building a lot of good, healthy foliage and it sort of overcomes the problem. You there, did I lose Jim? Okay,

yes, I got some backwash here. I had white flies all over my hearty at biscus this year, and it just kind of beat them up really bad. I was wondering ifre's anything I do to prevent it this year. There's not a great prevention. Here's the deal on white flies. When we go after them with insecticides, we kill things that keep white flies in check, and then it becomes us and our spray wand versus the white flies, and we're having a spray and spray and spray to try to stay ahead of

them. I would instead try to do this the white flies that they create eggs underneath the leaf with little pupa that form underneath the leaf, and they look like a little tiny fish scales if you will. They're a little round, but they're like stuck to the top of the leaf. Round and flat, as if you had a fish scale that was dried on the leaf. But the size of like a little lowercase typed zero. I'm very small. I'm sorry, I say no. Can you hear me? Can you hear

me? Yes? I can hear you. Okay. So what I would do is I would get horticultural oil and insecticidal soap those kind of spray and spray them upward from under the plant to coat the bottom of the leaf and try to use that as your management technique and realize that the natural enemies will come in and bring the white flies under control. But you got to not use the I don't want to say toxic, but the poison type insecticide.

You know, the oil and soap smother and they dissolve waxy coatings and things they don't poison, And so they're going to be the safest thing to use to try to get them under control. But it's going to be a process and they won't always be as bad as they are now, Okay, well, appreciate it all right, Thank you, Jim. I appreciate that. I appreciate your call very much. Let's go out to Greg now and northwest Eastern Hey, Greg? Hello? Greg? Yes, sir? Can you

hear me? Yes, sir? Okay, sorry, I set the phone down. Well, ago, I caught a little bit of a lecture you gave. I think it was when you weren't getting so many calls on how you like to use some variety of hose to weed a garden, and uh, it just sounded like a sharp idea that you know, the concept I've been following for a while has been, you know, using a trowel and digging up the weeds. So I got the roots and uh uh, you

know, with a knee pad and just working my way around. But it's so time consuming that seems like by the time I get to one end, the others have already started spouting weeds again. So yeah, uh, what you mentioned sounded a whole lot more efficient. But I just want to understand strategy a little better, right, So if you could refer me to where you where you did that before, and I could look it up, or I'll just I'll just there are people that didn't hear it, and I'll just

say it again so people can can hear that. I grew up with the old standard type of garden hoe. It's someone if you say picture of garden ho it's what everybody pictures. And those, yeah, a flat edge at a ninety degree angle to the handle, And so those are great for moving soil, like if you're healing up your potatoes, are good for chopping out big weeds that are already an established big weed, getting it out of the ground. But they're not the kind of hoe that I use now. I

mean, I have some, and I'll use them for those purposes. But the key to making weeding easier with a hoe is to get a hoe that has a more Let's see, it's designed to slice just under the soil surface horizontally. So imagine this flat, sharp blade that you're skimming like a half inch under the soil surface horizontally, and you're severing the roots, but you're not turning new soil over to bring new seeds to the surface and just start

the process again. And the one I like best is called a diamond, and it's like a real long, narrow diamond. It's about four or five inch maybe five inches or so wide across and about maybe an inch and a half two inches maybe two inches deep, and all four sides are sharp.

It's got those corner points. And when you're using it, instead of chopping like you picture the regular hoe where you're bent over chopping, this one, you're standing up and it's almost like you're almost like you're either sweeping or mopping kind of thing with it. It's like you're sliding it under the surface and you don't stoop to use it, and you can get all around. It's

very precision, and again it doesn't disturb the swid a lot. But you got to do that before the weeds are big, because once you've got a really thick, strong, woody stemmed weed, you're not gonna be able to chop it. Greg, I'm going to need to take a break here. Let me finish that, sent that answer when we come back. Just hang on sure, all right. Our phone number is seven three two one two fifty eight seventy four. Hello, and welcome to garden Line. We're glad

you're listening. I'm your host, Skip Richter. And right now we are on the phone with Greg talking about some of the more advanced type of garden

hoe. So what we were talking about is the diamond hoe, Greg, and I like it because I'm standing up straight instead of holding the like a hoe shovel, where I don't know how to describe this, where your thumbs are pointing down toward the handle, toward the hoe, your thumbs are pointing upward toward the end of the handle, and it's like you would hold a broom to sweep, and you're just kind of you're going through there and doing

some some brushing through like that. It works really well when when they're small. The most important thing though, for weed control is to have a mulch on the soil. So the minute you get through chopping out the weeds, I like to refer to it as almost brushing them out the way you're using the hoe, then you throw a mulch over the surface. Because if the sunlight hits the soil, weeds we'll come back up. We're going to have

new seeds coming in, and that dis plagues you to more work. Do you use a pre emergent before the molt or on top of the molt. I wouldn't use a pre emergent if I'm using a mulch. Is this a vegetable garden or what are we talking about? If it's flower garden, flower garden. There are some pre emergents that you can use. Here's the problem. You can't disturb the soil after you use a pre emergent because it creates like a barrier, a force field if you will over the top of the

soil that stops weeds from coming through. But when you want to go in later and plant weeds or flower seeds like zendias or something, it'll stop them from growing too. So I generally don't use a pre emergent in flower beds. If you were going to get it all planted and everything and then put a pre emergent down, that would be fine. But I just think it's

better to mulch because there's other reasons to mulch. You prevent soil from crusting, from washing away, from splashing on your plants, and if you just put enough to block the sunlight and don't let the soil surface receive sunlight. All the weed sieeds you've got them under control. Now. Perennial weed like nut grass or bermuda grass, Yeah, that'll come through mulch, but weed seeds won't. Hi, I'm with you. What dimensions on that diamond holl

Oh? I don't know, you know, I think it's about five inches across and maybe a couple of inches high. We're Europe in northwest Houston. Well, either the Langham Creek or Jones Road where the hardwarees I might go to, or yeah, you know, they they may well have it. I have not looked for that particular hoe there. I didn't think about that, but I would talk to them and see see what they have it. Do you have a different place you directly on? Well, I'm trying to

think of where I saw. I saw some at Southwest Fertilizer, which is you know, down Bissonett and Runwick Way south of you. I don't know where else they carry them, but diamond. Do this first, go online, do a search for diamond hoe and you'll see exactly what I'm talking about. Then you know what you're looking for. You just want to keep it sharp. But if you've if you've got an area of soil that you're trying

to keep weed free. It's just easy because I don't know, if you've used a regular hoe very long, your back starts to hurt from that stooping. Yes, and I would much rather stand up right and do it. And it works good. And there's there's also versions of it on a little handle, so if you're on your hands and knees and you just you know, kind of just brushing through there, cleaning it all out, it works really well for that. All right, Okay, I'll give it a try.

