(gentle music) (cheerful string music) - Welcome to Oklahoma Gardening.

Today, I'll introduce you to some sweet potato vines.

We get an update on the hardy succulent and cactus garden.

It's not too soon to start thinking about poinsettias.

We talk about monarchs as they make their migration south.

And finally, we head back out to the OSU Student Farm to see how their fall garden is growing.

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

(cheerful string music) So if you're looking for an easy, low-maintenance plant.

(cheerful string music) You have two different types of flowers on one plant.

(cheerful string music) Capsicum is what gives the pepper its heat.

(cheerful string music) This time of year in late summer, I always like to walk around the gardens and kind of look at some annuals that really performed well for us, and one of those annuals that I tend to sometimes overlook are the sweet potato vines, but this is something that always gets a lot of attention.

Now, I know sweet potato vines have been on the market for quite some time and some of you probably know them really well, but there are a lot of cultivars out there.

For some of you, you might have seen these out in landscapes but not really known what they are or much about them.

So I wanna kind of review some of our sweet potato vines that we have here in our collection that just always get a lot of attention.

Now, sweet potato vines, they're actually native to tropical America and the edible sweet potato vine often has a pink or white morning glory-like flour.

Now, the ornamental ones that we have here showcased, they tend to not flower because they're bred really more for the foliage.

So notice I did say that the flower looks like a morning glory, and that's because, in fact, it is in the same morning glory family, which is different than the Irish or the white potato.

In fact, the Irish or the white potato is actually more closely related to tomatoes and peppers, being in the Solanaceae family.

So your sweet potatoes and your white potatoes, they're in completely different plant families, so they're not really related, but we're gonna go over some of the ones that we have here.

So this first one is called Blackie, and you can see it has a very deeply lobed leaf to it, and it's just got this really deep, intense purple color to it.

And you can see that it gets a little green on some of the lower levels that aren't exposed to as much sun.

Now all of these do like full sun.

So next to it, here we have the Ace of Spades, and the big difference between these two, Ace of Spades tends to have a little bit more of a rich purple color to it, but it has that heart-shaped leaf.

It kind of reminds me of some of the cultivars that we see in redbuds that have that real prominent heart-shaped leaf to it.

But you'll notice that the new growth is very distinct with that green color.

Now, again, this is not a reverting, you might remember from a few segments that we did ago about reversion of cultivars.

This is not reverting.

That's just the new growth, and that's what it looks like.

So you get a nice contrast there.

Now, and if you're wondering, what do I pair this with?

'Cause it's very bold, it's impressive, the color that you get.

One of the easiest ways to create contrast is by simply putting the contrasting chartreuse color next to it.

So next to it here, we have this very chartreuse sweet potato vine, and this one is called Marguerite.

Again, it has sort of a heart-shaped leaf to it that's not really lobed or anything like that.

A very beautiful color, but you can just see how it creates this bold impact.

Now behind us here, if you're looking for something that's a little bit more subtle, you might go with this tricolored sweet potato.

And you can see it has a little more of a ruffle look, a little bit more texture to the leaf.

As the branches come out, they have kind of a pink tint to 'em, especially on those newer leaves.

They have more of a softer, almost like a subtle green color to the main part of the leaf, but then the margins of it are kind of edged in white and pink.

So it's a nice, softer look.

It really works well in containers that maybe have a little bit softer color, and not so bold.

Now, the one thing you'll notice about all four of these is they are in raised containers here.

In fact, it is actually an old culvert that we dug up out on the road and we cut it up into pieces and then placed it on end here.

Now you'll notice that all of these have more of a trailing habit or kind of a spreading habit.

If you plant 'em on the ground, they kind of sprawl out and they work really well to quickly cover the ground for that reason.

So you can plan a plant in the ground, and it's gonna really help suppress some of that weed, 'cause it's almost like a living mulch.

But if you want something that's actually going to climb up, there are a couple of new cultivars on the market, and we've got some that are growing, so let's go take a look.

- So here we have a Sweet Caroline Upside Black Coffee.

And you can see how it's created this impressive wall of color here behind us.

And what this actually is is several different plants that we've planted along just a wire crisscross trellis that we've created from the eave of our house down to the ground with some eye bolts.

And so really it was just this crisscross wire that we created and we allowed these plants to grow up and you can see how they sort of kind of twine on themselves, creating these little arms that reach up and then will grab hold of more stuff.

So it definitely does need some sort of structure to actually climb onto, but it will kind of twist up more so than just trail down.

Now you can see that it does sort of have that same very deeply lobed, dark purple texture and color to it.

And also it has the new growth that is very bright green.

Again, creating a nice contrast here.

But a very impressive wall.

So no longer does sweet potato have to just be crawling on the ground, but actually you can elevate it and really create an impressive display.

