The GardenRight Diary

Welcome to the GardenRight Diary.  The Diary consist of a series of reports on activities in our yard and garden.  Our three acre yard is located in Southern Maryland, USDA Zone 7.  For those of you not familiar with Southern Maryland it consist of  3-5 counties (it depends on who you ask whether it's 3, 4 or 5) located just southeast of Washington, D.C. The climate is typical mid-Atlantic with hot humid summers, moderately cold winters, and wonderfully pleasant springs and autumns.  We're only 30 miles southeast of Washington, D.C., about 45 miles south of Baltimore, Maryland, and 60 miles northeast of Richmond, Virginia.  We are bordered on our west by Virginia and on the east by the beautiful Chesapeake Bay.  Here at our three acres, which we affectionately call "Cactus Hill," because of numerous cactus plantings, we experience our last frost in the spring approximately the middle of April and the first fall frost approximately early November.  Our lowest temperature recorded here was 6 degrees F. which occurred in late January 1994, and our highest temperature has been 102 degrees F. which occurred in late July 2002.  The diary entries begin (bottom of this page) with a short mention of  the unpleasant event of April 28, 2002.  On this date Southern Maryland was struck by a F3-F4 tornado.  At 7:30 p.m. that evening the tornado roared across Cactus Hill destroying our house, our wonderful old barn, our pickup truck and 28 of the trees we had planted.   The house was rebuilt and we moved back in on March 13, 2003.  The diary picks up the action from that point on. 

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Friday, March 28, 2008
    The peas are planted!  For the past two years the weather has not allowed a late March planting but this year everything was a go and the peas are in the ground.  This weekend, weather permitting, plants of broccoli, cabbage, cauliflower and spinach will also be planted.  The plants have been raised from seeds started in the basement under fluorescent lights.  We've been starting many of our vegetable and flower plants under artificial lighting for many years and it seems to work well.  The one disadvantage is that you cannot move the young plants directly from under the lights out into the garden.  Since they have never been in direct sunlight they can be damaged by this sudden exposure.  The young plants must first be acclimated to the ourdoors.  This is accomplished by placing them outside but with protection from the direct sun and wind.  I use a wooden frame covered by two layers of window screening.  The young plants are thus given a partial shaded location with some wind protection.  After a week to ten days one layer of screening is removed and in another week they are ready for the garden. 

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Tuesday, March 25, 2008
    Today I applied a preemergence herbicide (weed preventer) to the outdoor cactus planting.  Weeds, especially crabgrass, is a big problem in the cactus bed.  Pulling weeds up under most circumstances is no fun but put those weeds among plants with big, sharp spines and the weed pulling is nearly impossible, or at least very painful.  The trick in avoiding this nasty chore is to prevent the weeds from coming up in the first place and that's accomplished through a chemical which kills the young weeds immediately after they germinate.  I use two different chemicals in combination.  One is a product called Surflan AS which is excellent in preventing the crabgrass and other grasses from coming up.  The second is a product called Gallery which is effective against non grass weeds, such as chickweed, or dandelion.  The combination of the two give me nearly 100 percent control of weeds.  The important part of this weed preventing program is to apply the preemergent materials on a regular schedule.  Once the previous application is wearing out, the chemicals have a limited effective time frame of about four months, another application must be made.  If you are too late newly deposited weeds seeds will sprout and you'll be in trouble.  I keep record of when I make my applications and I time my next application at the end of the four month effective period. 

