Unknown: Hi, and thanks so much for joining us for another episode of mid American gardener.

I'm your host Tinisha Spain.

And today we're g ing to talk about the cicadas t at everyone is anticipating a d also what we can do out in t e yard now that it's o ficially planting season.

So a always, we've got our p nelists here to get your q estions answered and give some g eat advice.

So let's have them i troduce themselves and tell y u a little bit more about t eir specialty and where you c n find them outside.

So Jen, w 'll start with you.

I am Jen Nelson.

I'm a horticulturalist and you can find me online at grounded and growing calm.

I'm pretty well a generalist of any kind of work questions, but my favorite topics are home vegetable gardening and houseplants if I had to pick two.

All right, awesome.

And Chris, go ahead.

Well, my name is Chris Enroth.

I'm a horticulture educator with University of Illinois Extension.

And you can find me online I, myself with a couple colleagues, we write the good drawing blog.

And we have the good growing podcast, which we post weekly episodes and posts every single week.

So yeah, check us out growing.

I like that, you guys.

It's a lifestyle, right?

It's not just work like there are segments where it's a lifestyle.

And then if there's any time left, you go outside and you plant stuff in your own yard.

So well welcome and thank you so much.

So as always, we start with showing towels and Jen will start with you.

What did you bring us today.

Um, we noticed last week, just randomly looking out my kitchen window, we finally had hummingbirds and I had forgotten to put the feeders out because I want to put them out earlier.

So I got them up this weekend.

And I just want to remind people that it's been pretty chilly the last few nights and hummingbirds need that sustenance.

So get your feeders out of this one has the glasses actually tinted red, you do not have to color the sugar water red, it's actually advisable to not do that.

But it's the ratio is a cup of sugar to four cups of water.

And I usually have to warm the water up a little bit to get all that sugar to dissolve readily.

Put it in your feeder and make sure you change it every few days.

When it's chilly out it lasts a little longer.

But at you when it gets hot out, you want to make sure you're changing it regularly so that it doesn't start to ferment and go mold that could be harmful for the birds.

But they at nighttime, they go into a state called torpor, which is almost like hibernation, so they almost die overnight when it's low in the 30s.

And so that's pretty chilly for them.

So they've been clustered around my feeder this weekend when we had some lows of the 30s though, do get those out if you if you're a hummingbird person that he likes to be them.

And you've talked about the color red before and not putting dye or not using anything to color that.

Can you talk a little bit more about why the feeders are red and sort of where the red came from?

Well, I can tell you my son was educating me this morning he said that they can only see read.

I have I have not fact checked my eight year old he told me he learned it on wild kratts which is a PBS show.

Um, so I I trust that they they fact check this house but he said they can only see read so and there's not a whole lot blooming right now this time of year.

And they have incredibly fast metabolisms, so to like supplement them and keep them happy as it's still a little chilly this time of year and we love watching them and love encouraging them in our yard.

Awesome.

Thank you so much, Jen.

All right, Chris, what do you got?

Well, I have some tomato plants to show you.

And it's kind of a difference of things.

And so these tomato plants, they were all grown from seed.

So I started these all it was about the last week of March.

And so we put them in some six packs, my camera doesn't blur it out here.

So we have some tomatoes in six packs right here.

And then we had once after about a few weeks, we then potted them up into larger containers here like this.

So you know it's about a six inch container.

And kind of the reason why we do this is because in the six packs, there's only a finite volume of soil for these two to have nutrients and water and so on.

So potting them up into a larger container gives them more space because under those girl lights in the six pack, you know there is there's there's a lot of competition happening and the so the tomatoes you can see they're kind of slanted in their growth patterns.

So you can tell who was closest to the light, who has kind of grown a little bit faster.

And kind of as they're sitting next to me on the desk here.

You can only see the top of the one that I brought it up because the others are still pretty small, still pretty stunted because they're just so crowded together.

Now, in that vein, though, I think with extension we always mentioned to people just because you see a tall tomato does not necessarily mean that it's That is the healthiest and the best tomato to get.

Sometimes that means that tomato also is stretched, meaning it didn't get enough light.

And so you know sometimes when you're at the nursery picking out a tomato transplant for yourself, if you have to choose between a tall leggy tomato, and maybe a short more compact tomato, you might go for the more compact one, provided that they they look healthy.

