Creating shade that doesn’t use water requires brainwork but may be necessary in the desert. Usually, a home’s hottest areas are the exposed south and west walls and windows.
Home and Garden
You’ve got to kill Bermuda grass when it’s alive, which starts growing in late spring, and seed the bare areas after all the grass in that area dies.
Fireblight, or fireblight disease, is one of the few bacterial plant diseases that threaten cultivated fruit trees and ornamentals.
Pepper plant size depends on the variety. The recent trend in vegetable transplant hybridizing for home gardens is for closer spacing and early production.
To increase the size of pomegranate fruit, focus on pruning, applying fertilizer and watering enough so the plant doesn’t get droughty. Right now, because it is late fall and it is getting colder, there is nothing to do.
Delay pruning grapes as long as possible in the spring to reduce disease possibilities and avoid any late spring frost damage after pruning. Immediately after pruning grapes, consider applying a fungicide to the vines if there were problems with grape bunch diseases last year.
Whiteflies are a bad insect problem for any plant. Their populations grow so quickly that small numbers lead to large numbers very fast. For that reason, it’s important to get them under control early, as soon as you see them.
Snails and slugs love where it’s wet. They also love food. Food and moisture make a perfect breeding area.
Early Saturday morning, I spotted two green beetles on a young apple tree. These are close relatives of what we called in the Midwest “June beetles.”
Q: I planted three yellow Lady Banks roses on my south wall when I moved here 10 years ago. Two years ago, my neighbor planted a white Lady Banks rose nearby. This year I noticed white roses growing on my yellow Lady Banks rose. I thought these flowers might be from their plant, but I traced it back to the base of my vine. Will my yellow roses eventually all be transformed to white? How do you explain this botanically?
Q: I cut the lower leaves off my artichoke plant a couple months ago per your suggestion. In fact, my son, who is a pretty good gardener, asked why I cut them off. He comes over and helps me with the vegetables and asked me why I did that.
Q: I am putting in 30 more wine grapevines. I was thinking of using chat, crushed rock, for mulch rather than wood chips. What do you think?
Q: I took your advice and am treating pill bugs in my garden like slugs. I have drowned them with beer but they keep coming back. My neighbor is giving me his old cans of beer. I had to dig up the rhubarb plants and put them in pots. This is sure a frustrating year.
Q: I have read that African sumacs are fast growers. The African sumacs here seem to be at a stand still. I have had two in my backyard since April. They are alive but the canopy and trunk just seem the same; there has been perhaps 10 percent growth. The trees are solid with tall, thin trunks, about ½ to ¾ inch in diameter, with a canopy that branches out at 8 feet. There are no branches or leaves below that. The trees are staked high and the stems are all finger diameter. Will they take off eventually?
Question: How do I separate the worms from my compost? I bought 1,000 worms from a worm farm online. They have multiplied into the zillions, but I don’t want to give them to my neighbors when I give away the compost. Is there an easy way to separate worms from compost?
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