Thanks, sir. I appreciate that call very much. Our phone number is seven to one three two one two fifty eight seventy four seven one three two one two five eight seven four. Give us a call. We'll talk about the things that interest You've ran by our c of you nurse the other day just to you know, stop in, say hi, check on things going there, and they're stocked up on all the things you need to deal

with the cold that we just had. Do you need you know, do you need some of that ocean harvest, You need some hummates to put down? Do you need to buy some frostcloth for the next freezer? Frost that shows up. It's always good to have it on hand because listen, when when freezes and frosts are forecast, that is not the time to be out trying to find supplies while everybody else is out trying to find supplies. Boy,

do they ever have roses at RCW. By the way, for those of you who don't know RCW, that's the nursery where Tombol Parkway, which is Highway two forty nine comes into belt Way eight. It's right there, real easy to get to, very very easy to get to. RCW Nursries dot com. They're rose List. I think it's probably four or six pages long, single space. I mean, it is a ton of roses. And boy I was out and looking and they had to just containers and containers

of roses, all potted up and ready to go. If you are interested in a good quality rose bush, or really any any of the woody ornamentals you know, crape, myrtles and trees and whatnot. RCW Nursery grows their own trees here locally and out in the oh gosh, Plantersville area, and so they have a good selection and they plant things that you should plant here, not things that don't belong here, so you can trust what they have that it's going to do well here at RCW Nurseries. Go to RCW Nurseries

dot com. You can find out more. See what I'm talking about. I always like to do that. You know I've been talking. I mentioned that RCW had the Ocean Harvest. You know, Microlife has a lot of different products that are helpful in our plants coming out of a freeze. The Ocean Harvest is one. That's one that's a fish based material. We drench it into the soil right now and get it down the root system. Put down their green bag, which is what we think of as the lawn fertilizer,

but it's good for anything you're going to grow. Really, it's a green bag. It's a six two four and that gives a longer term feeding, you know. So it's the liquids are going to be available immediately. They're not going to continue for weeks and weeks on, whereas the Microlife green bag will and then you just come back a couple of weeks later do the ocean harvest again to do it. But Microlife has a wide variety of products

are widely available. You can go to Microlifefertilizer dot com Microlife Fertilizer dot com. You can find out where you can get them and see all the different ones. I was down at the Fort Bend the Brass Home and Garden Show in Fort Benk County, and someone was asking me about fertilizing a blueberry and zaleas and things, and Microlife has an acidic fertilizer too, for acid loving plants. So I think this person actually had a camellia that they were wanted

to fertilize. But whatever you're needing, they're going to have a product for. It makes it real easy, really easy to take care of. By the way, all those plants you have out there that have been suffering from the cold, people are continuing to ask me do I cut it back? Do I cut it back? And there's two answers to it. My first answer is what I do, and that is leave it alone. When new growth starts, the plant will tell you how far back to prune it because

you'll see buds coming out. The second answer for the impatient folks out there is take your thumbnail or a knife and scrape the edge of the bark back and look for creamy white or green underneath, that's healthy. If it's paper sack brown or a grayish brown, that's dead. And just go back a little further and scrape again, and go back and just cut out deadwood.

Don't prune into living wood yet. Pruning is stimulating process. And if this is an average year, we should have another frost freeze coming, and so we want to be ready for that. So that's why I'm not recommending that you prune it at this time. If you got little annuals and perennials, it sort of melted into just a mush. If you can stand to accept the ugly for a while, just leave it. That's a protective cover over

the crown of the plant. When we have our next freeze. If you can't look at that, take it off, clean it out, but be ready with some composts to put over as a mulch over the crown of that plant to protect it again. For the same reason, you can just scratch it back when the new growth begins, move it out of the way. A little bit accomplist is always a good thing to have. Let's go now,

we're going to go to Liverpool and talk to Chuck. Chuck, are you and where are you, Yes, sir, are you doing this morning? I'm good? Where are you located? I am down here by CHOKULD buy you Okay? How can we help? Yes, I'm trying to trigger out a good avocado tree that we can possibly grow and maybe keep outside around

here. But last year i'd purchased two of them. One of them was called the Grande and the other one was called a Poncho, and they supposedly had good tolerance, and when we had that hard freeze, i'd put them inside the garage. But there's some air got into I guess some air got into it. And when we took that bit down and the teens that killed them both better the hammer. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Avocado is not dependably hardy here, but we do have avocados that are hardier than most,

and that's what you were talking about, and those are good varieties. There are a number of other good varieties that are so locally in the area that have more heartiness than normal. But two things that they can't handle. One is we're having mild weather and they're not getting slowed down and ready for cold, and then we have a hard spell that hammers them. The second thing is just getting flat too cold, and it just was way too cold. It's way too cold. I mean, it's one thing if it's twenty five

degrees, you know, it's another thing if it's twenty or below. I mean that none of them are going to be able to take that without severe damage. But they should re sprout and you should be back in a tree. You can select one of the sprouts to be the new trunk coming up out of the base. Okay, So if it kills down and then it's three sprouts back out of the base below the dirt, well, then you'd have to regraft again, wouldn't you if it's a grafted one, And a

lot of them are yes, if it comes below. But here's what we do. And I know this doesn't help you after the fact, but going forward, when you have an avocado like that, or any plant that has a graft that may be col susceptible, you want to mound up a big old cone of soil around the base for the freezing nights, for the freezing knights, and then pull it back. And what that does is it keeps the stem just above the graft from completely being killed and it dies back to

the top of the mound, but then you still have a bud. That's the desired variety, see what I'm saying. Yeah, don't leave those mounds. Landscapers do that around town. They put mounds up because people think they're aesthetic. That is a bad practice. But just for a week or so during freezing weather, you can have a mound and then just pull it back

away from the trunk. Right, Okay, So any as far as a particular one that you would recommend yourself, or just either one of the ones that I had before, you know, the ones you had before, or find there's some others. I'm trying to let me do this. If you will go to Aggie Horticulture website Aggie Horticulture, there's when you get there, there's a fruit and nuts section, and then there's a list of a bazillion different fruit plants, and there's a whole publication just on avocado that gives you

a bunch of additional varieties. Let's do it that way. It's free and print it. You can look at it. It's real easy to do. But yeah, they're fun to grow. We just have to realize that. Of course you're fore, you're far enough south that where you get away with what a lot of other folks around here can't get away with. All right, right, all right, well, thank you. I appreciate the call.