Now there is also a Sweet Caroline Upside that's called Key Lime.

And that is the chartreuse version of this.

Now where we planted it this year, we just planted on a single pole for support and we sort of tried to tie it on there a little bit and get it to grow.

And what we found is that one single pole wasn't enough support for it.

Didn't allow it to really twist on there and grab onto it well enough.

So we didn't see that it was as successful that way.

I don't know whether it was necessarily less vigorous or the actual trellis system that we provided for it.

But here we've got it growing on a nice crisscross system that's doing well.

And then we also have it growing on some stock panels and then it's topped out at eight feet.

Again, that's the Black Coffee that's over on the stock panel.

So this one is doing quite well for us.

I know a lot of people know about sweet potato vines, but if you haven't looked at some of the newer cultivars, there are some unique ones out there.

And again, the nice thing about sweet potato vines is I would say per plant, you are getting your biggest return of color per square foot because the time you plant it after frost, till the time the first frost happens in the fall, you're gonna have this color all season long.

So it's well worth the investment in one annual plant because of the amount of volume of foliage that you get from that plant.

Sweet potato vines, although they're tropical, they're well suited for most Oklahoma soils.

And other than the potential of root rot if you over water the plant, there's really not much concern.

They do love full sun, but you wanna make sure that you're providing them with consistent moisture through our hot summer months as well.

So regardless of whether you want it to trail down, spread out, or grow up, there is a sweet potato vine out there for you to add into your landscape.

(gentle music) (gentle music continues) (gentle music continues) Today we're back here at our new Hardy Succulent and Cactus Garden.

And joining me is Professor Cheryl Mihalko, who took this on as a class project last semester.

So what do you think?

How's the summer treated it?

- Well, it was a long hot summer, but we're really happy with it.

We've had really good success.

We haven't lost any plants to the heat.

And we've had really good growth this summer.

- [Casey] Yeah, so it definitely looks like it's starting to fill in.

You can see some of that new growth coming on, some of the cactus that are a little bit more of a tender lighter color green.

So that's a good report right there.

Tell us a little bit about, you kept some of the old plants, right?

- We did.

We had the opportunity to work in a place that had the right soil, had a lot of these beautiful rocks, and had some of the yuccas and we left those en masse in the places that they were.

And we've even begun to add some other things that are similar in form and texture, the asperulas here, and some additional variegated yucca.

So that's giving the garden a little boost in terms of it looking like it's a little bit established.

Of course it's gonna take some years, but we're real happy with it.

- Right, and so tell me a little bit, 'cause I always, I think a lot of times, people think cactus are so different than a lot of your other landscape plants.

But when we're talking about spacing, right, because I kinda probably think that they grow a little bit slower than some of our perennials, but... - Some do and some don't.

I think the yuccas probably maybe seem a little bit slower but you can see the new growth on the cactus and they're really just putting out new pads.

They're really, really happy.

Our vision is to sort of have it just completely be this wonderland of inter-mixed cactus.

And so when they get a little bit large for their spot, we have the opportunity to propagate by removing pads.

- [Casey] Okay, so just like any other plant, kind of space them based off of the requirement for that plant and give it some time, right?

- [Cheryl] Absolutely.

- [Casey] So you thinking again, about three years?

That would be the time?

I think?

- [Cheryl] Yes, I think so.

I think so.

We have to just... - [Woman] With our Oklahoma weather, we have to just see how it goes, but I think we're in good shape with the selection of material that we got and also the way we've placed the stones.

So when it gets really cold we should have plant material that survives into zone four but the way the stones are placed will give it that little extra heat in the winter.

- Okay.

All right.

So we've got plenty of hardy material, but we've also, 'cause we know we get those crazy Oklahoma winters sometimes, so a little extra protection there.

And I think that creates that little microclimate, right, that sometimes we neglect then we need to take advantage of more.

- In Oklahoma we have to do everything we can.

So the other thing is that we know we've got a great soil, one that's really mixed in a real granular form so the water's gonna drain right through.

So it's where we're always appreciating rain in Oklahoma, this of course is a plant collection that doesn't need a lot of water.

So hopefully when it rains, it goes right through and it being in the sunny spot, we should be fine.

- Right, south facing on a slope also helps with that as well.

So I know your class has been involved in some identification projects as well for these plants.

Tell us a little bit about that mapping.

- So this semester, the studio design class has come out already, and we identified each plant in its location.

So they are currently developing an as-built plan and that should be ready by the end of the semester.

So we'll post that where everyone can see, not just the name of the plant, but where it is actually located in the garden.

- Okay.

- Excellent.

Well, that'll be nice for visitors also that are here and just for all of us to learn a little bit more about maybe some plants that we tend to not always give it's full glory.

So thank you so much for sharing this with us, Cheryl.

- Sure.

Thank you.

