Narrator>> Making It Grow is brought to you in part by the South Carolina Department of Agriculture.

Certified South Carolina Grown helps consumers identify, find and buy South Carolina products.

McLeod Farms in McBee, South Carolina.

This family farm offers seasonal produce, including over 22 varieties of peaches.

Additional funding provided by International Paper and the South Carolina Farm Bureau Federation and Farm Bureau Insurance.

♪ opening music ♪ ♪ Amanda>> Good evening and welcome to Making It Grow.

I'm so glad you can join us tonight.

I'm Amanda McNulty.

I'm a horticulturist with Clemson Extension, and a little later in the show, we're going to have a wonderful, wonderful talk about lichens and mosses with Tim Lee.

Tim is an interpretive ranger, with the South Carolina State Parks and a lot of the Master Naturalists take courses with him if I'm not mistaken.

Terasa, isn't that right?

Terasa>> He teaches classes for a number of groups.

In fact, I just took one with him on natural plant communities that's part of the South Carolina native plant certificate course and that's a joint through South Carolina Botanical garden and the South Carolina Native Plant Society.

Amanda>> He is a fountain of knowledge.

>>He really is.

>> and a great pleasure to be with, as are you, Terasa Lott, who is our Master Gardener Coordinator for the state and also a very important member of our Making It Grow team.

>> Now... >> Thank you, as always.

Terasa>> Thanks, Amanda.

You're too sweet.

You know, I talk about the important job of our master gardeners within the state, but they're part of a national network, and I was just looking at some of the figures in 2020, nationally.

Master gardeners reached 8.4 million people and donated more than 3 million hours of volunteer service.

Amanda>> Gosh!

You know, people used to say, I hear some people say, Well, if it's worthwhile, they pay people for it, but you can't pay people to do what volunteers do.

There's just a whole another reason for doing it, and so I've always said, I don't like to hear people say that.

Terasa>> They do it because that's where their heart is.

Amanda>> I think that's right.

Yeah.

Stephanie Turner, who was so wonderful to us when we were remote, and you would do things with us from your home in Greenwood, where you are the Clemson Extension Agent for horticulture, and today, you're down here with us, and we are delighted, and you are showing us some wonderful things that your son had done.

He's quite an artist.

Yes, Stephanie>> I have a 12 year old son, and he loves to draw and animate.

And so yeah, I'm always a proud mama bear showing that off.

Amanda>> Yeah.

Well, and you know, even if they don't do much but mess up their room.

I think we're supposed to like them.

(laughter) And then Karla Coffey, you are at Lander where you once went to school, and I guess you graduated, then decided that you knew enough that they give you a job one day.

Karla>> Yes, ma'am.

Yeah, I am a proud alumni of the class of 2019, and now I am the grounds manager of Lander University.

Amanda>>...but you are trying to make it a little different experience than it had been in the past, the overall feeling of the grounds.

Karla>> Well, we're trying to always increase the beauty of our campus and thus the student experience and I love to add flowers and we already have incredible landscaping all over the campus, including some really beautiful gardens.

And it's such a wonderful way to feel solace and feel a peace when you're a student and you're so stressed out from deadlines to see flowers.

So, I try to add as much color in and beauty as I can.

Amanda>> Well, that's nice.

Yeah, that's true, because just being outdoors and kind of getting lost in the experience of nature can kind of get you that deep breath of ah, yeah, it's going to be okay.

All righty, and then Carol Stahle, you are relatively new to that area, but and you are in your apprenticeship as a master gardener in South Carolina, but you had a long master gardener career before.

Carol>> I did.

I did.

I was a Penn State master gardener for 10 years.

And then we retired to South Carolina and I got involved with this program.

Amanda>> and learning that you don't get to spend your whole - winter is the time to go outside and do something, whereas in Pennsylvania I guess it was too snowy.

Carol>> That is very, very true.

Here, I found that the earlier you start in your garden, the better off you're going to be come June and July.

Amanda>> Yeah, that's true.

Okay.

Well, we're so happy to have you as a member of South Carolina.

>> Well, thank you so much.

Amanda>> Well, Terasa, you usually start us off with something kind of pleasant.

Is that going to happen today?

Terasa>> It sure is.

It is time for Gardens of The Week, when we take our virtual field trip and see what you're doing in your yards, gardens or perhaps another beautiful place that you've had a chance to visit.

We begin with Becky Thompson who sent us a bird nest.

She said it's not a plant, but definitely a sign of spring.

From Tony Neely a fox family, also not a plant, but Tony says They sure have enjoyed watching them frolic in their backyard.

From Pam Sutherland, a busy bee foraging on a red bud.

And Lynn Polly shared a population of May apple.

That's a native plant, in fact, it's the only species in that particular genus, Podophyllum, and then from Diana O'Neal, she heard us talking about lavender in one of shows and how some species are not well adapted to growing in South Carolina, and she sent the photo that she's had in the same spot for 20 years.

She said it suffered through dogs, children, hot, dry summers, flooded hurricane years and even snow.

So, she was really proud of her lavender and we really appreciate all of those photos.

Don't be shy, feel free to post your photos when we make a call on our Facebook page.

And if you're not selected, you know, please don't feel offended.

We can only show just a random sampling.

Amanda>> But you do post other gardens that people submit to you on Facebook, I think, so if people go there, there's usually something else to look at.

Terasa>> Oh, yes, there are usually lots of photos and we encourage you to visit our Facebook page frequently.

Amanda>> Okay.

Well, I think you've got a question for us Terasa.

So, let's see who can help us.

Terasa>> Well, we are going to start off with a I guess we'll call it a mystery.

Cyndi would like some help with identification.

She sent in some photos and said this is our beautiful backyard shade tree.

We don't know the name though.

Can you tell us?

