- Hi, thanks for joining us for The Family Plot: Gardening in the Mid-South.

I'm Chris Cooper.

It's getting hot.

We're gonna talk about how to keep your lawn happy all summer.

Also ants can bug you at a picnic, but fire ants can ruin your day.

We're gonna talk about how to control them.

That's just ahead on The Family Plot: Gardening in the Mid-South.

- (female announcer) Production funding for The Family Plot: Gardening in the Mid-South is provided by The WKNO Production Fund, the WKNO Endowment Fund, and by viewers like you, thank you.

[upbeat country music] - Welcome to the Family Plot, I'm Chris Cooper.

Joining me today is Booker T. Lee.

- Glad to be here.

- Booker is an Extension Agent right here in Shelby County, and Mr. D is with us.

- Hello.

- Thanks for joining me, fellas.

- Glad to be here.

- This is gonna be fun.

- It's good, always.

- Alright Booker, we have our lawn care guide with us, - Lawn care [laughs] so we're gonna talk about good ol' summer lawn care.

And Booker we have a couple questions for you.

- OK. - So, number one, which is a common question: what is the most common diseases in lawns right now?

- This time of the year we'll see a lot of diseases in our lawns this time.

Number one is probably brown patches.

We see a lot of brown patches on our lawn.

It's caused by hot and humid weather, and we've done had some hot and humid weather today.

And also you can give it too many nitrogen fertilizer.

- Okay.

- So you want to hold back on your nitrogen fertilizer when you see brown patches.

And also compact soil.

Aerate that soil.

And I did that to my soil last year and that made a big difference in the lawn diseases.

'Cause I did have a brown patch and another is spring dead spot.

Cutting your grass too short.

Now it's time to start cutting that grass, you don't want to cut it too short.

Most lawn grasses needs to be two to three inches tall.

- OK. - And also, disease on your lawn, bag that grass.

Sometimes they'll leave those tips on the lawn, but now when you've got disease, bag that grass.

- Right.

You don't want that to spread, right?

- And next is powdery mildew.

You see a lot of powdery mildew when the grass stay wet a long time, poor air circulation, you see that grass begin to turn white.

That's called powdery mildew.

Most on your cool-season grasses you'll see that a lot of times.

And also again, avoid high nitrogen fertilizer.

- (Chris) Okay.

- And grass under trees can cause that too.

Water early in the morning-time.

Let that grass dry off before nighttime.

Another thing is fairy ring.

And this come when you have a lot of dead stump or something in the lawn, and it'll be getting ready to rot out.

- (Chris) Okay.

- That's called fairy ring and you'll see a lot of time after rain, where that little mushroom in your soil start popping up, - (Chris) I've seen that.

- I have that, Chris.

[laughter] - (Chris) You'll admit that?

- I have a tree in my lawn, I had it removed and every time it rain, you'll see little mushroom come up.

It not hurting anything, just there, they'll go away.

Once everything rot and decay, you'll see it go away.

- Okay.

- (Booker) Then you know you'll see a dollar spot.

And dollar spot caused by poor drainage.

We do have a lot of soil that drain poorly now.

If water stand after the rain, you're probably gonna start seeing dollar spot begin to pop up.

Check the soil pH.

You want that soil pH between 6.0 and 6.5.

- And only way you can do that is by what?

A soil test.

You cannot go out there and guess at it, and also cut the grass at recommend height.

Don't cut it too low, now.

I cut my grass low twice.

And then when I do those first couple cutting, then I let my mower up and keep it at the right height.

And another thing is make sure we water our grass early in the morning time.

Give that grass time enough to dry off before nightfall.

Two things do that and a lot of times disease can be controlled by cultural practices.

You don't want to start adding a lot of chemicals to your lawn.

First thing we do, what can I spray on my lawn and get rid of it?

If you keep spraying chemicals on there, it's gonna come back again next year.

What you wanna try to find the problem, see what's wrong with the problem, then try to correct the problem, then you'll have less diseases on there.

