(light music) (bright classical music) - Today on "Oklahoma Gardening," we work our way through some colorful plants.

We start out by taking a closer look at a red hot tree.

Then I'll share with you two of the most popular annuals you'll likely see at the garden centers.

We have a spring native for the shade garden.

And finally, I wanna introduce you to a new person joining the "Oklahoma Gardening" team.

Underwriting assistance for our program is provided by the Oklahoma Department of Agriculture, Food, and Forestry, helping to keep Oklahoma green and growing.

(bright classical music continues) "Oklahoma Gardening" is also a proud partner with Shape Your Future, a program of the Tobacco Settlement Endowment Trust.

Shape Your Future provides resources for Oklahomans to make the healthy choice the easy choice.

(bright classical music continues) I love sharing with you guys the cool things that plants can do.

(bright classical music continues) We're back here at the student farm.

(bright classical music continues) I wanna share with you a tropical plant that you might find in some Oklahoma landscapes.

(bright classical music continues) It's important to know which plants we are dealing with so that we can continue to maintain them successfully for years to come.

(bright classical music continues) If you're looking to add a little color to your garden, why not go big by adding a Prairifire Crabapple.

You can see behind me the amazing display of cranberry-colored flowers that cover the canopy in early spring.

It's actually just a beautiful plant that's really gonna make that impact for people that might be going by your landscape.

But the display doesn't just end in spring.

In fact, it continues on.

As it pushes out that foliage later on, it's going to be kind of a burgundy-red color foliage in the summer months that will slowly transition to a deep green with some red veins in it as you go into the fall months.

Now, finally, as you head from fall into winter, it's gonna produce these crabapples.

After all of these pollinated flowers continue maturing, you're gonna get these small fruits that persist through the winter months.

And they're actually edible and preferred by the wildlife, so you're gonna help benefit that wildlife in your community as well.

So it's really a small tree that's going to give you year-round benefit.

Now again, I mentioned it is a small tree.

It's only gonna reach and max out about 20 feet tall.

So it's a nice tree if you have utility lines or something going across the back of your yard.

You can still plant this one underneath there.

Now, you might be thinking, "Crabapples, aren't those prone to different diseases?"

While some of 'em are, this Prairifire is actually resistant to a lot of those that kind of affect some of the more common crabapples.

So some of those diseases that you might hear about are fire blight, scab, cedar apple rust.

And Prairifire has shown high resistance to those.

So we've had these planted out here at the gardens for several years, and they've never had any problems with them.

So an excellent tree to plant in your landscape.

It does need full sun and well-drained soil.

It is hardy to zone four, so you don't have to worry about sometimes those unseasonably really cold temperatures that we can get in our Oklahoma winters.

This is an Oklahoma-proven plant, so it is tried and true to add to your landscape.

(upbeat music) Petunias have come a long way from your grandmother's garden.

It's no wonder that they're one of the most popular annuals to utilize in the landscape.

And they used to just come in like solid purples, pinks, whites, and yellows.

But since then, they have continued to create all sorts of different versions.

In fact, so from here over, we're looking at petunias.

You can see that we've now got doubles, we've got really dark ones.

This one here is kind of bordered with this lime green yellow around the edges, and it's just really attractive.

We've also got a lot that are now striped as well.

So petunias, one of the nice things about petunias is, obviously, when they're out in the landscape, they give you that nice little fragrance, kind of a sweet smell as you're walking around them.

But typically, some of 'em are either mounding, but then, we also have these Wave petunias that they came out with that really spread out a lot more.

So these are great in the landscape, in a garden bed, so that you can really fill an area with that annual color.

So this particular one is just a Wave petunia that is a white one here.

- And it's going to get about 30 inches in diameter, and stay relatively short.

Whereas some of these others will get more of a mounding habit to 'em.

Now another popular line that's come out is the Supertunias, and those have been out for quite a while and they're coming out with more and more colors.

This particular one is called persimmon here, and you can see how it has a nice kind of greenish yellow throat to it and then sort of an apricot rim around the corolla there.

The nice thing about a supertunia series though, is that they are self-cleaning, meaning you don't have to deadhead them.

