Dial-a-Garden Message

for the Week of Monday, October 26, 2009

Lenore Donovan, Advanced Master Gardener
Colorado State University Extension Tri River Area

Thank you for calling Dial-a-Garden. This message was recorded on Monday, October 26, 2009.

If you have a warm season lawn such as Buffalograss or Blue Grama, you should be able to spray out any cool-season or winter-annual weed grasses now. Your dormant grass will be affected very little, if at all, and the weedy grasses are easily visible. Use a product that has glyphosate as the active ingredient; there are many such products available.

Fall is a great time to start or rebuild a compost pile. Leaves, winter annual weeds, and plant debris from the vegetable garden are all good candidates. The winter annuals work well because they add a lot of “green” (high nitrogen) material and they won’t go to seed until late winter or early spring. Avoid adding weed seeds to your pile unless you are very confident that it is heating up enough to kill them. If you have your lawn aerated this fall, you can add the aeration plugs to the pile too. You’ll need a location about three feet by three feet and can pile up three feet deep, in order to have enough material that the pile will heat up properly. Shredded material composts the fastest, as it provides more surface area for the microbes to act on. Turn the pile often and keep it evenly moist for best results. If you have too many leaves and not enough fresh grass or weeds (they should be close to equal by volume) you may need to work in a handful of nitrogen. Call the Master Gardeners at 244-1836 for more information on getting started or troubleshooting.

The fall planted bulbs can still be planted into November. If you have ordered some by mail and they haven’t arrived yet, prepare the area where you will be planting them and cover it with a thick layer of organic mulch to keep it warm.

If your trees or shrubs had problems with leaf spot diseases this year, be sure to get the leaves raked up this fall. These disease organisms overwinter in leaf debris, and are blown or splashed back on to the emerging leaves in the spring. Unless you are very sure of your compost pile’s ability to heat up, it is probably best to bag up these leaves and send them to the landfill. In Mesa County, you can drop them off at the composting facility at the landfill, Tuesday through Saturday, at no charge. The facility at the landfill is temperature controlled so you won’t be spreading disease. The City of Grand Junction has begun it’s leaf removal program; see the city’s website at http://www.gjcity.org/CityDeptWebPages/PublicWorksAndUtilities/StreetsTraffic/LeafPickUpProgram.htm for the details.

Spiders frequently move indoors in the fall, seeking warmth, moisture, and food. They feed on live insects (and other spiders) so controlling these food sources will make your home less inviting to them. Spiders should be relocated instead of killed whenever possible; they are beneficial organisms which aid in pest control. Very few spiders are aggressive, and bites to humans are very rare. Some, like the “cat-faced” spider, can become quite large, but they are harmless and should be left alone. Please see our fact sheet at www.ext.colostate.edu/pubs/insect/05512.html for more information and good pictures for identification.

We lose more plants to dehydration over the winter, than we do to cold weather. To keep your plants healthy over the winter, be sure to give them a good soak now and then about once a month through the winter. Water on a day when the air temperature is above freezing, and early enough so the water can soak in before the nightime freeze sets in. Even areas where the soil is frozen will absorb water, although they will do it slowly. Please see our fact sheet at www.westernslopetrees.org for additional information on winter watering.

The Master Gardeners are still available to answer your gardening questions at our Mesa County office at 244-1836. These volunteer educators are a terrific community resource. Our apprentice course is being offered again this winter. If you would like to learn more about this wonderful educational opportunity, please drop Susan Rose a note at www.susan.rose@mesacounty.us or give her a call at 244-1841.

Thank you for calling Dial-a-Garden. This message will be updated next week; have a great week!