Unknown: Hello, and thanks for joining us for another episode of Mid American gardener.

I'm your host Tinisha Spain.

And today joining us on the show one of our panelists that you know, and she's going to be teaching us about something special that her and her students are going to be doing in the classroom.

So let's go now to Jen have her introduce herself, and tell you a little bit about where you can find her these days.

So Jen, tell us about you.

Hi, I'm Jen Nelson.

I'm a horticulturalist.

You can find me in lots of different places.

I'm online at grounded and growing dot com, I do a little bit of consulting and article writing there.

And I also teach Hort 105 vegetable gardening at U of I.

And it's kind of a new endeavor for me.

And we are getting ready to have our first week of in person classes.

And our lab is starting up and we are testing out a new lab for this semester that we're going to share with you guys.

Awesome.

And you know what i It's been so long since I've seen a chalkboard.

I'm actually excited.

Like, usually their whiteboards or smart boards, like there's an actual chalkboard in your classroom.

Yes, there is.

And my kids get a big kick out of it.

They love to write write messages.

Yes, yes, it makes you think of days gone by.

So when I got this message from you last week about what you guys were going to do, I thought you were a little crazy, because it involves toilet paper and spores and all kinds of stuff.

So tell us what you're going to be doing and give us a nice walkthrough of the project.

Because I think this is totally fascinating.

And this is something that people can do at home, right?

Yes.

So kind of just walk you through kind of where this came from.

In the fall.

One of our lab, things that we do is carving pumpkins.

And believe it or not, there are a lot of college students that have never carved a pumpkin carving pumpkins is a very American thing.

And if you're not from here, you probably have never done it.

So I was looking for something to replace that lab for the spring because obviously we're not doing pumpkins again.

And look at through seed catalogs.

One of the things that caught my eye are mushroom kits, and I've done a couple of mushroom kits with my kids.

And the ones that I did were too expensive to do on a bigger scale for a class.

But I remembered something I had heard of some years back of growing mushrooms on toilet paper, and it sounds completely disgusting, right?

It's completely got a gross out factor.

And that's probably where the crazy part comes in.

I thought you were not sound like you're gonna do what.

But it makes sense if you think about that mushrooms, and we're fungi are part of the decomposers in the ecosystem.

And they are typically breaking down wood products, logs, etc.

Leaves, you know, plant material.

And so I mean toilet paper is basically wood.

It's cellulose, it's the same material that the fungi are breaking down.

In the woods, it's just in toilet paper form.

So there's a company that sells classroom kits of all that you need to grow oyster mushrooms, which are very tasty.

That's what I grew.

I think I brought it on the show.

We did yeah, we watch the process with you in the kids.

Yeah, with the kids loved it.

So I figured little, my little kids will love it.

I think the big college kids will like it too.

We are going to start this process.

It's a lot much bigger process than a longer process than what I have done personally at home.

Because what we're going to do is add the mushroom spawn, which is what it's called, I'll show you that in a minute to this role and allow it to sort of permeate the role and grow for a while before we trigger it to produce the fruiting bodies which is what we eat.

So we're going to be growing grade of oyster mushrooms.

I'll show you what those those look like.

If BJ can get a shot of that.

It's the one in the center on the top, a white, the white one there in the center.

Hold it up just a little bit higher.

Yep, now we can see it.

So the ways our oyster mushrooms Yes, those are oyster mushrooms.

Can you explain the flavor of the oyster mushroom?

I, to me they have a very meaty texture.

Okay, I used them in a stir fry and they were almost like chicken.

Okay.

My kids are not huge oyster fans, at least my son is not and he didn't mind them that much.

So when I ordered this kit, this is enough for seven rolls of toilet paper and it's like this brick of grain that has mycelium growing on it.

So that's fun.

As growing that's that lives the mycelia this sort of white fuzz is growing on the grain.

This is not the part you would eat.

But this is what we are going to basically kind of like seed, the toilet paper rolls, we're going to dip the toilet paper rolls in boiling hot water.

App, she's at school folks.

So you're gonna get the real experience.

Like bringing everyone back now.

Yeah.

