Hello, and thanks for joining us for another episode of min American gardener.

I'm your host Tinisha, Spain.

And joining me in house today are two of our favorite panelists who come on and join us and they brought lots of stuff to talk about.

So let's have them introduce themselves and tell you a little bit about their specialty.

So Chuck, we'll start with you.

Okay, I'm still Chuck voigt I retired almost eight years ago, which is unbelievable from the University of Illinois Department of Crop sciences, which is where horticulture resided at that point.

My specialties were herbs and vegetables, and certainly had trees and shrubs and other things as well.

So we should be able to cover things a little.

All right.

I'm John bodensteiner.

I'm a vermillion County Master Gardener and retired pharmacist six years, seven years almost.

And I enjoy doing a lot of things I am volunteering at a local high school and teach the greenhouse in botany and help teach the botany class and enjoy the kids and you're so busy, busy, busy, a lot of things so yeah, it's like you retired from one job but picked up about 14 others in the process.

Okay, let's get started.

So, Chuck, we'll start with you.

Okay, some things you want to share.

All right, well, it was a as my garden got smaller, I decided I needed to do a little bit of vertical thinking.

So that phoned cattle panels on sale at one of the Farm Stores and talk the guy who farms the ground to at the farm to take me up there with this yet happened to have a 16 foot trailer which worked out really well get the job because the panels is you may be able to see are 16 feet long and 50 inches across or whatever, however you want to call it there 16 feet by 1550 inches so just a little over four feet and so that's fine and I tried to do some things last year and it was not so good.

But I did pull lima beans which I've had some quite a bit of success with more so than like pole snapping is I've never done as well but the pole Limas you can see just grasp onto that and and shot up to the top of the eight foot things because I cut them in half and stuck them in the ground and anchor them with can kind of see a steel posts there anchoring them and they grew up to the top of that and just made this a bundle of of foliage there at the top I think next year I'm going to take a 16 footer and put it across the top so they have somewhere to go once they get to the top and I think that'll spread them out and probably increase the yield because they'll get more sunshine as a they are all in a clump there at the top.

I was just going to ask how was your yield?

Did you get up pretty good do well pretty good.

Yeah especially considering how dry it was through you know we had one burst and one burst at one July was pretty good.

We had about four inches and several showers in July May and June we had about an inch on the installment plan in tiny little batches that didn't matter.

And then after July August and most of September again was was just super dry.

I also tried to dry cucumbers and they're not as as strong a climbers Okay, and so I ended up with them on the ground in between and it was hard to get in there.

So I'm going to have to adjust how I do cucumbers and get them vertical but the beans worked really well.

I also did some bush soup beans I did dark red kidney white kidney and and one called Calypso which is kind of fun because it's black and white kind of speckled.

I don't know Do you want to Yeah, let's let's look at the beads.

All right.

The pole Limas Christmas is going to dark purple and white striped looks is very nice.

I really like this one I got this one from Jim long and in Missouri.

It's Potawatomi.

And the Potawatomi is where the where the natives that the French encountered up in Kankakee county when they were when they were settling Bourbonnais.

So I thought if they did well for the Potawatomi they ought to do well up in Canada.

And then the white kidneys which are our are essentially like a Kundalini.

Okay, that Kundalini is a white kidney, I'm not sure if the if they are separate varieties or not, the dark red kidney is a classic favorite.

And Calypso is just is just fun.

That is a pretty bean.

It is very pretty.

Yes.

So you flick a Black Eyed Pea?

It does, doesn't it?

Yeah.

does require a color treatment.

And what do you need to do to get them ready for next year?

Do you use inoculant?

Do you pop them in the fridge?

How do?

How will these overwinter until you're ready to put them in the ground next spring?

I don't.

If I had room, I would put them in the fridge or the freezer to just for longevity sake.

In reality, they're probably going to sit in a peanut butter jar somewhere not too hot.

And we'll just renew them annually and not not worry about keeping them long term.

The Potawatomi is I did have in the fridge as well as the Christmas because they're a little harder to find.

So they don't require a stratification.

Oh, no, they're as far as they acquired that day, the day you pick them.

Basically, if you planted them, they would they would grow there.

Okay.

They don't have any, any protection at this point.

Gotcha.

Okay.

Well, we is, you know, in that picture, you can see that the, the Bush ones don't, don't get long runners.

Occasionally, they might get a half runner on some of the other Bush types, but but pretty much the the standard nice clump.

That was interesting this year, because they came up, they got that first big leaf, and the ground dog I think went down and ate all those big first leaves.

And I'm beside myself saying bad things about the groundhog.