So some of the older petunias you might remember that you would have to go around and remove those spent flowers to prevent them from producing seed.

So a lot of times you would see the color, it would come on, and then it would sort of fade for a while, and if you didn't deadhead it, it would go into seed production and then you would find little seedlings later on in your garden.

So that's one thing that you don't have to worry about with the supertunia series and some other petunias that have been more recently developed.

Now, the other thing too is while a lot of petunias have bigger flowers on them, they are also getting smaller.

So you might find some of these that are a little bit smaller here.

So this one is very similar to this older one, this royal velvet here.

This is a supertunia mini vista, and you can see the flowers are about half the size of this one here.

So they are getting just a little bit smaller, almost starting to look like calibrachoas, and we're gonna get to those here in a minute.

Again, here is another one.

This is called a little tunia.

So again, a very striped one, kind of a bicolor there, another bicolor here.

And then also this is another mini supertunia.

And so again, you can see this is a regular supertunia.

Here's a mini supertunia.

And then next to it here we have calibrachoas.

And these are a different plant than petunias.

And so you can see, although they look very similar, and in fact our have a common name called million bells because of that bell shaped flower like a petunia.

And again, they just put perfuse number of flowers all over them.

But this is a fairly recent introduction.

They were kind of introduced into the horticulture market in the 1990s and have only grown in popularity since they have a much smaller flower than petunias, about a half inch in diameter.

So you can see though the difference is while petunias originally had more of a solid color, of course, you know, some of the hybrids have really changed since then.

The calibrachoas really do have a mix and a range of color in each of their flowers and even on their plants in some cases.

So here we've got several.

And what's nice about 'em is they're just very dainty little flowers.

Another benefit to having calibrachoas is that they are all self-cleaning, so you don't have to worry about deadheading them when they're out in your garden.

Now, as far as planting petunias or calibrachoas, so petunias do really well as a bedding plant.

They do like high organic material.

So if you have heavy clay, you maybe wanna make sure to amend that soil first with some organic matter or perhaps just stick them in containers.

They do really well in containers too.

So if you are wanting to fill a landscape bed and really cover that space, you might look at something that is like a spreading petunia versus more of the mounding petunias, that are available on the market.

Calibrachoas, however, I would suggest maybe keeping those in a container just because they can be a little more sensitive to some of our soil conditions.

They do really like a lot of good drainage and high organic matter again, but they can be a little more sensitive to that.

So they work really well for containers.

In fact, you'll often see that you can buy hanging baskets full of these calibrachoas and they just make a beautiful display.

The other thing to keep in mind with these is also the color.

So if I'm looking for something to plant out in the landscape, you can see that these petunias come in both bright colors and also some really dark colors.

And while this dark color might look nice on a bench, 'cause a lot of times we're buying these, we're looking at 'em on a landscape bench, they might look nice, this dark color, or even some of the darker ones might not look that good out in a large bed because they're just gonna look like shadows and voids in the landscape.

And so it'll just kind of look like green and dark.

You won't necessarily see that.

So if you do really wanna use some of these dark colors, go ahead and make sure to mix in some of these yellows or whites to kind of brighten it up and highlight some of those darker colors in the landscape.

Or perhaps use these in containers or beds that are really up close to your house where you're gonna notice them a little more intimately than somewhere farther away.

Stick with the bolder, brighter colors for something that's a large mass planting out in the landscape.

Calibrachoas, like I said, they work really well in containers because all of these need good drainage, but especially the calibrachoas.

But because they have such a mix of colors, these work really nicely in those container mixes.

And the other thing is you can kind of look at the different colors and pull out other combinations of flowers.

So here you can see we have a yellow, we have some peach, we have some orange.

And so you could go ahead and mix several of these different calibrachoas together and giving you a nice combination in a container.

And they also do even come in these doubles, like you can see right here.

- So that is what you'll probably be seeing out in the nurseries right now are petunias, Calibrachoas, and a lot of other annuals.

So when you're headed out to the nursery, make sure you know what you're shopping for.

(light music) Today we've got a beautiful native that is blooming here in our shade garden.

Now, we're in early spring.

It's about mid-March here in Oklahoma.

And you can see that the Celandine poppy, also known as the yellow wood poppy, is already up and blooming.