Amanda>> Uh huh.

Well, Stephanie, Does this look familiar to you?

Stephanie>> Yeah, so we did take a look at that tree and it looks like a Kwanzan cherry tree.

Those beautiful double pink blossoms give it away.

It's a fruitless tree, which is nice, that doesn't make such a mess in the landscape, and that's a wonderful, popular plant.

Amanda>> And pretty hardy, I think.

Stephanie>> Yeah, and drought tolerant.

Yeah.

It's a pretty good little tree Amanda>> But the cherry blossom is that yashima?

Stephanie>> The yashima?

No.

That's a different... Amanda>> I don't know if it's as, easy, as long lasting and free of pest as the Kwanzan.

Stephanie>> Oh yeah.

The Kwanzan is pretty tolerant of most things, and I think it blooms a little bit later, too.

So then you kind of miss some of that frost.

Amanda>> Y'all are too young to remember this, but people used to decorate for the proms, and they would get pink Kleenex and make it into little blossoms that always look like Kwanzan cherry blossoms.

>> Little crepe paper pom poms?

Yeah!

Yeah!

Yeah!

Amanda>> They do kind of look like that.

Don't they?

They're very full...and pink.

Terasa>> We were having a discussion one day and I was saying that I think it's, you know, there are ornamental cherries and plums and apricots that are all in the same gene.

They're all Prunus species but probably when...cherry comes into my head, I don't think Prunus species.

Amanda>> Yeah, yeah, yeah, and you know, one of the nice things is when things don't make fruits is that they don't attract insects that might I mean, we like, wasps, of course, are fruit eaters, and...so it's nice not to have wasps at the bottom of your favorite tree.

Stephanie>> Yeah, and the messiness of rotting fruit.

Amanda>> and potential, wasps are not like our dear friends, the bees, in all cases.

Yeah.

Okay.

Well, Carol, you have with some of your fellow master gardeners, come up with the program, and give us a quick overview of the logistics of...the place that this takes place and what y'all's goal has been, please.

Carol>> It takes place at the Piedmont Agency on Aging, which is in Greenwood and it's home to a senior citizen center, Amanda>> -where they come Carol>> where they come for the day...for the morning, really half a day, and a daycare center for children, and we also have a beautiful greenhouse that belongs to the master gardeners on that same property, and we take full advantage of it along with the whole growing area around it with raised beds, and because we, you know, master gardeners are all about education and we were at a place where kids were learning, it was a great opportunity to incorporate all of those things into an intergenerational gardening program with the seniors, the youngsters and us, and so we have put together a whole calendar for the year of a lesson per month, that involves the children and...the seniors if they care to get involved.

Amanda>> ...I believe that you've seen to it that this aligns with the South Carolina standards.

Carol>> Yes, we did.

We had to make sure that they were in compliance with South Carolina early learning policies.

Amanda>> ...and a think you, y'all are even, you're going to share those with other people, somehow, so that if somebody else wants to do what you do, and I think within your own community even have some places where you can go and get a bag that has some of the things in it that you do for crafts.

Carol>> Yes, the ultimate goal when we get through our full year of programs and have tweaked it, and it looks great, it will go into our Lakelands Master Gardener, Speaker's Bureau Library that can be...

They can borrow...all of our members could borrow from that.

Amanda>> Well, let's see what some of the crafts are.

Carol>> We're hoping to have this go statewide.

Amanda>> Oh, okay.

Carol>> Talking about bees, I'm going to do a quick little craft, and you will have your pipe cleaners yellow and black.

Take them out, and if you'll twist the yellow and the black ones together.

Amanda>> I seemed to have lost mine.

>> Well, here you go.

>> Thank you.

>> Here's your wings.

Twist them together.

The yellow and black.

Amanda>> Twist them together?

>> Yeah, twist them together, So you've got a Amanda>> - Oh, a spiral.

Carol>> Yes.

>> Okay.

Stephanie>> This was a great craft that the master gardeners did for our Steam Festival in Greenville.

Carol>> Oh, it was very popular.

>> For your what festival?

Stephanie>> STEAM.

>> Oh did you?

Stephanie>> STEM You know STEM.

Well, it's got art inserted.

So, it's STEAM Festival?

Yeah.

Amanda>> Okay, and while we're doing this, maybe you chose one of the others.

Some of the others that you have while we're getting all twisted together.

Carol>> Our little educational garden that the kids planted a few weeks ago, is just starting to sprout, and it's been - we did the square foot gardening technique.

So, we did beans, and peas and carrots.

>> Go ahead and pick them up.

>> But we're going to be needing plant markers.

(laughing) Carol>> So, this is just an example.

Amanda>> Hold it up, so that we can see it.

Carol>> We're going to be doing these in the next...couple of, next couple of - probably next month, and that's just an example.

I've started one that's probably going to be pretty good for carrots, (laughter) but there you go.

Karla>> That's so cute.

Amanda>> That's a great shaped stone.

>> Yeah, these are nice and flat, and they're easy to paint, and then what we'll do is when the children have finished painting them, we'll have our seniors label them, and I will seal them with something.

Amanda>> So you're going to come back and color this, when you finish working on it.

Carol>> Yes, and then we'll seal them so that they're weatherproof.

Amanda>> Oh, good idea.

Carol>> Yeah.

Amanda>> Yeah, yeah.

Well, and that's fun, because this is one where I can see that the people who are grownups can do the writing.

>> Yes.

>> And the children can have a wonderful time getting paint all over.

>> That's exactly right, and you use washable paint, I believe.

Carol>> We do.

Amanda>> That's why you have to seal it.

>> That's right.

All right.

Take your white pipe cleaner.

>> Okay.

>> Wrap it around the very middle of it.

Amanda>> Just wrap it around?

Carol>> Just wrap it around, so you have, There you go.

