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

I'm your host Tinisha, Spain and joining me are two lovely ladies in the studio today to talk about gardening.

So before we get into their topics, let's have them introduce themselves and tell you a little bit about where you can find them in the garden.

So, Martie, hello, out there in TV land.

I'm Martie Alanga.

I'm a former employee at 16 of a garden center.

I had a terrible boss, so I stole all of his Little Debbie nutty bars.

And then I graduated from there to having my own business years later.

He was terrible.

And yeah, so I've done quite a little bit of landscaping and where you find me and my garden is under all of the bind wheat.

Yeah.

We insane we're just crazy.

Oh, really bad.

No, no follow that.

I do love a nutty bar.

I'm Jen Nelson.

I'm horticulturalists.

So you can find me online at grounded and growing where I have a blog I also can be found on campus teaching vegetable gardening to undergrads and we are planting our little fall container gardens this week.

And fighting deer for fighting deer for Asian pears pears.

You know same thing at my house like I said they have they actually snapped a branch pulling on so hard.

They don't care.

Now they don't they don't want their fun to watch and their babies and it's adorable but they are really doing damage to the tree which the zucchini I harvested some zucchini I forgot about for a couple of days then they were like the size of a newborn babies.

They leave those alone.

Yeah, no, they don't want though.

They just want to pay something.

Get your peaches?

Yeah, probably probably dear to my husband.

I think she's not gonna have to consider some sort of barrier, maybe an electric fence.

And he's like, the neighbors aren't gonna like that as a day.

Yeah, no.

I want peaches in the Asian pears.

I planted those two specifically so that I could get the and haven't had a wife or the near one another.

Yeah, the right next.

Maybe you just put a pin up and get a Wolverine.

Honey Badger since it makes something sensible, sensible.

All right.

So the country you're not fooling anyone.

We have a lot of stuff to cover, Marty is going to do some visual aids.

So I don't even know what she's going to talk about, which is scary.

Because usually I tried to pin her down before the show.

So what are you going to be demonstrating for us?

What do you draw on it, I'm gonna demonstrate how to properly dig a hole and plant some perennials.

It goes on like that, because it's time it is.

And it is.

This is a perfect time of year to plant trees.

And they should be moms should be a perennial boys and girls, but people plant them too late and fall.

So they're actually hard to hear.

But nobody's thinking about them in spring when the tulips blooming and you should put them in the ground.

But that's when you should plant moms for fall.

This is never gonna happen.

You know, it's just not.

So.

That said, trees, perennials, right now is a great time to put those in.

You can do perennial vegetables this time of year, no problem.

You can do herbs, I mean, any any kind of perennial is suitable to plant like, right now, in September or early September, almost September, it's close.

So anyway, when you have a container shaped like that, you got something you want to plan it.

And then you've got the soil.

Okay.

Dig a hole that's as deep as a container, but twice as wide.

Okay, it can even be and when you get a little loose soil over here, you got your little pile that you're out, make one pile, make one pile, do not step in it.

Okay, I'm just making your life easier here, kids.

So when you go to plant this, you take the pot off, Okay, goodbye.

And then you loosen up the roots with your trowel, so and break up this extra little corner here.

So you'll wind up with your plant looking like this.

So it's got a root ball and it's shaped more like that.

And it's got roots sticking out of it, right.

So you put this fell in here, you put a little loose soil in the bottom, okay, that's going to settle.

So you put this dude in here, and then you backfill it.

You might want to put little compost in there if you can, if you have some, but you also make a little make a little ring around your plant with your dirt, you fill it all back in, and then you got your soil here and just mounded up around the edge a little bit, make a little bit of a little two inches, no more of a little place that will catch water when you water it.

So the water goes down the roots.

Now what you want to do is make the soil in the hole.

Blend with the soil in that root ball, okay.

And how you do that is you tear up that ball a little bit, that little root ball, you tease those roots out so they can get started in that soil, right.

And then you put some mulch on top.

That's why you don't have to plan it.

You got plenty of loose dirt in the bottom.

So the little mulch on top, you'll hold that moisture, the moisture comes in and moisturizes everything in here, put the hose on, put it at a pencil size trickle, okay, a pencil size, not the fat part, the pencil the end, okay, but a pencil sized trickle of the hose right here.

Mm hmm.

And let it go for about, I don't know, half an hour, something like that.

Because if you don't do that, what you have in the winter is a hole with your root ball in it.

Or if you didn't do like I tell you a tee you got a root ball like that.

There's loose soil here, but this is still here.

Even if you have mulch, like I said, if you don't get these edges to meld right into the soil, you'll get an air pocket around there.

And then in spring, this will be sad.

And or dead.

Yeah, or dead.

Sad.

It looks at sad.

Okay.

Because waned a little bit about that air pocket.

You're talking about freeze and thaw?