Anyway, we're going to dip the rolls of toilet paper in boiling hot water, let them cool.

So they're the boiling hot water will sanitize the rolls kill any kind of unwanted fungus or germs that would be there.

Because there's, there's fungus drifting in the air, we just, you know, think of the mold that pops up on bread.

If you've left it a lot around too long.

There's all kinds of stuff in the air.

So we're going to boiling water, soak them, let them cool off.

And then we're going to fill the center of the roll with this green with mycelium growing on it.

And then we're going to put the whole shebang into these special bags that came with the kit that have event and we're going to seal them off with a rubber band, but leave there some gas exchange to that vent.

And then we're going to incubate them in a room that the temperatures kept between 65 and 75.

And that'll stay like that for about three weeks.

And after that they should be nice and fuzzy with the mycelium there should be obviously, fungal growth, and then we're going to chill them for a period of time, at least 48 hours.

And then after that, when you bring them out into room temperature, that should be the trigger that it will produce.

What's the fruiting bodies?

What produces spores?

So that would be what what I showed in the picture in the catalog, the part that you eat?

So from day one until the day of harvest, what are we looking at as far as time goes?

Probably a four to six weeks.

Wow, sorry, good project.

Yeah.

So it'll be it'll be a while like that will take care of it to a point and then the fruiting part the students will take home and have to take care of their baby mushrooms.

Everyone seems excited about it today.

i i I got some good response in class.

So I'm fingers crossed, fingers crossed.

Yeah.

Now is this a one and done?

Will they be able to you know, harvest oysters from the same role, you know, service to more than one harvest, but it's gonna kind of dwindle off.

Definitely, if you were somebody, there's ways to do this on actual logs and such you can set it up for a longer period of harvest, but you should get more than one according to the instructions.

Awesome.

Well, we will have to check in with you throughout the whole process so that we can see because I know there are a lot of people at home that are probably like I could get into that I can I've got a little time to invest in that.

There's a there's a pretty serious catalog that came with this kit that you can go down a rabbit hole and be gone for a while with.

With growing mushrooms.

It's like a whole niche of vegetable gardening that I don't think a lot of people really delve into very much.

So yeah.

Very cool.

Now how would this kit and I know you haven't done this one yet.

But how does this one differ from the smaller one that you did at home with the kids because you didn't use the toilet paper roll for that one did you?

What's what's very different is that what I bought was a block.

It was like a core fiber so a coconut fiber and coffee grounds that was already the fungus had grown into so it was already full of mycelium kind of like kind of like this Brit this bunch of grain but it was in a compressed bricks.

So I didn't have to do the step of waiting for three weeks for it to grow.

I just had to soak the brick, and then missed it and keep it in a nice warm area and the fruiting bodies the part that you eat started growing within a week or so.

So there was a lot of legwork done for me.

And that I think is probably why those kits cost a little more than this toilet paper kit.

Gotcha.

Awesome.

Okay, well, we will certainly be checking in to find out how they're growing and how the students are taking to them throughout the semester.

We've also got some questions that were sent in, and one of them was addressed specifically to you.

So move over Chuck.

Jim's got fans now as well.

So let's jump into a couple of the Facebook questions that we posted.

This one is from Diane O'Connor.

And she wants to know, what should she be doing with her elephant ears and cannas, she's got them overwintering in pots in our heated, partially sunny basement.

They're alive and some of them still have leaves.

So she wants to know how to kind of get them to limp along until they can go back outside.

So what are you What's your advice?

For Diane and Springfield, I would say since they're still actively growing and she has them in a heated area, and they're still have leaves on them to be very, she could very carefully keep them as they are.

The thing with overwintering tropicals is they're all going to naturally slowed down over the winter time because there's less sunlight.

Even though it's heated, it's still getting less sun than what they would in the summer.

So I would be very, very cautious about overwatering, like maybe watering it once a month, if that letting it letting it dry down, and if they start to kind of go dormant and lose more leaves, that's okay.

Just make sure that that the bowl itself is not getting soften rotting or drying out, it will get like wrinkly if it didn't have enough water, but I would very carefully very much observe it regularly.

And just keep doing what she's doing.