But high humidity, over-watering, and another thing we get diseases on our lawn is we cutting our grass with a dull mower blade.

When did you have the mower blade sharpened?

Sharpen that mower blade.

Keep that blade sharp.

I sharpen mine at least two or three times during the growing season to make sure that I have a good sharp cut.

Another thing is cut your grass in different directions.

You need to try to go in different directions and make sure that grass stands up.

You goin' the same way, you layin' that grass down.

I had a lady call me that one time saying, "My grass is turning brown all the time when I just cut it."

And I say, "Well, look at that."

I said, "When did you have your lawn mower blade sharpened?"

She said, "I never have."

[Chris laughs] It was beating it down, it wasn't cutting it down.

- No clean cut, right?

- No clean cut.

Now if you're gonna aerate your lawn, you got warm-season grass, you got cool-season grass.

You aerate it when the grass begin to come out and grow.

Now you can still do your Bermuda grass right now, but I would try to do it in the evening time now.

I don't want their roots exposed to hot weather all during the day right here.

I wanna give it a cool off period at night.

But aerate it, you'll see a big difference in your lawn thing in there.

- Okay.

Let me ask you this.

So can a fungus kill your grass?

Is that a possibility?

- Over a period of time it will.

You're gonna have over two or three years.

You know like spring dead spot?

You have it during the year but during that growing season, it'll go back in there, it'll get covered up.

But each year it'll get larger and larger, if you don't do something to control that problem, it eventually will kill your grass.

- Mm-hmm.

Okay, now look, there's somebody out there watching and they're like, "Okay, Booker, we understand your cultural practices, but I just want something to kill it."

So what can they use to actually control some of the lawn diseases?

- A lot of thing they might want to know what disease they have first.

- (Chris) Okay, that's right.

- You know, you've got spring dead spot, you got brown patch, it's a different fungicide to control that.

The best thing to do is check with one of your hardware stores and see.

Until you know what disease you have, you don't know.

You can bring it by the office, we'll look at it for you and tell you.

Then you go by the hardware store and get your fungicide to control that disease on there.

But that's your most important thing: know what disease you have, 'cause different control for your different diseases.

- (Chris) Okay.

So-- - And, so.

A lot of people wanna know will it affect my Bermuda grass, will it affect my zoysia grass, fungus mostly affect a lot of grasses.

You will see it on that.

- Okay.

So why do I have moss on my lawn?

That's a common question.

- People like moss.

[laughs] I like moss, I don't have moss but I seen a lady that's got a lot of moss on her grass, she water her moss like she take care of her grass in the shade.

A lot of the time you have moss on your lawn is really, you have compact soil, could have poor drainage, and normally it's in shade.

You see a lot of the time in shade.

It normally water kinda stand when it rain.

You don't drain fast, it'll kinda stay there and then all of a sudden you see that moss begin to grow in there.

But mostly in a shady location, under a shady tree.

It's probably got poor drainage and poor drainage really, really big on that moss.

But moss, it look really good.

- It looks nice.

- Some people suggested to let the moss take over and just grow where it grow, don't try to control it there.

But you need to aerate it, check the soil pH, sometimes it's be on the acid side and you need to check the soil pH, you might need to raise the soil pH some.

- (Chris) Right.

- Need to get it in there.

- Yeah, moss looks good, if you keep the leaves off, Diane Meucci's place has nice moss there, so a lot of people like it.

- Yeah, we went down to Alabama and this lady, that's all she had in her backyard, just moss and she have a sprinkler system on her moss.

Water that moss, keep it looking good.

- (Chris) Make sure it look good, huh?

- Make sure it look good.

I guess one thing about moss, you won't have no other disease probably get into it.

- (Chris) Yeah, probably so.

- This could be a problem if you hadn't growing moss in there.

- Okay.

Let me ask you about winter kill.

So, I'm sure you got a lot of questions at the office this year about winter kill.

Why are we seeing so many cases with the winter kill?

Specifically have to do with the cold winter we had?

- Do with the weather.

