Rodd's Seeds of Wisdom Horticultural tips and tricks from Rodd Moesel

Spring forward applies not just to our wall clocks and alarm clocks but also to most of the plant world. The early crops that tolerate or enjoy a little cooler weather are already “coming alive” for spring. The two crops that “trumpet” the arrival of spring for me are the beautiful yellow flowering shrub forsythia and the spring flowering bulbs of daffodil or narcissus. They kick off the annual symphony of life and colors that then marches through an annual chorus of crops that come alive as the temperatures warm, the sunlight grows more intense and the day length grows longer. Flowering shrubs quickly progress from forsythia, quince, wisteria, lilacs to roses and so many others. Flowering bulbs start with the trumpet flowers of daffodils and quickly progress to crocus, tulips, hyacinths and many other bulb crops you should have planted last fall to enjoy now. The trees start to flower with apricots, peaches, ornamental pears and soon are yielding to redbuds, apples and many other trees strutting their colors. Please make time to enjoy this annual symphony of color and nature in your yard, your neighborhood and across our state. This is a great way to see and smell things you enjoy, find them at a local nursery and then add them to your landscape.

Another way we know spring is at hand is that we suddenly have so many things to do in the yard and many that need to be done now! There has never been a better time to learn and experience the joy of growing your own vegetables, berries and fruit with the rising prices of produce and the interest in locally grown food. You can’t get any more local than your own yard. We are nearing the end of the planting season for cool season vegetables. The best time to plant seed potatoes, onion sets and onion plants, lettuce, radishes, carrots, cauliflower, broccoli and thet like is now by St. Patrick’s Day. You can plant later but your yields will drop as the crops mature later into the heat of summer. It is still early to plant tomatoes, peppers, eggplant and other warm season crops. Our last average freeze in OKC is around April 7th and we usually say it is wise to plant them April 15th or after. If you must plant early be prepared to protect these warm crops with hot kaps, wall – o – waters or row cover fabric.

If you want to control weeds and crabgrass in your lawn, now is the time to apply pre-emergent herbicide over your lawn either by itself or as part of a weed and feed product to fertilize while controlling the weeds. Pre-emergents will only work if applied before the summer weed seeds germinate. A good rule of thumb is to apply the pre-emergents before the redbud flowers are finished but the sooner the better after the forsythia’s bloom. Visit your nurseryman to select the right pre-emergent for your lawn. My favorites include products containing Dimension or Barricade (prodiamine). Make sure to water in with at least a ½” of water after application to activate these treatments.

Please join me this Sunday March 20th, at 1:00 P.M. at the OKC Zoo Education Building for a free program by famous plant explorer, Tony Avent of Plant Delights Nursery in North Carolina. This great speaker will really get you excited about the upcoming season and encourage you to try out some new plants. He is sponsored by the Oklahoma Horticulture Society with support from the Oklahoma City Community Foundation.

Every week presents new opportunities of things we can do in the garden as we make the annual march towards spring. Now is the time to apply pre-emergent weed killers to your lawn to control crabgrass, sandburs, foxtail, goosegrass and many other summer grassy annual weeds. The easiest way to control the unwanted weeds and annual grasses is to keep them from coming up or germinating.

The best time to apply the pre-emergent herbicide is when the yellow forsythia are coming into flower in your area. That would usually be from about now until March 15 to April 1st depending on the weather and your location. You can apply a liquid spray or weed killers in a granular form that can be applied with a lawn spreader. There are many good weed and feed products that allow you to fertilize at the same time you are applying the herbicide if you are also needing to feed your lawn. It is best to figure out the quantity of product needed for your yard and cut the rate in half to apply one half going north – south and the other half going east – west to get good even overlapping coverage. If you do not get a good rain within 48 hours of application apply water equal to at least ½” of rain to activate the product and to get it spread or washed across the full soil surface so it will be effective in killing the weed seeds as they try to germinate.

Crabgrass and weed control is always the subject that draws the most e-mails and follow-up questions. There are many good brands of weed and feed or pre-emergent weed killers so I will try to avoid recommending a specific brand but I will suggest you look for a herbicide containing one of the following products if you maintain a lawn of some type of Bermuda grass. Use a product containing Balan, Betasan, Dacthal, Simazine, Surflan, Treflan or one of my two favorites Dimension or Prodiamine (Barricade). If you have a lawn of St. Augustine, bluegrass, zoysia, centipede or other specialty lawn grass visit with your local nurseryman to select the right product for your lawn. A good rule of thumb is to apply the pre-emergent between the time the forsythia shrubs start blooming and the redbud trees stop blooming. Don’t forget to be adding peat moss or compost and getting your flowerbeds and decorative containers ready to plant when spring arrives.

Now is the prime time to plant your seed potatoes, onion sets and onion plants, strawberries, grapes, blackberries and raspberries. Plant all your cool season vegetables like carrots, radishes, beets, turnips, lettuce, broccoli, cauliflower, spinach, peas and swiss chard. Anytime we have a nice day you now have lots you can do with your lawn or in your garden.

Happy Valentine’s Day!  After the hard winter we’ve had, especially the brutal arctic fronts of the last two weeks with their lingering snow deposits, the bright colors and scents of beautiful flowers will be even more special to show our love to our Valentine Sweethearts today.

Hopefully you have been able to locate those special flowers that bring back the best memories and show the depth of your love to your special “honey” as flowers have done so effectively for centuries. Plants allow a lot of imagination to deliver the message of love.  A buddy told me he gave his wife a tree some years ago and this year he is carving their initials in a heart on that tree as their love and that tree has grown.