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Thursday, August 31, 2006  
        Weeds are the story in today's diary entry.  Our Cactus Hill property is three acres in size and in the shape of a rectangle.  The rectangle is such that you can easily slice it into three equal parts with each part an acre in size.  The long axis of the rectangle runs north and south with the northern end close to the county road.  Our house sits on the border between the first and second acre and the first acre is basically our front yard. 
        When designing the landscape we envisioned a small area of trees bordering the county road and extending approximately 150 feet into the property.  There would be a lawn area extending up near the house.  The lawn would be separated from the house by several foundation planting beds. The lawn would be separated from the tree area by several modest sized mixed borders.  The main border (shown at the left in 2001) runs east and west.  It's approximately 12 feet wide and 80 feet long.  There's the west border, running north and south and it's 12 feet wide and about 40 feet wide, and the beginnings of the east border which now only contains a series of large shrubs and small ornamental trees.
         The main and west borders contain small trees, shrubs, and herbaceous perennials.  The soil is excellent.  A well drained, loose sandy loam.  Provide that soil with some moisture and the weeds jump.  Our property is surrounded on two sides by weedy fields of an abandoned horse pasture.  There's plenty of weed seed available and they take full advantage of our landscape beds. 
          Most of this year I've kept the weeds under control with periodic hand weeding and targeted herbicide sprays.  I use a generic brand of Roundup with a two gallon pump sprayer and as long as I tackle the weeds when they are small this works quite well.  However, things happen.  You get busy on other projects; you make excuses to postpone a day weeding or spraying and the next time you look  you can't see the landscape border plants for the weeds.  Here at the end of August that's the position I find myself in.   Two things are needed to get me out of this viscous cycle:  (1) a weeding schedule on paper that I make myself follow, and (2) adding preemergence herbicides as part of the weed management program.  I know (1) will be the more difficult of the two but at least I can implement (2) now. 
          I plan to use two chemical preemergent herbicides in combination.  One is the chemical oryzalin which is sold under the trade name Surflan.  The second is the chemical isoxaben, which is sold under the trade name Gallery.  Oryzalin is excellent for the control of grassy weeds and isoxaben is good in controlling non grass (broadleaf) weeds.  In combination they will control a majority of my weeds.   These are preemergence herbicides which means they are applied after the beds are cleaned of weeds and they prevent weed seeds from germinating .  Once applied they work for about four months at which time they must be reapplied.  Both are applied as a liquid with a sprayer.  Mixing and applying these herbicides is not something I enjoy doing, and they are expensive, but I really want to take a stab at making these borders clean and attractive.  I find that when they are weedy I tend not to want to work with them.  I don't add new plants.  I don't prune the shrubs.  I don't dead head the perennial flowers.  I want to make these beds a source of pride in the landscape and getting the weeds under control is a must.  I will mulch the beds and continue to do some hand weeding, but hopefully I can implement a program whereby I don't have to spend several weeks getting these beds cleaned up at the end of each summer.  I'll let you know how things go.  Stay tuned.

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Wednesday, August 2, 2006
       Today here in Southern Maryland the high temperature was 102 degrees F.  It's also quite dry.  We haven't had a substantial rain in more than two weeks.  It's time to get some water on the important parts of the landscape --  the house shade trees.  We planted three red maples just to the west of the house in 1993.  The tornado in 2002 destroyed two of these and we replanted in 2003. These three trees play an important part in shading the house during the summer and giving us a nice piece of shade.  The one tree that survived the tornado became our center of operations when we were monitoring the house rebuilding during the summer of 2002.   (the photo to the right shows two of the three maples in their fall color) 
       Watering plants takes time and sometimes it's impossible to get everything watered, that's why it's important to set priorities.  For us the trees are at the top of the priority list.  For the past couple of days I've set up my inexpensive ring sprinklers.  I usually let the sprinklers run for about 20 to 30 minutes and then move them to a slightly different spot under the trees.  Over several hours I can get water to a substantial part of the trees' root systems.  We are expecting scattered thunderstorms over the next two days so hopefully nature will provide the irrigation.  If not, I'll move my sprinkler show to the white pines in our windbreak area. 

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Saturday, June 24, 2006
       It's blooming time in the cactus bed.  The cacti that grow the largest and produce the most flowers in my outdoor cactus planting are the opuntias and cylindropuntias.  The photo on the main web page is of Cylindropuntia imbricata in flower.  The opuntias, which have large flat stems or pads, begin flowering in late May and continue for about three weeks.  The plant pictured to the right is Opuntia engelmannii. It was planted as a single pad in 1998.   The cylindropunitas, which have cylindrical stems, start flowering in mid June and continue through the end of the month.  Both types, opuntias and cylindropuntias, can get large and when a large opuntia or cylindropuntia is in full bloom it's quite impressive.  The plant shown on the main web page is about five feet high and three feet wide and produced around 40 flowers.  My current outdoor cactus planting is approximately 50 feet wide and 40 feet long.  All the plants in the bed remain there all winter and although I lose a few plants each winter most take the cold and snow and come back strong each spring.