I'm gonna run to break here and turn it over to NICKI if you'd like to give us a call five five seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy four. It helps when I give you the right number. We're having a good time on the garden line, and we are glad you're listening, and we're going to go straight to the calls. Right now. We're going to head out to Cyprus and talk to Tigue. Hello, Tig, Hello there, Skip. I have a lot of semi tropical perennials, and

I love them because they bloom most of the year. But in these hard freezes, now four in a row, they die to the ground. You know, you have to cut them to the ground. They come back. But I think I want to mix in some things that will not die to the ground. I just don't know what they are. You got any suggestions. Oh, now, tell me a little bit more about what you're looking for in a plant other than doesn't die the ground, something that flowers for

a long period of time. Okay, So most of the ones that I have will flower. Some of them will flower literally all year and unless it gets really cold. Okay, so you must have like esperanza yellow bells, or the yep analia, yeah, Amelia, huh, Douranta there's another one. Yep. They're wonderful. They're wonderful. Except yeah, so you're gonna have to go to a shrub. And there are a number of different kinds of shrubs. Uh, it just depends on you know, what you're looking

for. Probably evergreen would be a good one if you want to have something that you can see all through the year. There are shrubs that they go dormant and then they begin to bloom again and the like the spring. For example, things like sparea will bloom in the spring with it's called bridal wreath that has clusters of little tiny white flowers all up and down it. But

that's a spring bloomer, a spring only bloomer. Oleanders are going to carry you through unless we have really bad cold where they can get killed back. But it'll bloom in the summertime. Itex is a pretty large plant though, but that's a summer bloomer. Also, that's not a little shrub. It kind of depends on what you like, though. You know, in terms of lots of blooms, I don't mind if they go dormant. I just would rather not have to cut them to the ground. As much as I

do, I won't give up on what I've got. I just want to mix something else in that doesn't require that. Yeah. Yeah, and this is sun or shade. I didn't catch that if you said it mostly sun mostly, some part part sun, part shade. Yeah. Oh boy, I'm I'm drawing a blank right now. Coming up with other ideas off the top of my head. Blooms Okay, well yeah, if there were more of them, I probably would know them too. Yeah, well, they're

there. It's just there's only ten thousand plants in my brain right now. The search function is not working my Google search on the brain. I've got one of those hard drives too. Listen to have another question again. Earlier today you were talking about putting a trellis on a west wall, which I have, and I had some I had some shade there. It was becoming problematic in terms of the closeness to the foundation, so I took those down.

And I want to I really want something that goes up for two stories, and I'm I also want a vine that flowers because I like that but won't freeze back. And I wanted to get your suggestions on that. Well, well you're you're a mister challenging questions today for sure. So when you want vines that go up like that, a lot of people will use. Like the fig vine. You see that even on roadside overpass kind of walls around Houston. That is pretty cul tender, though we've lost fig vine off

the side several times. Ivy is another one. The problem with ivy's are that they are very kind of almost invasive. They'll grab onto your wood parts and that's not good for the wood, the painted wood and stuff. But that is an option that does that sort of thing. There are other vines that I like, but they're not they don't always fill in as well, like coral vine. I'm sorry, not coral vine. Oh my gosh, I just went blank on it. It's one of them that I'm thinking about.

Is the native text and honeysuckles. Yeah, some scarlet honeysuckle. Yeah, they're just not that vigorous. If you had something to grow on, you could, but even get I don't think you're gonna get two stories out of those. Crossvine is the one I was trying to think of. Yeah, tangerine beauty, crossbine is the one I was trying to think of. It's good. It tends to kind of run in a line rather than spread out like an ivy would cover a wall. But crossbine is deciduous and then

it blooms beautifully in the spring. But it is a runner, and so you, I don't know how up to a story high you're gonna you know, control those vines and manage them and stuff. That's an option. There are climbing roses that will do pretty good, but again you're going to have to attach them to the trellis and there is some after pruning seasonally that you're going to need to be doing to those. By the way, for a flowering shrub rose roses beautiful. They have lots of shrub roses that are breed

disease resistant and they will bloom and bloom and bloom for you. That would be another good option for you to consider. Good thought. Yeah, talk to your where you are. You're in Cyprus, so you can go over to RCW Nursery. They've got an excellent selection right where two forty nine comes in to about way eight. They're not too fun. Do you like to shop there? In? A rose selection is great? They have an unbelievable I mean, and you've got a number of great nurseries up there with good

roses. But that that would be an option for you on the vine, you know, without just taking up a lot of airtime for me trying to think. Nothing is coming to mind else off the top of my head. But I'll think about it. Maybe something comes to mind, I'll mention it. All right, Okay, thanks a lot, all right, thank you appreciate. I appreciate your call very much. Today's theme has been try something new. What are some things that are new? Well, here's an idea.

Have you ever had purple Martin houses before? You know, purple Martins are actually out there eating pests and they're a benefit to our gardens, and plus they're really cool. They're beautiful. And you get a purple Martin house up on a pole and they once they find it, they set up shop and they'll be back. You'll have an year after year, and you can go to a place like wild Birds. That's probably the best place I can

think I have to get a purple Martin house. It's the best place I can think of to get a bird feeder or bird house of any kind and bird seed of any kind. By the way, bluebirds if you especially if you have a property where maybe there's like a little bit of a field or an open area on the edge of the woods, that is bluebird heaven. And if you put a little bluebird house up there, they're gonna find it. And when they do, you have one of the most beautiful birds we

have here in this area right there. And wildbirds can get you fixed up on that as well as the feeds like the super Blend I've been recommending very important during the cool season to provide those birds, you know, some extra protein and fats to sustain them through this season when it's kind of bleak out there. Wilbirds will get you fixed up. There's a I think six wildbirds all over town WBU dot com forward slash Houston, but WBU dot com forward

slash Houston to find of wildbirds near you. We're going to take a little break here. When we come back, Jeanette and Seabrook, you'll be the first up our phone number seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy four. Welcome back to garden Line. Glad you're listening today. The theme of the day try something new. What are you going to try that's new,

something different, something you haven't tried before. You know, if you're up in the Montgomery area, a place you can go to try something new is Ana Plants and Produce. They have a wide variety of all kinds of plants, and they have lots of bling for the landscape too. I mean, maybe right now, you know a little cooler weather chiminea out there on the patio. That'd be kind of cool. They have all kinds of things like that, whether it's an iron trellis that you might want for the garden or

other things. Of course, they've got folks that know what they're talking about. That's always helpful. That's why we like our Mama Pop Nursery share on garden Line. They're open seven days a week from nine to five, so today they're open up there in that area. Find something new that you haven't done before. What do you need to decorate that patio? What kind of

plants you want? Do you want to do someone a hanging basket? Try something new at A and A Plants and Produce up there in the Montgomery area. They're on the east side of Montgomery, like you're heading toward Conroe, just on the edge of town there. If you've been by that area, if you live out among many like neighborhoods up around Lake Conroe, you already know about A and A Plants and Produce. We're going to go now down to Seabrook and talk to Jeanette. Hey, Jeanette, Hi, Hi.