But then they they recovered and put up the first the first trifoliate leaves and it slowed him down.

But it didn't stop them.

So to my contacts, it took them right down to two inches or maybe an edge to the ground after they were flowering.

And they never did recover.

I don't know why it was just one pass and then it was over.

Or if it was something else.

I didn't see deer tracks.

So somebody ate that first, that first true leaf and slowed them down.

But they did okay and recover the tax to nature.

Okay.

All right.

Well, back to you in just a second.

Jim.

So Jim said, John, which would you like to talk about, we're going to talk about something that's coming up soon.

We're getting into that Christmas Thanksgiving period.

And I always have a lot of questions.

And so I brought one of my Thanksgiving cactuses.

As you can see it is getting really loaded with blossom buds.

I have noticed some that were this was outside.

And it was in pretty much full sun during the summer.

And the reason that starting just down to get the budget is that this is our regulated you know, if it you have to get the hours of sun or light down to about eight to 10 hours.

And once it reaches that, then it'll start to put the buds on during 1216 hours of light, it's not going to put the buds on.

I do have it in a clay pot.

It's got a hole in it, I've got very good draining soil in it, good potting soil, I did keep it watered, you know, and I did the finger test.

I you know I did water every time that I watered everything.

If it wasn't dry, I didn't water it.

The one of the things that we do mostly with these is we over the water over water them and they tend to rot and and you know it'll rot right at the ground level and they'll get flimsy.

Also, if they're under a lot of stress these rather than the green, they'll almost turn purplish.

If you start to notice these leaves turning purple, it means that they're under stress, you're doing something that the plant doesn't like.

So figure it out before you get into trouble.

So I have people say they said this is a Christmas cactus.

This is not a Christmas cactus.

This is a Thanksgiving cactus.

And you can tell by the little horns.

You know it looks like a little devilish leaf on there for you if you really wanted to.

And I brought this sheet and it's going to show the difference in what the different leaves look like for Christmas and Easter and thanksgiving.

The middle one is the Thanksgiving one.

You can see it's got the little horns on it.

And then the Christmas has got a little bit more of a shape and then Easter to almost a rounded one, and depending on and it depends on again on the number of hours of light and they are different different plants.

You can't make this this you I guess you could make it bloom at Christmas if you regulated the number of hours of light.

And it's it's different lengths that for each of them is why they bloom in those different times.

And and you don't want to be changing it midterm.

You know if you know it's the process starts the process starts you want to keep it there.

Yeah.

But the main thing is don't overwater and put them in a good pot.

And don't put it in too big of a pot.

This is perfect for this.

It's sturdy.

If once this gets too big, increase it by one size of the pot go from a this is I think a six inch and then I would go to an eight inch you I wouldn't go to a 12 inch because the plant gets lost in there and to get the plant the correct amount of water.

You have to overwater it to get the you know the soil is going to wick the moisture away from the plant if you get too big and so the crackpot correct amount of water to correct sunlight and you should have a Happy Happy Planet Happy Planet commercially.

They they add to the confusion by giving Thanksgiving cactuses names like Kris Kringle and White Christmas.

Yes, and they are Thanksgiving cactuses.

And and the only the only thing about it is from a merchandising standpoint.

They're selling them in November.

West Indies period.

Yeah.

And so it's when we're already in Christmas mode literally the day after Halloween.

Well, Christmas is already.

No, you're right.

It's already out.

Yeah, yeah.

What when we were in Holland, they had a mechanized system growing these these things.

And, you know, it's like acreage, oh my god, they just run them through and and it's amazing.

accidentally or on purposely break up a leaf off.

Don't throw that away.

Stick it in the ground.

You've got you can you potentially have another whole plant?

Yes.

And you can share it with a neighbor.

You know, this is this plant is a piece of a great grandmother.

Great Grandmother.

So this technically is a clone of it is a clone actually exact because it started from this of a plant that's probably over 100 years old.

Wow.

I love those.

I love a legacy plant.

So don't throw these away.

I'll put this in there.

And I'll take you to the greenhouse and I will start one for one of the one of the grandkids.

You know, a new term has come out of that.

It's called prop lifting.

Instead of shoplifting propagation.

Oh, so you take a prop, but it's stealing.

So somebody breaks a piece off it takes it's a new term online called prop lifting.

I don't know if it's punishable, but I want another one that's been around for longer.

That's that's less about thievery and more about passing things along, filter rushing calls and pass along plants pass along plants.

I like that one better than proper for shoulder brushing used to have his garden in the back of his truck.

He came and then he complained because the the the he was here in January for my Earth Day.

