well happy earth day what a perfect time to talk about growing and gardening in the next half hour we'll share tips on eco-friendly gardening and tricks for managing your backyard greenhouse then we'll transform wild leeks into a delicious taste of spring we'll also answer your questions share a garden tour and the dirt from across the region great gardening is next gardens are always a work in progress or the earthworm is a sign that there's lots of life in your garden google doesn't have all the answers and the best way is to talk to fellow gardeners you know in the spring it has a totally different look i kind of like that it changes from month to month [Music] welcome to great gardening i'm karen sunderman and happy earth day indeed you know for gardeners that's everyday right well our guest experts are here to share their growing know-how and that includes deb burns erickson professional grower and gardener glad that you're here thank you dub and bob olin he is a horticulturalist and educator in saint louis county and beyond we are lucky to have both of you thank you our pleasure yeah happy earth day to you as well seriously what a beautiful day now our telephone volunteers are from st louis county master gardeners program and we want to thank them for their support and their time here for great gardening and we'd like to encourage you to call in your questions for our experts we'll get through as many as we can and the number to call is 218-788-2844 or toll-free 877-307-8762 and you can also email those questions to ask wdse.org okay spring really is poppin today you know earth day yes i saw dwarf iris on my way to work i see ramps out there what else is growing oh we're beginning some to see some of the spring flowering bulbs jump in some of our beautiful flowering shrubs oh here's some forsythia speaking of flowering shrubs a warm sunny sight beginning to break bud there and i want to just point out it's one of the first flowering shrubs to emerge in the spring beautiful yellow flowers that come from the flower buds and then the vegetative portion comes a little later that's out near the tip so we'll get a little bit more of that later but that's the first and then of course we're going to follow up with a lot of them like the star magnolia those are tighter in bud but did find some of a breaking bud so they're in our landscape and this one kind of surprised me i drove past this this particular location household in a southern exposure and there were so many beautiful hyacinths out there they emerged early and they were just a wonderful part of the landscape and people don't often think of the hyacinths but the beautiful spring flowing bud flower that is a little bit more frost resistant really i looked hard for tulips it's a little early for some more tulips i found one finally but they do come a little later as the daffodils narcissus do as well yeah i love that you're out there being a detective hunting hunting for spring bloomers that's awesome it's a fun time of the year you know spring is my favorite time everything is emerging we came off a winter and things are breaking bud and we're just beginning to see these in our landscape now yeah it's so fun yes absolutely and deb you took some time out from your own greenhouse to come here and i know that there are people who have their greenhouses in the backyard you have some tips for us great it's a great idea to try your hand at doing a greenhouse determine the size and your location first your location i think easy access is number one but also it's oriented north and south the sun gives it a little bit of rotation so you get shade at different times so everything's not getting blasted with heat and then wind protection and the wind protection board the greenhouse itself not to mention the wind protection from the plants but the you can lose a greenhouse to win too and so when you first start firing it up now get it clean get it sanitized try to get everything washed down we like to use a little bleach even in it just to keep it sanitized and then when you're selecting it or making it consider what you want for flooring keeping out insects keeping on weeds keeping out mice mice can do a plethora of damage to your your crops to anything that you have in it do they eat on the plants oh yes they will like if you think pansies they're you know they can take the coal they can go closer to the floor because it really matters where you put it in the greenhouse that if it's on the floor and mice get in they will eat them all we've lost entire crops of pansies to mice so consider that um and then also then so benching and where you place things metal adjustable shelves are really nice and you can grow things for they can tolerate more cool on the bottom or things that can tolerate more shade and then wood benches are nice but they can absorb odor they can start to break down and metal just seems a lot easier to work with and one of the most important things once you're fired up and you're getting heat in there from the sun and as the sun warms it you really want to cook it out you really want to get the cold out of the ground so get that close it up when you first start heating it really heat it as as hot as it will get as long as you don't have plant material in it and then start to drive the cold out of the ground take the heat from up high and push it down into the ground add when you're sterilizing it the water really helps to warm the soil too and we talked about different degrees for for different types you want to do with it right so when you first get it and you get it warm and you're getting germination at 70 degrees and that's great and um so then as you've got all your germination and you're starting to get crowded and you don't want it to stretch so much you can start to back off the temperature and realize that the temperature is different in that greenhouse where it is according to height it's warm up on top so get some fans to either push that heat down or else and to circulate you really need it to circulate and then it's much cooler on the ground so even a fan on the ground pushing up will warm that spot it's amazing what just fans will do and you need