Yeah, okay, yeah, you've got to get those two soils, the ball of the plant and the surrounding soil to meld into one cohesive chunk.

Because if you don't, that air pocket forms and air on roots, while soil is not concrete, what even concrete breeze while soil is not water.

And, and you know, it doesn't have to be mud when it freezes.

The roots have to have some air but not mostly air.

They need the the soil to be loose and crumbly, and damp.

And they have to grow in to this hole.

You dug all the surrounding dirt and eventually it'll go this way.

It'll go all the way in to Mother Earth here.

So that's how that works.

And if you don't have that, if you have an air pocket, that cold air will get down in here around the air pocket and it'll kill these roots are trying to grow out but it's too cold.

It's too unprotected, and they'll die.

And then you'll have to go back to the garden center and buy some more.

This is the same problem people have with moms.

They plant them in the fall.

And they don't get the whole properly dug.

They just chunk them in.

They don't you know, they watered them a little bit when they quit blooming.

People quit thinking about them.

They're all they've already moved on to Thanksgiving and Christmas and the moms were there and they were pretty another boom i You're on your own.

Yeah.

So they die.

And nobody likes that.

So when you're planting for Fall planning, you can do this.

And you can apply it to herbs, ground cover SatAM, grasses, roses, shrubbery, trees, all of it.

If you're planting asparagus, it has to go a little deeper.

If you're planting Irish, they have to go quite a bit shallower.

But the main thing, the main plants that anybody's going to plant, this tutorial will serve you well.

Okay, now I have a question.

I have a big pot that's been on my porch for probably eight years.

And the moms come back every year.

I thought they were self seeding.

But is that the case?

No.

There would be the routine it'd be the roots hot dog, but you have a protected microclimate there and a heavy large pot there on a porch with some cover.

Yeah.

And every year I always thought they were just feeding No.

Wow, its roots while you were doing what so many people want to do and can't do it when they're trying.

Yeah, and I cut their foliage back in the middle of the summer so they're not quite so ganglion.

And they come up this absolutely beautiful sphere.

Sure.

Look at me.

Could you be doing Oh no.

Not the expert.

What's awesome i Okay, well, I learned something new today.

And I think we all did.

And you're quite the artist.

Oh, it's fabulous.

I did not know how to make plants look happy or sad.

It's all in the fingers, twice the width, but the same depth or slightly or slightly more shallow and slightly, a little bit of soil in the bottom.

Is this partly why some plants heave if you don't get that, right, that's why I plan to be here this evening is when the soil freezes and thoughts, you know, like when you put water in a bottle and cracks in your, in your freezer.

Was that wrong?

Yes, yes, it was.

Same thing happens in the soil special, we have a really wet fall, and that snaps off really cold.

The water expands and contracts and it'll push that plant right up out of the ground, if it's not anchored by its roots in the earth.

So that's why it's important to do that.

She was just being rhetorical.

She actually knows what he thinks.

That was for all of us that in that sort of TV lands that happened to me before I did plant a bush.

Yeah.

And I took the cover off in the spring and it was practically sitting on top of the hole.

So I that was a fail on my part.

Did it die?

No.

But it was had the sad face.

Yes.

Definitely.

Sitting there on top of like, oh, yeah, yeah, those do it for me all the time.

Leaving but they kind of notorious for it.

They do.

I'm sure they do.

And I love them.

But I can only get the larger varieties to grow.

I love the little teeny guys along the edge of something.

But they just they just don't make it for certain ones.

I can keep going.

And some of them.

Just don't.

I learned a new term today.

He's a liar.

Yeah, it's it's what happens in the winter when the soil and then the soil is wet, it expands and contracts and it just squeezes out like a tube of toothpaste.

And sometimes you're fortunate.

And they're still plantable.

And you're just like, I'm sorry, really sorry about that.

And I guide you back to back in.

So but sometimes not usually not for me.

You know, I got lucky then.

Okay, well, Jen.

So in class, you guys aren't you said you're going to do some fall vegetable container gardening.

Yeah, we have the advantage of the greenhouse.

So it's kind of eternal spring there.

But we're still planting things that we would plant this time of year.

Things like lettuce, kale, we were planting carrots and beets and radishes.

So we won't have the sort of drop off in temperature later in the semester that we had had them outside like we've done in the past, so but I wanted to show.

Well, if you are wanting to do a fall garden, it's not too late.

We tell people to start thinking about that and planting some things at the end of July and August.

But you can grow some really quick turnaround crops like radish and lettuce into the first part of September and still get something used to just have to make sure you get your seeds in the ground before it starts to cool off a lot at night and you start to lose that soil warmth.

So if you're doing something at home and you want to maybe do it in a pot and maybe put some plastic over the top to try to catch some of the sun's rays him keep things warm and toasty if you're trying to really push that envelope, which a lot of us end up doing.