We have just a recurring problem every year with our yard we have the leaves are really really bad even though we treat them, and we want to know. My husband has bought nitrofoss barricade and is ready to treat this weekend, but we're wondering these treating according to a schedule, but we're wondering, if we have a particularly bad problem, can we treat more often for a little while. You don't want to do that, You don't want to do that.

I want to do that night. Flash barricade is a very good product for preventing weed seeds from germinating. And when you put it down, you follow the label uh, and that will do as good as it's going to do. You can. If you doubled it up, you would not get better weed control. You would you would be the potential for damaging other plants. And you don't want to do that. That's true of an insecticide. That's true fungicide, that's true of herbicides. The label's there for a reason,

and so go with the label. And that will do one hundred percent of what you need it to do. Uh. And so with barricade, you're gonna put it down. You're going to water it down just a little bit, like a third of an inch half an inch of water just to move it into the soil surface. That's all you got to do. Just just get those granules to release the chemical down in the sole surface. When the weed seeds try to germinate, it's already there and it'll shut them down.

Okay, And it's if we already have weeds out there, then is there, you know, and we'll pull as much as we can. But if they're already going to be producing seed, is the barricade going to prevent those seeds from germinating? No? No, it's a pre emergent. So is this in your lawn right? Yes? Okay, so there's a product. I was talking about a product earlier that Nelson's puts out that is designed for managing existing weeds, and it would be something you would put on.

Now those weeds you're seeing right now, those weeds are going to be blooming and setting seed here in the next couple of months, and we have got to stop that from happening, because once that happens, then you got a problem and you're trying to kill It's too late. You've already killed the weeds, have already made their seed. It's called turf star we Donator and it

star we Donator Donator, huh. And it's a fertilizer. And so you put it down and you want your weeds to be wet, So turn on the sprinkler just enough to get the surface of the weeds wet, and then you put the weed nator down. It sticks to the weeds, and the chemical moves in and kills existing weeds. Okay, you need with it.

No, not on this. No, it's granules that you put out, and it again if the weeds have to be wet, because you want it to stick to the weeds surfaces, and it moves down, it kills the weeds and then the fertilizers there to feed over a period of time. It has more than one kind of nutrient form of nitrogen, so it can over a period of time it's continuing to feed. So that would be a good option, and you know that that is what you would do for now.

The only other thing you might do for now would be to, you know, just get a spray that you spray just to kill broadly feeds in your lawn. That would be an option if you don't want to fertilize right now. If you wanted to just spray, you could, you could go that route. But the weed nator will do what I just messed. Okay, So if we put down the barricade, would we also then use the turf star at the same time, you could, because they're working in different ways.

Okay, but let's see, let me think about this. So what I would do if you were going to do that, I'd put down the barricade and then I'd water with about a third of an inch of irrigation to move the barricade down in the soil surface. Then immediately put the terfinator out the weed nader and make sure that it's sticking to those wet leaves. Therefore, because you just watered and then just walk away, you've done it, okay, and you've accomplished both that way okay. And the weed Nator.

Where can we find it? It's pretty widely available. So you are in down in Seabrook area trying to think who might downe that. I would, you know, if you can find an ACE Hardware pretty close, they're probably going to have it. A lot of the ACE Hardware will carry things like that, and I would call them and ask them if you go to Acehardware dot com and do their store locator, that ought to do pretty good. I don't know if Moss Nursery down there in Seabrook, Carrey's, Nelson's weed

Nator or not. They might, but I just don't know. I was down there the other day and I just didn't check. But you know, if you head in, you know, toward town just a little bit, you've got M and D and Claire Lake on Bay Area Boulevard. That's an ACE Hardware that's probably going to have it. The next close one to you is going to be kill Gores down in League City on main Streeam. I would try those two and see if they have it. There's plenty of other

aces around, but those are the two closest to you. Okay, great, all right, thank you very much. Thank you appreciate that call very much. You are listening to guard Line. Bye bye. You're listening to guard Line, and we're here to answer your gardening questions. What do you wanna talk about? Today's theme is try something new? What new have you tried this year? What have you tried that you have not done before?

I would recommend that you consider that. How about sprucing up that patio and making it a better place to enjoy just you know, we have a lot of months of the year here that are just good to be outside, especially if you got a little bit of a cover over it, maybe a vine over the top, or a covering over the top of an area where you have shade, and you get out there and enjoy it. You know, a little barbecue pit going by the way. Summer is coming, barbecue season

is coming. So something to think about. Well, you've listened to another hour of garden Line, another hour in the books. We are about to take a break here for the top of the hour in the news, I want to remind you of a couple of things. I should have mentioned this just on the phone with Jeanette out there and seek. My lawn care schedules are online if you go to Gardening with Skip, that's me gardeningwith Skip dot com and that's my website, and the lawn care schedules are on there.

The first one lawn care schedule, fertilizing, organic and synthetic options, air raiding, mowing, and watering. It tells you all about all of that. Second one, the pest disease and weed management schedule. When do chinchbugs occur here, wind soid webworms typically attack? When do you treat for grubs? What diseases? What weeds? And when? What are organic options?

What are synthetic It's all on that sheet, simple as that. Kt RH Garden Line does not necessarily endorse any of the products or services advertised on this program. Welcome to kt r H Garden Line with Skip Richter's just watch him as work. Things not a side. Welcome back to garden Line. Welcome back to garden Line. On a beautiful Sunday morning, take a look outside.

Oh my goodness, this is the day. Listen if you've got one drop of gardening blood in it ought to be your heart ought to be beating today because this is a This is a great day to get outside and do things in the garden. Uh. This is also a good day for me to talk about star Hope mission. You know, I've I've talked about Star Hope many times. My wife and I have supported Starve Hope from way back when because we believe in the mission of it. Star Hope brings hope.

They bring a chance for a new life, a spiritual training. They bring for people that are just in a down and out situation, maybe for no cause of their own, it doesn't matter why, people that need a new hope. A mom living in a car with their kids, where do you go from here? You know, handing them five bucks even going to change their life, but bringing them in, providing housing, providing care for the kids while mom learns a new job, skill providing helps with substance abuse,

providing whatever they need to get back on their feet. That's what Star Hope does. They walk them through a process so that when you give a dollar to Star Hope, it's a dollar that changes lives. It doesn't just feed for a day, It changes a life. And that's what they're all about. Go to sohmission dot org learn more about it, and I think you'll agree with me that it is. It is money well spent. It is putting your compassion to work in a very very meaningful way. I've been there.