to consider the temperature well right now it's like when everybody wants to get stuff out there in their greenhouse so thank you for these tips it's that's huge absolutely huge and we're going to take a quick tour of a front garden in duluth this was originally recorded recorded in 2018 and it is the transformation of a front yard by linda and norm herron and it is inspiring hi i'm linda herron and i'm norm herron and welcome to our garden we're here in the congdon neighborhood we've lived here for about 38 years and but our gardens have not been here quite that long we started them around 10 years ago we had small gardens little patches every year i felt like i needed more and more i wanted to try different varieties of flowers and so i thought well we'll just make the garden a little bit bigger and finally we reach the point where we thought let's just take up all the grass do all flowers it's all perennials and i like to move my flowers around if they don't do well in a certain spot they need more sun they need less sun it's wonderful to do that the grass became a dull feature for me so it took the first year to we did the half i dug that up and uh the next year the other half oh my liatris i love these these are actually minnesota natives prairie star they call them i also love the yellow tall spires of ligularia i love yellow flowers they're just so bright and cheery when and you look at them and they make you feel good just looking at them and this is one of my favorites the spider plant spider plant it has those tendrils that come out and i guess that's what reminds people of a spider the bees like it they i do have a ton of bees i mean in fact if you just sit here or stand here you can actually hear a hum well earth day is a great time to talk about eco-friendly landscaping and we have some tips to share with you there bob you gave me a whole list of things to think about well we've been looking at this concept of growing green you know the great thing about green plants is they are good for the environment they pull in co2 they release oxygen essential to all life but if you're not careful you know you can over apply pesticides or fertilizers and do more harm than good so you want to make sure and we have the options as gardeners you can avoid all synthetic pesticides and fertilizers fertilizers do come from they use natural gas to set them and fix the oxygen from the air so just avoid them so you're going to get nutrient from some place so you want to supply from organic sources and people who know me know i'm always composting everything i pick up potato peelings and other foam houses and coffee grounds and so forth compost it all and then of course you've got well-rotted manure be a little careful to weed seed in both cattle and horse manure but certainly a good option uh certainly we've got peats that are useful and then you can actually grow some green what we call green manure crops or cover crops a lot of people maybe winter rye at the end of the season get some winter eye established get it to grow late fall and then till it in in the spring and then the other big challenges are obviously insects and disease they really are and you've got some options there the nice thing about insects you we've got biologicals now we've got these bts bacillus's that are available you can cover with a light uh rema and so forth and then we do also want to be a little careful about our watering practices people are not aware that a lot of the a lot of the water vapor in the air is really a greenhouse gas and part of our issue has been all the irrigation we've done to provide this bountiful food supply so let's not add to that with a lot of overhead irrigation let's try to irrigate with a hose or a perforated hose or an ooze tube or drip irrigation right down on the soil line i just want something called an ooze tube in my garden that is hilarious we're going to cut you off and jump into questions are you ready fine are you ready okay so what do you plant in a cemetery basket that deer won't eat oh well the mints again nepota or anything really fragrant herbs but um and salvia they really don't like salvia and you get some nice color on that but those are a few of the things a few of the things yeah i like that mint family the square stems that work pretty well there and they're they're quite resistant really good to know um here's a gentleman who had raised beds on a deck with kale but he had aphids like crazy so does he have to change out the soil completely how would you manage that you know i'm assuming he's talking about last year right and aphids are going to be everywhere aren't they and so uh managing it he's going to have to be a little careful anytime you have an edible you're not going to reach for a synthetic pesticide but there are some like safer's insecticidal soap would be an option for them now that's not your dish soap that's an actually insecticidal soap and we have some biological options that certainly could be used or again clean them up and then you may want may have to cover with a product like remia spun polyester to keep them clean okay jerry from hayward how do i get rid of fairy circles in my yard well fairy ring is really you're seeing the fruit and fruiting heads of a mushroom complex so you've got all these mycelia that are down in the in the soil and you're not going to dig those out so what you really want to do mushrooms saprophytes are growing on decaying material in soil so you want to accelerate that decay process pull some soil up get some nitrogen fertilizer down there and that will accelerate the decay process once that organic material is decayed the fairy ring mushrooms are going to leave your yarn in your lawn and you can reseed with a good grass seed okay one more quick one when is the best time to transplant rhubarb and can you do it now yeah you could do it right now yeah sure yep absolutely all right well cool we are moving on and i love the fact that we don't have to grow everything ourselves take a look at this time lapse by thomas soderbergh these are ramps or wild leaks and right now they are sprouting on hillsides and in the woods and even in town it's so fun to see them