Even the people that are supposed to be teaching it.

Not naming names, but but one of the things we're doing is some carrots and we have chosen some varieties that are on the smaller side because we're using I was gonna bring the container but it's just a container that anybody probably has at home.

They kind of look like the old recycling containers.

Yeah, remember, like the tub like a tub.

Yeah, so you don't have to buy a fancy pot, you can use whatever you have on hand.

We're using this right it is called a Branca and it's a baby carrot kind of a smallish carrot, it'll grow in a container and I bought it as a pelleted pelleted for it.

So it is actually this is a different carrot called as Atlas which is going to be round like a ball.

They look like Super Bowls when they're when they're grown little tiny basketballs.

But the seeds for carrots are tiny.

And so if you're trying to space them out in a garden, you're gonna end up with way too many no matter what you do, because they're like planting dust basically.

So a pelleted seed is coated in it's like a clay or something water soluble that it makes it bigger and easier to handle so I can space it out in the in the container not waste as much seed.

The trade off as these costs more he's cost almost twice as much as as an non pelleted seed but it does make things a little easier to handle.

Especially if you're just wanting to not waste a lot of seed.

Can you just take one out there just like little they are.

You're gonna pay for that convenience.

Math.

They're dramatically larger.

Yeah.

Oh, wow.

They they kind of look like they should be decorating a cupcake or something.

Yeah, they do.

They do like, look at these two kids together.

I definitely overseeded.

Carrots, barley and like, yeah.

Together you get tight on that or not?

I don't know if that oh, you can?

Yeah.

It's a huge step this is a son.

That's really in what I was reminding the students today is that even if you overseed it, which we do say, you know, plant a little, a couple extra just in case something doesn't grow, because even this is a fresh seed I just ordered.

And the germination test says only 93% grew.

So there's still some that won't grow even in the freshest seed.

And they're expensive.

Yeah, winter's got the nerve to be expensive.

And is that good?

Is that quite the standard?

I mean, you know, I don't know what the standard is for carrots, but every crops going to have kind of a typical, but the, the tops of carrots as you send them out, it's totally edible.

So it's possible to use it as microgreens.

And use it as you go along as you send things out as they get bigger.

Now, have you guys already started your plan?

Thanks.

We did.

We had a session this morning.

And we have another group this afternoon.

And then the rest of the week.

So yeah, so far, so good.

Everyone's excited.

And they've heard a lot of I can't believe I'm really doing this.

It'll be like Christmas when they when they see that it's actually working.

Yeah, because a lot of them just are like, what, what do we do?

What are we doing?

It all makes sense down the line.

I said, get your kale smoothie recipe, because you'll have lots of things to harvest and take home.

You guys are always doing cool stuff.

The mushrooms was one of my favorite projects that you guys did and we'll be we'll have to check back in with you guys to find out how things are going.

Okay, so now we're going to answer a couple questions.

We've got about 10 minutes left.

Let's go to question 42.

This one goes to Marty This is Steven Casper in Palos Heights.

He wants to know how to treat a three year old red oak that's got some leaves that are turning yellow.

So I figured a resident landscaper would be able to tackle this one.

red oak leaves turning yellow.

What do you think red oak and black oak and pin oak all have?

Pointy.

Oh yeah, so they have a pointy leaf.

They're pointed.

Pointy, pointy.

Like this, right?

Those are all in what Black Oak Family Jen Red Oak Family red oak trim.

And then these, the white oaks look more like this.

They have a rounded lobe.

These are the ones like swamp white oak that I grew up with.

And Saffer oak.

Yeah, they all have this rounded leaf.

These guys can pretty much live through the nuclear holocaust.

This one.

These guys have a tendency toward chlorosis chlorosis.

Yes, they get yellow.

You'll see pin oaks, a lot of times they get yellowy.

And they just don't feel good.

And if they get chlorotic enough, they'll die.

So what do we treat that with gym?

Iron?

Iron an iron supplement for the tree?

It's probably a pH issue with oil that's causing the iron that's there to not be available.

Yeah, gotcha.

Okay, you think you need to?

Yeah.

So do you?

How do you apply that?

What do you do?

Is it a painstaking process?

Or is it?

What's your soil that might not make it?

That's only three years old.

I mean, test your soil, you got some time to treat it yet.

And see where you're at soil was?

So step one is soil test.

Yeah.

So you see what you got?

What you're starting with, because if it's only three years old, if they planted it when they moved there, if they built the house, then pretty much these days, the fill that they bring into landscape erode with this crap.

It's horrible.

It's mostly clay.

It's got all kinds of detritus in it.

So that's a fancy word for junk.

Yeah.

So test your soil by by at home soil test kit.

It's fun, fun, fun.

It's really really easy.