Two week ago we talked about the early bird gardeners just starting to plant onions, potatoes and many of the other cool season leafy vegetables and root crops.  Since then, the ground has been covered constantly by snow and ice and we have been in the Oklahoma deep freeze!  As soon as you can dig in the ground, we are now into the main planting season for cool season vegetable crops between Valentine’s Day and St. Patrick’s Day. Visit your local nursery or garden center to buy vegetable seeds, onion plants or sets and seed potatoes as well as strawberries, rhubarb, asparagus and bare root grapes, raspberries, and black berries to start your food gardening for this year,

This is the time to spray your peach trees and nectarines with lime sulfur to prevent peach leaf curl later in the season. Spray your other trees and shrubs with a good grade of dormant oil to kill scale insects, spider mites and other insects that may have survived the winter and to reduce pest problems later this year.

This is a great time to feed your trees and shrubs so that their roots are well nourished and able to take full advantage as their sap starts flowing. The biggest growth spurt of the year occurs with spring “leaf-out” and so feeding now will benefit your fruit and nut trees as well as your ornamental trees and shrubs.

This is pruning season for your deciduous trees, shrubs and rose bushes. Do not prune early spring flowering shrubs like quince and forsythia until after they flower. Make nice clean cuts to shape your tree or shrub noting the bud below the cut will be the main new shoot after your cut. This allows you to select how your tree or shrub will shape. Use good sharp hand pruners, loppers or saws to get good cuts and then paint larger wounds to reduce borer and pest problems.

Hopefully we have our worst winter weather behind us and we can all get serious about preparing our flower beds and planting our cool season vegetables.

We are still in winter but it is time to start thinking about spring gardening. The last couple of years huge numbers of Americans have rediscovered vegetables and fresh food gardening. Many Oklahomans have planted their first vegetables, berries and fruit trees in the last two growing seasons and it is unquestionably the fastest growing type of gardening.

Some folks do the traditional vegetable garden, others mix their vegetables among the ornamental flowers in their regular flower beds. Many have been raising vegetables in all sorts of container gardens, baskets and all styles of unique containers on their patios, porch or even apartment balconies. There is something very satisfying and fulfilling about planting your own seeds or small transplants, watching and helping them grow and then picking the fresh greens and fruit to add to your salads, home cooked dishes or just to eat fresh from the yard.

The planting season in central Oklahoma for most of the cool season vegetables is from Valentine’s Day in mid February to St. Patrick’s Day in mid March. The prime season is southern Oklahoma runs about a week earlier and it goes about a week later in northern Oklahoma as our state warms from south to north. Take advantage of the nice days at this time of the year to rototill or spade your vegetable garden or flower beds to prepare for spring planting. If you need to add sphagnum peat, aged compost or other organic matter this is a good time to get it worked into the soil so you are ready to plant when the time comes.

This is a great time to take a pint size jar soil sample from about 6” deep and have your soil tested at your OSU County Extension Office, located in the town that is your county seat. For a minimal change of $10.00 they will test your soil and advise what nutrients you have in ample supply and what you need to add to maximize your garden’s performance. You often can reduce or target your fertilizer use and save several times the cost of the soil test. It is also good for the environment to only use the fertilizer needed and thus reduce runoff of extra nutrients and extend the supply of our valuable fertilizer minerals.

The cool season food crops you will want to plant first include seed potatoes, onion sets and onion plants, cabbage, cauliflower, carrots, swiss chard, kohlrabi, head or leaf lettuce, peas, spinach and turnips. This is also the time to plant asparagus crowns, strawberry plants and rhubarb as well as bareroot blackberries, raspberries, blueberries and grapes.

Get your soil ready and start thinking about planting cool season vegetables and food crops to grow your very own fresh food.

Oklahoma has now experienced a couple of strong arctic blasts and  it is truly winter in the Oklahoma garden.  We have been so dry that we are in danger of winter damage to many of our shrubs and perennials from  dehydrating in these extended cold temperatures.  Unless we get some good rain or significant snowfall soon, you should take advantage of a nice day to thoroughly soak the ground around your trees, shrubs & perennials  with water to limit this dehydration and help protect these permanent plants from winter temperatures.

The Oklahoma Home and Garden Show will be this weekend,  January 21-23 at the State Fairgrounds in Oklahoma City.  The show will feature about 400 exhibitors, many special presentations and programs and some very nice installed landscapes to give you ideas you can use in your yard.  We no longer have a gardening only show in Oklahoma City so this is the next best thing.  There are a number of nurseries and landscapers who exhibit in addition to the roofing, window, pool, patio and many other home type exhibitors.  Usually about one fourth to one third of the show is gardening related.  It is also a good opportunity to learn about the gardening support services of the Extension Center, Master Gardeners, The Oklahoma Horticulture Society and many other gardening groups.

This is a great time of year for gardeners to look through seed catalogs, read gardening books, join a horticultural group or attend a gardening show to get a vision and ideas to put into action this Spring.  Remember the old gardening statement “The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago, the next best time is now.” Use these winter months to plan how you want to change or re-new your landscape and what new projects you want to tackle. The gardening show will also feature exhibits on garden ponds, vegetable gardening and hardscaping in addition to featuring new plant materials.

This is a great time of year to add more foliage or house plants in your living space.  They liven up and beautify the house, produce fresh oxygen and help clean up air pollution while we have the house all sealed up for winter.  We seem to appreciate house plants most during this season when the days are shorter, most of the great outdoors is brown and in hibernation and we are spending more time inside.  Visit your local greenhouse, nursery or florist and select several new foliage plants to liven up your environment.