So you know, if you had to choose between two healthy plants, one's a little bit taller and leggy.

One's a bit stouter.

I'd go with the standard tomato, but we can always take these tall tomatoes and put them bury a little bit deeper in the ground because the stems will send out adventitious roots.

And so that's kind of the beauty about tomatoes, you you can have tall, leggy stems and they'll be okay.

Now, can you talk a little bit more about when you know it's time to get them out of that cell pack and into their own spot?

Do you go by true leaves?

What's your method?

Or what is the method?

I like to hear from both of you actually on this one?

Yeah, so that's a really good question.

And sometimes it's kind of up to the gardener.

But for the most part we're looking for when we see those true leaves begin to emerge.

So as the tomato seed germinates, it sends up what's called the seed leaves.

And so for tomato, it's a die cut, which means two leaves, you know, die caudalie, two leaves.

So it's going to send up those two leaves, they don't look anything like these tomato leaves that I have in front of me right here.

Those are the leaves that are inside the seed, which I thought was fascinating when I learned about that and horticulture at school, but but then you start to see the true leaves emerge, which looked like these actual tomato leaves.

And once I see those, and they expand, they get a little bit to size, so maybe a few weeks, maybe one week or two, that's when I will pop them up into a larger pot here and give them that space that they need.

And so this is not being crowded underneath the lights might be one that's potted up in this bigger container.

It's got its own room, it's got its own space, and it's pretty happy right now.

Cool.

And Jenna, you've talked a lot on the show about how you grow yours on countertops, and kind of like in the house everywhere.

So you know, how do you know when it's time to get them out of that cell pack?

And is it different?

If you're growing them for countertop tomatoes, and what's your man i'm i'm still growing, I'm under grow lights.

And I think as you gain an experience, like you can look at this at the leaves like Chris was talking about, but I'll also sometimes pop them out of the cell pack.

And look at how how much root development there is.

Because one thing that I have experienced is that you may plan for X number of flats in a bunk.

Everyone wants to plant super stuff super early, right in January.

They're asking questions about planting.

And if you were to start tomatoes in January, which you could I guess, but you've got to make sure you have the space to keep fighting up like Chris is showing I have fallen into that trap before of having little more.

My eyes are bigger than the available space thing.

And you'll just have a less quality plant.

If you keep it in that cell pack too long there.

They're just going to exhaust all the available available nutrition, you're going to be watering them for two or three times a day because they'll just be using up all the moisture so quickly.

So yeah, I kind of I looked at both the routes that we use, but then over time you kind of get an isolate.

Oh, yeah, that's about time or I plant my stuff later so that I don't have to go through that repotting phase.

So I'm just acclimating them to outside and putting them right on the ground for like containers.

And, you know, I've speaking of starting things early, you know, we I think we've all done that.

And I, when you're using fertilizer with them as well, and it's like, oh, man, I don't have I don't have a lot left on these soft bags, because they're gonna explode if I don't get these guys out of here soon.

So but I like that you both use different methods.

I like that use roots and leaves and kind of, you know, the experience that you gain.

You know, a lot of people get so bent out of shape on the textbook way to do things.

And that's why I asked a lot of you to expound on different things because I'd like to hear a variety of answers and what works for you.

So thank you for that.

Jan, you've got another show in town or another couple shoutouts here.

Yeah, I've got another bergeaud so it is time and I have a question for the viewers.

So this is my Orioles theater, and it's a dish of grape jelly.

Just regular old grape jelly.

That's plenty of oranges.

Yeah, this has worked really, really well for us.

And I don't have as many Orioles so far this year but I've I've had some I had an Oreo on my hummingbird feeder this morning.

That was a first I've got a lot of birds going where I don't expect them to go.

The question I have for viewers is I have been I thought I just must have had a mess of Oreos eating the grape jelly.

And then I looked out and I had just probably four or five house finches eating the grape jelly and I've never seen that before.

And I asked a friend indicator which is about 25 miles west of where I As they had seen it too, I asked my uncle who lives in Naperville above Chicago area he he sees oils and hummingbirds but no house finches at his at his grape jelly and oranges.

So I'm just curious.

It's not something I've seen before.

I will have to see what what people say.

Leave us a comment on Facebook, folks, and let us know what you've seen eating the great jelly at your place.

