THE GARDEN PATH , NOVEMBER 2014 A publication of Kerr Lake Extension Master Gardeners

PLANT OF THE MONTH - NOVEMBER CHECKLIST FOR NOVEMBER By Marty Finkel By Mary Jane Bosworth

 Plant and plan now for spring color. After conditioning your soil, plant daffodil and other bulbs for spring color and overplant them with pansies, which will bloom in mild winter weather. In the spring the bulbs will push through the annuals for a two-layer garden bed. This idea can be used in pots as well.  It’s time to divide perennials. Hostas, phlox and ferns can be divided but lifting them with a Ruscus aculeatus ‘Elizabeth Lawrence', Ruscus aculeatus digging fork, separating them and replanting ‘Wheeler’s’, and Ruscus aculeatus var. angustifolius them at their original planting depth. If you Narrow-leaf Photos courtesy of Plant Delights Nursery, Inc. prefer, you could share your “extra” plants with www.plantdelights.com . friends.  Fall is the ideal time for planting shrubs and Ruscus, common name butcher’s broom, is a trees. The cool weather permits the very slow-growing, evergreen shrub with bright red establishment of a good root system before next berries: ‘Wheeler’s’ occurring in November and year’s hot weather. persisting through the winter, ‘Elizabeth Lawrence’  Mulch shrubs, trees and perennials after the first summer through late spring, and narrow leaf has blue killing frost for winter protection. fruit from late summer through fall. Ruscus ‘Wheeler’s’  If you haven’t done so already, get your garden gets to about 4.5’ tall in eight years, R. ‘Elizabeth ready for spring by removing all plant debris. Lawrence’ to 2’ tall x 2’ wide in 10 years, and narrow- Do not compost it if disease is present. leaf butcher’s broom reaches 4’ tall and wide after  Rototill the garden to expose insect and disease several years. There is another cultivar, R. aculeatus organisms to the cold. Incorporate organic ‘Christmas Berries’, that is covered with red berries matter, if needed. almost on top of each other and grows to only about 12” tall and wide over a few years’ time. As you can GARDEN TO DO – NOVEMBER see, none of the butcher’s brooms is suitable for instant By Carl Shafer gratification! They could stay in a trough or other container for a few years, though. They all are tough Remove any old mummified fruit on trees, plants, are excellent plants for dry shade, and have spiny bushes, or vines and from the ground as these can be green cladodes on their stems instead of leaves. What is sources of disease next year. Clean up under pecan a cladode? In some plant groups, instead of leaves, trees. Also continue to cleanup garden plants as they flattened green stems serve the same purpose as leaves, finish producing. Disease free plants can be tilled in or i.e. photosynthesis, and in Ruscus, the cladode so composted. Diseased plants should be removed from resembles a leaf that the casual observer would have no the garden. They should be sent to the landfill or reason to suspect otherwise. Even weirder, the burned, if you have a safe area for burning. inconspicuous flower comes from a node sort of in the Remember there is now a fee for soil tests from middle of the leaf, that is, cladode. December through March, other times are still free. Lime can still be applied if needed. Late fall and early winter is a good time to plant fruit and nut trees. Container blueberries can also be planted now. Other berry plants are normally planted 2. Determine the amount of sunlight received each in the spring. Check local nurseries for plants. day. Remember that if your window is shaded Plant your garlic now if you have not already by deciduous trees now, it will be full sun in the done so. winter. Continue to collect leaves and compost them. 3. Based on light select herbs. It is best to pick Clean and repair, if necessary, your garden tools herbs with similar light and moisture and equipment before putting them away for the winter requirements. See “The Garden Professors” Sept.25 blog, 4. Select a container. I usually use plastic boxes “Digging the wasps !” which starts with a late planting and a tray to catch water. of buckwheat as a fall nectar source for honeybees and 5. Purchase a good quality potting soil. As you leads to “digger wasps” whose larvae are parasites of plant the herbs, add a little time release Japanese Beetle grubs. Also has a link to U of Maryland fertilizer. blog with more information. Use the internet to order some seed catalogs if From experience, I’ve found chives, parsley, you are interested in trying some new or different thymes, rosemary all grow well together. Sage will vegetable varieties next year. Also most garden grow successfully inside but it is quite magazines, at this time of the year, will have many mail temperamental so it’s best to grow it separately. order seed company advertisements. To get you started Lemon grass and bay also grow well in a pot and here are links to a couple of seed company directories: will over winter inside. Don’t forget mints. They http://njaes.rutgers.edu/pubs/publication.asp?pid=FS always are better in pots. Mints will have a tendency 1163 to get leggy so frequent pinching back or cutting for http://www.ianrpubs.unl.edu/epublic/live/g1895/buil use is recommended. d/#target2 It’s not too late to start chives and parsley from seed. Both germinate rather quickly and are easy to For possible new varieties to try next year, start. If you don’t have small plants for the rest, check the All-American Selections, (http://all- don’t despair – propagate. Here’s my method: take americaselections.org), for their new and recent national your handy dandy window box, fill with potting soil and regional selections of vegetables and flowers. then insert two or three clay pots with the holes Some books you may be interested in studying plugged up into the soil (I use aquarium cement, this winter: available anywhere aquariums are sold). Keep the For raised beds – All New Square Foot Gardening clay pots filled with water and the soil around the and Square Foot Gardening Answer Book by Mel clay pots will stay moist (water can seep slowly Bartholomew, through the clay sides of the pot. Water the For vegetable containers – The Vegetable Gardener’s container extremely well. Take cuttings and insert Container Bible by Edward C. Smith, and around the clay pots. Keep the pots full of water For straw bale gardens – Straw Bale Gardens by Joel and most of the cuttings should root, grow and Karsten thrive. Enjoy your parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme HERB OF THE MONTH- NOVEMBER winter garden, By Edna Lovelace Gaston Ladybug

