Hello, and thanks for tuning in for another episode of Mid American gardener.

I'm your host Tinisha, Spain.

And joining me in studio today are two of our panelists who are here to answer your questions and of course show you some of their things from their gardens in their homes.

But before we get into that, let's have them introduce themselves and tell you a little bit more about where you can find them in the garden.

So Marty, hello, hi.

I'm Martie Alangna.

And I landscape.

I probably probably landscape more than I should, but I do anyway.

So I did it for a long time.

And then I quit.

And then I kind of, you know, everybody has a yard, what am I going to do?

So anyway, I kind of specialize in the urban garden, the small garden, so people have, you know, tight spaces, and they're ugly, and they just started looking out the window at that.

So they call me and they call you trees and shrubs and all that good stuff, annuals.

I'm not a big fan of annuals because, you know, they're annuals Spoken like a true landscaper.

I'm Ella Maxwell.

I'm a horticulturist and Master Gardener as well.

And I do have a large yard.

So even though I'm in an urban area, I have some large plant collections.

And I like trees, shrubs, perennials, and I don't plant a lot of annuals either, but I do see their benefits.

They do I mean tomatoes on the vegetable garden is full of annuals.

That's true for the asparagus.

God bless it.

Which means all dead but that's another show.

My son's not It's not whatever.

Okay, anyway, as always, we're gonna start with some show Intel's and the ladies, as you can see brought lots of stuff to talk about today.

So, Marty, you've got a theme?

Yes, I do.

And it's right on time, too.

Because it's been it's rise above your heart.

You know, we met somebody somewhere.

And they said, the first time I heard Marty say drier than a popcorn fart.

It was like a life changing moment for them.

So you just made someone's day and I can't remember where we were.

But there you are.

That's for you.

It's a word picture.

I grew up because that's all I feel like I'm doing as water.

It is it has been hot, dry.

Although we in central Illinois have gotten rains in the nick of time.

You mean you're still watering, but then we just got it about an inch inch and a couple tenths.

So the corn looks much happier.

Yes.

It's not all spike, right?

I'm glad for the farmers.

Yes.

So well here while back you know, it was it was a heat index like 104.

And I saw a lot of damage from people watering in properly.

So, okay, you're familiar with probably all of these things.

Okay, this guy right here.

Now you've seen them before they a little jet stream.

And then you can make it Jarier or not Jarier you know, and it goes.

Or it goes, Okay, these are useless for the garden.

Really don't do that.

Use those for the I don't even think the lawnmower likes getting washed with this, but it never said anything.

So, okay, save this for the common objects, the driveway, you know, the garage for whatever you're doing.

These are not useful for plants.

They're either too soft or too hard.

It's just it's not it's not good for the plants.

Remember, they are alive and they're tender.

These are better.

They've got adjustable.

I'm sure you've seen these if you live in America, so they the thing adjusts around.

And you can have a spray or a mist or a flat surface or on and on.

Showers usually my go to Yeah, garden garden or shower.

Some of them.

They're they're called different things.

But yeah, just a gentle like, like you're pouring out a watering can.

And you hit this like, that's just darling.

Okay, that's what they need.

Don't water in the middle of the day.

I don't know if anybody walked out and brush up against a shrub or a tree a couple of weeks ago when the heat index was 104.

But they were actually hot.

I mean, they're really hot.

And if you go out at 230 in the afternoon, like, Oh, you're wilting.

I'll give you a drink and you squirt them.

Essentially what you get is you're steaming them like a vegetable in a microwave.

Okay, the leaf is so hot and the cold water hits it and it just goes and then you get that brown spine.

You're like those minerals don't help.

Okay, don't do that.

Water later in the day, when the air is getting cooler all the time if you're going to water overhead and get the foliage wet.

If you're not going to water from overhead and get the foliage wet.

You can probably water anytime of the day at all but if you're going to do this like with this like walking around, doing your oh yeah He's also come with adjustable heads on a long aluminum wand.