Do you have one more Gen?

Or do you want to do one more?

Let's see.

It was just kind of a random if we're growing greens isn't the right time, right lettuce and other grains in the spring.

I've been growing some kale and I, I'll be honest, I sat down at the computer and I really wanted to munch on something salty.

And we just got an air fryer.

we upgraded from a little teeny tiny one.

And so I made I made kale chips this afternoon with some kale that we grew here at home.

And so just to DIY, if you want a little bit of a healthier, healthier, salty snack, just give him a light coating of olive oil.

And I did four minutes at 375 with a little salt.

And I've got my salty snack.

They are I haven't made them.

I've had them.

But now you make me want to try.

I'm Chris, have you made your own kale chips?

Oh, you better believe it?

I don't I don't know what it is about kale.

But if I was a child, and you tried to feed that to me, I'd hate it.

But as an adult, they're delicious.

It is my son's side I my son is just like you're crazy.

But oh my mom, it's like that depends on the generation.

Because to my mom, it's a garnish.

You know what I mean?

Like, we don't eat kale, you know, you put kale very nicely on the salad bar around everything else, you know.

So it's weird how some people view kale is like a delicious snack and others are like, No, thank you.

Just depends on where you fall.

So.

Okay, we've got some viewer questions that have come in.

And Chris, we'll start with you.

This is question number 15.

DJ, from Carly.

And for those that like to grow potatoes like I do, how do you find space to keep the rotation on a three year schedule?

So that's the first question.

They're trying to put in new raised beds and want to put the potatoes in but don't know where to put them.

After that three years.

quite the challenge, as growing in containers has never worked so long.

a spot for potatoes that will last Chris, what do you think?

So potatoes, they're in the same family, or sorry, potatoes, yes, they're in the same family as tomatoes and peppers, eggplant.

But the big difference with potatoes and the others that I mentioned is potatoes prefer cooler weather.

So they like their roots kept a little bit cooler, tomatoes and peppers.

Obviously they like the heat.

That's why, you know, even though we would hopefully be planting our tomatoes, by now it's still chilly at night.

So we're not, but potatoes are doing very well right now because the soil staying cool.

There's some nice moisture in the ground.

So it's understanding that if you're trying to grow potatoes in a container, some of the issues that you might have now, now initially, as I mentioned, it could be the temperature, you know, if you're planting in a smaller container, and the sun is hitting that container and heating it up, it's really knowing the temperatures and those containers can get pretty hot, especially in the summer months.

So you know, larger containers might work, maybe containers that are a bit more porous, that allow the air and water to evaporate, which cools it, but then it comes into the second problem it dries it out.

So making sure that you're consistent with your watering it as we get into the warmer days of summer, you might have to be watering that at least once a day, sometimes even twice a day.

You know, I recommend if you can mulch overtop if you're going to be growing in a container using something like wood chips.

So but again, being in the same family as tomatoes, and peppers, potatoes have their own series of disease, and that's why we want to rotate them around the garden.

So having a raised bed, while Yes, it's beneficial, it might minimize some of the other locations you could plant.

So if you could divide your raised bed into thirds, potentially, and then plant every third and you would get a three year rotation with that.

Now ideally, we would love to see a four year rotation.

But if you can only do three year rotation, that's okay.

Maybe throw them in a container one year to get that fourth year.

And for that idea, growing potatoes and containers can be challenging, but keep the roots cool, keep them well watered and keep the containers on the large size too.

So if you've got a raised bed, you can do potatoes in a section.

And then that won't count as having used that whole bed for potatoes potentially.

But if you're going to use the next section for next year, don't make it the one directly adjacent on the length of that raised bed.

So if you're on one end, skip to the other end the following year.

And then maybe that's the next year you go into the container then in the center of the bed.

So I mean it's a lot of Sheldon pick things around.

But yeah, it's a good idea to rotate potatoes just because of the Soil for disease that can build up.

Okay, Jen, I know you grow potatoes, anything you'd like to share?

I agree with everything person saying you might want to consider even more raised beds, instead of dividing it is causing a lot of challenge to you.

And you know, okay, you need that's one great excuse to build more and more garden space, right.

I personally don't grow potatoes as much as I used to because I have had a lot of problems with mice and mice digging them up and eating them.