And his Rosemary furrows Blau in January.

Rosemary's not hard, especially in the back of a truck, yeah, he was a character.

Okay, Chuck, we're back to you.

Okay, with more seasonal items.

Yes, well, we I won't overdo the favorite boom corn thing.

But this was the year to renew the seat of the black seated Hungarian broomcorn.

It is.

Again, calling it corn is confusing because it's a sorghum.

And we found that out the hard way I was growing it out at the Research Farm.

And they put corn herbicide on it a pre emergent horn herbicide and it didn't come up because because that's designed to to kill things like shatter cane and things that would be in a cornfield.

But it is fairly dry circles are more tolerant, drought tolerant than regular corn.

So it did fairly well this year.

The black traditionally does not have as good a broom straw as the red and neither one of them has to get a broom straw is the modern type that they actually use for brooms.

But there it is.

I renewed the Caesar seeds.

Yes, yes.

And those are there's a big history.

That's a long history.

Isn't this the hunger?

Yes, yeah.

Mrs. Louis George goes from from Essex, Illinois traded me this the red and the black Hungarian broomcorn for cow horn and a couple of other potatoes that I was going to tie up Ah, there was an article about me and the Kankakee paper.

And we made it made a connection.

And so I've had that since the since probably must be, it's almost 40 years, it's probably about 1985.

So 38 years.

So I've had that kept it kept it going.

No noticeable crossover of the red stays red, the black stays black.

And this was the year also to renew the miniature popcorn.

And it can be Kaliko like that.

But I've also separated the colors I've had yellow, orange, red and black.

separate colors.

Do you eat these not really ornamental just for funsies Sure, you could, you know, if you had a surplus, you could you could, you could do that dry it out good.

And it would pop there would be probably pretty intense flavor.

The other thing to notice here is the tips.

So that it didn't cross pollinate with field corn, which was there on the farm with it.

I planted this pretty late.

And so corn earworms usually don't overwinter in northeastern Illinois, they have to come from from down south and so they show up late in the season.

And so if I had planted this in May, I probably would not have had this tip damage.

But from a seed saving standpoint, it makes almost no difference.

If I was selling this commercially, which I used to do, I used to have a deal with my mentor Joe at out at Joe's pumpkin land here in Urbana.

And I would bring hundreds and hundreds of these and and and sell them to him for way less than the labor that went into him.

But so anyway, I've had some goodies to just basically is for educational components just to keep them alive and thriving.

And sort of yes, that's yes, I interesting.

I introduced the Hungarian red and black to seed savers.

And from there they got picked up some in in commercial sources.

So they may be safe, although some sometimes you see them listed as as mixed and that you know that's that becomes a mutt.

So that's that's not good.

So I'm keeping them going as long as I keep going and as long as I can keep going.

I love these I got those originally at at pigeon and Bantam swap meet at the Kankakee County Fairgrounds are finding stuff at the coolest place that was growing it in his in his exotic bird pans.

And then they were eating it.

And then with oil content, something about it.

He thought they really, really made their feathers pop in terms of color and shine and in whatever so.

So do you get one cup per?

No.

So they're multiples, I was gonna do multiples.

Because I had it in so late this year, I had maybe only three or four per stock.

So that's a nice thing compared to regular.

Yeah, I think I think it may show some a little bit of primitiveness within it maybe back to the to sent even I don't know, but they make lots of lots of men.

And if you're not being careful, you can go over the patch three or four times and still keep finding little ones that that were kind of hidden.

So I love that I had one.

I had one before I got this one.

That was interesting at the time and sort of the same, but it was a much longer season one and this is much, much superior to that what that one was awesome.

Okay, thank you.

All right, John, we're back to you.

Okay.

I know you had talked about bringing something that fall colors, or fall plants, anything in the season dried plants, things that we could and so I brought something that I grew one of my other master gardeners, right.

And I don't know if the camera will bring up the real color in this but this is called beauty berry.

And it's it's about six years old now.

And oh yeah, look at that.

Gorgeous.

And it is a beautiful, beautiful Berry.

Unfortunately, it doesn't make a real real good cut flower in that the berries will last maybe two days after that they really tend to start to drop down even though they're in water.

So I usually plan on one or two days out after after this freeze that we had last night to cut down to I think 25 Last night at home.

I live out in the country is kind of in it got a little colder than an actual Danville and but this is one of my favorite yard plant and you can divide it and make.

So what I did is I also grow a number of grasses in my yard.

And so I brought this this is northern sea oats and then just an ornamental grass and I put off a few stalks of the of the beauty barrier you can see already there leaves are starting to really start to wilt.