>> Okay.

>> and then you can loop the ends.

So you have some wings.

>> Oh, okay.

Carol>> They'll be pretty big wings.

These are pretty big pipe cleaners Amanda>> Yeah.

These are not tiny bees.

These are...good ...bumblebees.

Carol>> Yes.

(laughter) Karla>> Yeah, mine's a big bumblebee.

Okay.

Carol>> Okay,...put your bee on your finger, >> Put you been on your finger.

Carol>> and start wrapping...the ends around your finger.

Right, Steph?

I'm doing this right?

Stephanie>> Yeah.

Carol>> and do the other one.

Do the other side.

(Amanda laughs) Carol>> and you've got a bumblebee finger puppet.

Amanda>> Oh, isn't that fun.

Carol>> which is, a big hit with three and four year olds.

Amanda>> That is fun.

Yeah, yeah.

So we can I can wave my hand around and say... Yeah they can't fuss at me for waving my hand.

>> No, there you go.

Do we have time for another one?

Amanda>> Sure.

Carol>> For one more?

This was a lesson plan that we're going to do another one within the next couple of months, and...normally, what we'll have are our stickers and cutouts from seed magazines of different vegetables >> Okay.

>> and fruits, and we'll just lay them all out, and for the three year olds, we can say, Okay, now pick out all of the red vegetables.

Amanda>> Oh.

>> Pick out all of the green vegetables, Amanda>> which is a learning experience, Carol>> Right.

The colors group them, and if you were, if you were to put food on your plate, that without... adult help, what...foods would you choose to put on your plate?

Amanda>>...You didn't give them ice cream bars?

>> No, no, no.

It was just fruits and vegetables.

What would you make your dinner plate look like?

...They put everything on their plate Amanda>> Do they get to?

You have a little bit of some kind of child glue that they use.

Carol>> Oh, yes.

Glue glitter.

It's a hit.

So then, we take this cool little plate.

We glue everything on and cut it in a spiral, and they've got a spinner.

How about that?

They've got a spinner and...they love doing that one and the three year olds will need help with the cutting.

They can't do that.

We'll have our seniors help with that, but the four year olds are.

Amanda>> Because it's ...not one of those heavy duty plates.

Carol>> No, it's not.

It's not, but I'm sorry, I didn't bring more cut outs to show, but anyway, let's... get some of this Amanda>> - a few of them.

So, we've got, we've got grape fruit, and we have pears and we have watermelon.

I can see some of the glitter.

We have bananas.

This is fun.

Avocado.

Yeah, sweet potato, have to have sweet potatoes, and strawberries.

This is just and so some of these.

They probably like strawberries and watermelon right off the bat...because you said you encourage them to try to experiment a little bit and try new things.

Yeah.

Okay.

Well, that's just...that is just way too much more.

Carol>> Yeah.

Amanda>> Okay.

>>...those are some of, our plants.

Amanda>> All right, thank you so very much.

>> You're welcome.

>> Oh, get these from dropping on our toe.

Boy...and I think you've got some things that perhaps you've tried to add to the campus.

Karla>> Yeah, I brought some with me.

And it's wonderful that we have this little bee, because I can kind of do a demonstration with it now, which is really fun.

Carol>> Can you get it?

Karla>> I brought some of my favorite plants recently.

When I place plants around campus, they have to benefit certain criteria.

They have to be aesthetically beautiful.

We want them to be drought tolerant and low maintenance.

And we want them to be native or pollinator friendly.

And this is Gara, which, as you see here, it's kind of tall because it's not in a grouping with other ones, but it has these beautiful white flowers, and this variety is called whirling butterflies because the flowers in the wind.

They sway around like butterflies, and bumblebees and all kinds of bees and beneficial insects really love this plant, which is one of the biggest reasons I plant it, because it does get a lot of aphids.

But the aphids attract other beneficial predators.

And so it's kind of like my sacrificial squash, where you plant one plant that gets attacked by the insects, but it helps attract the good guys that you want to your garden, so.

I love it for that reason.

Amanda>> This is a perennial?

Karla>> Yes, yes, and it's got a super deep taproot, and so once it's established, it's very drought tolerant.

Amanda>> Yes, because although you have irrigation, you're very fortunate.

You make an effort not - You group plants according to their needs, I believe.

Is that one of the things you do?

Karla>> Yeah.

And we want plants that can take care of themselves.

We want self sufficiency.

Sometimes there are droughts.

You never know what the weather is going to bring you year to year and so drought tolerant plants are always a good choice.

Amanda>> Okay, well, ...that one's so tall.

Why don't you put that one down and bring up some of your other favorites please.

Karla>> And the ones that I brought work really well layered together.

This plant that I'm about to bring out looks really short right now but it will actually get taller than that gara plant and this is Russian sage.

It has these beautiful blue flowers.

It's kind of boring looking right now but it's got very silvery blue foliage.

Amanda>> Now let me ask you, I've always thought of Russian sage just being more grayish and silvery.

Is this a cultivar that's a brighter or more green?

Karla>> Yeah, well, I think this one just hasn't gotten that silvery, silvery quality to it yet, but this one's called crazy Blue Russian sage, and you're right, it has this beautiful kind of blue green, silvery blue foliage that looks really nice up against a deeper green foliage.

Amanda>> And... fragranced, if I'm not mistaken.

>> Yeah, if you crush it, it smells, like I said earlier, it smells like Christmas to me.

It smells like sage and plus maybe a little bit of lavender... but it's very nice.

The flowers are gorgeous, and again, very drought tolerant perennial, and the bees love it.

>> So, what the flowers look like.

>> They're blue and they're kind of conical.

>>Okay.

>> And they kind of sway in the wind and this will get kind of taller than the gara.