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Friday, May 12, 2006   -   Weed Patrol
          Over the past two weeks we finally have had several significant rainfalls and with the warm temperatures the weeds are jumping and it's time for weed patrol.  We have great soil and all it takes it warmth and water and there is an explosion of weed growth.  Over the years I've tried a number of weed management strategies for the landscape but have finally settled on a weekly application of a liquid, postemergent herbicide.  Initially, I'll clear weeds from the landscape beds manually, but thereafter I'll patrol the landscape weekly and spray any newly sprouted weeds.  The initially clearing takes time but as long as I follow up with my weed patrol the landscape beds and areas around trees and shrubs stays free of weeds.  Combined with two inches of mulch, the landscape stays relatively weed free throughout the summer season. 
         The liquid, postemergent herbicide I use is glyphosate.  You may be more familiar with the original brand name of glyphosate, Roundup.  Today glyphosate is sold in many different brand products, most far less expensive than the original Roundup.  I purchase the glyphosate is a 2-1/2 gallon product and mix it at the rate of 2-1/2 ounces per gallon of water.  I use a two gallon pump up sprayer which is easy to carry around as I walk through the landscape spraying weeds wherever they are found.  You do have to be careful with glyphosate.  It's a non selective herbicide.  It will kill or damage any type of plant it's applied to, but it is only absorbed through the leafy tissue.  I can spray at the base of woody trees and shrubs and kill the emerging weeds without damaging the landscape plants. 
         I one part of the landscape that does not lend itself to the weed patrol are the perennial borders.  Since most of the plants in the perennial borders are herbaceous and not woody I cannot use glyphosate around them without risking damage.  Weed control in these beds must still be accomplished by cultivation and pulling.   Then there are the outdoor cactus beds.   Weed control in these beds can  literally be painful. 

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Saturday, May 6, 2006   -   Lettuce and Spinach Salads
          The first harvest from this year's vegetable garden is lettuce and spinach.  Nicole and I love fresh green salads and each evening for the past few weeks we have had our lettuce and spinach salads.  All of the cool season crops are doing well and we expect to add edible podded peas to the salad in a week or two.  The broccoli, cauliflower and cabbage are still about a month away from harvest.  Next week we'll start the planting of the warm season crops, including tomatoes and bush, snap beans.   The use of the fabric mulch between the rows has worked out well.  It's not very attractive but it not only prevents weed growth but also allows easy and clean access to the garden when the ground is wet or muddy.  When Nicole first suggested this method of weed control I was against it.  I always liked the look of freshly cultivated soil.  However, I wasn't so good at keeping up with weed control and I must admit, the fabric has kept the garden much cleaner and much easier to weed. 

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Friday, March 31, 2006   -   Landscape Irrigation
         Here in Maryland we have not had a significant rain or snow since mid February.  The ground is very dry and this is not a good situation for woody landscape plants just breaking dormancy.  A number of trees and shrubs are already leafing out and many more will follow in the next week.  When I discuss landscape maintenance with master gardener groups around the state I always put irrigation at the top of the list.  It's natural to think about irrigation during the hot months of summer, but irrigation is required whenever there is insufficient moisture in the ground.  Two days ago I began watering the shade trees near the house.  These are my priority plants.  These are the trees I would least like to lose.  Yesterday I moved the sprinkler equipment to the evergreen windbreak we have to the northwest of the house.  Here we have clusters of Leyland cypress, white pine, and red cedar.  While red cedar is very drought tolerant, the Leylands and the pines suffer badly when there is insufficient water.  Today I'll water a row of "Molten Lava" crabapples near the beginning of our driveway.  These crabs are in full leaf and the soil in that area is quite sandy. 