And with the cannas as we get into spring, a lot of times those is do put on so much growth over the summer, she might want to check and see if she needs to divide it if it's just so jam packed in there.

I've heard I have not done cannas and pots myself, but people that I know him like they really can.

Oh, the pot.

Yeah.

And they won't bloom.

And that's how I knew I kept asking Karen, cuz that's one of her favorite flowers.

And I they wouldn't bloom wouldn't bloom.

So she said, You need to see what's going on in the pot.

And holy cow, it was just completely full in there.

I mean, there was no room.

So I know that.

Yeah, I know how much they grow in my garden.

When I dig on them, like, Oh, my God, what would they do in a pot?

Yes.

But that's a good point.

If they get too crowded, they won't flower.

And you can't even tell you know, from under the soil.

I had no idea that there were so many under there.

So you really do have to dig them up some time and find out.

Okay, this one is from Madeline, this one is specifically for you.

She says can't wait it is almost planting season.

My question is for Jen, and it's about a house plant called String of Pearls, which I know is one of your faves where you like that whole family, the string family and we'll call it she wants to know do you prefer top or bottom watering.

And then also, if you missed yours, I will just like offer a disclaimer that this is like one of my favorite plants.

But it's also one that I have killed the most often.

Because I just get sucked back in because it's it's really unique.

And if you haven't seen it before, you know, it's just looks like peas on a on a string, hence the name.

But one of the I have one right now that I think is three or four years old and it's doing quite well.

And it actually flowered over the about November December timeframe.

And I'm doing something right.

And I think what I'm what I'm doing right is I'm really letting it have a rest over the winter time.

I barely water it at all.

I like just this morning.

Actually, after reading her question, I was like, Oh, I haven't watered my string of pearls in a while and I soaked I soak it.

It's in kind of a different planting situation where it's it's not in a traditional pot.

But I would I did do like a bottom soak to it and then let it drip dry.

And it's actually in a hanging basket.

So I hung it back up.

Over the summertime I water it a lot more regularly.

And it's a lot more actively growing, then this is again, back to the sort of that tropical situation in the previous question that things are slowing down over the winter time, and they're hardly growing at all.

So you're just wanting to keep them alive and too much water will start them rotting.

And that happens really easily with string of pearls.

Okay, and so do you try to get yours like over to the sink to soak it all the way through?

Or do you that's what you do.

I've heard a lot of people say that and then they ended up picking up a bunch of strings or pearls all the way there and all the way back.

But that seems to be the way that most people get success.

Yeah, and I you know, I'm not gonna like change what I'm doing right now because it seems to be working really, really backing off on the water over the winter has been a game changer for me.

Okay.

All right.

And then one more question.

Lorraine.

Her fourth wants to know if you can give some advice on winter pruning small accent tree.

So is this the time of year that we should be pruning.

It is a good time of year for pruning in general because you can see the branch structure.

The thing with the small accent trees, if they're flowering, if they're spring flowering and you're doing the pruning now you're likely removing a lot of those flowers and it's not going to kill the tree but if the flowering is very crucial or critical in your mind, you might want to wait until right after they flower and do your pruning then, but if it doesn't matter to you, and if you've got the time now and you know that after it flowers, you're going to be so busy Do you want to be able to do it, there's no reason why you can't do it now.

And honestly, I kind of like doing it better when there's no leafs present, because you can see what's there and kind of take a step back.

And with any kind of pruning, I would suggest a couple of things like one thing is to take a picture and print it out.

One thing is to take a picture and print it out.

And you can actually, you can do this on the computer or just do it on paper where you kind of sketch out which branches you want to remove.

Also, when you're actually doing the pruning, don't like get in there and start cutting a bunch of stuff.

And then step back, like, take a couple of things out, step back and look at it.

You can't put stuff back once you've cut it.

So be very deliberate in what you're doing.

And you know, take your time and don't go too crazy at it, I kind of use the example of someone is like tweezing their eyebrows for the first time, like you need to pause and take a look.

Make sure that you're not leaving yourself with nothing to go on.

Because it will take a while for that plant to recover.

And sometimes you can totally destroy the structure if you're not careful.

Okay, so have a plan.