So I often put this behind the gara in the gara as your medium level that kind of sways.

And then I have a slightly smaller plant, which again, looks a little boring right now, but you just have to imagine it with its beautiful summertime blooms.

This is Rudbeckia Irish eyes.

Well, I love to use these plants together in the landscape because they layer really well and they also have our school colors.

So when the Russian sage blooms, it has these beautiful conical blue flowers that are kind of large and tall, and they sort of sway in the wind and bees and butterflies love them.

And then I put the gara in front of that.

It has the white flowers that sway in the breeze and Amanda>> and then that would make a beautiful, the green would help you see the white flowers better.

I would think.

Karla>> The silvery blue kind of color of this foliage, looks really well works great with a darker green because they contrast against each other very well.

Amanda>> And then the flower color on this one again, you told me was Karla>> a yellow.

Bright yellow with a green center.

This is Rudbeckia Irish eyes, and it's - the flowers are about this big.

They're about the size of a grapefruit.

>> That's big.

>> ...They're just gorgeous yellow, they just catch your eye from 100 feet away.

Amanda>> So there's a reason why you use these colors sometimes?

Karla>> Well, our colors at Lander University are blue, gold and white.

So I like to layer them together and just... just a little on the nose.

Well, it's important to establish a sense of place on our campus.

Amanda>> I agree 100%.

>> I like it if the students are able to see some Bearcat pride, Amanda>> Okay, okay.

Amanda>> We're now going to have we, as I told you earlier, when we started, Tim Lee is going to come down and talk with me about mosses and lichens, which are just some of my favorite things in the world.

I really like them better than flowers.

Nowadays.

They're just so incredibly diverse, and ancient, and kind of the beginnings of degradation of rocks and things.

So let's learn about mosses and lichens.

Well, you're going to be liking today's program a lot, because I'm speaking with Tim Lee, who is a naturalist with the Parks, Recreation, and Tourism department in the upstate, and we're going to talk about lichens and mosses.

They seem so similar sometimes.

But they're, and they are similar some but they're also pretty different.

And you came and spent the night in Sumter last night, so we could get started early, and you took a walk down the street, you could have gotten almost everything you needed just wandering around downtown.

Tim>> Right, almost everything that you see on the table right now, they are examples of right on Main Street.

There were we'll talk about this in a bit.

but they are lichens that are called crustose lichens, which are literally crusty if you would, and they were growing on the bark of the trees.

We had some foliose lichens, big bushy ones, if you would.

Moss is growing between the bricks on the sidewalk and growing on the sides of some of the old structures, but interestingly enough, even some of the new building structures had mosses growing on them as well.

Amanda>> It's crazy, and one thing that I really love about this is that they are such diversity in where we found them, and some of them I mean, like I think of mosses as being in real, you know, on the north sides of trees and things like that, but some of the lichens and mosses grow in the same areas and some grow in very diverse areas.

Often you find them together though.

Tim>> Yeah, absolutely.

Well, what we have in front of us right here on the right is one that people commonly know is reindeer moss.

It's actually a lichen, and just beside it is pin cushion moss.

So this is a moss and this is a lichen, but they were growing right beside each other on very sandy soil, And just at first glance, you might think they're the same thing, same sort of organism.

One of the great things about both of these is they can grow in very harsh conditions.

They're called extremophiles like extreme conditions that can be very dry, and in some cases, even very warm.

In this case, this the lichen and in this case on this moss, both of these, which is true of all lichens and mosses, they don't...have a root system, which is different from a lot of plants that we think of when without a root system.

You don't need to put your feet down in the soil so to speak.

You're getting your water and your nutrients from the air around you.

So, in this case, very extreme conditions, very dry, very warm conditions, but you got to both a lichen and a moss growing be side each other.

Amanda>> Well, let's start with lichens because so many people call the extension office and they say, lichens are killing my plants, and what we generally say our statement is well lichens, are completely self sufficient.

They don't take any nutrients from your plants.

They just want a way to be in the atmosphere to get up in the sunlight, and occasionally, they'll grow on plants that aren't growing very quickly if a plant is slowed down a lot, but also, sometimes some plants just have a great surface for lichens to grow on.

So, how does a lichen make its business?

(laughter) Tim>> Well, lichens are really like an ecosystem.

It's everything kind of all packaged in there together.

So you have a mycobiont , which means it's a fungus, and you have a photobiont.

So, it's the one that photosynthesizes, and that could be either an algae or an alga.

It could be a cyanobacteria, which is a blue green alga, if you would, and that's the one that actually makes the food if you will, and then it provides the food.

The lichen, or the fungal component actually provides the structure, >>Aha, >> Okay.

Now, both of those, both the algal and the fungus, in some cases, is a sign of it.

They could live on their own, but there are places that they can live, that they would not be able to by living together in playing different roles.

So, in other words, the algae in here would not be able to survive in those dry conditions without that fungus helping to capture that moisture to help keep it wet.

Amanda>> Okay, and then the moss, although it looks like this is a great big thing.

that's all one plant.

It doesn't have a vascular system.

It doesn't have any roots, and so it has to...these are really tiny little things, and they have to...move nutrients and water, just by almost osmosis.

Tim>> Right.

Exactly.

>> As if we were kind of holding hands.

>> Yes.

>> And I was...this part of my hand was, and then your...I'm passing nutrients and water on to the next door neighbor >> to the next door neighbor.

Exactly.

This is hundreds of individual plants inside of here.

So you want to think of this going into a small scale like a little forest, but hundreds of individual moss plants that look like little trees.

That particular growth form is called an acrocarp, and those are the ones that sort of stand up.

By the fact that they're all grouped close together, the moisture that's available within there allows them to be able to move that water easily across the leaf.

It's not really a leaf though, Amanda.

It's a leaf like structure.