(soft music) - Poinsettias have been a long time tradition dating back all the way to the 1820s.

In fact, the first person that brought the Poinsettia from its native Mexico to the United States was the first US ambassador to Mexico and the poinsettias are named after him.

In fact, his name was Joel Roberts of Poinsett.

Now poinsettias are native to Mexico, and while we know them as small tabletop plants, usually, in Mexico they're often known as small shrubs or small trees getting anywhere from two to 12 feet tall.

Now, traditionally, we buy these as an annual plant that we just used for the holiday season each year and then oftentimes we discard 'em.

However, I know some plant lovers really enjoy holding onto those Poinsettias, and attempting the challenge of trying to get them to re-bloom or to have those red colorful bracts again the following season.

Well, you can see we're here at the Greenhouse Learning Center on OSU's campus and the horticulture club has already potted up this year's crop of poinsettia.

And so now is the time, usually late September, early October, is when you wanna start thinking about getting those bracts to come on and turn color.

Now this doesn't just happen overnight.

In fact, you gotta give it a little bit of time.

So again, the beginning of October is when we need to start exposing these plants to what is called short day treatments and providing them with a uninterrupted 14 hours of night darkness.

And so you can see here we have all of them in the greenhouse, however, our fancy new greenhouse is equipped with some blackout cloth.

And so at 5:00 PM every night, there's shade cloth.

It's not just shade cloth, it is blackout cloth that completely closes off all of the sunlight that might still be remaining around here.

So much so that we even have the windows that are covered so that there's not any extra light pollution that can creep in here on these poinsettia.

Now at 8:00 AM those blackout claws open back up, exposing our plants again to the bright sunlight that they would naturally receive here in the greenhouse.

Now of course, if you're a homeowner and just have one or two plants, you don't have all this fancy technology.

So how do you get your poinsettia to color up as we head into the Christmas season?

Well, there's a couple of tricks that you can do and one of the simplest is just to get a cardboard box and actually cover your poinsettia.

So you wanna make sure that it's completely covered so that you're not getting any of that light down there.

If you have any cracks in your box, you might just take a towel and also cover it as well.

Another option would be to just put it into a dark closet or something and then actually use that towel to kind of cover the base of that door so that there, again, is no light pollution creeping into that closet.

'cause believe it or not, even the light from a television can actually prevent your poinsettias from developing those flowers.

So this is one trick.

Again, you're gonna wanna do this at 5:00 PM and then remove the box.

- ...at 8 AM.

So that's the trick is, you gotta make sure not to forget about it, and once you remove that box during the day, again, check it for water and kind of maintain it as you would a normal plant with checking water and also exposing it to bright light during those daytime hours.

So that's an easy trick.

However, you gotta be diligent, right?

So we're talking about two months of doing this daily.

So you can see why a lot of times, people just look at poinsettas as an annual plant to purchase every Christmas season, so it might be worth that cost that you're spending.

But if you're up for a fun challenge, you might give this a try to get your poinsetta to rebloom this season.

(relaxed acoustic music) - Hi, welcome to Bug of the Month.

There are a lot of butterflies and moths that you can find all over Oklahoma.

Probably the one that people are most familiar with is the monarch, a large, orange and black... Go Pokes!

...butterfly that you see in the fall going back down to the Mexican overwintering spot, or you may see them intermittently coming back north trying to get to Canada in time.

The monarch has a male and a female, and the male has two spots on the hind wing that designate him being a male.

The female is a little larger, and she has very thick black lines on the veins of her wings and none of the little heavy black circles.

Monarchs are being considered endangered these days, so plant those butterfly gardens and keep on the lookout for them.

They are a magnificent and unique animal that we are fortunate enough to have flying through, going to Mexico and back to Canada every year.

(upbeat acoustic music) - We're back here at the student farm, and joining me again is Lynda Carrier, who's one of the co-managers for this farm, and Lynda, it's been a bountiful summer, right?

- It has, it certainly has.

- So we're headed into fall.

Tell us a little bit about how your summer is winding down right now.

- Okay, well, it's really kind of ramping back up again.

A lot of our, you know, we had cool season crops early in the spring, harvested those, and then we went right into the summer season crops, we had... We still have tomatoes, okra, peppers, watermelons, and you know, several other things that are still going, pumpkins, as a matter of fact, too, so.

- Right, we're into October and it's, like, 90 degrees out here, so it's kind of, the warm season crops are still pushing on.

- Yep, yeah.

- You've got some cool season crops I see behind us here that have been in the ground for a couple of months?

- Yeah, yeah.

We started them from seeds in July, the early July, at the Greenhouse Learning Center on campus, and then about mid-August, we came out here and transplanted, I think we've got probably about 4,000 plants out here, cabbage, cauliflower, broccoli.

We direct seeded some beets, and then we recently started some lettuce as well, and we'll get that transplanted before long too, so.