I've seen the changes that occur, the stories of life, change that change people, that change the future of their children, and that changes our community to for the better. That's Star Star Hoop Mission. I want to go out now to Tom and Cyprus. Hey, Tom, how are you today? Morn and Skip? I just wanted to thank you for a new idea that you gave me early last year about keeping the spring tomatoes through the summer and growing on bigger in the fall, and so I did that.

I had never tried that before, and it struggled during the summer because it was just a brutal summer and I originally had five tomatoes plants, and they just started dying one at a time. I realized finally that the ones that were dying first were the ones further to the south, which didn't get any shade from a tree late in the afternoon, so I put a tarp up.

I just made a little shade so that that last surviving one would get shade about maybe two or three hours earlier in the afternoon, and that seemed enable it to pull through that hot, hot Augusta. Right, So that's just an idea somebody else might be able to use, you know, if one when summer like that and it's so hot, just give it a few hours of shade late in the afternoon. And that that in this case made

the difference, and that that tomato plant turned into a monster. It was like probably a six foot by six foot footprint, and I bet you I got probably sixty seventy tomatoes out of it. Do you remember what kind of it was? Off hand? That one I don't remember because i'd bought the seedling from I think from D and D feed store, and uh, you know, I planted in the spring then by fall. I don't remember what kind it was. But anyway, so that was that was an interesting thing.

Maybe some other people could take that little hint. And then another one. I had called you about my squashes in November, and I was worried because they had too many buds. I don't know if you recall that, but it was like acorn squashes, and there was a squash about every six inches along the vine. I said, well, with that many, there's no way they're going to grow full size, and you said, well, don't worry about it. So yeah, sure enough. A lot of those

sort of self aborted when they're about as big as a walnut. They just you know, turned yellow and then the stem just severed and they fell off. Yeah. So I ended up with a few, so that all worked out. Okay. Yeah, but that sometimes it just the pollination just doesn't happen. It doesn't work. But that's good. So did you raise some good acorns squash? Yeah? I had a pretty good I didn't plant the seeds until like September twenty eighth, I think, which was kind of late,

but that was because of the heat. So some of them didn't get as big as I wish they would. And that's what I was worried about when I had so many little ones started all right, you know, there wasn't going to be time. Yeah. Every year's new, every years different, and every year's fun. That's good. I appreciate that information. Tom, Thanks for kind of reporting back on that. Is that is true. We got to be patient as gardeners because I tay you think you get things

figured out. You think I know how to grow it tomato, for example, and then all of a sudden, this year nature throws you occur. That can happen. That's all right, Hey, One thing I wanted to mention to you talking about nutrients and things. I'm going to be really talking a lot about fertilizing here and a little bit, but right now I want to mention something and there's a little confusion about this, and that's azamite.

Azamite has nutrients, but don't think of it as a fertilizer, if that would be helpful, because when I talk about fertilizing your lawn, we're talking about putting out the nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium, the thing that they need the most of That helps, especially the nitrogen push new growth. But they also need a lot of micros, a lot of trace minerals. Plants in general need that that are essential. The plant could not grow without them,

and azemite provides that. And you can do that anytime of the year. It doesn't have to be you know, at certain times when you would do your other fertilizing. You can do it at anytime. You can do it right now. Azmi I would also encourage you to think about using it in your vegetable garden. You know, it doesn't take much. I mean, it's really really simple. Ten pounds will cover a thousand square feet of

vegetable garden. That is simple, and you don't have to just over and over and over and over and over do it just at least once a year. Just get that down, put it down, work it under the soil, and that way the produce you grow will be even more nutritious in terms of having a lot of different minerals and things in it. Sometimes our soils can get depleted and it just helps to always keep things beefed up. And azemite is a good way. So you can go by doing that. We're

going to head out now to Kingwood and talk to Charles. Charles, I got about a minute. We may get it done for a break here, but let's see what we can do, okay, guy. Keeping with the theme, I'm so tired of losing all my citrus to the freezes. I wonder if you can give me some names on blueberries. The trees had a neighbor in Pennsylvania who grew blueberry, so I take it the cold won't affect them down here. I just wanted to know the brand name or whatever they're

called, the species or whatever. Okay, well, the common blueberry we grow down here is called rabbit eye, the rabbit blueberry. And there's many varieties of rabbit eye blueberries out there. Some common names or Woodard and Climax and Premiere and tiff blue and things like that are all common rabbit eye names. Not all of those varieties I just named, or for this far south up down here, if we got down into the high teens and low twenties,

those will not be affected, correct, right. But any plant that is living the life of riley in warm weather conditions and then suddenly has a hard hard phrase is going to have big problems, even if it's a hardy plant. So we can't control that weather change. But in general, we don't worry about cold damage on our blueberries down here. How do they control that up north? When you know it's cold six months out of the year,

they're they're blooming like crazy. He had trees out just you know, well, yeah, yeah, it's the it's the the way the weather cools off. Because we warm up so much in winter here, we can pull plants kind of out of a dormancy and then a cold front hits and really damages them. So thank you very much for the information. I'm going to keep an eye off, I'm gonna talk. I'm gonna toss out a real

quick final thought and that is there's also Southern high Bush. So when you're out there shopping Kingwood Garden Center, Warren Southern Gardens, ask them about Southern high Bush. That's a different kind of blueberry, a bigger blotberry, a smaller plant, a little more personicity on water quality. But it's a very good one to choose too. And Charles, thank you, thank you very much for that and for hanging on. We're going to take a break seven

one three two one two fifty eight seventy four. I'll be right back. Welcome back to garden Line. We are talking about all kinds of things gardening today, including the theme of the day. Try something new. What are you going to try new? What have you never done before? Get out of the rut man, I mean, we're talking about lots of opportunities to grow all kinds of new things. What do you want to grow? What do you want to try? Is there a new tool that you want to

get. There are some really cool tools out there. By the way, if you've never done a soil knife, they call it a hoary hoary knife. It's a very special large knife that goes in the soil that cuts roots, it helps dig I use it for transplanting, you know, dig a little hole for a transplant. It's just got a lot of uses, really cool. I love those things. That's just an example one of the tools that you might want to try out in the gardens. There's always a new

thing to try when it comes to gardening. That's the fun stuff. Always something new. What do you want to try new? Hey, give us a call seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy four. Speaking of trying some things new, have you been out to Ingended Forest? I was just yesterday down at the Brasses Home and Garden Show and Intended Forest was there. In fact, they are there. They're still there today visiting with Clay

about things going on out at the Enchanted Forest. And there's always stuff going on. They got talks going on every weekend where you can learn stuff. Did you know that they also do a gardening consultations as you come out, like do you have questions about getting a bug identified, or what's the best fertilizer, or I want to do a project, can you advise me on that? Just visit their store. They've got knowledgeable staff that can help you