Okay.

And if the long one you get is a cheapy, Charlie, it doesn't have a shut off, if it doesn't have a shut off buying in lunch, because that's how you keep from grinding when you're watering stuff over your head, like annuals in pots, which I never do.

So anyway.

So, back to this, okay, when you're watering over the foliage, and it's nice, you know, in the evening and get out there, and you can just cool everybody off and let them drip run off at the same time.

I'm assuming that all you good gardeners are mulching, you have to mulch.

And then as the water drips off, and cools the leaves, that drips down through the mulch, and it feeds the roots, too, if you see something that's really really suffering in heat, and you need to water it, take this off of your hose, take it off, okay?

Lay it over there where you can find it later.

That's not what I do.

But you should.

And then you take this little dude, and you've got the end of this hose, right?

So you just have the end of your hose.

You lay it down.

Here, hold it, there you go right over here.

Oh, I'm the plant, you're the plant.

Okay, lay this right down by the very stem of the plant.

And then turn the water on.

So you have a trickle the size of a pencil and no larger.

Okay?

And then go do something else.

Go fold socks, or watch Gilligan's Island or something for half an hour.

Okay?

And then just dated yourself.

I'm just saying.

One more Hey, trigger.

No, thanks, Roy.

I'm stuffed.

So anyway, this is not a comedy show, we are educating people we are.

So this way you don't get any on the leaves, you don't burn the leaves.

But you get all the moisture right at the roots where obviously it's gonna benefit the tops.

But don't water when it's too hot from overhead.

Don't do that.

And also an O also a vegetable garden.

Oh, you can use these I really like these kinds of sprinklers they oscillate.

You know, they don't puddle.

And you can set them this high or eight feet in the air.

You can adjust them easily with your water pressure so you can get just exactly the right space that you want.

And the right amount of water where you need to have it.

You just have to fart around with it a little bit.

Now let me ask you this.

What are your thoughts on evening watering?

I've heard yay.

And I've heard nay evening watering is probably not good for grass, because it's prone to fungus growth.

It's in the soil.

And I don't like to do evening watering or what do you think I don't like do you mean watering down vegetable gardens.

Because, again, most vegetables are annuals, they're susceptible to all kinds of stuff.

And they only live one season.

So encouraging things to kill them is a little bit counterproductive.

But you do what you want.

Well, some people only have evening watering, it's very difficult for them to get up early in their routines and such.

And so, you know, though I think the most important thing with watering is Be smart about it because you want to be water wise and not wastewater kind of thing.

And so I think some of the drip products that are out there, the soaker hoses, even timers, some people can set watering timers, I think the biggest problem is in this heat is over watering.

And so we showed how we watered the small plant.

The important thing is is the plant should recover.

If the plant is not recovered that next morning, there's something else going on.

And over watering and underwatering have similar symptoms to do.

So when you don't want to water a little bit every day.

No, that's why using like the oscillating sprinkler that she has.

And maybe putting out a small container when you do water you want to water at least maybe half an inch so that it's going to percolate down through the soil.

You know, we're talking about like an hour or an hour and a half right?

Right put it out but again, you're fine in the evening.

There are some plants that will suffer with mildew issues or other kinds of disease problems and your idea of watering near the base, rather than watering.

The foliage is is right on there.

I also did I was thinking about this too on the way in here.

When you have you know if you don't have a long aluminum water with rows on it like this, get one and like again with a shut off, makes life easier.

You can spend time and you're great.

I'm mulch my garden was straw and I don't shake it up.

I don't shake up the sections we call them flakes of straw.

I just lamb lamb like this.

There's one there's another plant If I land with a crease between him, it holds the moisture better, it breaks down on the bottom, but you can walk, you can just walk along in your garden and go with a long one, you don't have to bend over because I'm all about lazy, okay.

So, you know, count to 25, move on to the next tomato plant, count to 25, then come back down the same row, do it again, and then go the next row.