Like you said, before you go out there.

Awesome.

Okay, Jen, thank you so much for answering questions, and for letting us know about your project that your class is going to be doing.

And we're going to find out how that turns out.

So thank you very much for coming by.

Thanks.

Thanks a lot.

Thanks, Jen.

And now that we're all thinking about houseplants let's check out a segment that we did at plant mode with owner Mathis Helmick earlier this year.

Alright, here we are plant mode in downtown Champaign enjoined by the owner Mathis Helmick we're going to talk about some plants that may be better for your more experienced plant person and also some desirables that came out of this huge explosion of plant parents during the pandemic.

So take it away.

Give us the tour.

What are people looking what are they looking for?

Yeah, some people got into plants they got some easy plants they got some more difficult plants and Instagram told them they needed certain plants or try to get certain plants for those type of folks.

Yeah, I don't know.

The Instagram crowd Yeah, this is a I got some leaves are gonna fall off it because it's that time of year.

Ficus triangle RS variegata, fancy angle shaped variegated Ficus plant are a little fussy when they get moved around, they can drop leaves.

But this is gorgeous.

That is gorgeous.

And people who get those generally know what's up about it.

I'm a big fan of these philodendron silver swords.

There's not a lot of silver colored plants out there.

Now let's talk about this because this is people you know, that's pricing.

Yeah.

So what makes this guy so fancy?

Generally availability.

Okay, I mean, there are giant mega growers out there that supply the big box stores and they definitely start like, hey, this plants on the radar is something we need to put into production.

After they do that.

Things that are superduper hard to find become more available.

So dispatcher guy and then I try to pay attention to that stuff too.

If I have a wholesaler that's like I can get these are really hard to find they're this much I sort of look around and see who's selling what locally or staying if the big box stores have um, there's quite a few plants that have big box store would carry now that I feel like they didn't carry a lot.

This is a begonia Mackie lotta, I'm not gonna call this rare anything.

They're also called, like Batwing begonias or angel wing begonias are like little spaceships to be though that is pretty silver.

You have to pay attention to trends, try to you know, it's not just, these are good plants.

It's what are popular plants.

And sometimes more than like me Googling, like, what's popular today.

It's based on my clients just kind of being like, Hey, can you get me you know, you got me one of these before, here's my list.

And sometimes I'll be like, those are the five rares plants in the world.

I can't find those.

But this one here was on an availability list.

And then I reached out to my growers, there's a couple of them that will send me some pictures.

We have this it's gonna be about this much.

It's in that size.

It'll be there next week if you want it.

And then so it's pretty cool to make people like real happy when they're so fast.

They're probably peeking in the Windows on a good day to you know, to come pick up their order for sure.

This is an example of a plant that is it big box stores these days.

So it's you know, it's it's a $26 plants probably $18 like Home Depot or something, but it's a skinned apses moonlight.

It's called a Sentinel, sat and put those also, I just think they're pretty great.

A lot of my clients are like, I'll pay three or four more bucks or 10 more bucks to buy from you instead of a big box shop.

No big deal.

Sure.

supporting small business.

Yeah, so another kind of silvery plant.

I love the wrap up by Dora Dieker Siva, and this is a vine that grows right now.

It's like I'm just doing This makes this turn and goes up in then the leaves start to split.

So you see it in just sort of different stages of growth, which I think is pretty cool.

And if we were to Google image this and put the word mature in it, they'd be like this tall.

These leaves would be about two and a half feet wide with these big dramatic splits.

And this is another spaceship plant.

So as your house and indoor jungle, it's getting there.

Yeah, I go through phases.

I go through like, I want to intake a bunch of plants.

I'm into this and then I sort of look around like I want to plant shop.

I'm going to her shop.

I'm going to tell people this was from my house.

It's only this much.

I'll give them away.

But yeah, right now I'm in an intake mode.

So I do occasionally look around.

I it's a small apartment I live in so it's pretty easy to jungle up.

Yes, I bet the oxygen is just pristine.

I like to think so.

Yes.

Yeah.

What else?

What else do we have?

Another philodendron that I like this is called Jungle Boogie narrow for form.

