Melinda's Garden Moment

Drying Herbs

Keep the flavor of your garden alive all year long.  Pick and dry herbs for winter meals and holiday gifts. 

Gather the herbs into small bundles and secure with a rubber band.  As the stems shrink so does the rubber band.  Use a spring type clothespin to hang the bundles from a clothes line or hanger. 

Move the bundled herbs to a warm, dry, airy place - out of direct sunlight for drying. Many gardeners like to cover the drying herbs with a paper bag to keep them clean.

You can also dry herbs in the microwave.  Remove the leaves from freshly harvested herbs.  Evenly spread 2 cups of washed herb leaves on a double thickness of paper towel.  Microwave on high for 4-6 minutes depending on your microwave.

Fully dried herbs will be brittle and rattle when stirred.  Store dried herbs in an airtight container for later use.

A bit more information:  Complete your herbal gift with a few of your favorite recipes or suggestions for using these herbs.  You may even want to include a few of the other ingredients for these recipes, place it in a basket and tie it up with a bow.  Something from the heart and garden always makes for a special gift.

For more gardening tips, how-to videos, podcasts and more, visit www.melindamyers.com

Vacation Care for Your Houseplants

You can stop your mail, kennel your pets, but it is difficult to find a reliable house plant sitter while on vacation. 

I receive lots of calls from gardeners who return home from vacation to find their houseplants either floating in water or the soil bone dry and leaves brown and crispy.  Reviving them is difficult and often impossible.  Avoid the problem by creating an environment that will allow your plants to survive on their own.

Fill the sink or tub with an inch of water.  Set your well-watered house plants on overturned pots or stones so they are setting above not in the water.  Loosely cover the sink or tub with plastic.  I have used this system to keep my plants looking good for several weeks.

Or, invest in one of the self-watering devices.  A two liter or similar container filled with water is mounted on a plastic or terra cotta pick.  Water moves from the container to the soil as it dries.

Whichever method you choose, give it a try before leaving town to make sure it is working correctly.

A bit more information:  This may be the time you decide to invest in self-watering containers.  These pots have a reservoir that holds the water below the soil.  The water moves from the reservoir to the soil as it dries.  You can also make your own.  Fill a container with water.  Place one end of a fabric strip (serves as a wick) in the soil of your houseplant and the other end in the bucket of water.  Repeat for each houseplant.  The water moves through the fabric strip as the soil dries.  Test before leaving town.

For more gardening tips, how-to videos, podcasts and more, visit www.melindamyers.com

Squash Vine Borer

All your hard work is paying off with an abundant harvest. Then, one day you notice your squash plants are wilted and near death.

Take a closer look at the base of the stem for signs of the cause, squash vine borer.  This black and orange day-flying moth lays its eggs at the base of the stems of vine crops.  The eggs hatch and the small worm-like larvae burrow into the stem, eating their way through the center, leaving a trail of saw-dust like material called frass.

The feeding prevents water and nutrients from moving between the roots and leaves and the plant then wilts and eventually dies.  But don’t give up just yet.

Leave the plants in place while carefully slicing the stem lengthwise.  Remove or kill any borers you find and then cover the stem with moist soil.  This encourages roots to form along the stem so the plant can continue to grow and produce.

Reduce future problems by removing and destroying any borer infested vines this fall.  Proper cleanup removes the borers that overwinter in the plant debris.

A bit more information:  Next spring start watching for this pest early in the season when the plants begin to vine.  Smash the small brown button shaped squash vine borer found at the base of the stems.  Some gardeners choose to use insecticides.  If you do, be sure to read and follow all label directions carefully.  Start treating as soon as the adults are spotted in the garden.  Repeat as recommended.  Consider using one of the more eco-friendly options like spinosad or pyrethrins.  Spray only the base of the stem and early in the morning to minimize the risk to the all-important bees.

For more gardening tips, how-to videos, podcasts and more, visit www.melindamyers.com

Keep Your Landscape Green Despite Watering Bans and High Water Bills

You can have a good-looking landscape and lower your water bill this summer! 

Whether it is a self-imposed or community wide watering ban, many gardeners are looking for ways to reduce their use of municipal water.