You know, a lot of times you see a lot of winter kill, normally it's where you got a low area in your yard, and then when it rain, gets cold, that water kinda stay there a long period of time, a long one.

'Cause I've seen, I had winter kill and where my house faced it, everybody else, snow and ice were gone, I had mine about two or three days on there still.

So that's why over a period of time, you'll see that winter kill beginning to happening there.

So, the best thing to do for winter kill is once the grass start coming out real good, get you rake and rake all that dead grass outta there and just clean it up real good, and that Bermuda grass will come back and spread over that.

Zoysia grass take some time to get over there.

You got a big spot in your zoysia grass, you might have to re-sod it some.

- (Chris) Okay.

And real quickly, Booker, when is a good time to have your soil tested?

- Well, any time-- - Any time?

- Any time you can have your soil tested and everything.

But the ideal time is in the fall of the year.

'Cause if you need to add lime to it, you can come in and add lime to it during that time.

By the time your grass begin to start needing it, it's already there.

Now, on your soil pH, it's gonna take some time before you get a different reading.

You know, you put it down, you put it down in this fall, you might see the same thing for at least about six months, ultimately then it'll start getting into your reading.

But it will help anyway still though.

And lime is the most important thing on your lawn grasses because it regulate all the other fertilizer that you put down.

It won't be taken up by the plant.

- Alright, well there you have it from our lawn guy, Mr. Booker T. Lee.

Thanks for the information, Booker.

[upbeat country music] We're gonna take a look at our pepper plant.

We think there may be some nutrient deficiency going on with this.

If you look at the older leaves, you can see some yellowing.

Again, to me, that's always an indicator of a nutrient deficiency.

And you see this first on your older leaves, especially for your pepper plants, and for your tomato plants as well.

What needs to be done is possibly going back in with a nitrogen fertilizer so we can green this plant up.

We'll put that down, possibly do a sidedress with that, water it in.

And what should happen in a few weeks is you will see this plant start to green up, and then from there it should be fine.

[gentle country music] - Alright, Mr. D. Ants and fire ants.

We don't want them to ruin our picnics.

- They can do it.

They can do it.

- They can do it quickly.

You know, fire ants are pretty much everywhere in our area.

I don't know how far north they go.

Probably, I live in Lauderdale County and I don't have them up there.

- Really?

- I do not.

I know Tipton and everywhere south of Tipton County, Tennessee and the central part of West Tennessee pretty much and south we've got them, but still, the old stand-by method on fire ant control is using the Texas two-step.

[laughing] And that's simply putting a bait out and make sure if you got a bait left over from last year, you need to check and make sure that the ants will feed on that bait and the way to do that is just put some of it down beside a fire ant mound and sit there and watch it and see if they will go out and start feeding on it.

Because most of the baits, the base is a milk base or some kinda oil base or something like that, and it can go bad, it can get rancid, and it might get to the point where it doesn't attract the fire ants.

So the baits need to be fresh enough that they will attract the fire ants.

And you need to put the bait out when the ants are actively foraging.

So you know, in the afternoon, there's no need to put it out right before sundown because they're not gonna be actively foraging at night.

- How far from the mound do you put the bait down?

That's usually the question that we get.

- I wouldn't put it, I definitely wouldn't put it on the mound.

Those entrance and exit holes for the fire ants are out two or three feet from the mound, so you know, if you've got a lot of fire ants, I'd just broadcast it.

Just scatter it around your yard.

They're gonna go to it, they're gonna find it.

And what you're hoping that they will do, you know the fire ant can't eat that bait.

Worker's not gonna eat that bait.

He has a sieve and he can't swallow solid food.

The worker fire, I say he, it's a she.

She can't swallow that solid food so she will take it to fourth or fifth instar larvae is the only stage of the fire ant that can eat solid food.

That larvae will eat that food and then it will regurgitate it into a pouch.

A little pouch, turn it into a liquid basically and then the worker fire ants will take that liquid, they will feed off that liquid, they will take that liquid to the queen and so this is a process that will take eight to ten weeks to kill the queen.

And after that happens, then go out there.