In fact, it blooms a little bit early, even well before a lot of our other perennials have even begun to emerge out of the ground.

What's really fun about this is, not only the bright color adding some interest into that darker shade, but also, you can see here, it has four petals.

And this is a characteristic of the poppy family.

Not exclusive to the poppy family, however, but it is a characteristic.

Now, I say petals, but actually, botanically speaking, these are technically the sepals of this flower here.

So after they're done blooming, they're actually gonna produce kind of a fuzzy pod that will turn into seeds.

Now, you don't have to worry about this plant being an aggressive seeder.

However, it will reseed.

In fact, they say that ants are kind of responsible for distributing those seeds.

And so you'll find that it's not just the new seedlings are growing right underneath the other plant.

In fact, you might find them kinda some distance from the original plant.

You can see here, we have a few that are just kind of scattered back and forth around this plant.

So you don't have to worry about it being aggressively reseeding.

What's nice, though, is it does kinda create a repetition through your landscape of this plant as it evolves.

Now, the foliage will begin to emerge early on, and it's kinda got this basal growth, which means all the foliage sorta comes from a central location at the crown of that plant.

You can see the foliage is heavily dissected, adding really nice texture into the garden.

It only gets to be about a foot tall, and so it's just pretty low maintenance.

There are no pest problems really with this plant or disease problems either.

And in fact, you won't even have a problem with the deer liking this plant because the foliage is toxic.

Now, if you wanted to save the seeds on this plant, what you might wanna do is cold stratify it.

So either plant those seeds later in the fall as you go into that cold, moist season.

Or you can take some of those seeds and put 'em in a container with some potting soil, and then put 'em in the refrigerator for a few weeks, several weeks, a period of time to, in fact, induce that germination on these plants.

It is native, like I said, mainly to eastern United States, because it likes that shade condition.

You can see here, what's nice, though, is we are under a deciduous shade, meaning it gets more exposure when it's kind of taking center stage.

But later on, it's gonna get a little bit more shade.

Because it does need some moist conditions.

However, it will tolerate dry conditions.

You just might find that it actually goes dormant.

But really later on in the season, it's gonna get covered over with other perennials as well.

So nothing to be too concerned about, pretty low maintenance.

A nice addition to your shade garden here in Oklahoma, especially eastern Oklahoma.

(light music) (light music continues) Hey, everyone.

I am in the kitchen today, because I wanna introduce you to a new person that you're gonna be seeing right here on "Oklahoma Gardening."

This is Christi Evans, who is an Extension specialist.

And you are a registered dietitian, correct?

- Yeah, yes, I'm a registered dietitian.

- So we have convinced her to start doing our cooking segments for us here on "Oklahoma Gardening," and we're so excited to have you.

So thank you so much.

Could you tell us a little bit about your background with Extension and also, you know, your field of expertise?

- Yeah, so I originally started with OSU Extension back in 2007.

- And then I left after about three to four years and went and did some other things as a registered dietician.

I worked as, in consulting for a while and worked for the WIC program.

But then I came back, and I originally was, when I came back, with the Community Nutrition Education Program in Oklahoma County.

- And we actually knew each other back in the day.

- Yeah.

- When I was in Canadian County.

- Yeah.

Yeah.

We worked together then.

But then I went to work in Cleveland County after that as an FCS educator.

- Okay, and now you are up here on Stillwater Campus, and so, glad to have you up here.

And it looks like you're ready to start cooking already.

So what do we have here?

- Well, I have some vegetable scraps.

Usually when people make a vegetable broth, they will have about, you know, eight cups of vegetables that they plan to make a broth with.

But you don't have to cut up a whole piece of vegetable in order to make broth.

You know, you can make it with scraps instead of just throwing them away, or.

- [Host] This would go to my compost pile.

Honestly, that's what it looks like it's for, but.

- Well, yeah, and I mean, putting it in a compost pile, at least you know you'd be putting it to use besides, you know, putting it in the trash can, but, you know, you can keep that and make your broth.

It'll save you, you know, save you a little bit of money.

- Absolutely.

- And, yeah.

- So is there a recipe to making a vegetable broth, or?

- You can find a recipe, but it's really not complicated at all.