Start by prioritizing your watering needs.  New plantings and stressed plants should receive top priority.  Make sure these plants are watered thoroughly and often enough to keep the young and recovering root system evenly moist.

Next are the moisture-loving plants like paper bark birch, katsuras and Japanese maples.  Water thoroughly and mulch the soil around the base of the plants to keep the roots cool and moist.  This also eliminates the grass that is a big competitor for water and nutrients.

Consider letting your lawn go dormant.  Dormant grass will recover though you may have a few more weeds to control in fall.

And, don’t forget about established trees and shrubs.  They do need a helping hand during extended droughts.  Water the area under the canopy thoroughly.

A bit more information:  You can further reduce your water bill, live within your communities watering ban and keep your landscape thriving.  Capture rain with the help of rain barrels and cisterns.  You can collect 623 gallons of water off 1,000 square feet of roof for every inch of rain.  Try interlinking several barrels to maximize your ability to capture and store rainwater.  And, make sure to have an overflow hose to direct excess water away from the house and into the lawn or better yet rain garden.  You will be amazed what a difference this can make.

For more gardening tips, how-to videos, podcasts and more, visit www.melindamyers.com

Add a Bit of Pizzazz to Your Summer Landscape

The summer weather and your busy schedule have left your landscape looking a bit weary.  There’s still time to add sparkle and enjoy your landscape this summer. 

Many garden centers now carry large size annuals ready to pop in the garden and add a little extra color.  Or, invest in a few container gardens or hanging baskets.  Set them at entryways, on the deck or right in the garden.

Replace faded annuals in existing planters and gardens to add a fresh new look. 

Summer and fall blooming perennials and shrubs can be planted now for immediate and long lasting garden appeal.  Just make sure all new additions are properly watered throughout the remainder of the garden season.

Add a bit of whimsy and color with some garden art.  Purchase something ready made or convert one of your discards or favorite old items into a colorful garden accent.  Gazing balls are back in style but so are bowling balls painted to look like giant lady bugs or covered with pieces of stone or glass to create mosaic garden art.

A bit more information:  Add additional color and pizzazz to your containers with colorful dowel rods, stems from red or yellow twig dogwood and the contorted branches of cork screw willows and Harry Lauder’s Walking Stick.  And don’t forget to tuck in a few fairies or animal statues for the kids. 

Then look for some creative containers.  Chairs, bikes, grills, old wagons and anything with a place to set plants can be converted into a planter.  Or, paint them bright colors and place among your plants to create added interest and a colorful surprise for your visitors

For more gardening tips, how-to videos, podcasts and more, visit www.melindamyers.com

Summer Lawn Care

Warm temperatures, drought and summer rain storms take their toll on our landscapes.  Keep your lawn healthy and looking its best despite the summer weather. 

Continue to mow high throughout the summer and fall.  Taller grass is the last to go dormant during hot dry spells and is better able to fend off insects, disease and weeds.

If you water your lawn, water thoroughly and less frequently to encourage deep rooting.  Get out the sprinkler and water whenever your footprints remain in the grass.  Deeply rooted lawns are less susceptible to summer stress and pest attacks.

Do not apply herbicides to the lawn in summer.  These chemicals can damage your lawn during hot weather.  Plus, when they do kill the weeds, new weeds, not the slow growing or dormant lawn grass, are the first to fill the voids.

Avoid fertilizing the lawn.  Dormant lawns do not need to be fertilized and all lawns can be damaged by high nitrogen fast released fertilizer applied during the heat of summer.

If you allow your lawn to go dormant during hot dry spells, leave it dormant until cooler temperatures and rains return so nature can get it growing again.  Those lawns taken in and out of dormancy with irregular watering are the most stressed.

A bit more information:  Give your summer stressed lawn a bit more help this fall.  Continue to mow high as long as the grass continues to grow. Use a low nitrogen slow release fertilizer to help your lawn recover and prepare for next year.  Labor Day and Halloween are good times to feed the lawn.  Adjust your timing based on weather and never fertilize frozen soil.  It’s a waste of fertilizer and bad for the environment.

For more gardening tips, how-to videos, podcasts and more, visit www.melindamyers.com

Compost – It’s Simple

Save time and money by turning landscape trimmings into a valuable soil amendment. 