grow and react to the light so thanks tom for doing this special time lapse for us and there are plenty of foragers and cooks out there harvesting right now and as a matter of fact ramps are the locally sourced ingredient in tonight's farm to table segment so here's a savory and delicious recipe to enjoy who doesn't like a puffy muffin i think that just screams make it hi i'm jen gilbertson and today we are going to make ramp and goat cheese puffs kind of like a muffin kind of like a puff pastry so we've got our ingredients in front of me we're going to have four ounces so roughly half a cup each of wild ramps and scallions or green onions they're called the same thing a little dice right across so there's our scallions and then we want the same with the ramps so about a half a cup and you can use both the stem and the leaves you can really smell these these are great nice and fresh ramps are kind of a meld of garlic and onion so ramps are the first springtime food they're only available for a very short amount of time so people crave them and then they're gone for the rest of the year and then we have gouda which we will shred three to four ounces and i feel like ramps just lend themselves to that more of an umami flavor which gouda is a great cheese for that nice and soft it'll melt right into those puffs we've got one egg here's the second one so we're going to whisk these up quickly my mom was a really awesome cook but our kitchen was too small for us to all cook together so we'd usually get chewed away we're going to add the veggies in got our half cup of wild ramps and our half cup of scallion okay we're going to mix those together my youngest loves to bake we all love to eat you know it's how we connect as a family and go about learning each other's days for us that is love you know it's the way our family connects with each other greek yogurt is not one that i see often in baking but i really like using greek yogurt i actually eat greek yogurt pretty much every day when i teach the kids cooking courses i always say you know part of being a cook is making a mess part of being a good cook is cleaning up after yourself they don't really like to hear that much and i think i need to also add the cheese yes i do so roughly three to four ounces of our gouda half a cup of heavy whipping cream one and a half teaspoons of the baking powder next step is we will add our dry into our wet [Music] i might have to get out a second tray so they're ready to go in timer for 20 minutes and we're ready to go truthfully i get bored if i have to make the same thing over and over again so i want to make it interesting and fun and different and and introduce new recipes all the time all right so these are ready they're golden brown they puffed up nicely they smell divine they smell so good nice and cheesy you can really hit that garlicky ramp and the spring onion so they look great they're delicious [Music] super good and i'm getting hit with that garlic [Music] [Laughter] seriously these are good they are so good and i just you have some in front of you with ramps i mean ramps are fantastic they're they're so fresh you have to use some fresh i think you could dehydrate them but they're just so good and a mild onion garlic like she said flavor to them and fresh now and you really need to use them now and you only have really a few days really really going to be good so we do have a special foraging special on our youtube channel or heading to our youtube channel about sustainable harvesting of leaks these wild leeks and you know what big thanks to forager ariel bonkowski for taking us out and showing us the rope so you want to take a look at that the big takeaway is tread lightly and don't harvest the bulbs right right the rhizomes on those especially right you want to be a little careful that way yeah quick question about leaks came in not wild leaks but actual leaks how do i what do i need to plant them in trenches or is there a secret way to get that done this is kathy from proctor uh the standard way is just get them get them trans dig they go in deep you set them nice light soil nice light sandy soil would be ideal and then yeah you don't want it any place where you're going to collect water then you're going to backfill as the leak grows so you keep that blanch to give you a real nice leak they do like good fertility so they maybe some nitrogen can be incorporated in into the soil but trench them and then add the soil as you go through the growing season okay when do you put weed and feed on your lawn and should the lawn be wet oh that really is a good question whedon feed is the only fertilizer it's combination herbicide as well as a fertilizer it does go on when the lawn's wet because the weeds are wet so the herbicide granule actually adheres to the broadleaf wheat all other fertilizers go on when the when the lawn is dry and then you come over the top with irrigation or you put it on just before rain two separate concepts be very careful uh we see people using a weed and feed in their garden you got an herbicide component so fertilizer is one thing but weed and feed has herbicide and fertility and they go on wet so they can control the broad leaves okay and why would white lilacs bloom purple all of a sudden this is from bertha all of a sudden i don't know well if it's on the entire plant we have what we call sports that will occur right from a root chute going somewhere else and you'll get some genetic variability so uh that more than likely is what's what's happening we've seen that a lot of fruit trees and other things i find it interesting because white is one of the older varieties and for that to go purple seems it would be just white rootstock yeah yeah i don't know maybe something else going on right now wow uh when will my tulips finally bloom tell me because right as the deer are coming yes that's the truth they do bloom later in this last week and what i wanted to point out is we had these colder temperatures and with tulips you want to tighten the bulb right now any time you get warming during the day cool at night is fine but when we hold those cold temperatures below 30 during the day and if your tulips are in bloom