You know, when you can contemplate the universe while you're out?

There.

There you go.

No foliage in the evening.

Okay.

All right.

All right.

Well, I guess I'll talk a little bit about watering, because I have a rather sad orchid here.

So this is a failure novices orchid.

And it is truly an epiphyte.

That means that it has these roots here that are aerial.

And this is where it gets its nutrients and water from the air.

And they come, they can be potted in a bark mix or different things like that.

But these really do well outside in the summer in a shaded location.

And so that's where I'm going to put this, the problem that I've had is I've kept them with some of my other house plants down in the basement, and it's too cool.

And it's too dark.

And they they've struggled.

But if you have one that is doing poorly, here's a trick that you can do, you can take a bowl, and some iced tea, or you can make, you know, brew some tea, but it's actually the tannins in the tea.

And what you do is you soak the entire plant for about 24 hours, then you take it out, set it on a towel or something and you let it dry.

And so over a course of a week, you soak it in the water, you let it dry out, you soak it in the water.

And so these do have small cells on the bottom that can absorb water.

And so it'll bring the turgidity of your plant back, then you can report it.

And that's what I'm going to do and put it outside and hopefully, my failure novices will recover because I have killed quite a number of them too.

And I adore them.

And I just can't I got them in a place.

I think it's perfect, bright, indirect light.

Kind of hearts on the piano, good daylight all day long.

No, no, they just Yeah, so I can try different locations in your house if you have have struggled and there's no reason not to continue to buy them and enjoy them.

The flowers lasts, lasts for weeks months.

And then hopefully you can keep them going or giving them to someone who is more successful.

Okay.

All right.

Let's do a couple of questions before we go back into show until this one's going to be from Trish.

Gail.

This is an email question.

She says I live in the rural area outside of Monticello on seven acres, which includes four acres of dense timber, and at least 12 perennial flower gardens.

That is a lot of work.

You go girl.

In the last few years, I've noticed an invasive weed shown in the pictures attached.

And we do have those I don't know what it is, it pops up in the gardens and it grows rampant climbing up trees and attaching itself.

With runners.

It's bright lime green and color.

The ladies are nodding because they already know what this is.

And I'll just kind of briefly summarize, I never noticed this weed until about four or five years ago.

Any suggestions to get rid of this pesky nuisance?

So first, identify it, the first thing that you neglected to read is she tried pulling it out and it has spines on the stem.

And that is one of the ways to identify this plant.

It's called Green Briar for that reason because of these spines, and that it's not something that you could bear hand pull out of the ground to what are your suggestions to get rid of it?

Well, the thing about it is it does have some underground rhizomes, I believe and so that's why she's finding this like mother plant having things come up very much like hops, I would would say that it would be similar to that in at least in my garden.

But what it does do is it makes a fruit and it is not invasive in the literature but it can be problematic because it does have fruit and those are going to then be deposited around with the birds feeding and such and so you can have the seedlings pop up as well.

But I found that they do dig out pretty easily.

They're also shade toner, which is terrible, too.

But yeah, yeah, yeah remover.

And when you look in the literature, a lot of times they're recommending herbicides, especially some of the The glyphosate roundup problem prop products where you're just going to treat maybe the cut stem or something.

But I have really found that it hasn't been that much of a problem that I couldn't dig it out.

I had it grown through a fence from a wooded area that didn't belong to me.

Okay, so it's coming from the neighbor.

Yeah.

And I put I put leather gloves on, and, and then a towel.

And so combination of dried out.

Yeah, well, I couldn't go over there.

Yeah, that's true.

Well, and again, that that shoveled that I think I showed my roots layer.

That's, I mean, that's pretty easy.

And this is maybe a two person dig where you've got someone kind of pulling on it and the other person, you know, popping the shovel so that you know that you've got the whole plant.

Yeah, it's not seriously deeply rooted or anything, but it is important to correctly identify it and then decide how you want to control it.