Fall is fast approaching. That means winter (and THE TYROS' CORNER -NOVEMBER little outside gardening) are not far behind. But that By Eileen Novak doesn’t mean our herb gardens must wait until spring. Bring them inside! Gardening can be a solitary occupation, but I My favorite way to have an inside herb garden is have never found myself alone. There’s a red- a window box. In fact I do a lot of window box shouldered hawk that sits on the peak of my roof and gardening – herbs, annuals, perennials and vegetables. screams at me. When the hawk is away, a mockingbird Here are some suggestions: (the Rich Little of the avian world) goes through his entire repertoire at least twice. There are the bluebirds 1. Decide which window will host your garden. who chortle at me in little worried voices, there’s the groundhog who plays catch-me in the lettuce garden, Thoroughwort, waybread, self-heal, love-in-idleness, but mostly, there are the weeds. I talk to them. grelda, gallant-soldier, and the best one of all: triffids. Sometimes I sing to them. But I do my darnedest to I’m sure glad I’m gardening in North Carolina. If I get rid of them. And to keep me busy, they always were in England, I wouldn’t know if I were writing for come back. the garden path or a sci-fi/romance novel! I have had a hate/hate relationship with I have been pulling weeds from my vegetable Bermuda grass for many years. I have tried many garden for 3 years now. I have read about the “seed things to get rid of it or control it, most with an bank” that seemingly inexhaustible pot of weed seeds astounding lack of success. Let me tell you what that lies slumbering within the soil, waiting for the well- doesn’t work, just to save you some time: Landscaping meaning gardener to till the soil or even just pull some fabric…Lovely stuff. All the information on the label sicklepod and expose more seeds to light and air – their tells you it’s a great weed prevention technique. invitation to grow. I have pulled so many weeds, that Unfortunately, Bermuda grass doesn’t think it’s a weed. seed bank MUST be close to bankrupt, but no, around It’s a grass, and there’s a lawn and its job is to expand, the edges of the garden, I find that my friendly birds extend itself and cover holes in the lawn. Since it has have deposited seeds wrapped in guano. At the fence the intelligence of, say, a plant, it doesn’t get it that my line, I have all sorts of things growing and of course, flower garden filled with cannas is NOT lawn. It sees a they mostly come up in between the 7 foot high deer big, empty space and puts itself in there with gleeful fencing (that didn’t keep them out this year) and the 3 abandon. And the protection offered by the foot tall metal fence that has been useful in deflecting landscaping fabric and the mulch atop it is a perfect the rabbits. environment for expansion. It happily spreads, crawls I’ve been looking for weeding alternatives and and occasionally pokes up a finger to get some sunlight, found on the internet a propane torch, reconfigured to the mulch and fabric working together to incubate and be a weeding flame-thrower. I keep dreaming about enable it. And when I scrape aside the mulch and pull getting one. But I think I’ll check the fire insurance up the fabric, I find that the local insects have turned first… the space into an arachnid pre-natal ward. I have disturbed more than my share of spider mamas, INTERESTING TID-BITS FOR NOVEMBER scuttling away with their egg sacks. I truly don’t know By Marty Finkel who is the most scared - They don’t scream. On a positive note, however, I should point out Wool carder bees – have you ever heard of that I have had moderate success with digging a moat. them? They are fascinating creatures and their Maybe 5 inches deep and wide, that the lawnmower common name derives from their method of cutting blades hang over and cut whatever is sticking up or is and/or scraping fuzz off certain plants to line their sucked up by the whirring blades. Of course it does nests. The female wads the fibers into a ball and carries require maintenance, since the grass inevitably crawls in, it in a patch of hairs called a scopa on the underside of but I have had one garden surrounded by a medieval her abdomen. The scopa is also used to carry pollen. moat for a year now and it is much less effort to Nests can be found in hollow reeds, and the bees will maintain than others. readily use nesting blocks with holes drilled 7-10 mm in It would be nice if I could turn all the crabgrass diameter. The male is very territorial and often can be in the lawn into a cash crop. The closest I can get is seen guarding a flower patch, darting and chasing dumping what I pull from the flowerbeds into the competitors to the point of wrestling them to the compost bin and stirring. Someday those self-same ground, including much larger bees, such as weeds will be nourishing my gardens. Of course, since bumblebees and honey bees. Female carder bees are I am doing the “lazy man’s” approach to composting, allowed in this guarded area in