        My irrigation equipment is quite simple.  I use several Y hose connections so that I can run four sprinkler heads off one outdoor faucet.  The sprinkler heads are cheap plastic sprinklers shaped like donuts or flower heads.  There are 30 to 40 small holes in each sprinkler and by adjusting the water pressure I can control how far the water is thrown.  I use an on off connector switch for each hose leading to a sprinkler head  to adjust the pressure.  While inexpensive, this type of irrigation is time consuming.  I closely monitor each sprinkler head and when the water begins to run off the soil surface rather than soak in I move the sprinkler head to a new location.  With four sprinkler heads going I stay busy monitoring and moving the sprinklers.  This system allows the water to be placed right where it's needed with a minimum of waste.  I would rather be doing other spring gardening activities right now but water is critical for these plants and irrigation is my main priority now. 

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Saturday, March 11, 2006  -  Planting Peas

       Planted four rows of Sugar Ann edible podded peas today.  This is the earliest we've been able to plant pea since we have been in the house (1993).  The weather was perfect, dry for the past 10 days, which allowed the soil to be worked, and 75 degrees today, which made the work very pleasant.  Our main vegetable garden is 12 ft. wide, 60 ft. long and bordered by cinderblocks. (Photo at left shows the northern end of the garden - where the peas were planted between weed block fabric).  We've been working it since 1993 so the soil is in very good condition. Usually we get the peas in between the 15th and 25th of March, although we have planted as late as April 7th  Nicole and I enjoy fresh peas from the garden, especially in salads.  In the next few days we hope to get our three rows of shelling peas in.  Peas are harvested in mid May to early June and their place in the garden is followed by a planting of tomatoes.  I also moved the first group of cabbage seedlings to the cold frame.  Seeds were planted in the basement under fluorescent lights in early February and seedlings potted into plastic cell paks.  I use the type that has six cells, each 2x2 inches at the top and three inches deep.  I potted up two of these 6 cell paks with cabbage.  We are not big cabbage eaters, although Nicole will make slaw, so we only plant  ten cabbage plants.   I pot up 12 seedlings, 10 to go in the garden and  two to serve as backups.  Broccoli, cauliflower, spinach and lettuce seedlings are still in the basement awaiting transplanting to their cell paks.  Tomato seed will go in toward the end of March. 

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Tuesday, March 7, 2006  -  Pruning Grapes

      I took a casual walk through the yard today and discovered I hadn't pruned the grape vines yet!  Soon after we had our house built on the property I planted two concord grape vines.  My family had a concord grape vine and as a kid I grew up feasting on this purple, somewhat tart grapes each summer.  Old fashion concord grapes are not readily available in the local grocery stores, having been replaced by all of the new seedless, sweet grapes.  Store bought grapes are fine and there's not much sense in growing your own grapes unless you want a variety not available in the stores and that's just what I wanted.  Grapes are relatively easy to grow although in areas where the summers are hot and humid there is always the fight against several fungal diseases.  I don't spray my grapes so to combat the disease problem I make sure I prune them heavily each winter to open up the growth and encourage as much air circulation as possible.  The other important reason to prune grapes is that the fruit produced on second year wood and if you don't prune each year the vines grow longer and longer and the grapes are produced further out on the vines.  My vines are supported to two wires stretched between two posts with the vine planted in the center.  One wire is positioned about two feet off the ground and the second wire is five feet off the ground.  The idea situation for the pruned vine is to end up with four branches coming off the vine trunk.  Two branches are attached to the top wire and two to the bottom wire.  This type of grape support and pruning is called the kniffen system.  It's not the only way to train a grape vine but it works well for me and my concord grapes. 

     By the end of a growing season my concord vines have made  lots of new  branches and new growth on the end of the branches left from the previous year.  I fumbled through the myriad of branches to find four branches they formed last year and that originated as close to the main trunk as possible.  I tried to select each of these four branches in terms of their ease of attachment to the wire supports.  Once selected I marked them with a piece of ribbon and began pruning out all of the remaining branches.  For a healthy grape vine you will prune out approximately 75 to 85 percent of the existing growth.  Once everything is removed except the four selected branches I shorten each of these so that there are 10 to 12 buds on each branch.  That gives the vine 40 to 48 buds and this is about all the production a vine can support.  It took me two hours to prune the two vines and now I'm set for my concord grape feast this coming August.

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