So we somebody's got to enjoy youngling wars with wildlife, that he's nice.

Okay, we're going to question number 32.

This one's virgin.

This one is from Angela.

She writes at the beginning of March, I bought a young Chicago hardy fig tree.

It has developed brown crispy splotches on most of the leaves.

Is it still or I'm sorry, it is still growing perfectly fine.

Are these splotches a disease?

Did it get stressed and is now growing out of it?

any insight you would provide would be appreciated?

So what are you thinking?

And I Oh, I see it on that top sort of left leaf there.

What do you think?

I think, um, well, a couple of questions I have that I can try to address I wondered if she had put it outside at all.

In March, we had some warm days.

But if it had not been acclimated outside, that could just be effects of the wind and sun.

But a part of the big will have some issues with too much moisture will cause some bacterial spots on the leaves.

It's usually nothing too serious.

As long as you address the moisture issue.

We see it a lot on fiddle leaf fig.

It's that super popular house plant we keep seeing everywhere.

But Chicago fig is actually Hardy.

It's hard at least in zone five, I think a little lower, too.

We had it growing up.

We have one in our garden, and I have one in my garden now.

So it is possible to plant it outdoors.

The problem is, is that it will it's kind of like that hydrangea question we seem to get all the time, but it has to flower and fruit on old wood.

And so most of the time around here, the stems above ground get killed to the to the ground.

And they do regenerate.

But something that might be fun for viewers to check out.

There's a website called the Italian garden project.

It's the Italian garden project calm, they have a whole like you can go down this immense rabbit hole of fig growing.

And a lot of Italian immigrants brought fig trees from Italy along with them.

And they grew them and overwinter them and produce fruit.

There's all kinds of methods, we've tried some of them where you'd have to like wrap them some people will bend them down and mulch them for the winter to protect those stems.

But if that's kind of a rabbit hole, you want to want to why that you have the time to invest in this rabbit or something that you can I have never heard of anyone.

I don't know why you couldn't grow Chicago hardy just as a part of houseplant they will tend to lose their leaves indoors in the wintertime.

But as long as you can remember to water them maybe once a month, then by spring they start sprouting again.

But there's there's lots of other varieties that are not hardy in zone five that you can keep growing as a house.

And once you've had a fresh bag, if you've never had one, you'll understand why people are going to all this trouble to try and get the fruit from them because they're just no comparison to the dry.

I don't think I've had a fresh one.

So now I'll be on the hunt.

See if I can get the experience.

So if you're watching No Okay, I'm still listening.

Yeah, cinnamon cinnamon.

Okay, another question.

This one's about past number 33 from Anthony Becker.

Every year I have squash bores.

I think he says that often built the plants and kill most of the vines as well as squash bugs that drain them.

Some years I'm physically able to kill most of them but I'm a quadriplegic and have limited access to the plants.

I've tried several pesticides like seven but do not see much that fazes them.

This year.

I'm trying a bt spray for the bores, but I'm wondering if the team knows the best effective treatment for bores, squash bugs, and since I'm asking cabbage butterflies, so that's a loaded question.

Let's see if we can break it all down.

control for squash and stinkbugs and then the cabbage at the end.

I can say that for me.

The best control I've found was by accident I planted my squash way later than usual.

So I missed that window when the the bores and the squash bugs are really actively looking for squash.

Now is that now Are we in that time now?

I've plant I planted my squash, like in late May or June.

That was really beneficial to me.

Okay and Chris, anything from virgin?

I didn't mean to cut you off.

I thought you were done.

Anything from you, Chris on that.

squash vine borer is one of those that can make someone quit gardening altogether because you have these big beautiful squash vines, and then overnight, they seem to wilt.

So I think they said what they were thinking of using a bt spray, is that correct?

That's correct.

Okay.

So you could try to apply bt What's his backstory in Genesis, it's, it's an organic product that only targets caterpillars.

Now, the squash fine board larval stage as a caterpillar.

It's a clearwing moth, I believe.

And she'll lay her eggs at the base of that squash plant, and the egg will hatch.

And then the larva tunnels into the plant stem and just goes to town eating away, and then it kills all the tissue and you know, wilts your plant.

And it goes pretty much unnoticed until the plant wilts.

So I think the idea here is you put bt on there.

So as that larva tunnels into the stem, it might kill it.