It's only one cell thick, which is also why it's able to be able to bring that water in versus having to go through multiple layers.

It's just keeping that one cell, or that one layer of cells with the moisture content and any other nutrients that are coming in via the atmosphere.

Amanda>> Did lichens come first, probably?

Tim>> That's a good question.

Most of the research indicates that mosses have been around for a little over 400 million years.

Okay.

Now if you go back and you take the algal component, the photobiont, algae's been around much longer.

So if you take one component of that, yes, the algal had been around way longer than than the moss has.

Of course, the Moss is a true plant.

Even though it doesn't have a vascular system, so we call it a non vascular plant.

Whereas the lichen itself, we group them or classify them as fungi, but there are many, many different things all in that in that component, one unit.

It's like a whole ecosystem in there.

Amanda>> ...Then they have different ways of reproducing.

Yes, completely.

Tim>> The moss is going to produce a spore, and when that spore comes out of a little capsule, and you can see some of the capsules, right over there.

Yeah, there you go.

Little round structures like little balls.

Those little capsules contain the spores Amanda>> The male and female gametes.

Tim>> Everything's all packaged together.

Yes.

Think of it almost like a seed.

Amanda>> Oh.

>> Okay.

Not exactly, but almost like a seed that's going to go.

It's going to land and when it lands, it's not going to grow into something that looks like a moss.

It's going to look more like an algal mat, a green algal mat.

Within there is when your actual gametes are going to form.

So, we call it the gametophyte.

The phyte is plant gamete, the plant that has the gamete.

Amanda>>It's complicated.

Tim>> It's kind of complicated.

So, it's two steps to get to that.

Amanda>> But the one thing is that they must have water to move those gametes so that they can get together, I believe.

>> Exactly >> Kind of like sperm.

Tim>> Yeah, exactly.

Mosses are sometimes known as the amphibians of the plant world.

While they can live on land, they have to have that water for sexual reproduction to take place.

Lichen is a little different.

Within lichens you have reproduction taking place both asexually, which means a piece of this could break off.

and if it has all the components, the mycobiont, the photobiont, then you can have a whole new plant growing.

Amanda>> I think you found this that had broken off a rock, and it was on the ground, and so here we have, ...it's okay, now.

It's a whole nother blanket.

Tim>> Yeah and it's now in a whole different location.

Yeah, exactly.

Amanda>> Down here in Sumter.

Tim>> Yeah, and what you see on the lichen, the reproductive component, you see most easily is going to be that like on this plant right here, you can see there's a little cup if you would, right, there Amanda>> I sure can.

>> That's the reproductive structure of the fungus itself, and that's going to contain sometimes, but not always, kind of like a spore.

That's, but it's got everything all together, And by that, I mean, it has the genetic material to grow the fungus, the algal, and in some cases, they even have yeast growing within them as well.

So, that lands in the right conditions.

Amanda>> Bingo!

Tim>> Bingo!

You got a new plant.

Amanda>> ...It's just stunning that they've come together, they benefit each other.

They, the alga certainly couldn't live without this under some of the harsh conditions.

What a - I mean, they grow on tombstones.

Tim>> That's right.

They do.

They do.

They grow on tombstones, Amanda>> and but they also grow on trees, and limbs, and rocks, and just an incredible variety of places.

Tim>> Anywhere you look, almost, you can find a lichen growing.

There's some data out there that indicates that as much as 7%, as much as 7% of the Earth's surface is covered with lichens.

So, they're growing everywhere, almost.

Amanda>> Then they are indicators, really, of often clean air.

So explain that to us.

Tim>> As we were talking about earlier with the moss and the lichen, a lot of their moisture, a lot of their water content, as well as a lot of the nutrients are coming in from the air surrounding them.

Amanda>> They don't have any roots.

>> They don't have any roots.

So whatever else might be in that air, or that water can also be taken up by the plant.

So, the overall health of that plant in the case of the moss, or the overall health of the lichen can be indicative of what's happening in the air around them.

Now, that's not true of all lichens, and there are some lichens that...I mentioned they're extremophiles.

So, they will grow in conditions where the air quality is very low.

While there are other species similar to this one right here, which looks kind of dried up right now because...it's been in a envelope since the 1980s.

So, the photobiont in there is no longer viable.

Amanda>> So, it's herbarium specimen.

Tim>> Herbarium specimen, exactly.

The common name for this is lung lichen, and it's very sensitive to changes in the air quality.

Amanda>> When I was with you taking a course recently, I believe we were in - was it Sassafras Mountain?

Tim>> We were at the base of Sassafras Mountain, yes.

Amanda>> ...went down to a place.

I mean it, just, you could just feel like it was healthy.

and I believe we saw that there.

There was high moisture, but also you'd say that the air quality there is just fabulous.

Tim>> Exactly, and of course at that point being Sassafras Mountain, we were right along the edge of the Blue Ridge escarpment, and all of that warm moisture coming in from the Gulf hits those mountains rises and cools, resulting in over 80 inches, in some places 100 inches of rain.

So, we were in a temperate rainforest that day.

Amanda>> Well, why don't we go through - you've got such a wonderful collection and talk about some of the different mosses and lichens that you brought.

Tim>> Sure, absolutely.

One of the ones I want to start out with is this one over here.

This came off the streets of Sumter, South Carolina.

Very small, but it's one of the ones that is very closely related to this particular one.

It's one of the pin cushion, because they typically grow in a round pattern, and they're puffed up like a pin cushion Amanda>> So, this is a moss.

Tim>> This is a moss, and this is a moss.

Both pin cushion mosses.

They once again are a collection of hundreds of individual mosses all growing together.

Kind of like in that little moss forest, if you would.

So, really interesting in there.

Another moss that we have.

It's growing very, very close to the bark.