Eight to ten weeks to kill the colony because the worker fire ant can live nine or ten weeks.

Two or three weeks after you put the bait out, put a contact kill.

Go out there with a contact insecticide and spray.

And the reason you're doing that is hopefully within that two or three weeks, you've gotten the queen, taken the queen out.

The workers live, like I said, eight or nine, ten weeks and if you kill the queen, you'll still have workers running around there for weeks.

So do the contact killer after that.

So that's the Texas two-step method.

And the reason it's called the Texas two-step has nothing to do with the dance.

[laughing] It was developed by Texas A&M University.

They developed that system, but there are a bunch of baits.

I've got a list of probably 10 or 15 baits here.

- And these are just the baits.

- That are recommended and then on the contact killers, there are a lot contact killers out there that have imported fire ants on the label.

Just follow the label.

- Yeah, let's name some of those baits.

- Okay, the baits we've got Extinguish, Distance, Award II, PT Ascend, Spetracide Fire Ant Killer Plus Preventer Bait, Advion Fire Ant Bait, Garden Tech Over n' Out, Amdro Fire Ant Bait, Siesta, Extinguish Plus, and then the Spinosad baits such as Ferti-Lome and Southern Ag Payback.

And those are some examples of baits that are out there that will work.

And then the contact killers are the ones with pyrethrins... synthetic pyrethroids, several of those that will, bifenthrin and esfenvalerate, all of those that will do the job for you.

- Make sure they read the label on there too, right?

- Make sure you read the label.

- 'Cause when using the contact, right, you gonna pour that right on the mound itself, right?

- The drenches you pour right on the mound and that's a good way to do it.

Mix it in a five-gallon bucket according to label directions.

That way you don't even have to use a sprayer, just drench the mound because the workers always return to the mound.

But keep in mind, if you do a real good job of controlling fire ants, when that queen does her mating flight, she looks for an area that doesn't have fire ants.

- Come on.

- She doesn't like a lot of competition and she will land in a fire ant-free area and create a new mound.

So it's not something that you can do once and think that you're finished with.

It's kind of an on-going deal.

You know you're gonna have a picnic in August?

- Yep.

- Booker?

I'd go out there, start about three or four weeks before that and hopefully you'll be free during that picnic.

- Though we see a lot of the time, out in the field pasture park, people mowing, they hit the mound, they kinda spread out.

And that's how you see them in field pasture.

- Most of these baits that I mentioned are also good for other ants.

They'll take out other ants that are out there.

So if you've got other ants that are creating problems for you, I would go with the baits for you.

But you don't have to go with the two-step method.

Just the baits will take the colony out.

- You probably will be doing the Texas two-step if you get bitten by some of these ants, I'm sure.

- Fire ants, they'll make you do it.

- They'll make you do the jig, no doubt about that.

Let me ask you this 'cause we get this question a lot so.

You see some fire ant mounds that are real tall and some that are real low to the ground, why's that?

- Well, the purpose of that fire ant mound is to pretty much regulate the temperature and humidity for the brood.

And during conditions that are wet and cool, those mounds will usually be higher to try to get the brood, the young larvae, out of the real damp conditions.

You're gonna see, with this hot weather and dry weather that we're having, the mounds are gonna almost disappear because they're going deep in order to get cooler, more moist conditions.

- How deep?

How deep you think?

- You know, six, eight inches, ten inches, you know.

You can find them.

- Wow.

[laughing] - Digging around, you'll find them.

- And they'll find you.

- They're not that deep, but they don't have to have them up above the soil line to keep them dry.

And I say keep them dry, but they do require some moisture.

So when it gets real dry, they're going down.

They like a little humid, but they don't like it too wet, they don't like it too dry.

Kinda like me and you.

[laughing] - That's right, that's right.

So it's humidity, how about that?

That's smart.

Wow.

- Pretty sharp critters to be so small.

And they pack a punch.

- Dang, might need to go to check our park before we have our picnic.

Make sure we have no fire ants out there.

- Check 'em out.

