UGA Vegetable Gardening Publications
With food prices high, folks have been thinking about growing some of their own food. Food gardening is not hard and it doesn’t have to take much room in your landscape. You can even do it in containers! These gardening publications are available on the Internet or ask for a...
Shrub – Transplanting 1-2-3
Most shrubs and trees should be transplanted when the demand for water is least, in late fall or winter. Since many roots will inevitably be lost, they need many weeks to regenerate themselves before the hot, dry blasts of summer arrive. If you are contemplating moving a plant that would...
Shrub – Pruning Calendar
The Home & Garden section of the Atlanta Journal and Constitution published a very nice pruning calendar several years ago. When viewed on a sheet of newsprint, it was gorgeous. When reduced to fit onto a sheet of typing paper it was impossible to read. I imagine you didn’t keep...
South Africa Adventure – 2014
As many of you know, I led a group of gardeners and spouses to South Africa in 2010. The memories of that vibrant, beautiful, surprising country still linger in my brain! We had such a good time I’ve decided to lead another group trip there in January, 2014. Want to...
New Gardening Books
I regularly receive interesting-looking gardening books from publishers. I don’t have time to read them all or give an intelligent review but I know they would appeal to many gardeners. These are some of the books I’ve gotten recently. You can click the link under the book cover images to...
Flattened Stem – Fasciation
Q: I have a ‘Sterling Star’ lily. Its stem is about 1″ wide and flat, not round. It has loads of flowers/buds. What causes this mutation? Will it continue to grow like this in years to come? Q: I saw...
Coneflower – Green Flowers
Q: I purchased the three white cone flowers last year while they were in full bloom. This year however two plants have green petals in place of white ones.Should I pull the two plants that show signs of problems? A:...
Jasmine – Pruning
Q: I have recently moved into a new house with a large garden in mostly full sun. Several jasmine are planted around the house. They bloom white during the summer. I’ve been pruning away at them because they are vigorous...
Daffodil – Not Blooming
Q: How can I get my daffodils that haven’t bloomed in several years to bloom again? A: Daffodils bloom in response to how happy they were the previous year. If you fertilized yours last spring or divided the clump and...
Coffee Filter – Covering Drain Hole
Q: What is the scoop on using coffee filters to cover the drain holes in pots rather than small rocks or broken pieces of pots? A: The coffee filter idea seems reasonable to me. If you don’t cover the hole,...
Squirrel – Digging in Pot
Q: I missed your talk about dealing with squirrels on the radio a week ago. I have a wooded backyard and want to plant some hellebores (Lenten rose) that I have in pots. Every time I put out something the...
Lovegrass – Using
Q: What can you tell me about using weeping lovegrass on steep banks for erosion control? When is the best time to plant and how? A: Weeping Lovegrass (Eragrostis curvula) is a native of South Africa introduced into the U.S....
Hornet – Preserving the Nest
Q: We have a hornet nest in a tree near my house. I want to take it to school for science class. When will the hornets be dead inside the nest? A: The hornet nest will be safe after a...
Palms for Atlanta
Q: My niece just moved back from Miami to Woodstock Georgia. She misses all the palms in Miami. Can a palm grow outside in northern Georgia. Her house gets a lot of sunlight. A: Needle palm and windmill palm do...
Frog – Control
Q: I live on the Chattahoochee river and we are inundated with frogs! Some nights their noise is so loud we can’t go to sleep until midnight. Is there anything that will repel them – or at least teach them...
Walnut – Toxic to Apples
Q: I have ordered an English walnut cultivar for my back yard. The only available spot will place it within thirty feet of young crabapple and apple trees. Very recently I learned that English walnut cultivars are grafted to black...
Wild Plum – Identification
Q: I have a question that centers around a pleasure from my pre-teen years. Growing wild near my Dad’s garden plot and near the county road were small plums. The fruit were about twice the size of a cherry and...
Bermuda – Remove from Liriope
Q: What’s the best thing to use to get bermudagrass out of monkey grass (liriope)? A: The label on the grass-killing product Vantage(tm) lists liriope as being tolerant of its active ingredient, sethoxydim. Greenlight Bermudagrass Killer(tm) contains the chemical fluazifop...
Clematis – Wilt
Q: I have a two-year old clematis that is climbing up over my garage. In the last couple of months it has started to turn brown at the ends of the vine and now all the leaves throughout are turning...
Banana – Growing
Q: I have the offspring of a banana tree that came from my great-grandparents’ back yard in South Carolina. I planted it in my yard in 1989. It came back every year with more banana trees but no fruit. Last...
Pineapple – Growing
Q: Six years ago I had a fresh pineapple for lunch. I put the top in a pot just to see what would happen. After five years I harvested a small home-grown pineapple this past April. My problem is that...
Lucky Bamboo – Identification
Q: I keep seeing small bunches of a plant called “Lucky Bamboo”. It is usually three to five green stems in a jar of water with glass beads or rocks. The sections have small roots and usually one sprouting of...
Squash – Identifying
Q: My curiosity has gotten the best of me. I opened my compost bin one day to find dozens of tiny sprouts. My mother, a farm-raised lady, recognized these as squash sprouts. Since my wife and I often eat yellow...
Weeds – Identification with Pictures
Weed control in the landscape is a tough business. You have to know a lot about the weed in question just to get started! As in most situations, a picture is worth a thousand words. Websites Preen has terrific weed...
Diagnosing Holes in the Yard
Sometimes many heads are better than one when it comes to solving a problem. Wade Hutcheson, my Extension colleague in Spalding county, gets plenty of calls from the citizens of his area asking his help in identifying various holes in...
Brown Patch – Diagnosing
You have brown patches of dead grass in your lawn. Is it the common lawn disease ‘brown patch’ or is it something else? The answer is important: if it is brown patch you probably need to spray with a fungicide....
Bermuda – Weed Control
BASIC INFORMATION: Weed Identification Pictures General Turf and Weed Info Lawn Care Calendars THREE METHODS There are three primary methods of controlling weeds. Any one method, when used alone, will not usually control all of your weeds. To consistently control...
Lawn – Timing Pre-emergent Herbicide
One of the sourest phrases that can be directed at a child or adult is “I told you so!” Whether you touch a hot match, leave tools out in the rain or lift cinder blocks all afternoon, someone is usually...
Crapemyrtle – Pruning
One of the most confounding arguments I face is whether and how to prune crapemyrtles. They are mercilessly “murdered” by unaware landscapers and homeowners each winter… yet they still bloom in summer. Some people even believe a crapemyrtle won’t bloom...
Lawn – Growing in Shade
OK. I admit it. I have given up. I came to the conclusion that grass just would not grow in the corner of my lawn near the ornamental cherry trees. The shade there is so dense that my grass, no...
Lawn – Leveling
A new home in my neighborhood had bermudagrass sod planted in March. By May, one area was a perfect checkerboard of straight lines, composed of weedy plants, surrounding the individual squares of sod. Evidently the sod installers were in such...
Bermuda Grass – Disease – Brown Patch
Brown patch is most prevalent on bermudagrass which has been heavily fertilized when night temperatures are above 68 degrees and day temperature are above 80 degrees. Dead patches of grass may start small but can grow and join together to...
St. Augustine Grass Seed – Where to Buy
Q: Please tell me where I can buy St. Augustine grass seeds. Our lawn has some now and we like it a lot, but we’re having trouble finding seeds. A: You can’t buy St. Augustinegrass seed. The plant is very...
