Plants or Crops
All Plants or Crops Content
What’s Bugging Your Garden? Colorado Potato Beetles
Colorado potato beetles have become all too common in many home gardens and also in community gardens where potatoes are commonly grown. If left untreated, they can defoliate potato plants, drastically cutting yields of the delicious tubers that so many of us love to eat.
Weeds Around Spruce Seedlings?
I have many producers call wanting a control for the broadleaf weeds coming up around their young Colorado and Black Hills spruce seedlings. At this time of year we are looking at post-emergence herbicides to control weeds that have become established.
What’s Bugging Your Garden? Broom Moth
There is a new pest problem for flower growers that enjoy Baptisia (false indigo) called the Genista Broom Moth. It is actually the caterpillars that cause the damage.
Shot Hole Disease in Apricots
Shot hole disease of apricot trees can be identified through symptoms on leaves and fruit. Small holes will appear on leaves while brown lesions with a deep purple band will show up on fruit.
Care of Peace Lilies
Peace lilies, or Spathiphyllum, are popular houseplants because they are generally easy to grow, have pretty flowers and can tolerate lower light levels. But lots of people do have problems with them. I would say that most of these problems relate to improper watering and fertilizing.
Pollinating Tomatoes in High Tunnels
In field-grown tomatoes the air movement is sufficient to vibrate flowers and achieve pollination. This is not generally true in the high tunnel because there is not sufficient natural wind to vibrate the flowers. High tunnel tomato growers should therefore pollinate their crop by other means.
Pig Squeak: Bergenia cordifolia ‘Winterglut’ (Winterglow)
Bergenia is a great plant for many different types of sites in the garden performing well in shady locations to full sun, if extra moisture is provided. It looks great as a single specimen plant or planted in groups of five or more.
Nugget Ninebark (Physocarpus opulifolius ‘Nugget’)
‘Nugget’ is a South Dakota State University release of this popular shrub. This particular cultivar has lovely golden yellow foliage in the spring which fades to a darker green later in the season.
Native Plants: Switchgrass (Panicum virgatum)
Switchgrass (Panicum virgatum) is a native, warm season prairie grass that has slowly found its way into the popular ornamental grass market.
Earwigs in the Garden: Less-Toxic Control Alternative
Since earwigs provide some ecological service as natural enemies, I hesitate to recommend a pesticide application to control it. As an alternative least-toxic solution, bait trapping the earwigs should work to reduce the insect’s population to the non-threatening levels.