- But you have kids that are playing around they don't know 'em, they might just run into 'em, get into 'em before you know it.

- That's where you see most of the problems, where you have people that aren't familiar with fire ants.

I know the first time my daughter found fire ants, I lived in an area where we didn't have 'em and we were in an area that had 'em and she's standing on a mound going, "What are all these little things?"

Because fire ants take a solemn oath when they're small.

Baby fire ants take a solemn oath, they will not sting until everybody's ready.

- Oh my goodness.

So they'll cover you up and then... (snaps) - (Booker) One time.

- They hit you all at once.

- They hurt me right now.

- [Mr. D] Now fortunately, we got 'em off my daughter before they got to that point, you know?

So if you don't know what you're doing, you're not used to 'em, then you get in trouble.

But people, a large percent of the population of the US lives in areas that are infested with fire ants and they survive nicely.

- Wow.

So do they have an automatic?

Is it one sting or?

- They've got automatic.

- They've got automatic.

- They can hit you, they have an automatic.

Bam, bam, bam.

Keep stinging.

- Alright, thanks for that information about those fire ants.

- Oh yeah.

- Oh boy.

[gentle country music] - Over a period of time you'll have dead grass, leaves build up in your soil.

We call that thatch, and thatch is dead grass in your soil.

And every now and then you need to get that out of there for the water and stuff to penetrate down to the root system.

And you can use like a little garden rake in there, especially if you got a small area, you can use a garden rake.

And you just want to get in here real good and just rake across there and get all that dead grass outta there.

[raking] And you start to get all that dead grass coming outta there.

Now you see the green grass beginning to show through there once you get all that dead grass outta there.

So, when you get it outta there, and this will be really good compost material when you get through to put into your compost bin.

It'll rot and decay and you can use it in your flower bed.

This is dead grass, leaves and all that stuff that done built up in your soil over a period of time, and you can just take this here.

Look at all that dead that just came outta there.

You can take this here and put in your compost pile and this will be good material.

[upbeat country music] - Alright, here's our Q and A session and Booker, you jump in there with us.

- (Booker) Okay, then.

So here's our first viewer email, from Ms. Theresa, she writes, "My purple leaf plum tree bloomed this spring, "but now there are no leaves on it.

Can I save it or should I cut it down?"

What do y'all think?

- Could be borers in there (mumbles) - Yeah, I would look at the bark, look at the trunk of that tree and see if you see any gum, sap, coming out.

- Oozing out.

- Because probably if you've got a, if you have a peach, plum, or nectarine in this area, you're gonna get peach tree borers if you don't go with a preventative insecticide spray.

And you've gotta be pretty lucky to hit that as that adult moth is flying around laying eggs.

The peach tree borer is devastating.

It's a devastating insect, they get in the trunk of the trees and disrupts the cambium layer and it causes them throw their leaves off.

It causes them to die.

It'll kill the tree.

But peaches, plums, and nectarines, both the ornamental type and the fruit-bearing types, are susceptible to that, that's why I don't have any in my landscape.

- Yeah, you exactly right.

And purple leaf plums have problems with borers.

- With borers.

- They're short-lived trees as it is.

But then you get these borers in there and they will actually disrupt the movement of water and nutrients throughout the plant, so there you have it.

- Yeah, I have one in my yard too and the same thing, borers get in.

And over a period of time, all the leaves were gone.

So it will do that to that tree.

- This time of the year, if you don't have any leaves on your purple leaf plum, I'd say take it out.

- Cut it out?

(laughs) One cut.

- One pruning cut.

- One pruning cut.

- It's called severe-- - Severe prune.

- Take it down to the ground.

- That's the best thing you can do for it.

- Right at the bottom, don't even worry about it.

So there you go, hope that helps you out, Ms. Theresa.

Alright, here's our next question, thanks for your email.

"I am having a problem ith large earthworms "in my garage and on my driveway.

"What can I do?

I need help.

"I have a lawn service and they treat it "with grub spray, no improvement.

"Any suggestions, ideas, would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks for your help," Ms. Esther.