It's growing in a lateral horizontal fashion as it grows out, and if you compare it to this one you can see how it's growing in a long line.

It branches many, many times.

So sometimes it's referred to as carpet moss.

Oh, because it lays flat.

Yes.

Another common name for it is the fern moss, because of all the branching, of course.

The ferns are Amanda>> - Ferns so ferny.

>> Yeah, so ferny.

They're very feathery.

So the fern moss or the carpet mosses are sometimes referred to as.

Amanda>> Now does this have a lichen growing with it?

Tim>> It does.

Side by side.

Exactly.

There actually is a lichen here that actually contains a green algal, but there's a blue green photobiont over here.

So the blue greens are going to give you that dark color lichen if you would.

Amanda>> There's another moss about that people have heard of a lot and perhaps even used, but not in this form.

Tim>> Right.

I mentioned to you earlier, there were different forms of mosses and we talked about the one that was standing tall and one that laid kind of flat down.

This is another group of them.

They're known as the Sphagnum mosses.

Sphagnum mosses look to me like an upside down string mop.

I don't know if you know the book, "The Lorax," like a Truffula tree if you would, and one of the reasons that this plant has been used historically in gardening, is that up to 90% of the cells in this organism are dead.

They just hold water.

So, if you would, the majority of this is water.

You can see it this dripping out from the middle of my hand on here.

Amanda>> So people like to use that to enrich their soils, and if we walk to Swan Lake, and there are certain places on the far across the street, not in the main part of the garden, where you can actually see that growing down near the cypress swamp.

Tim>> Yes, it grows in wetland areas.

It will not survive in dry conditions.

Some mosses will do well in drier conditions, but others have to almost a saturated in order to be able to...survive.

>>Well let's move on to the lichens, because I don't think that's often the case with them.

Tim>> No lichens can dry out, almost completely... and in that case, what you will see is you will see a very light grayish color like this light green, and then when it gets wet, it will darken up because that protective layer on the outside of this particular plant or particular lichen that outside layer is protecting that photobiont in there, and this one is known as usnea, and a lot of people see this and particularly if you're on the coast or come to the mountains, you'd think it's Spanish moss, but it's not interestingly enough Spanish moss is named after this, the species is usneoides.

Amanda>> Looks like... Tim>> looks like usnea, exactly.

This is usnea, and a lot of times people will see this growing on their trees high up the fruticose lichens, the highly branch ones have the ability to capture more moisture.

...So they are going to grow higher in your trees, and this is the one that a lot of people see growing is this usnea.

Or they will see some of the other fruticose lichens high up and their trees, and they think there's something wrong as we talked about earlier.

There's one more thing I'd like to tell you about the reindeer lichen.

Some people call it reindeer moss.

We don't have reindeer caribou in our area, but in the areas where they are caribou up to 90% of their diet is this particular lichen and so without that lichen, the caribou would not be able to continue to exist.

Very important.

Amanda>> ...I've heard that there's some concern that since they have to get everything from the atmosphere, that sometimes this has a good bit of radioactive material in it.

They're kind of were studying that to see if it's have any effect on those on those mammals that use that as their diet.

Tim>> Exactly.

Black deer, black tailed deer, which we don't have either, as well as caribou, they're looking to see what the radioactivity levels are within their within their bodies, so.

Amanda>> Well, this is the kind of thing I love to go out in my yard and find.

I just think that's just the most beautiful thing in the world.

Tim>> ...This was one laying on the ground.

You're going to see these high in the trees once again because of that high branching of the fruticose that you have, and I mentioned about the reindeer lichen, but if we move across the table all the way over there, that little clump that's seen right there.

Can you point to that to me, Amanda?

Come back a little bit right.

There you go, right there.

Yeah, if you look closely at that, you'll notice there's a little depression in the middle there.

Amanda>> Oh, there certainly is, and it's soft inside.

Tim>> Yeah, and a little feather.

It looks like a lichen or a moss sitting there.

It's actually a ruby throated hummingbird nest, and what the hummingbird will do is gather lichens and put them all on the outside of the nest to camouflage it, so when a predator sees it, they think it's just lichen on the tree.

Amanda>> Yeah, because not many things like to eat lichen.

Tim>> That's correct.

So they're only a food source in this case, but also are playing an important role in helping to hide those little birds as they are developing.

Amanda>> I love textured tree bark, but also like some of the trees that have real smooth barks, because they'll just be home to all kinds of lichens, and I think that's what we have here.

Tim>> That's exactly what you have there.

That's an American Beach, a little small branch off of that.

We had do some pruning on that.

There are seven to nine, depending on who you ask seven to nine different types of crustose lichen growing, they're together.

Now they'll grow together, but they'll bump right up to each other, and they will sort of put this little line and they won't let the other one grow within there, and one more thing I'd like to mention about that is these little black squiggly lines in here, they almost look like someone had done some writing.

That's how we know which genuses this is.

This is Graphis, and there are many different species of Graphis, but they all have the same thing in common that the reproductive structures are lined up, and they turn and twist like letters.

Amanda>> It is fun to scratch the surface.

>> Yes.

>> And if people want to do more than that, there are resources you can look at, and just go out and start taking walks, and look at what you see on your walks and on your trees, and don't be alarmed when you see these things.

And...then also, the Master Naturalist course, is one that you would reach out to Clemson Extension to find out about and there are often programs through that.

That's how I got to take this, And...then some of our state parks have interpretive rangers like you, and so you don't... have to travel around the world.

I mean, look at this, Tim>> Right here.

>> All right here, and we have some great resources, and I want to thank you for coming and sharing your knowledge with us today.

Tim>> Thank you so much, Amanda.

I appreciate it.

Amanda>> If you ever had the opportunity to take a class with Tim, I would encourage you to.