have a thriving garden. Maybe bring out some schematics. So here's my yard, and here's some pictures of this stuff, and what would be a good flower for here? Let them direct you to that. That's why we love our mom and pop garden centers here on guard Line because that's the kind of service you get, that's kind of knowledge you get. That's the kind of insurance so that your gardening dollars equal success in the end. That's what we're here for. That's why we're here on garden Line. As a matter of

fact, Hey, they got seeds out there. If you want to plant some tomatoes and eggplant and peppers for transplants and all other kinds of airloom seeds. They've got the equipment you needed, some trays, some starting mix for your seeds. Do you want to plant seed potatoes in your garden this year? And by the way, they're not seeds or potatoes. We cut them into chunks with an ie or two on each chunk to start potatoes. Do you want to grow some potatoes. They've got the red, they've got the

white, they've got the yellow. Out there, they've got the supplies. You know, earlier I was talking about using the micro life ocean harvest as a drench over plants to help them get started. They've got all of that kind of thing. Your plants that were frozen back need a little boost. When the weather begins to warm, they're going to begin to grow and they're going to have to do a lot of regrowing of what they lost. And the folks that enchended for us can get you all set up. You know,

they're easy to find. I love going out there. They enchanted in the name is a good a good name for them because they really are an enchanted place. But they're on FM twenty seven fifty nine. So if you're in Richmond, Texas and you're going to head up, let's say Sugarlane direction, they're oft the right FM twenty seven fifty nine in Chamton Forests. You need to go visit them. And I tell you when when weather warms up a bit more and the coast is clear to getting all those warm seasoned vegetables

and flowers out. They are going to have a stock that is like no other ready to go for you to take home to your garden and chant it forest. Our phone number is seven one three two one two five eight seven four seven one three two one two fifty eight seventy four. This is our last hour of the weekend. We're here from six am to ten am on Saturdays and on Sundays to answer your gardening questions. Well, we're in the

last almost the last half hour. Just a little bit here, we'll turn the corner and be there, and so this is your chance to call in. We usually see a lot of calls as we get toward the end of the show because people think, oh, I forgot I was going to ask this. Well, now's the time to remember. It gets a little bit busier usually later on as we go uh okay, garden line quiz, same oquiz every time. What is the most important thing to do to have success

with plants? And the answered? Ding? Ding, ding, Build the soil, brown stuff before green stuff. That's the way it works. Once you create a beautiful root zone where we've got nutrients and we've got good water holding capacity, but excellent drainage of excess water where we've got the biological activity that is what makes roots thrive. Where all that's happening, you drop a plan in and it's going to hit the ground running on the way to success.

And that's why Airloom Soil makes the special blends that they make to help you have success. For example, Airloom Soils, Rose Soil, Airloom Soils, Vegetable and Herb Mix. I've got a bed raised, a planting bed on rollers that I'm going to be filling with that vegetable and nerb mix. I'm about to once I get off the radio and have some time to go home and actually do gardening myself, I'm going to go do some of that and get that radio leaf mold compost. There's another one they produce. They

got plenty of that on hand. They sell about the bag. A lot of these products you can get purchased by bulk if you want to have them delivered. There's different options there. You just have to contact them. Go to Airloomsoilsoftexas dot com, Heirloomsoilsftexas dot com. There you're going to find a calculator so you know exactly like in my case, to fill that bed, how much soil do I need? Use a calculator. It'll tell you exactly what you need. And where do I buy heirloom soils? Go to the

website. I want to make a bulk order. Go to the website. Find out there's plenty of good stuff out there. They just are all set up for helping you have success by giving you that foundation brown stuff that comes before the green stuff. If you want pretty green stuff, you need to get quality brown stuff. There's another one. Maybe I'll trademark that if you

want pretty green stuff, you got to have quality brown stuff. That's another good way to think about it. It is something that I do harp on, and it's because you know, it's easy for people to get excited about. Like if I told you there's this new tomato and it's wonderful and you got to have it, you know everybody's running. I got to have that tomato. If I told you that there's this hibiscus and the flowers are bigger than a dinner plate and it blooms and blooms, everybody wants that. But

both the tomato and the hibiscus have got to have quality soil. In order to do what they can do. Otherwise they're not they're not going to do well. And so that's why we've got to have good brown stuff, quality brown stuff in order to have the beautiful, productive, bountiful and in the case of a vegetable garden, tasty green stuff that we want to have. Hey, I want to remind you that we are in the big middle of

pruning season. Now's the time to get your dormant pruning done. Those deciduous trees that are dormant, even like oak trees that are not deciduous, if they need some pruning, now is the time to get it done. And the place I would tell you to go is Affordable Tree Service Martin spoon More Affordable Tree Service. We're talking about a place with thirty years of experience. They've been a garden line supporter for a long time UH and gardenline listeners know

that they have good results. When they talk to Martin, he comes out, he's knowledgeable. You need to call him and get on the schedule. Though he stays busy. That's what happens when you treat your customers right and you do a good job and you know what you're doing. You're going to be busy. That's a good thing. Tell him you're a gardenline listener, so you go to the front of the line when you tell him that it's seven one three, six nine nine twenty six sixty three seven one three six

nine nine two six six three. Or go to afftree Service dot com. Afftree Service dot com. Anything you're going to do around a tree, don't do it until you talk to Martin. Do you need to do trenching? You can do a lot of damage that way if you don't take certain steps to protect your trees. Do you need pruning done? Don't let the guy that drove up with a pickup of chains on a business card touch your trees. Someone needs to know what they're doing, or the damage is forever on

a tree. They never recover from a really bad pruning job and a driver on all day looking at the hat racks where someone thought they were getting a good deal, well they weren't. Affordable Tree Service aff tree Service dot com. I'm going to go out now to West Houston and talk to Lynn. Hello, Lynn, Hi, how are you? I'm good? How are

you? I'm good? And I'm really really good because I managed to my husband and I managed to save our one year old potted lemon tree that survived last year's freeze, all right, and I did it a new way. He went up to home depot and got me some C nine clear incandescent Christmas tree and we wound those lights through the tree. It's about three feet tall and three feet wide, and we covered it with a barbecue cover real good, and put those lights on and left them on for four days. And

lordy, that tree, it just looks so happy now. I am so thrilled. That's good. And I had never tried that before, and you know, it was on one of my Facebook groups and I thought, darn it, I don't want to lose that tree. So anybody who wants to try that, I'd say go for it. It does work, you know. C nine is one of the incandescent lights. A lot of our Christmas lights, for those of you listening to this call, a lot of our Christmas lights are LEDs and they don't put out hardy any heat at all.