the hopes of mating. it’ll be a while. When my compost bin gets too full, I There are two species of carder bees, the native go out to the store and pick up more cinder blocks. At Anthidium maculosum and the introduced northern least we don’t have to mow that area. European Anthidium manicatum. The native one is small, I was reading a book on weeds to get some measuring ½ to ¾ inch long and is black to brown with background – know your enemy – but it was written by white to yellow patches on the abdomen. The Richard Mabey, an Englishman and in England, they European male carder bee is much more aggressive in have unusual names for weeds. Try these: defending territory than the native one. Some of the favorite forage plants are sage, mints, catnip, lavender, GARDENING FOR THE BIRDS AND THE Russian sage, and lamb’s ears (Stachys). You can BEES...PLUS BUTTERFLIES AND ME expect to see them early summer through fall. Often By Edna Lovelace Gaston the male can be seen early in the morning, covered with Being in a major clean-up / straighten-up dew, asleep on a flower. mood, it’s amazing what has been discovered! One of Female carder bee lining nest with plant the items is the National Wildlife Foundation planning fuzz kit I used in preparation for getting our yard certified as Photo by Ilona L. : Creative Commons. No a wildlife habitat. One of the many tools in the box is a changes have been made to this photo. Photo can wildlife planting guide. From this I will list some of the be seen on Bugguide, hosted by Iowa State recommendations. Following each is a code that details University Entomology who will utilize it. The codes are B – butterflies, H – If you want to have 8 weeks of peony bloom hummingbirds, S – songbirds, G – game birds, M - next year, plant all four groups of peonies: woodland, mammals tree, herbaceous, and intersectional. Paeonia japonica, Low shrubs (up to about 8’ tall) - Beautyberry the woodland peony, blooms in early spring with white, (S, G, M), Cotoneaster (B, S), Smooth Sumac (M, S, G) cup-shaped flowers, and they naturalize well in Tall shrubs (about 6’ to 15’) – Yaupon (S, B), woodlands. They have scarlet seed pods in the fall. Red Buckeye (H), Wax Myrtle (S) The next to bloom are the tree peonies (April through Small Trees (about 12’ to 60’) – Flowering May, depending on variety), which are woody shrubs Dogwood (S, M, G, B), Serviceberry (S, G, M), and have the largest flowers. The flowers come in American Holly (S, B) shades of red, yellow, orange, and white. The Large trees (over 50’) – Tulip Poplar (H, B, S, herbaceous peonies follow and extend the season into M), Willow Oak (M, G, S), Pine (S, M), Eastern Red early summer with later bloomers such as ‘Coral cedar (S, B, G, M) Charm.’ Intersectional peonies, or Itoh hybrids (crosses This is by far not all. But now is a good time for between herbaceous and tree peonies) are the last to more research and check the nurseries. Many places are bloom, and they bloom for 3 to 4 weeks, thus making now having sales as they do not want to carry plants an 8-week season of peony bloom. over the winter. Time to bargain hunt! As the weather gets colder, many of us will be For much more information (and details to having fireplace or wood-burning stove fires, and one apply for becoming a Certified Wildlife Habitat check result is ashes which can be used in the garden. There out the National Wildlife Foundation’s website are no known toxic constituents in wood ashes that can http://www.nwf.org/How-to-Help/Garden-for- damage plants if used at appropriate rates. They Wildlife/Create-a-Habitat.aspx. Shop and plant now, contain potash (potassium) as well as most of the other relax over winter and get ready to enjoy your new 13 nutrients essential for plant growth. The fertilizer friends next year! value of wood ash varies according to the type of wood used, with hard woods producing about 3 times the ash Editor: Fern Boyd, Kerr Lake Extension Master Gardener Extension Agent: Paul McKenzie and 5 times the nutrients per cord as soft woods. If soil 305 Young St., Henderson, NC 27536 is acid and low in potassium, wood ash is beneficial to 252-438-8188 or 252-257-3640 [email protected] garden plants and lawns. For lawns, apply no more http://vance.ces.ncsu.edu http://warren.ces.ncsu.edu than 15 pounds of ash per 1,000 square feet of lawn. Recommendations for the use of agricultural chemicals are included in this You can also mix wood ash into your compost pile as publication as a convenience to the reader. The use of brand names and any you build it. With its high pH level, it should be used mention or listing of commercial products or services in this publication does not imply endorsement by North Carolina Cooperative Extension nor discrimination with the same precautions as when handling other against similar products or services not mentioned. Individuals who use agricultural strongly alkaline matter such as household bleach. chemicals are responsible for ensuring that the intended use complies with current regulations and conform to the product label. Be sure to obtain current Information for this paragraph comes from Dan information about usage regulations and examine a current product label before Sullivan, Oregon State University Extension soil applying any chemical. For assistance, contact your county Cooperative Extension Agent. scientist. North Carolina State University and North Carolina A & T State University commit themselves positive action to secure equal opportunity regardless of race, color, creed, national origin, religion, sex, age, veteran status, or disability. In addition the two universities welcome all persons without regard to their sexual orientation. North Carolina State University and North Carolina A & T State University, U. S. Department of Agriculture, and local governments cooperating.