Now that seems a little bit unlikely that it might work, but it's possible, I'm not going to rule out the possibility of it working.

I have seen people try like physical exclusion, like paper towel rolls, things like that aluminum foil.

That hasn't always worked either.

it a lot of times people will call the office after the fact so their vines wilted.

What do they do?

Well, what you can do is a little bit of surgery, you can take a sharp knife or a paperclip, unfold it actually go in there and remove that Caterpillar that that boring Caterpillar from inside the stem.

You pull that out, and then you would then mound up some some topsoil or compost there on the wounded area.

give it plenty of water.

And hopefully, the plant might be able to send roots out and and then hopefully reestablish itself.

But again, the odds are not always in your favor.

So I like Jennifer's suggestion staggered out your planting date is a good way some plants might get it but then the others won't.

Okay.

And same advice for the cabbage he wrote in cabbage butterflies.

Will the BT be effective on that as well?

It will Yeah, so they're probably thinking cabbage moth or cabbage looper.

And one thing I love about most of their cabbage crops, you know, our kale and things like that we grow, we don't have to worry about them flowering.

So if you really want, you could just put some type of insect netting over top to physically exclude these altogether and just avoid the pesticide.

Another good idea.

Okay, thank you guys.

And finally, we don't have any other questions today to answer.

But we have gotten some emails, asking questions, everyone is anxiously anticipating the arrival of the cicada.

And so Chris, you had mentioned that there were some some chatter going on in other counties.

But if you guys could just take this last three or four minutes and just kind of tell people what to expect, you know, I think a lot of people just wanting to know what to be ready for.

Will this harm anything in their garden, so just run us down the list of what we can expect with the cicadas.

And Jen will go, we'll start with you.

Go ahead.

Um, I would say to think about, if you're wanting to guess whether you're going to have a ton of cicadas, on your property, look at the age of the trees in the area, so anything that was around 17 years ago, you pretty likely to have cicadas I live adjacent to a county Forest Preserve.

So there's lots of big old growth trees, so if if they come out near me, there's probably gonna be quite a few of them.

If you're in a new subdivision with trees that are recently planted, it's probably not going to be as big of a deal but you may have some that fly in, they do move, they don't just stay in one place.

Okay, all right.

And Chris, can we you know, is do we need to be concerned about our vegetables or flowers, you know, what, what will they do damage?

Will they do harm to anything?

You know, and unfortunately, my neck of the woods now I like insects, I think they're fun and fascinating.

Unfortunately, where I'm at in West Central Illinois, I'm not going to get them so Yeah, I know.

Tanisha you're probably at Ground Zero trail, Illinois.

grass.

So you're so your vegetables, probably a lot of your perennials, they should be fine.

The big damage occurs when the female she likes to lay her egg in the kind of this the twigs or the ends of the branch tips of trees.

And so she cuts a slip in that branch and she lays her eggs in there.

And then when you get like hundreds of them doing that, suddenly you have a tree exhibiting the symptoms of flagging, that's what we call it so that this tips of the branches actually die.

And so then the tree has this flagging effect, and that's the damage that happens and that's when People will call in and be like, what's happening my trees, all the branch tips have died back.

So that's what what's probably the main issue.

And then the noise.

Let's talk about the noise.

Because you both use the word deafening.

So we've got about a minute left.

What can we expect volume wise, depending on where you are.

If you need a white noise machine at night, you're probably not going to need it while the cicadas are out.

Wow, that loud, huh?

And how long will this last?

So we've gotten reports of emergence already in southern counties of Illinois.

And, I mean, so it should be getting started when the Knights start staying warm.

And as far as I know, I think they go up through August if that's correction for if that's a I don't know if they're a frost insect, but they go throughout the significant part of the summer.

Yeah, I don't remember off the top of my head, but it's it's a significant amount of time.

Yeah, boy.

Yeah.

Well, we'll definitely talk more about this in the coming weeks as we find out where they are.

And I'm sure our viewers will let us know if they're seeing him at their house.

But thank you guys so much.

Great show.

Lots of great information.

Appreciate you.

And thank you so much for watching.

We appreciate you.

If you have any questions for us.

You can send us an email to your garden@gmail.com and always you can find us on Instagram and Facebook just search min America gardener and we will see you next time.

Good night.