CE night is like a light bulb, like the little hunter WoT bulb, sixty WoT bub you put in your house in the lamp well SEA nine's or that kind of Christmas light and they do produce heat. And like Lynn was saying, you string them all through the tree and you got all these little tiny heat sources all through that canopy. It works. And Lynn, you're proofing and proofn Free is covered with blossoms right now, it is. And you know what one extra thing, you may get a lemon one, you

may get a lemon. Well life, well, when life gives you cold weather gets C nine bulbs and you'll get lemons that. I don't think that's how that goes, right, but anyway, Yeah, and plus the best part of all is now your neighbors have one other thing to talk about. You know, Mildred Lynn has got Christmas lights. It's after Christmas. She's hanging them outdoors. What's she's lost it? That's right. I love your show. Thanks, thank you so much. Thanks for Colin. I appreciate

that. Hey, it's time for a break. It's time for Nicky in the news. Our phone number if you'd like to give Josh a call seven one three two one two five eight seven four, or I should tell you this seven one three two one two kat r H Bunny You'll be first up when we come back. Welcome back to garden Line. I'm your host, Skip Richter, and we're answering gardening questions today at the phone number seven one three two one two five eight seven four seven one three two one two five

eight seven four. We're going to about to Spring, Texas and talk to Bonnie. Now, Hello Bonnie. Hi Skip. I have a question about sweet peas. I've been trying to go them like three years now, I guess, and each year I started a little bit earlier. And I think I first started like in May, and then I screwed it up the time to start the seeds. Anyway, I'm thinking, is it time now to start seeds for sweet peas. I haven't been able to get a blossom yet.

Oh yeah, you got it. You got to start early, early, early, much earlier than May. You can plant them now. You can do that, but I want to tell you next year, next year, in the fall, go ahead and plant some and be ready to protect them when we have a hard freeze. But I have found that planting sweet peas in the fall gives you a better plant coming out into spring that actually

will even be better in terms of bloom production. But other than that, yes, now is a good time to get those sweet peas in the ground. I would soak them overnight in some warm water and give them even a faster head start, and then get them out there ready to go. Does it help to put them in the little like hex kit slots plants the seeds and keep them inside for a while, or would it be better to put it outside right away? I have always direct seed of mine outside, but

this year I started. I have two flats full of little sweet peas. They're up. They're probably about three inches high right now, and I'm about to put those out in the garden. But again, yes, if we do have a nineteen degree day, we got a problem to cover them up. But they're pretty cold hearty and they'll go through the winter just fine for most of our conditions here. All right, sounds good, and I'll certainly try again. All right, Bunny, enjoy those They are a wonderful flower

to grow. I love them. Thanks absolutely, all right, By bye. We're going to now go to Montgomery and we're going to talk to Jen. Hello, Jen, Hi jiff I. Last week a guy called in and he was going to put down some kind of turf something or another, and you said to wait until the rain was through some kind of a turf builder or something like that. Okay, what was the name of it. I don't know which one he was he was talking about. I would not

have been recommending something called turf builder. That's a different company thing that we can go into details on any of They have a number of products, but I don't have those on my list to recommend it at all. Okay, but no, but it was something. It was something you recommended, so

maybe it wasn't terf. Well, here's the thing. If you put a fertilizer out and it's going to release fairly quickly, then it's going to wash away in all the spring rains before the grass is growing enough to actually take

it up, and so we don't want to do that. The other thing is if you put there are products that if we're going to get a lot of rain, they'll just literally wash off the lawn, you know, if you're going to like we just had gully washers of rain inches and inches and so you spend money on something, you put it out and then when you have water sheeting across the lawn in this like flow, it can carry it off site. And we don't want to do that. The thing we could

be doing now is with the pre emergent products getting them down. But with those you just want a little bit of water, because all you want to do is dissolve the particle and have it move into the surface of the soil, just the top half inch of soil. That's where it does its work. And so again you get this gully washer rain and you may not have that turnout like you want it. Plus some of those, especially when people overapply them, you get them washed down in the root system of trees.

You can have some problems from that as well. So I don't recommend putting those down before a heavy rain. Okay, So the bottom line is right now, I should not be putting any kind of fertilizer down in my yard to get rid of weeds and all that stuff. The only exception to that would be if you have a fertilizer that is going to relate, that has the chemistries and where it will release gradually over time different kinds of nitrogen,

some release faster than others. Then you could put it down now and again aside from fourteen inches of rain, you put it down now and it would be releasing not all right now, but as the weather warms up, you're going to get more and more of it releasing to the lawn. That would be okay, but it's early to be doing our primary fertilizing for lawns.

If you don't, if you don't have the chemistries that can release over time, well then I guess that must have heard it wrong, because I know he was going to put it down, and then you said, don't wait till next week, Yeah, which should do this week. So maybe it wasn't. Maybe I'm just here not hearing it right, but I yeah, the deficit in the details, Yeah, the deficit details Ghent. We have

a lot of different products that I talk about here. There's organic, there's synthetic, there's fast release or slow release, and it just kind of depends on the details. But primarily what I would have been talking about, and I don't remember the exact call you're referring to, but is probably the fact that we're about to get gully washer reins and we don't need to be doing anything right ahead of that, all right, So I don't need to panic

and stop and pick anything up right now. No, although you've probably heard me say more than once this weekend that if you're out shopping and you see stuff you're going to want to do, go ahead and get it, because then it's there and who knows where the opportunity arises. You've already got it, you're ready to go. It's only going to be a month or two or three however long until you do what you're going to do. And so

we're good, gotcha, Okay, well then I will. I will do that, Thank you so much, all right, Jen, thank you a lot. And by the way, Jen, if you haven't been online to my website to get my schedules, you should do that because they're free up there. It's gardening with Skip dot Com and all the kinds of questions you're asking are going to be on that schedule. Oh, gardening with skip dot

com. That's the website. Okay, okay, I'll do that, thank you, And that's where I add all kinds of new stuff that I'm creating. I'm about to put something up that's about how to test your soil. So anyway, okay, Well, I listened to you on my way to church every Sunday, all right, and some of it it was kind of a so I miss and so I don't so I need to think, all

right, garthing schedule. All right, thank you you bet and remember too, and I'm saying this because you just said it, but anytime that you want to listen to a past show, you can go listen on a podcast, the iHeart Podcast for Garden's Success, So you can listen to that at eleven o'clock tonight or on Wednesday morning at four if you want, if you want to listen, it's always available there so you can always do that. Great, all right, thank you, all right, thank you very much.