It’s as simple as placing disease and insect free plant debris into a pile and letting it rot.  Don’t add meat, dairy, weeds gone to seed or perennial weeds that can take root and grow in your compost pile. 

You can enclose the pile in a bin to keep the process neat, tidy and out of sight.  Some gardeners prefer tumbler composters for added ease. Speed things up by layering yard waste with soil, adding a bit of fertilizer or compost and moistening to a consistency of a damp sponge. 

Turn the pile as time allows, moving the more decomposed materials from the center to the outside of the pile.  It’s a great work out and speeds up the decomposition.  The more effort you put into composting the sooner you have rich organic matter for your garden. 

Use finished compost in containers, work it into garden beds to improve your soil’s moisture holding capacity and drainage or spread it over the soil surface as a mulch. 

A bit more information:  You may have heard the Composter’s Chant “Equal parts of green and brown help the microbes break it down”.  It is true that including equal parts of nitrogen rich (green) materials like herbicide-free grass clippings, fruit wastes, vegetable clippings and manure with carbon rich (brown) cornstalks, evergreen needles, straw and fall leaves will speed the process.  But don’t let this recipe prevent you from composting.  All plant waste will eventually decompose as weather, insects and micro-organisms digest the materials over time.  So put your landscape trimmings in a heap and watch the magic happen.

For more gardening tips, how-to videos, podcasts and more, visit www.melindamyers.com

Harvest Tomatoes for the Best Flavor

Nothing beats the flavor of fresh-from-the-garden tomatoes.  And, proper harvesting will insure the best flavor. 

My favorite way to eat tomatoes is right in the garden.  Warmed by the sun and definitely fresh.  For the best flavor, harvest tomatoes when they are fully ripened.  This means you need to leave them on the plant 5 to 8 days after they fully color. Vine ripened tomatoes have the best flavor for using fresh or preserving.

Check plants regularly and keep harvesting, so the plants continue to produce.  This also reduces problems with insects and disease attacking over ripe or rotting fruit.

And, notice the Indeterminant tomatoes will keep growing and flowering until frost kills the plant.  Prune off the stem tip of these tomatoes in September.  This will redirect the plant’s energy into ripening the existing fruit instead of producing more tomatoes that won’t have time to mature.

Store the mature red tomatoes in cool, 45 to 50 degree, conditions with high humidity.  They will last about 7 to 14 days in these conditions.

A bit more information:  At the end of the harvest season you can pick mature green tomatoes when the blossom end is greenish white or showing color and ripen them indoors.  Store the unripe tomatoes in a 60 to 65 degree Fahrenheit location. Set the fruit on heavy paper so they do not touch or wrap the individual fruit in newspaper.  These will ripen in several weeks.  Speed up ripening by moving a few tomatoes to a bright warm location a few days prior to use.

For more gardening tips, how-to videos, podcasts and more, visit www.melindamyers.com

Blossom End Rot on Tomatoes

It's finally here!  Your first red tomato.  You reach in, twist it off the vine and have a look.  And there it is - a big black spot on the bottom of the tomato. 

The problem is blossom end rot.  It’s caused by a lack of calcium in the soil.  Now don't reach for the fertilizer, most soils have plenty of calcium.  If in doubt, have a soil test before spending money on something you may not need.  Root damage or moisture imbalances are usually the problem.  They prevent the plants from absorbing the calcium from the soil. 

Prevent the problem by keeping the soil evenly moist throughout the summer.  Proper watering and mulch can help.

The good news.  It’s safe to eat the firm red portion of the tomato.

A bit more information:  Check the soil moisture in container-grown tomatoes daily.  Fluctuations in soil moisture are greater in containers than in-ground plantings.  That means a greater risk of blossom end rot.  Water thoroughly whenever the soil is slightly moist like the consistency of a damp sponge.  Most planters need to be watered thoroughly every day.  Some even twice a day.  Keep in mind the smaller the container and the higher the temperature the more often you need to water.

For more gardening tips, how-to videos, podcasts and more, visit www.melindamyers.com

Controlling Japanese Beetles

You can’t miss them.  These voracious pests eat and mate in broad daylight and feed on the leaves and flowers of over 300 different types of plants and the roots of turf grass. 