- Okay, so they're kind of not enjoying this heat right now.

- No, yeah.

It's a little more.

- But the weather should cool off, hopefully, as we transition back into that cooler season.

So it's nice to be able to really get, you've been growing since February out here?

- Yeah, yeah.

- And when do you anticipate that maybe your harvest will end, do you think?

- I would say when it freezes, yeah.

(both laugh) We'll probably, and probably some of this stuff, if we get a light frost on it, it'll be fine.

- Okay, okay.

So it's kind of impressive how many production months you can get out of Oklahoma's weather here.

- Yeah, yeah.

- So tell us a little bit, I know this was the first year for growing here, and you did a lot last winter to get everything kind of situated.

What's the plan this winter?

- [Lynda] Okay.

Well, so we started on two and a half acres of land, which sounds like not very much, but this two and a half acres has produced over 50,000 pounds of produce that has gone to Our Daily Bread.

- [Interviewer] That's amazing.

- [Lynda] So we're pleased with that, and Our Daily Bread is as well, and hopefully other people are, too.

- And those numbers are going up daily, right?

- Yes, oh yeah, 'cause we harvest daily, so.

- Okay, so you're gonna expand or?

Tell us a little bit, - Yes, we are gonna expand.

- what's the next step?

- So the next step is, now that we've got our cool season crops in here, we're gonna concentrate on the east side of this property and developing it just like we did this side.

- [Interviewer] Okay.

- [Lynda] So we're starting out with, it was all grass, so we sprayed the grass to kill it, and then we flail mowed it, and then... - [Interviewer] So tell us a little bit about flail mowing versus brush hogging and using other forms of cutting.

- [Lynda] Right.

A flail mower is really the, if you're doing a lot of vegetable gardening, I would highly recommend it.

- [Interviewer] Okay.

- It breaks it up into small pieces to where it makes it so much better for mulching it, it mulches it.

Where a brush hog has just one blade that works horizontal and just shoots it out.

This flail mows, it works parallel, and it drops it directly below it and in small pieces.

So it's much easier to break up.

It works great on vines.

We used it several years ago in some trials for sweet potatoes when we were getting ready to harvest them, and took the flail mower over the sweet potatoes, and it just ground them up really fine.

- Oh, very good.

- So, it made it a lot easier to harvest 'em.

- So the vines don't get twisted up in the rotary action of the brush hog?

- Right, right.

- Okay, alright.

- Yeah, so the flail mower, it's really if you're a vegetable, you know, producer, I would highly recommend having one.

- Okay, so, another two and a half acres on the other side that you'll be doing?

Alright, and so again, deer is always a concern.

I know this fence saved you numerous times.

Will you also be doing the same as well over there?

- Yeah, same thing over there.

You know, our plan is now that we've got it flail mowed, we're gonna come in and disc it and get the ground all worked in, get all that grass and everything worked into there, help with organic matter.

And then from there, we are gonna start, let it sit for a while and and decompose, and then we will plant cover crops.

- Okay, and I know you've got some cover crops behind us, because it is so hot and trying to get seeds growing, you got a little irrigation going.

Tell us a little bit about what kind of cover crops you've selected this year.

- Okay, well, what we did on this area here, that area back behind us has already been, we used that early in the spring and we decided that we'll just cover crop it now.

So we put crimson clover in.

We normally would add wheat to it, but we just went straight with crimson clover.

We were trying to time it on an event where we had rain coming.

So we had the crimson clover, so we planted it, and it came up in four days.

- Very good.

And now the rain got shut off, so the irrigation's on.

- Exactly.

And that's an important thing, I think, that a lot of home gardeners might think about is watching the forecast, right.

- Exactly.

- And timing your seed planting with hopefully a rain to help with that germination.

- As a matter of fact, we were watching the radar that day that we planted it and we saw the rain coming in, and thought, "We got just enough time to get that in the ground."

And by the time we got the planter unhooked and cleaned up, it started sprinkling.

So, it was perfect timing.

- Excellent, excellent.

Well, it sounds like you've got a busy winter ahead of you.

And then next year, you'll be twice as busy.

I hope you still offer us a little bit of your time.

- Certainly, we'll try to.

- Thank you so much, Linda.

- Thank you, thanks.

(bright whimsical music) - [Casey] 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 whimsical music) Next week, we've got beautiful flowers and creative crafts that you won't wanna miss, right here on "Oklahoma Gardening."

(bright whimsical music) - Soon Farm, take 57.

(all laughing) - Thanks to modern electricity.

So if you want to- I don't like what I'm saying, I'm just- - [Camerawoman] Do you need to go place down some, or?

(bright whimsical music) - [Casey] 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 underwriter, the Oklahoma Department of Agriculture, Food, and Forestry.

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

(bright whimsical music)