It may look like an ethereal puffball, really rather pretty, but don’t be fooled. Dandelions are tough weeds! Also known as lion’s tooth, blowball, and monk’s head, it can be a problem in gardens, lawns, pastures, and tree and vine crops. Introduced from Europe where it has been used as an herb and medicinal plant […]
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Ants on your artichoke plant? Your plum tree or leafy vegetables? They’re a prime indicator that sucking insects are feasting on your plants. There’s a group of soft-bodied insects — aphids, mealybugs, soft scale and whiteflies being the most common, that feed by sucking juices from plants. The direct damage they inflict on the plant
Mulch is really good for the garden. It’s any material placed on top of soil to cover and protect it, improve soil structure and fertility, and enhance the area’s overall appearance. Mulching mimics the natural environment found in forests where leaves and branches blanket the soil surface, replenishing nutrients as they decompose and creating an
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Summer is here and so are yellowjackets – those one-half to one-inch-long bright yellow wasps with black strips and their signature “narrow” waist. Yellowjackets prey on other insects and scavenge on human food and garbage. They will fiercely defend their nests – in holes in the ground, inside wall cavities or hanging gray paper-looking ones,
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Grrrrr – while merrily tending my roses, I’ve come across another victim of the dreaded beast – the gopher. If this is not one of the gardening challenges you face, you can stop reading now. Since I live in gopher heaven, each season I have to deal with the damage from this voracious pest. And
Traps are the Most Reliable Way to Manage Gophers Read More »
Seeing leaves on your fruit trees rolled up like a sandwich wrap? Could be leafrollers, a family of insects that attack the leaves of fruit trees like apples, pears, and peaches. They also target some ornamental trees like ash, poplar, and oak. Leafroller larvae feed on tender, new leaves, giving them a ragged appearance; they
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Noticed any branches of your pear or apple trees that look like they’ve been torched or scorched? Might be a case of fire blight, a nasty bacterial disease. It most frequently affects pome fruit trees (apples and pears) and related plants – crabapple, ornamental pear, pyracantha, and quince. Infections may appear scattered throughout the crown
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The main benefits a layer of mulch on your vegetable or flower beds can provide include: Not sure what to use? If possible, choose an organic material that adds nutrients to the soil as it breaks down. Check out this information on a wide variety of mulch materials to find one that will work for
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The bane of many gardeners, especially rose-growing ones, is the gopher. While this voracious pest loves roses, they’re not fussy – in fact, there aren’t a lot they DON’T like! The pocket gopher is named for the external, fur-lined cheek pouches the critters use to carry food to their storage area. Their exposed chisel-like teeth
If you have some new seedling coming up, and some seem to be clipped off right at the soil level, it may be cutworms. These pests feed on blossoms and leaves of many ornamental plants and attack most edible garden crops, clipping off seedling stems near or just below the soil level. A few species
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