You guessed it - Japanese beetles.  Knocking the beetles off the plants into a bucket of soapy water is the most environmentally-friendly method of control.  Try doing this in the morning when the beetles congregate on the plants. 

Those fighting large populations may want to plant resistant species such as coreopsis, ageratum, lilies, pansies, arborvitae, and juniper.  This reduces the plant damage and your frustration.

Milky spore disease applied to the lawn kills the larvae of the Japanese beetles.  It takes several years for the disease to build up and provide control.  In the meantime, you can’t use other pesticides on the lawn.  And, keep in mind the adults can fly up to 2 miles and move in from surrounding areas.

A bit more information:  Organic insecticides such as Neem, pyrethrin, rotenone and spinosad will provide some control. Systemic insecticides such as Bayer Tree and Shrub Insecticide are applied to the soil at least 20 days before feeding is expected to begin.  I don’t recommend traps as most experts agree that traps attract more beetles into your yard.

For more gardening tips, how-to videos, podcasts and more, visit www.melindamyers.com

Caring for Garden Fresh Cut Flowers

Bring a bit of your garden’s beauty indoors for all to enjoy.  Fresh cut flowers right from the garden make everyday a special occasion. 

Collect flowers in the morning or evening when they are fully hydrated.  Cut the flowering stems back to a set of healthy leaves or base of the flowering stems so the plant still looks good in the garden.

Take a bucket of water to the garden to keep flowers fresh and hydrated while you harvest the rest of your bouquet. Store cut flowers in a cool location until you are ready to use them.

Remove the lower leaves from the stems before arranging.  Submerged leaves can lead to fungal growth and reduce vase life.

Recut the stem on a slight angle to prevent it from sitting square on the bottom of the vase, preventing the uptake of water.

Place the flowers in fresh water in a clean vase.  Keep the vase filled with water and add a bit of commercial or homemade floral preservative to the water. Make your own preservative by mixing in clear sugary soda and a drop of bleach.

A bit more information:  Any flower looks good in an arrangement, but some last longer than others.  Try growing a few of these flowers to provide long-lasting added beauty in your arrangements.  Consider adding Lisianthus (Eustoma) that lasts 10 days in a vase. Other annuals to try include the taller ageratums like Blue Horizon, cockscomb, cosmos, mealycup salvia, strawflower, pansy, nicotiana, statis, petunia, snapdragon, sunflower, sweet pea and zinnia are just a few of the annuals suited for cutting. And, try using a few perennials in your arrangements as well like asters, mums, coreopsis, delphinium, coneflower, coral bells, lady’s mantle and phlox.  For a bit of foliage use artemisia, dusty miller, hosta, lamb’s ear, lavender and twigs of euonymus and evergreens.
For more gardening tips, how-to videos, podcasts and more, visit www.melindamyers.com

Holes in Cabbage, Broccoli and Kale leaves

Have you noticed those beautiful white butterflies flitting across your garden?  Lovely to look at, but what they leave behind is a problem for gardeners.

The larvae of this butterfly as well as the diamondback moth and cabbage looper eat holes in the leaves of cabbage, broccoli, kale, collards and their relatives.

Nature helps control these pests.  Parasitic wasps, ground beetles, soldier bugs and lace wings are all natural predators of these insects.  You will need to tolerate a little damage and avoid using pesticides in your garden so these good guys will move in and help control the pests.

Regularly check along the stems and between leaves for the gelatinous eggs and green caterpillars.  Destroy whatever you find.

Or try the environmentally-friendly Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) sold as Dipel or Thuricide.  The Bacillus thuringiensis, known as Bt, bacteria kills only true caterpillars and is safe for people, pets, wildlife and other types of insects.

A bit more information:  Prevent the damage by covering these plants with a floating row cover sold as ReeMay, Harvest Guard or Grass Fast.  These polypropylene fabrics allow air, light and water through, but prevent the butterflies and moths from laying their eggs on the plants.  Cover the planting with the fabric anchoring the edges tight to the soil with stones, board or other heavy items.  Leave enough slack for the plants to grow.  Simple and eco-friendly.

For more gardening tips, how-to videos, podcasts and more, visit www.melindamyers.com