We're going to take a break the number of seven one three, two one two fifty eight seventy four. When we come back, Paul and Crosby, you will be the very first up. Welcome back to Garden Line. We are glad you're listening, and we're about to wind things up here in the next fifteen minutes. This weekend sure has been good day. Lots of good things to talk about today. We're going to start off by going back out now to Crosby to talk to Paul. Hello, Paul, Hi,

how are you doing well? Sir? That I live in Crosby on the lake and uh, I don't know if you'd heard the lake went up pretty high. Yeah. Anyways, I have five trees that were underwater, truit trees that were underwater. Is there, I mean, are they gone? Do I need to anything I can do to them to help them? No. One was a peach, one was an apple, one was a citrus. Okay, uh no, you don't, you don't. There's not much you can do. You want to get the water out of the soil is

what it needs. So anything that helps drainage would help. But they can put us well as the lake goes down. I mean, I think today they will be out of the water. Some of them were out of the water last night, but today they should all be out of the water. Yeah yeah, that ought to be okay. But even if you don't see water on the surface, there's water down below. Okay. Oh yeah yeah, And so that's the thing with the roots can't get oxygen, then then

you have the problem, you know, with the water. So I would that would be all that that. I would say, you know, a week of water, they're probably not going to die from that ongoing soggy conditions. You got problems now, It'll probably be just another day or two that it should be. They should be okay. Well, yeah, as long as four days isn't isn't too bad. That's that's about. Well, that that's I think you. I think you're gonna be okay, so property and

have make my own compost. There you go. There you go very tricks to that or making your yeah, uh to making your own compost. No, it's just a matter of when you have brown stuff and when you have green stuff and you put it together, that means there's nitrogen and there's carbon, and that race got a good ratio mix. There they will compost faster and you will get the job done. It works really well, so I would, I would just you can go online if you want a real simple

version. If you go online and search for composting for kids and put my name Skip Richter in there, I have a little online It was a slide set at one time, but now you can go through the pictures and steps of the basics of composting. I did it for kids, but it's the information's good for anyone. Sunday Sunday, All right, sir, thank you a pleasure. Yes, Sarah, you take care of good luck with those drownding trees out there. Let's go to Jersey Village. Now we're going to

talk to Walter. Hey, Walter Hice skip, How you doing well? Thank you well. I have a question about composting truly, as they have a section in the back that has an oak tree and I just let the leaves straw and is there Do they have too much tannin in the leaves to compost them and then use them as a soil amendment. No, not at all. Here's the thing. A lot of oak trees, an extreme example would be live oaks. They've got a real kind of a waxy coating over

the leaf and that slows decomposition, but they still will decompose. Everything that was once alive that hits the ground is going to rot back into the soil, animals and plants included. Now, if you want to speed the composting, you can break those leaves up. You can run over them with the lawnmower, you can run them through a shredder. Anything that breaks the leaves up creates more surface for the microbes to break them down, and so that

speeds it up. But just keeping it moist is the best thing. You know. The forest floor has no special mixes and stuff for composting. It just drops leaves, and it drops more leaves on top of them, and the leaves underneath that stay wet start to decompose, and it's a real slow gradual decomposition. But it ends up the same thing as if you put it in a bin, mix it up, add nitrogen stuff and speed it up.

It all ends up the same, right. But I've read that there are some trees that have stuff in their leaves and things that kind of suppresses competing trees. Okay, yes, yes, yes, that's a concept. It's called a lie lopathy, and what it basically means is one play creates a herbicide to stop other plants, and that happens in a number of things. Black walnut, the roots give off something called jew gloone, jewloone and jew gloone. Not every plant is bothered by it. Grasses aren't, but

tomatoes and beans and grapevines are all troubled by jew gloone. So, but that's produced by those I wouldn't worry about any of that when it comes to a compost. When you go through the process of a compost and breaking down, you're going to be okay, okay, I was just wondering about the oaks because acorns and stuff I have a lot of Yeah, they do. That's a good point, and they do. But just remember that in nature, their entire forests covered with oak leaves and acorns, and plant life goes

on just fine. So it's it's okay, no sweat. Yeah, Hey, thanks for the call. Good questions, Walter, I really appreciate that. Very good. Wow, we're running out of our day here. This has been too much fun. Let's just go back and do it again. Listen, if you need supplies on anything to make a beautiful garden and a bountiful garden and a beautiful landscape, Ace Hardware's got you covered. I mean, we've been talking today about pre emergent and post emergent fertilizers. They've got

them at ACE. When you hear me mention a fertilizer for your lawn or for your garden, they've got it at ACE. A's amie, they've got it at ACE. They've got it all there, tools and supplies, everything you need. Did you have some coal damage and maybe some plumbing you need repaired? They got that. Got a sprinkler had been run over and broken, and you got to get it fixed. You'll know it when you turn the system on. By the way, Ace Hardware's got you set up for

anything you need to repair your sprinklers. They just absolutely have everything you need and they're everywhere forty Ace Hardware stores in the Greater Houston area. Go to Ace Hardware dot com. Acehardware dot com. They have a store locator if you want to do the whole website. It's Acehardware dot Com slash store dash locator. But you can find it and you can find the ones in near

your I'm sitting you're looking a map right now. They are all over Houston, easy to find Ace Hardware and when you walk in, you're gonna have knowledgeable folks there and you're gonna have the supplies you need to do everything in the garden, and that includes decorating outside too. By the way, I need a nice sweet barbecue it. I don't know if my wife is listening, but there's this thing called the big Green egg at Ace Hardware's. They

have them there. They have all kinds of quality, wonderful supplies for barbecue and an outdoor living and strings of lights to make that outdoor seating area so beautiful. It just when you think about needing anything indoor, outdoor, in the home. Ace Hardware's going to have you covered. That is what makes it so much fun to go by and visit ACE Hardware's all over the Greater Houston area. Well, believe it or not, they're win another show.

I mean, we just I don't know. Time flies when you're having fun, they say. Okay, I guess they say, And so we're here having fun today. By the way, happy again as we started the show, Happy Daisy Day. January twenty eighth is National Daisy Day. By the way, Tomorrow for those of you who like carnations, is National Carnation Day. And my favorite January holiday is National Seed Swap Day on January the thirtieth. What would that be? That would be Tuesday? Am I doing my

math right there? National Seed Swap Day. It's always fun, you know when you collect your own seeds and share them with friends and stuff, and I don't know, it's just a kind of another fun way. It's another part of a social activity that is one of the many social things that makes gardening so much fun. For those of you who are interested in vegetables, do not forget the Fort Ben Regional Vegetable Conference Thursday, February eighth at the

Fort ben County Fairgrounds on Highway thirty six North Forty. Bucks gets you a full day of training plus law. I don't know how they do that, but anyway, if you want to find out more, go to the website for the Extension Office. It's Fortbend dot agra life A g R I L I f E dot org. There you can register. You can find out about all the classes, like there's gonna be something a mushroom garden building,

better Soils Irrigation be and honey production. I mean, oh my gosh, lots of good cool stuff at that event.