A perfect time to catch up on gardening info
|
|
Even a little bit of color stands out on a grey day:
The last red blossoms on a thriving pineapple sage.
(Photo: Kathy Morrison)
|
This late in December I don't have much time to garden even when the sun is out. The current rain system has kept me mostly indoors, where it's warm and cozy. Between flurries of gift wrapping and cooking, I can sit down with a big mug of coffee and catch up with articles and posts.
Do you follow The Garden Professors? They have an excellent blog, offering science-based reports and advice. But it's not humorless -- a clip from the movie "Mame" is included in the latest one.
Linda Chalker-Scott is maybe the best known of the writers, from her work dispelling garden myths and her book "How Plants Work." Her fellow bloggers include Jim Downer, Pam Knox, John Porter and Sylvia Thompson-Hacker. They also have an active Facebook group , where participants post questions and information, but it's private, and readers must promise to follow the very specific rules before they're allowed to join.
Here are a few of the gardenprofessors.com posts I stashed away recently to read and refer to:
-- Haul Out the Holly ... and a cactus ... and a parasite: A review of holiday plants and their traditions, by John Porter.
-- Pruning Mature Shade Trees , by Jim Downer. This post is an invaluable reference, and includes several pictures of older trees maligned by poor pruning. "Large trees bear the burden of their insults over the years," he writes. Yikes.
-- Poinsettias: from ditch weed to holiday super star (history, lore, and how to get those d@!% things to rebloom next year), by John Porter. Yes, you can get that holiday brightener to rebloom. But it takes some work. Porter also discusses the fascinating history of the poinsettia and how it came to be such a prominent Christmas plant.
-- Why root washing is important: An illustrated cautionary tale . Root washing is a huge topic with Linda Chalker-Scott, and it's an especially important technique for anyone putting in new landscape plants. Root washing is a method of releasing and correcting the root system of plants grown -- stuffed into! -- nursery pots, especially trees. As she notes, "Leaving rootballs intact creates textural discontinuities between the roots and the native soil, and poorly structured woody roots are not going to correct themselves."
Videos on YouTube of course are always good gardening references, but it's easy to get caught up in ones that have no real relevance to Sacramento-area gardens. These videos are iron-clad local, and perfect for winter:
Composting: Getting started and Composting: Hot vs Cold with Susan Muckey of the Sacramento County master gardeners.
Shopping for bare-root fruit trees with Ed Laivo of Dave Wilson Nursery.
Grafting fruit trees with Tom Spellman of Dave Wilson Nursery.
Identifying and removing suckers on citrus trees with Kerry Beane of Four Winds Growers.
Pruning woody sages with Pat Schink of the Sacramento master gardeners. This video includes growing season and dormant season (winter) pruning of salvias. My sages and salvias looked better than ever this past year, thanks to these pruning guidelines.
Comments
0 comments have been posted.Sacramento Digs Gardening to your inbox.
Local News
Thanks to our sponsor!
Sites We Like
Garden Checklist for week of May 12
Get your gardening chores and irrigation done early in the day before temperatures rise.
* Plant, plant, plant! It’s prime planting season in the Sacramento area. Time to set out those tomato transplants along with peppers and eggplants. Pinch off any flowers on new transplants to make them concentrate on establishing roots instead of setting premature fruit.
* Direct-seed melons, cucumbers, summer squash, corn, radishes, pumpkins and annual herbs such as basil.
* Harvest cabbage, lettuce, peas and green onions. This heat will cause leafy greens and onions to flower; pick them before they bolt.
* In the flower garden, direct-seed sunflowers, cosmos, salvia, zinnias, marigolds, celosia and asters.
* Plant dahlia tubers. Other perennials to set out include verbena, coreopsis, coneflower and astilbe.
* Transplant petunias, marigolds and perennial flowers such as astilbe, columbine, coneflowers, coreopsis, dahlias, rudbeckia and verbena.
* Keep an eye out for slugs, snails, earwigs and aphids that want to dine on tender new growth.
* Feed summer bloomers with a balanced fertilizer.
* For continued bloom, cut off spent flowers on roses as well as other flowering plants.
* Got fruit trees? If you haven't already done so, thin orchard fruit such as apples, peaches, pears, pluots and plums before they grow too heavy, breaking branches or even splitting the tree. Leave the largest fruit on the branch, culling the smaller ones, and allow for 5 to 6 inches (or a hand's worth) between each fruit.
* Thin grape bunches, again leaving about 6 inches between them. For the remaining bunches, prune off the "tail" end, about the bottom third of the bunch, so that the plant's energy is concentrated in the fruit closest to the branch.
* As spring-flowering shrubs finish blooming, give them a little pruning to shape them, removing old and dead wood. Lightly trim azaleas, fuchsias and marguerites for bushier plants.
* Add mulch to the garden to help keep that precious water from evaporating. Mulch also cuts down on weeds. But don’t let it mound around the stems or trunks of trees or shrubs. Leave about a 6-inch to 1-foot circle to avoid crown rot or other problems.
Powered by California Local