It was one of the most wonderful days I've spent and I wish I could learn lots more from him.

I hope that I can do that in the future.

So, I was making a hat and I went outside and I had baptisia was blooming, and I had some amsonia, and I had a little bit of viburnum and then I had a hat I made of lichens.

So, I added that on to it, and then I had a stick that looks bare, but if you look at it, it has lichens already starting on it.

Once you start to learn from Tim, about lichens, you can see that they're all over the place, and they're just the most wonderful and diverse things in the whole wide world.

Forget about those flowering plants.

Anyway.

Terasa, Terasa>> Well, we have a question.

This one can be challenging.

It's about a plant that I was not familiar with, not something we see common in our landscapes in South Carolina, and there was a photo so Lisa would like to know, she says "I have dwarf Moringa plants that have white spots, but not downy mildew.

They look like bleached out spots.

What will help?

Amanda>> Good heavens.

I don't even know what Moringa is, but glad to learn about it.

What do you think?

Stephanie>> So, Moringa is a tropical plant, and a lot of folks grow it as a nutritional like a green and it is not very cold tolerant, and so from the looks of the symptoms that you know, she's experiencing, it looks like maybe it got some cold damage.

Oh, we've had, you know, several cold snaps late this spring, and a tropical plant like that can be very sensitive and tender and it will tend to bleach out cold damage is a bleaching kind of injury on a lot of different leaves.

Amanda>> So, do you cook it before you eat it?

Or do you just chop it up in salad?

Have you ever had it?

Stephanie>> I've never had it.

Yeah, I've never had it personally.

So I don't know.

We'll have to ask our viewers.

Amanda>> Well, Kathy, I think this is something that should try it on all the children and let us know.

(laughter) If they like it, I'm sure it's delicious.

Well, cool.

Okay, and, I had, I have some beautiful harlandii boxwood, and... you know, Terasa we always say, Oh, don't fertilize early because you'll promote new growth.

Well, I've never fertilized you know, they're just...but they always put new growth on really, really early and they had about this much new growth that got just, I mean, whited out - I mean it turned just They just looked horrible.

It's beginning to kind of resolve itself, but I've heard that at some of the golf, fancier golf courses they sometimes have to go out for green spray paint.

There's spray paints that are suitable for plants that won't hurt the plants and touch them all up because you can't have unattractive plants on a super high end golf course.

Right?

Terasa>> And sometimes there's just not much you can do.

Right?

I mean, you can not control the weather, no matter how much we wish we could.

Plants do their thing and sometimes we have years where cold comes late, and we get a lot of plant damage.

Amanda>> Okay, yep.

Yeah, we just never know.

Do we?

Stephanie>> and it's sort of odd time of year where people are maybe not outside as much, and so they don't notice it.

If they are not paying attention, to weather and their shrubs, and they don't notice it, and I'll still get cold damage calls a week, two weeks later, when they finally do get out in the yard and think, Oh, what happened?

They don't make that connection, because they hadn't seen it.

Amanda>> Well, and it might have been 80, the day before you start to notice it.

So, it's just crazy down here sometimes.

Well, Terasa, what else can we help someone with?

Terasa>> Well, this one is looking for a plant recommendation.

We have Josh from Hodges.

He said, "I have a large area that receives "varying amounts of sunlight.

Can you "recommend a ground cover that would work "in that space?

Amanda>> Goodness.

Do y'all want to kind of tag team that one for us.

Sure.

>> Okay.

>>Go ahead.

Karla>>I think the first thing we'll bring out, is this ajuga reptans, and this is the black scallop ajuga.

It has these lovely dark purple leaves and beautiful little purple flowers right at this time of the year.

It's blooming right now.

A lot of people view this as a pest because some people call it bugle weed.

It may grow in your lawn, but this is a cultivated variety that I suppose someone found a dark purple one and decided that would make a great landscape plant.

So, they developed it to be a landscape plant.

Amanda>> I think there are several cultivars now.

Some of them are brighter, and Karla>> Yeah, there's one called chocolate chip that has skinnier leaves, and then there's one called burgundy glow, I think.

Stephanie>> That's a really popular one.

Karla>> It's variegated with kind of purple leaves.

Amanda> I really like ajuga.

Karla>> I do too.

I just can't get enough of it, and it's very good for transitional areas.

It can tolerate a lot of part sun as well as full sun.

It'll be the darkest purple in full sun, but it'll still look nice and lush.

Amanda>> Still be real attractive, and I don't ever do anything with mine, and it seems to just happily, expand slowly over the years.

Stephanie>> Yeah, it'll fill in and that's nice, and then it'll stretch if you have like a long bed in between sun and shade you can make a nice continual planting of the same plant, even though you're going through different sun exposures.

Amanda>> Okay, and that kind of links us together, which is always good to do.

Got another idea?

Karla>> Yeah, we also have something we mentioned on a previous show.. You could plant strawberry plants, a wonderful perennial groundcover.

That's also edible.

It turns beautiful colors in the fall, and it's nice and green and lush in the summertime, and Carol, you brought something with you, as well.

Carol>> I did.

I did.

Speaking of strawberries.

This is not a strawberry bearing...plant.

This is strawberry begonia, and I had always had this up north as a houseplant, and it's charming.

It has little silver veining through it.

The leaves are kind of a pinky, Amanda>> the underside is Carol>> a pinky red on the bottom, and it does get a flower and it gets these runners the same way that strawberries do, but it doesn't bear fruit as I said, but it gets these very delicate stalks with tiny little white flowers on them, and we were noticing on the way up that these would make a lovely, ground cover because my plant is good for zones six through nine, and it can take shade or part shade.

Amanda>> Goodness.

Karla>> You can mix them together and create a beautiful mosaic.

Amanda>> It is.