at that point you do have to cover so even tulips can be sensitive if we get these prolonged periods of cold temperatures even during the day but it just takes some time they're going to come minor just sensitive to deer so okay last year she had morning glories heavenly blue probably lots of uh foliage but no flowers what's the deal and and i've heard of this and a lot of times it's a day length sensitivity to that one and they if that's happening and you're really committed you could put a shade cloth over them give them a longer or shorter day and a longer night and then that they'll start to set buds black plastic if you don't have shade cloth but no light in there and then you got to get it off in the morning so we don't get heat that concentrates okay you guys are doing a great job on your questions and going fast for me thank you we're trying and now a quick break to see what's growing in your neighborhood from spring to summer here's the dirt it's a sure sign of spring in two harbors check out this amazing crocus display from brian and karen keikou the dutch bulbs have a few cila and other spring bloomers mixed in for color but planted in mass their spring display is stunning and in mackinnon gwen sorry shares beautiful examples of summer blooms where asiatic lilies vie for attention with two varieties of peony the rich yellow of globe flower or trollius adds depth in the garden and you can almost smell the scent of this beauty it's a moscow lilac it won't be long now friends please send us the dirt from your neighborhood we'll share your garden inspiration throughout the season on our instagram feed just email great gardening at wdse.org and thank you there's so much to know so thank you for sharing your pictures and we're going to keep going with questions this one came in online they have a perennial grass lawn and they want to see if there's anything else they can add to it that would be critter friendly be friendly what do you sprinkle in sure the obvious answer is an outside clover of some type because it mows tight for you and you know it's a legume so it's taking nitrogen out of the air and putting it in and the grass needs the nitrogen so all right there are other options uh we don't want to talk about creeping charlie but but uh stay with us stay with the clovers then mow a little higher higher rate so you don't clip the bloom exactly especially in the fall when you're mowing the grass try to leave it a foot if you can if you have that option so that the bees can go in there and and because some of our natives want to go into the round stems of the grass that's their winter yeah amy in hermantown wants to know do you need to soak the dahlia bulbs before you plant them i don't think so um i mean i guess unless you were going into a sandy into sand but we just generally put them in water them well that first time that you put them in but dahlias generally aren't and sometimes if you soak them they can get too wet and then that's a bigger issue a much bigger issue okay diane and duluth how do you get rid of purslane in your vegetable garden my grandmother used to feed it to me exactly eat it a lot of people it is an edible yeah very good vitamin c but oh really no yeah okay put it in your salad you put it out in all fi and all uh seriousness it it's very shallow rooted so it's very easy just to scrape the surface and pull it out right especially when it's little yeah it's very very easy to control that way ho ho ho it's kind of funny okay club root is in broccoli what can be done to get right i know nothing about this that is not funny unfortunately i do know a little something about it and it gets its name from the fact you get all this distortion down uh in the soil line it is one of the soil borne fungi that can cause you real problems so what he's going to have to do remove all the plant material dig out as much as he can but you've still got the spores in the soil move anything that's in the crucifer family cabbage broccoli brussels sprouts cauliflower that's all got to be out of there and it's going to take an extended period of time for that to actually diminish so plant your corn plant your tomatoes anything other than the cabbage family the commercially they have to actually fumigate and get permitted to fumigate that's how tough that particular fungi is one of the few most are fungi so are fully born that is soil born and hard to get out yeah i have never heard of that and i'm hoping you don't want anything yeah i don't want it all right last question two patches of daffodils a patch produce lots of flowers and the other one only green leaves what's the difference sun i always go to sun i mean trees as a tree grown and there's a lot of times they're under planted on trees and one has a tighter canopy perhaps than the other and this is my favorite question how soon can we plant our annuals well you can go repeatedly to your local greetings that's right right now you can plan right now and just keep going if you're having fun yes last pharmacy date take your choice june 10th maybe although it did freeze pretty hard on june 12th last year so we never know you just never know but thank you guys so much i mean that this was a really fast and we crammed a lot in and i know that there's somebody who has a deer fencing question and we'll see if we can get a faq on our webpage and youtube because i know that a lot of people have been asking about that fencing so thank you both and we'll be in the garden soon great yeah so that's a wrap for the spring run of great gardening thank you we'll be out in the garden in may and back here in the studio come june with tips to help you move into the heart of the growing season now in the meantime please subscribe to our youtube channel for timely information we're developing a list of recently frequently asked questions from northern gardeners and we want you to be sure to follow great gardening on instagram for tips and ideas as the season unfolds from all of us here thank you for watching great gardening and happy earth day production funding for farm to table segments is provided by the citizens of minnesota through the minnesota arts and cultural heritage fund you