And that was probably because of the frost last night.

Yeah.

And the, but during the winter, if you could see how those seeds just any wind at all is going to up and we are just something to look at the Birdsville will get at some of them.

And it just it just add some fall and winter when nothing else is booming, share and the wind is blowing.

At least I get these little Yeah, for sure.

I did not learn the value of ornamental value, I guess until I came here and then I, you know, you're really having something to look at in the wintertime, you know, even if it's got a little dusting of snow on it, it just, it's nice.

This here right now is probably about 14 feet tall.

Oh, wow.

If you and a lot of beneficial insects will use those steps.

There's kind of like it's got a pithy center, and a lot of insects, beneficial insects will lay their eggs in there no overwinter and the larvae will eat some of that.

And so if you leave that up, rather than cutting it off in the fall and burning it, you're going to you it's going to benefit your pollinators and different things in the in the spring.

And so I usually try to leave them as long as I can, you know, you can't leave them up too long, otherwise your new grasses will start to come up.

And if you cut those off too early, and I've learned that I don't burn them anymore, I used to burn them but that does some does some real damage to the the crowns.

And so I I just I just cut them off, I take my hedge trimmer, once I see the new growth growing and just cut it off above that.

And then I don't even take my grasses right away.

And I'll lay him to the side.

And make sure maybe by mid June, all the insects that were in there the beneficials will have either the caterpillars or the larvae will have metaphor more for the size to the butterflies or the MAS and and are gone and then and then you have to be careful when you throw those on the fire.

They'll it's like a Christmas tree.

Yeah, you you get a real idea why a prairie fire is such a terrifying thing because those grasses it's it's almost it's almost an explosion.

Anyway, they found out that they've maybe had five feet away from their house.

Well, I'll just burn them.

Well, they ended up with with melted vinyl siding.

I mean, it can it can do.

I mean that is hot.

And that's getting back to like the Christmas cactus and things with our Christmas trees.

Christmas trees can and can blow up and erupt they can change a room from 6070 degrees up to 600 degrees in 60 seconds.

And if you've made that in your lungs are scorched and panned.

Okay, be very, very careful with your Christmas trees and got it we've got about three minutes left and I want to make sure we get your your taters in Okay, well, we dug sweet potatoes, two or three weeks, oh, come on the show no two or three weeks ago, and and they turned out better than I expected.

Again, because of the drought and all the situations we did get some nice heat which they liked.

When I start my slips I haven't been these like little window plastic window box things and you can put like one variety in each end and keep them separate.

And I never have the heart to just well I keep them for a while because you never sure the first planning is going to survive.

But then by the time you realize that's going to happen.

These planners look really they're really pretty even even, you know the commercial route sweet potato plants are very pretty.

There's some kind or use and some other things.

And so I just keep watering them and they keep growing and this year as I was dumping them out because it was going to freeze last night I got a pleasant surprise.

There's a couple of reason bigger than this but but but the purple and Ivus white cream and and one of the one of the others, and they all had cute, usable little roots.

So we're gonna have some some baby sweet potatoes.

And, and the other thing is people grow the ornamentals.

And you could use grow these as ornamentals as well.

But look in those planters what when, you know when the taps freeze because the roots are edible even even on you know Marguerite and Blackie and all of those things.

Okay.

I think we probably have about a minute John, do you want to get into your rows?

Okay, you know, I just I this is this is available, you know, and it's one of the stores and I just bought it I'm going to use it as a gift for my wife, a Halloween gift for her.

And, and the nice thing with these is, it's just they're just fun to grow.

You can't put them outside right now.

Do you have to overwinter them?

They are tender.

Right now they I do have some that I have bought other years and that we use and they've survived for 567 years.

And this color is and they're fragrant.

They're just something nice to grow inside.

And rather than cut flowers which last and then you throw them away by by a potted plant, yeah, it may die.

But you can see just see you'll get to look at it longer inside and you may be able to put it out come spring, put it out and let it grow out there.

And it'll it's something else that you can add we had a lot we had the Alice in Wonderland so I bought white and red ones and we put and they've come back every year and that was eight years ago I think so maybe maybe and they're there you had to have I had to have white and we had a little artists that painted some of them red there they were pretending to bank because you the Queen of Hearts wanted all all red roses, and they've had Miss planted white one so they had to go and paint.

But what that thank you guys so much for coming in.

Thank you so much for watching.

And if you've got questions, you can send them into us at your garden@gmail.com or search for us on Facebook and Instagram.

Just look forward Mid American gardener and we will see you next time.

Good night.