The only sad thing is that you'd have to lie down on the ground and look under the leaves to see that pretty color.

Karla>> I know.

Amanda>> But sometimes that's worth doing, if you have a new puppy like I do.

(laughter) Terasa, you can do that.

Can't you?

>> Yes, and you know, I keep trying to get the dogs to help with the landscaping and they dig holes, but never where we want them.

(laughter) Amanda>> kind of like armadillos, but far more attractive than an armadillo, fortunately.

Okay.

Well, I think that's very, it was very charming.

Thank you for the ideas and suggestions.

Okay, Terasa, what's next?

Terasa>> This one comes in from Craig in Abbeville who also submitted a photo.

Craig appears to be worried.

"I found these in my mulch.

"Can you tell me if they're termites and if I "should do anything?"

Amanda>> Oh my goodness.

Well, Stephanie.

Stephanie>> Yeah, so termites, and flying ants can be mistaken for each other, and so, If you're trying to determine if it is a termite, there are a few things you can look for, the wing pattern.

So, termites their wings will be laid pretty much flat piled up in a stack straight back, and all four wings will be the same length.

Ants have two wings that are shorter than the other and they are kind of a little bit more splayed.

It's more of a bee pattern, and then termites will have straight antennae and ants will have bent, and so that will help you determine, in this case, what he does have is termites, and so in the mulch, they may be taking care of some of that wood material that's in there Amanda>> Especially if somebody had a mulch that was comprised of ground wood or something.

Stephanie>> Yes.

So, there's wood pieces may have attracted them.

There may be remnants of a tree there, a stump that you know, that they're not aware of, and so the thing I would say is to contact a professional to make sure you have a termite contract for your building and your structures.

Amanda>> Yes.

>> And so yeah.

Amanda>> and if I'm not mistaken, ants have a waistline, and termites sadly, have not been doing their calisthenics.

Stephanie>> Termites look like it just in the head and the body, like two segments.

They truly I guess have three, but they look like they're two.

Yeah.

Amanda>> Whereas the ant has that very constrictive.

Stephanie>> Yes.

It has three.

Yes.

Amanda>> Well...thank you.

and that's one reason sometimes we encouraged people to remember when they're planting by their foundation, that the plant is going to grow.

And so pay attention to how big it's going to be, and you want to leave a certain amount of space between your plants and the foundation of your house, where you may not care... may you may not want to have mulch and things that would, would harbor some other things.

So, I'm always real bad about not thinking that things are going to grow and get big, but...they, if you hopefully, things are going to get out, you know, because not many of us can buy a real expensive plant, but usually buy something a little smaller, and then plan for it to grow.

So read the tag, Stephanie>> I sadly see that a lot, a lot of installations where there's been way too many shrubs placed together, too close together, and too close to the foundation.

Amanda>> When they're too close together, it leads to poor air circulation, and that leads to too often to pest and disease problems, as well, so.

Stephanie>> Yeah, right.

So you can think ahead, right plant, right place.

Amanda>> Yeah.

Okay.

All right.

Well, Terasa, what else have we got dear?

Terasa>> Maybe we can try a trivia for the entire group.

So, it's an educational opportunity, one of our viewers sent in a photograph for that purpose.

It's a picture of a hand touching a very hairy vine growing on a tree.

She said something I learned this week while kayaking and exploring ran across something I thought was interesting.

Of course, I touched it.

No one in my group knew what it was.

Now, I know.

Karla>> Oh, never do that.

(laughter) Poison Ivy.

Terasa>> You got it, right off the bat.

(laughter) Karla>> I have really intimate experience like with that.

Been there.

Done that, Amanda>> Virginia creeper, which really has another type of adhesive structure can look like poison ivy, and so it's really important to know, I go out Terasa and try to keep the poison ivy under control in my yard, and very careful to cut it, but not cut into the tree that it's on and then I had a tiny bit of full strength roundup and a throwaway paintbrush because poison ivy is I mean, and some people have don't have it, don't react to it, but with over time, Terasa>> Even exposure, >> You could have a reaction, so don't just be cavalier about it, is my best advice.

Terasa>> Knock on wood, I have never had a reaction, but I'm not going to purposefully touch it just to see what happens.

Stephanie>> That's what I was going to say.

I've never had a reaction either, but I'm super careful.

(laughter) Amanda>> I have one of my dear master gardeners, her husband is extremely reactive to Virginia Creeper.

It has not urushiol in it, but it has some oxalic acid crystals, acids or something, and so it's just you know, don't, don't just cavalierly go in particularly in the wintertime, when things don't have any leaf on them and just start pulling things out of bushes and vines.

It's always good to wear something else?

Oh, goodness gracious.

But there are so many vines that are wonderful.

>> Yes.

>> Yeah.

and we had a fun time talking about those and the Apple Blossom one, the Evergreen clematis that Paul Thompson told us about was just so much fun.

So, there are lots, but there are also some wonderful native vines and I guess everybody's one of everybody's favorite would be our native honeysuckle.

Terasa>> The coral honeysuckle, got to love it.

>> Yeah.

Yeah, and so the color's just so beautiful, and called Woodbine is one of the common names.

I think we all should have some of that in our yard.

Karla>>I think so too.

Amanda>> Okay.

Well, I think we should have some of the wonderful things y'all brought in our yard and I think we should have y'all back again soon, because now it's time to say good night.

Carol>> Good night Amanda>> Bye bye.

♪ closing music ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ Narrator>> Making It Grow is brought to you in part by the South Carolina Department of Agriculture certified South Carolina grown helps consumers identify, find and buy South Carolina products.

McLeod Farms in McBee, South Carolina.

This family farm offers seasonal produce, including over 22 varieties of peaches.

Additional funding provided by International Paper and the South Carolina Farm Bureau Federation and Farm Bureau Insurance.