This gives me alocasia I love alocasia book and say things how they say them.

And I don't believe I've ever pronouncing anything 100 It's tricky, that names will get you in when people come to the counter and they say blah, blah, blah.

And if I feel like it's in my ear wrong, I don't I'm just like, it's right over there.

Yeah, I'll find all learning stuff every day.

But I love all these like this is a very drastic, yes.

Yeah, these get really big these leaves can get you know, that big.

This whole plant can be a floor plant that's like, you know, three and a half four feet tall.

They're pretty rad.

says another philodendron I'm a big fan of philodendrons they're all either vines or little shrubby bushes.

But I mean we've got tiny little growth right growth in there.

And I just like how the leaves unfurl.

And they're just always reaching and doing their thing.

So when do you I'm sorry to interrupt you.

When people come in.

Do you find that they know what they want?

Or did they just kind of stumble in and think I want one of everything different types?

Yeah, okay people who are writers maybe so there's a couple really good plant groups here in town.

Hashtag see you plant people.

Remember and and hashtag tag 217 plant gang Okay, okay, I feel like I started up and I want everyone to join in Yeah.

Do how you do you know it's just it's all friendly.

But yeah, there are people who you know such and such shop has this or plant modes got that and they'll post it and you know people will drive over from Bloomington on a Saturday or on a Wednesday or something Oh wow.

Or they'll buy from the website because every single items on my website for purchase I throw a lot of things on my socials and I'm really good about being like I got 30 of these y'all kind of like calm down.

I'll see you when you come Yes.

Or hey, I got seven of these.

And that's like get those people tend to a lot of the regular snag a lot of stuff on the new arrival days.

Do you ship or is everything curbside everything you come in the shop for pickup come in the shop and browse like normal times with masks.

We're all back stuff in here and boosted so that's why we're good like this at the moment.

Yeah, I'm a stickler you can ask around.

I think all my bad Yelp reviews are like from not opening early when people are trying to pull on the door or from me being like, Yo, no, no, no, no, no.

What are you doing?

Where's your mask?

Yeah.

Any other gift ideas?

What do you want people to know, you know, this season, if they're interested in gifting a plant to a friend for sure.

What's a good rule of thumb, any any any tips there for that plan on coming in, like, you know, four or five days before the holiday, whatever holiday you you do, because you're not going to be able to hide a plant in the closet, unless it's a Sansbury or ZZ plan or something.

But generally I get pretty busy that week.

Gift certificates are a big thing here.

A lot of people hit my website and just hit gift card and buy an E gift certificate, which you can use on the website or here in the shop.

Candles even though I sell these great Kobo candles that have an 80 hour burn time, I send people over to fire doll over on Neil Street as my friend is making really rad candles.

That's right.

I slid that in Florida all studios.

I don't know.

People want plants.

I sell a lot of plants in December to people who like plants.

And then I saw a lot of gift certificates to partners of people who like plants ah, or I get a lot of phone calls.

My daughter goes to UVA she won't be back until winter semester starts but I want to get a $50 gift certificate.

Can you leave it in the shop for her to pick up or blah blah, blah, making it work through the pandemic?

Absolutely.

Awesome.

Well, thank you so much for letting us come in.

Appreciate beautiful place beautiful plants really appreciate it.

And we'll have to come back and visit soon for sure.

And every time I watch that segment, I'm reminded of how much more I need to buy from his shop.

So next time we go, I'll be purchasing more.

And just a quick note for you.

When we originally taped that segment, Mathis was located on Chester Street in Champaign.

He has since moved to 113 North walnut in Champaign and he's open Wednesdays there Sunday so that you can pop in there and get your plant fix.

And again, I want to thank Jen and Mathis for being on the show today.

Always a great time when they stop in.

And for you guys, if you have any questions for our panelists, please send them into us at your garden@gmail.com or you can find us on Facebook, just search for Mid American gardener.

Send your questions in and we'll see what we can do to help while the experts will see what they could do to help.

And if you can attach a picture even better, that helps them be able to diagnose your problem a little bit easier.

And again, that email address is your garden@gmail.com and don't forget to send a picture.

We'll see you next time.

Good night.