And there, there are herbicides that, you know, non selective, like spot treatment things.

But I would recommend hand digging and she has lots going on though with seven acres.

I was seven acres and 12 flower gardens.

Wow, that's a lot.

That is a lot.

So good luck with that.

Okay, we've got another one from James.

This is an email question.

His Hostas are taking a beating.

This email says this heat has gotten to my house as they are in a marginal spot, but have done just fine in previous years.

I'll probably move them for next year.

But in the meantime, I've ordered a shade screen.

My question is, Can I cut off the worst of the burnt leaves to make them a bit better looking?

So yeah, take them off, take them off.

Yeah, even the hostel is in shade.

Because of this, the drought stress that they were having had these marginal which means along the edges scorching and right now that's all just very brittle and he couldn't throw actually, yeah, just break it off or cut those leaves off because Hostas will continue to make leaves throughout the summer.

Now what I would do is, if, if I'm going to have to do this to some also, I just just the of course it's the biggest leaves that looks so nice, but because they're the oldest, just cut it off as close to the, to the plant as you can just sharp knife or a pair of sharp pruners and it'll grow back.

Yeah.

The girls like lettuce, you know, it grows from the heart out.

And while we're talking about watering, what would you do to sort of revive a heat stressed hosta your base water that you were talking about here?

What would you what are some tips to hoster in the shade.

So even if they get morning sun once the sun is off the foliage?

I I would I mean I you can set up a sprinkler or you can water them by hand but I would say like moisture.

They like a damp, cool area.

And so I'm just gonna go out on a limb and assume they're mulched and then just set up a little sprinkler on him for two hours.

Right?

Well, the big thing to understand with everything, the hosta and some of the rain patterns that we've had is that they are growing in the shade of trees and shade trees when, especially if they're Maples with a shallow roots.

So again, some of the rain that we have, maybe it's not percolated down to them and so even though they're in the shade, they're supposed to be shade tolerant and everything they are not drought tolerant.

And I found that under trees digging, you know, there is some of the driest parts of my garden kind of thing.

So yeah, your idea of putting up a sprinkler a good one shade when it's when they're in the shade.

leaves again.

Yeah, it's seeing seeing leaves and seeing different kinds of leaves here.

Well, these are now just lacy leaves.

This is a porcelain berry vine.

It has this one is varigated.

So the variegated leaf is quite attractive, and it's quite attractive to Japanese beetles.

And central Noye now has plenty of Japanese beetles feeding now.

You're gonna find them on some of your favorites.

They do like this porcelain very bind as well as grape vines.

So they can be a problem for vineyards and such.

They also like dark foliage.

So they can be on dark foliage cannas that you have sand cherries, right.

linden trees, so be scouting for these.

Now I, again am not a proponent of insecticides or pesticides unless they're absolutely warranted.

And I just use a little soapy water ladders, so I've got a water, the response on the beat or when they're feeding, is I come up underneath the leaf that they're feeding, and I just tap the top of the leaf.

So we've got the leaf over here, let me hold it.

That's it, since you wouldn't plan you'd be plant on your garage there.

But anyway, you tap it here, and they'll just drop because they drop and then they fly off, they don't hang on, they just fall into this water and drowned.

So this is a good way to go out.

And I mean, you can't catch them all.

And if you really do have some large, some significant areas, I suppose that you could spray or the other thing I found is some of the lightweight, remade landscape fabrics, I have actually covered plants with that.

And if they're on your roses sacrifice that those rose blooms, because it's going to take about maybe four to six weeks for the next flush.

And by then the Beatles will have moved on.

But they they know a good thing.

They let released these pheromones that say, you know that Joe's right here, it's the best the best.

And, and so they will if you have if you can control that first wave of beetles, you probably won't have success and feedings.

Okay, so good luck with that good to know.

All right.

Let's take a Facebook question.

This is from Carol, do Black Eyed Susan need to be divided?