It's got little, little liquids in there, you put a couple drops in with your dirt and there you go.

And you see what you got.

You got a little color thing and it'll tell you where you're at.

You can buy really basic ones, you can buy more expensive, testing possibilities.

You can also take a soil test to your local county extension office, and they can help you with that.

Usually what what the problem is, is the soil is too basic because of the pH is too high.

And so you'd have to look at soil amendments that would bring that pH down.

And that can that's where the tricky part comes in.

Because trying to get soil to get a certain pH and stay there.

Yeah, is hard because the soil has a lot of capacity to stay where it is right now.

Sure.

Now and is that something that you would have to do throughout the life of the tree?

Probably top.

Maybe, yeah, you know, something like that.

But low pH doesn't necessarily translate to more iron either.

So there's actually the iron those there that you need to?

Yeah, there are sprays there are ways that you can apply it to fullier spreads.

Yeah, so it can suck it in like that.

That's okay.

So start with its project go from there, but it sounds like either way, they're gonna they're gonna have to do some work.

Let's go to question 63.

And this is kind of for both of you.

This is from from Mark lane.

He says, I planted two paw paw trees last year, and so far they're doing okay, but on one, there are suckers growing from the bottom of the tree.

Should I cut those out or leave them?

So what are your thoughts on suckers on posts?

Well, Paw Paws.

First of all, if you plant remember the little diagram we did boys and girls out planting, yeah, if you get a tree too deep, okay, when you just can't help it, I can just lens it's, it's just easier to do this, okay?

A tree has a place at the bottom where it begins to flare.

And that's kind of the, that's kind of the conjunction between the trunk and the roots.

Okay, if you bury the flare up here, you'll get suckers, because it needs it needs, the soil needs to be at the flood just below the flare.

So if you plant a tree, and it looks like this, in the ground, it's gonna die.

So because it's smothering this part here, with the roots, you know, they're just croaking over.

So it's trying to return instead of trying to maintain this top, which is too hard for it, it starts to sucker here.

So all trees will do this.

They'll try to live.

And if they can't live, they'll try to sucker.

And if they can't sucker either, then they'll just give up.

So as far as Paw Paws, we were discussing this question before the show started.

It is my understanding that Paw Paws tend to sucker out away from the trunk, and they kind of Grove they kind of grow in a grove.

So it's natural to the degree it is but not from the bottom of the trunk.

So if it goes out, you know, a foot and it sends up a little hoopty do here and there.

That that's kind of what it does they they grow in damp places along riverbanks and stuff like that.

But would you remove them?

Would you leave them, I might dig around the bottom of the tree and just see maybe take the soil down an inch or two if you can and kind of grade it out.

See if you can find a root flare.

Yeah, see if you can determine if it's planted might be planted a little deep, and take the suckers out at the top looks good and take suckers off.

If the top looks awful, it might be the sucker.

to gamble, so so take a little bit so you take your words that they send to send a picture with this one.

So dig a bit and see if you can find the flare.

And if not remove the suckers.

Is that the general?

Yeah, what we said.

You said if the top looks good, we have the top suckers.

And then yeah, see if you can take that, that grade down a little bit like Jen said, where you can see where the trunk begins to flirt just a little bit because that's the that's the spot where it begins to be above ground and begins to be underground.

And if you cover that up, that doesn't go well.

Okay.

All right, last one.

We've got a couple minutes left.

I'll try to get through this one because it's a long one.

This is from SU 10 Question 54.

Last fall, we removed an old blue spruce from a dry west corner of our yard.

I'd like to replace it with a big shrub such as spice Spice Bush since it supports pollinators and butterflies.

Is that a good choice?

Or will only acid loving plants grow there?

How long will it take for the spruce roots and acids to break down?

Should I amend the soil for a year or two before I plant anything?

Anything there so spruce trees out there wanting to replace it?

Worried about the soil?

I would say as long as they ground the stump?

I'll probably be fine for the Korean the Korean spice bushes with the viburnum right.

Yeah.

Or maybe maybe she didn't be talking about the other one with the little spidery flowers, the red.

I can't remember the genius for that.

Because we're professionals.

We're going to ask Google just Who am I unless I'm mistaken the roots and the trunk do not acidify the soil in the needles that drop so you're gonna have a certain amount of acid but again how do you know that Jennifer do a soil test?

You can buy them at any garden so the needles the drop needles is what changes the soil right the roots Yeah, okay, so I'm guessing even if it's pretty acidic at the surface to three inches maybe it's not going to be that way down farther and I would be more concerned about the sun exposure for for whatever plant you're trying to put in make sure it's like appropriate for whatever Yeah, for the for the light and wind exposure.

So times up guys.

We went through the whole show will always go so fast.

Well, thank you guys for coming.

And thank you so much for watching.

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And we will see you next time.

Goodnight.