- Okay.

- You just start with what vegetables you've got.

Pretty much.

I mean, there's some vegetables, you know, that you might wanna stay away from, but you just wanna probably do about equal parts of water to your vegetables.

- Okay.

Let's go ahead and go through this process then.

- Okay, yeah.

So one other thing though to mention is if you don't want to make a broth right away, like we're gonna do today, you could take your vegetable scraps and put them in a bag.

- Okay.

- You know, labeled, and put it in the freezer until you have the amount that you want to make.

- Oh, okay.

- If you wanna make a large amount of broth.

Or a freezer safe container like that with a lid.

But we're just gonna make a smaller amount and just make our broth.

- Okay.

Excellent.

- So, what we've got is some onion skins.

I'm gonna go ahead and put this.

- So the actual skins that you wouldn't be utilizing otherwise?

- Right.

Yeah, yeah.

And then we've got some ends of some bell peppers, and then we've got some celery tops and ends, and, you know, all of these vegetables are perfectly fine.

- Right.

- They're just, yeah.

- So they're gonna add basically the flavoring to the water that we put in then.

- Right.

Uh huh.

- So.

- Yep.

And then we've got peels from carrots.

- Okay.

- But there is one thing, you know, that when you plan to use your carrot peels and the ends and all that, you really need to make sure that you do wash the vegetables - Okay.

- and scrub them.

So, because, you know, if you're putting peels in there, you don't want that dirt or anything.

- You don't any extra minerals in there, right?

(both laughing) - And then herbs, we've got some stems from some herbs.

So, you know, typically people just take the leaves off.

- Right.

- or throw the rest away.

But those are great in broth too.

Gives it a nice flavor.

- Okay, perfect.

So really any herbs will work on that too, right?

- Right.

Yeah, yeah.

Whatever herbs, you know, that you have, or if you have certain ones that you like to season your broth with, they'd be great.

Also by using herbs, then you're gonna be less likely to want to add salt, so - Gotcha.

- that's a good thing.

But yeah, so once that's added in the pot, then we'll just pour in our water.

And again, you know, you want to have it pretty, like equal parts, but a good idea is so that you want the vegetables to be covered in water.

- Okay.

- Yeah.

If you use a little bit less water, it's just gonna make it a little bit more concentrated.

Or if you add more, then, you know, it's gonna not be as flavorful.

So kind of, you know, is again, another personal preference on how you, yeah.

- Okay.

So could you err on the side of it being more concentrated and then in the dish, obviously, you could probably always add more water to it later?

- You could, but you really have to keep an eye on it then.

- Okay.

- To make sure, as it boils.

- Oh, when you're making it.

Okay.

- Yeah.

Yeah.

- So now this is a broth, correct?

- Right.

Yeah.

- So, what is the difference, like I hear, you know, vegetable broth and vegetable stock or chicken stock.

What is the difference between those things?

- Okay, so now when we're talking vegetables, there really is no difference between a stock and a broth.

- Okay.

- But with meat and poultry, a stock is made from the bones.

So you know, you boil the bones, and that's a stock.

- Okay.

- And a broth is made by the meat.

- Oh, okay.

- So if you have the meat and, but sometimes people will talk about vegetable broth or vegetable stock.

It's basically the same.

- Because they also say bone broth, right?

- Right.

- Don't they?

So that would technically be a stock though?

- Right.

Yeah.

- Okay.

- Bone broth is just stock with a fancier name, I guess.

- Okay.

(both chuckle) - [Guest] But yeah, you just, once you get all of the vegetables and the water in your pot, then you'll just turn it to medium high heat until it boils.

Then we'll just put the lid on it and let it simmer for about 45 minutes to an hour.

- [Host] Okay.

So it needs to really kind of get those flavors out of those vegetables for a bit.

- [Guest] Yeah.

Yeah.

Give it time to, yeah.

- So is, you mentioned there are some maybe vegetables that we shouldn't be using.

What are some things that we should not add to our vegetable stock?

- Not use?

Something like cauliflower or broccoli, you really wouldn't wanna add, or Brussels sprouts.

- Okay.

- Brussels sprouts especially would give it a really bitter, a bitter flavor to it.