And if so when I have some that are in the midst of lilies, and she says, I'm just a non fancy gardener in Springfield, me too.

So do and then there's another question that I'm going to pair with this.

But let's start here do Black Eyed Susan need to be divided?

Not, not that I know have not generally kind of made you feel free to share them.

And I would usually I usually a clump that's happy where it is will keep getting wider.

So just take them off the edge where they're grown into something else.

Okay, and move them.

Like, cut them off three or four inches tall, you can move them now if you want.

It's not optimal.

It's better when the weather is cooler, or in the spring.

But you know, you can do really you can do a minute, but you don't have to.

It's not something in there.

And for heaven's sakes, I mean, they'll recover this water.

Well, if she's worried about the mixing in with the lilies.

That shouldn't be a problem.

But she could actually just weed them out of there and, you know, not even save them.

Yeah.

All right, the one that I was talking about, really well, you can get them with the roots to cut them off, put them somewhere else and just transplant them.

You got options.

Don't look.

Marilyn in normal says I have purple coneflowers and Black Eyed Susans that grow to enormous heights.

I'm wondering if I prune them down in early July?

Will they bloom afterwards?

So what are your thoughts on that?

Pruning the comb flowers and Black Eyed Susans?

Well, we thought that in early July, they would be blooming right now.

And so what what we're saying is Yes, after that first flush of blooms, cut them back, did him dead had them and or maybe cut them down by half, and then they will send upside shoots and bloom again.

But if she cuts them, and right now they most everything has potential flower buds on them.

It's going to be a long time enjoy those first blooms.

If she wanted to prune that should have been back in early May, you know where she just even a couple weeks ago and mid June before he started selling flower buds develop.

Also, I have to assume that you have the Rebecca Herta the kind of fuzzy lead ones, because they can get pretty tall.

I'm curious as to what kind of coneflowers you have it get to enormous heights and you feel like you got to put him back because I'm thinking who does that?

I mean, I don't know.

I've seen him nice tall, but that's about it well, more or she can maybe transplant them into an area of the garden where that the height isn't going to be problematic.

Right.

And there's lots of new dwarf varieties.

I think that's what the garden centers are always offering is more compact, more flowers, smaller plant.

Sure, you know, let's go for it.

A lot of perennials, you do kind of want to do that, too.

I planted some boltonia years ago for a client and it's just it's not called snow bank for nothing, you know, but it would just overlay everything.

So about 15th of June, I go back and cut it.

I mean by by the 15th of June it was almost three feet tall, and it would keep going and bloom at five feet tall.

So about the middle of June I just go by and and I just hack it off mercilessly, like 912 inches tall, and then by fall when it would bloom, which is when it blooms anyway.

It would be manageable.

Yeah.

I for small children on the way back, it was over asters it would just drown everything like really?

Yeah, I've done that too.

And there's many good books out there about how to prune perennials and such.

And you can experiment cut some of it back.

Sorry about that, too.

But not all of it, and then see what happens.

Okay.

All right.

That's that's pretty much it.

We're out of time ladies earn while you learn while you earn.

I like that.

Thank you for coming in.

Thank you for bringing all the goodies and sharing your knowledge.

Jelly.

Oh, yeah.

Quickly.

Can you talk?

Can we can we get that in 30 seconds.

What, sir?

30 seconds.

This is service berry jelly.

This is I was going to talk a little bit about foraging.

This is a tree that blooms white in the spring of serviceberry.

And it has an edible fruit that's really attractive to the birds.

But it tastes kind of like blueberries.

So my friend Karen and I, because we're a team.

We actually pick some berries up at an office building and be sure you get permission because one of the rabid people in the building came out and said why don't you wait.

We're out of time we cooked it up.

And you just put it in a you know, a water bath and you make jelly.

Perfect.

We'll have to taste it.

Alright.

Thanks, ladies.

Thanks you.

Thanks to you for watching.

We'll see you next time.

Good night.