Don't know if I'll be trying to get rid of those earthworms, Mr. D?

So what do you think?

- If you got earthworms, that indicates that you've got a healthy-- - Good soil.

- I think so.

- You got organic matter and I understand why the grub worm insecticide didn't kill the earthworm, because grub worms aren't earthworms.

Earthworms aren't grub worms.

Grub worms feed on plant material and roots and things like that.

Earthworms are feeding on organic matter.

What do earthworms feed on?

They're just a hollow tube.

I guess we are too in a way.

You put stuff in and it goes out.

But they don't feed on the same things.

- Plant matter of course.

- They don't feed on the same things.

They aerate your lawn, they add organic matter, their aerate your soil, they add organic matter to your soil, they're just a indicator of a healthy ecosystem in your soil and I would not try to be getting rid of them.

I know that it's irritating, when you step on one and you're bare-footed as you're stepping out of your garage, but keep your broom handy and just kinda sweep 'em out of the way and I wouldn't try to get rid of 'em.

- No, I put 'em back in the lawn.

You know, especially now it's so hot, going across the concrete, help them out, put them back in the lawn.

- Catch 'em and take a kid fishing.

How about that?

- Bait night.

- Brim love 'em.

Yeah, they're great bait.

If you've got that many, you don't even have to dig for 'em.

You can sell fish bait, picking 'em up off the ground.

- What do you think, Booker?

- You see 'em, you have a rain, you have a heavy rain you'll see them come out of the ground.

I see them all the time on my sidewalk and everything.

I try to put 'em back in there, I don't wanna just kill 'em.

They're doing some good in your soil.

They really keeping it aerated some too because they moving through the soil.

So try not to kill 'em.

- Earthworms, I call 'em little tillers.

They're you're friends in the garden.

They're your beneficials.

- Yeah, they're going through the garden, having a good time.

- Yeah, and they produce that black gold which is earthworm casting which you can use in your flowerbeds and things like that, so I would not try to get rid of my earthworms.

I definitely would not do that, Ms. Esther, so I hope that helps you out.

Alright, here's our next question.

"My banana pepper plant has brown "and black spots all over the leaves.

What is causing that?"

And again, this is the banana pepper plant.

Brown and black spots on the leaves specifically.

- The only thing that I saw that matches that description is the bacterial spot.

I kinda look down through the diseases in the red book again and fixed copper mixed with mancozeb.

- So copper-based fungicide.

- A copper-based fungicide should give you some relief.

I do notice that some varieties of pepper are resistant to bacterial spot and you might wanna check that out and hopefully, I don't know how many peppers, you said is it one banana pepper?

- We don't know how many.

- You might wanna check next time, or it's not too late to plant a banana pepper now, to try to find one that has some resistance to bacterial spot.

- Resistant varieties are always are always out there.

- That's better than having to spray all the time.

- Right.

If you got that problem, also, this is some cultural practices.

Don't pick our peppers or mess with them while they're wet because you can spread, it's bacterial, so you can spread it and that's just one little thing you might wanna try.

- And another thing, pepper and tomato get the same diseases.

Rotating the garden, that's one of the good things.

Don't plant where you had your tomatoes.

Put them somewhere else in your garden next year.

The disease might get on that plant.

So I'd rotate them.

Probably about next three years before I can do that same spot again.

Move them around in your vegetable garden.

- Okay, rotation, crop rotation of course, resistant varieties, and cultural practices.

I think you should always mulch around your vegetables too.

Cut down on the splashing effect.

Alright?

Well, Mr. D, Booker, We're out of time.

Thank you.

Remember, we love to hear from you.

Send us a email or letter.

The email address is familyplot@wkno.org and the mailing address is Family Plot, 7151 Cherry Farms Road, Cordova, Tennessee 38016.

Or you can go online to FamilyPlotGarden.com That's all we have time for today, thanks for watching.

I'm Chris Cooper, be sure to join us next time for The Family Plot: Gardening in the Mid-South.

Be safe.

[upbeat country music] [acoustic guitar chords]