- Okay.

- So those would be ones to stay away from.

And of course, you know, like lettuce, anything with leaves that you really, it's gonna cook down and be, you know, not really hold its shape or hold anything, so.

- Right.

Right.

Okay.

- Okay, so now that our broth has been boiling for, it's been almost an hour, we'll go ahead and turn it off.

- Okay.

- And.

- I love the color that it's taken on now.

- It is, it's gotten really pretty, a pretty color.

- Okay, we'll just set the lid to the side.

And at this point, you've got options.

You can take the pot, put a strainer over a bowl, and then just dump the contents of the pot into that strainer.

- Okay.

- So that way, you're straining off the liquid.

But what I like to do is just a skimmer.

- Okay.

- I think this way, it's a little bit easier.

But we can just take this and we'll just scoop out - Good.

- Our vegetables.

Yeah, thank you.

- Nice, yeah.

- We'll just scoop out our vegetables and put these into the bowl.

- Okay.

- And then I have a question for you, Casey.

- Oh, okay.

(laughing) - You (laughing) mentioned using your scraps as a compost, - Right, right.

- For a compost.

- Yeah.

- Well, could you still use them as a compost?

- Yes, absolutely, of course.

So you might wanna wait 'til it cools off just a little bit, it's not boiling anymore.

But otherwise, yeah, by the time you get that out to the garden, it's still good organic matter that's gonna continue to break down and feed the soil for the garden.

So absolutely.

- Good.

- So really, you got three purposes outta there, right?

(laughing) - Yeah, basically.

(laughing) Well, that's what I was thinking too.

These vegetables like have really served their purpose at- (laughing) - Absolutely.

- At that point.

- Absolutely.

- Okay, so once you get all of your vegetables out of your broth, then you can store it.

If you're gonna use it within three to four days, you could go ahead and put it in the refrigerator.

I, you know, like these types of bowls.

This kinda bowl actually, it would work in the refrigerator or the freezer.

- Okay.

- So three to four days in the refrigerator, or if you're not gonna use it within that amount of time, then put it in the freezer.

And it can store in the freezer for three to four months.

- [Casey] Okay, we just wanna make sure it's labeled, right?

- [Christi] Just make sure it's labeled, yeah.

Yeah, 'cause you don't, you know, you wanna make sure that you know what you've got in there.

- Right.

- Also, it needs to be a freezer-safe container if it's going in the freezer.

Or you can store it in a Mason jar.

A wide-mouth Mason jar would work great to put it in the refrigerator or the freezer.

- Okay, well thank you so much, Christi for this recipe, and we look forward to many more this season.

- Thank you, happy to be here.

- Thanks.

(bright classical music) For this recipe and more like it, scan this QR code.

(bright classical music continues) There are a lot of great horticulture activities this time of year.

Be sure and consider some of these events in the weeks ahead.

(bright classical music continues) It's time to start planting.

Join us next week as we celebrate the season, right here on "Oklahoma Gardening."

(bright classical music continues) In fact, it's called self, what is it called?

Shoot.

(laughing) Dry, or excuse me.

Not moist, dry soil, that doesn't make sense.

(bright classical music continues) To find out more information about show topics, as well as recipes, videos, articles, fact sheets, and other resources, including a directory of local Extension offices, be sure to visit our website at oklahomagardening.okstate.edu.

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You can find this entire show and other recent shows, as well as individual segments, on our "Oklahoma Gardening" YouTube channel.

Tune in to our OK Gardening Classics YouTube channel to watch segments from previous hosts.

"Oklahoma Gardening" is produced by the Oklahoma Cooperative Extension Service as part of the Division of Agricultural Sciences and Natural Resources at Oklahoma State University.

The Botanic Garden at OSU is home to our studio gardens, and we encourage you to come visit this beautiful Stillwater gem.

We would like to thank our generous underwriters: the Oklahoma Department of Agriculture, Food, and Forestry and Shape Your Future, a program of the Tobacco Settlement Endowment Trust.

Additional support is also provided by: Greenleaf Nursery and the Garden Debut Plants, the Oklahoma Horticultural Society, the Tulsa Garden Club, and the Tulsa Garden Center.

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