42May 13, 2015

It’s funny what some really warm weather can do to our plants. Last weekend, we had tiny, just beginning to unfold leaves on our maple tree. Sunday afternoon, we had full size leaves on the maple tree.

You would think that with 9 feet of snow this past winter, we would have waterlogged soil. With windy and sunny days, coupled with low humidity and a lack of rain, the soil in many areas is bone dry. Many of our flowering shrubs need water to open their flowers and to produce leaves. You should be checking your trees, shrubs and perennials to see if they need to be watered. During the last week, we have had many shipments of plants come into the garden center. On some days, we have to water two or three times per day due to the wind, heat and sun. Please check your plants for dry soil and water accordingly.

Many people gave or received hanging flowering baskets for Mother’s Day. If you want to keep those plants flowering, you need to fertilize the plants on a regular schedule. The plants will draw so much of the nutrients out of the soil in 2 weeks that soon the plants will stop flowering if you don’t replace the nutrients in the soil. We sell a very good quality fertilizer called a Blossom Booster. It is high in phosphorous. Your plants, to produce flowers, use Phosphorous. You would add this product to a watering can and fertilize your hanging baskets every 10 to 14 days. By giving your hanging baskets enough fertilizer you will have abundant blooms the rest of the season.

Ants appear to be everywhere! They are coming into the house and they are scurrying all over the lawn. I think that in many cases, they are looking for water. Ant colonies need to maintain a certain moisture level in the colony or the colony will die. With a lack of rain and very dry soil, the ants go looking for water. If you have a problem with ants in your home or in your yard, we have products that will control the ants.

As the daffodils and tulips begin to lose their flowers, it is important that you fertilize the bulbs. Tulips, in particular need a lot of fertilizer on a regular basis to store food in the bulb for next years flowers. Once the flowers have gone by, you can cut the flower stalks off, but do not remove the leaves. The leaves help to make the food that is stored in the bulb. You should use the Blossom Booster that I mentioned earlier to fertilize your bulbs. You should mix up the fertilizer and pour it on the soil near where the leaves come out of the ground. This should be done each week until the leaves of the bulbs turn yellow and begin to die back. If you keep up with the fertilizing of the bulbs, you will have nice flowers in 2016.

Well, that’s all for this week. I’ll talk to you again next week.