Under The Green: Randolph County
Promoting all that the Randolph County Agricultural Center has to offer with it's THREE departments housed "Under The Green". New episodes drop every other Thursday morning at 7am just in time for your morning commute!
Under The Green: Randolph County
Horticulture: What You Should Be Doing Right Now
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Spring is here, and this episode of Under The Green is packed with exactly what Randolph County gardeners need right now. From when to plant summer vegetables and how to handle lawn fertilization, to low-maintenance landscape picks, common spring pests, and the raised bed vs. in-ground debate, Cody Craddock shares timely, practical advice that can save gardeners time, money, and frustration.
You’ll also get a behind-the-scenes look at the new demonstration orchard, upcoming horticulture classes, and how the Extension Master Gardener program is growing at the Ag Center. Whether you’re a first-time gardener or a seasoned plant lover, this episode is full of local, research-based tips to help your yard and garden thrive this season.
Thank you for listening! Follow us on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/RandolphNCCE or Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/randolph_county_extension/
Welcome back to Under the Green, the podcast where we explore the programs, people, and practical knowledge housed inside the Randolph County Agricultural Center. Today we're talking horticulture and more importantly, what you should be doing right now in your yard, garden, or landscape to set yourself up for a successful season. Whether you're planting your first garden, managing a landscape, or just trying to keep your lawn looking decent, this episode is packed with timely advice for our area. So let's dig on in with our horticulture agent, Cody Craddock. Cody, welcome. Tell us a little bit about yourself.
SPEAKER_00Hey, glad to be here. So uh as Chastity mentioned, my name is Cody Craddock. I'm a Randolph County native and I'm the horticulture agent here in Randolph County. I've been with Extension for almost five years now, but working in Randolph for about four of those. I started off in a different county, but was lucky enough to be able to return to my home county here in Randolph. Went to University of Mount Olive for my undergraduate, and I'm about to graduate with my master's of soil science from NC State University. I'm really excited about.
SPEAKER_01Oh, that is exciting. A master's. We have a number of agents here that have been pursuing that or have already done that. We've got one who's pursuing her PhD. So I'm surrounded by a lot of smart people every day. And a fun fact, Cody and I often disagree on how to say his last name. Um so if you heard two different ways of saying it, just know that I was right. Okay. All right, good. Let's just jump on into our questions. For someone brand new to gardening, where should they start this time of year?
SPEAKER_00I think two big things come to mind. Number one is planning, and number two is going to be preparation. On the planning side of things, it can be easy to get overwhelmed with all the different things you want to do. And if you have a sporadic, spontaneous idea and you think, oh, I want to relandscape my front garden bed, my front landscaping bed, you can make a trip to Lowe's or Home Depot, come back, get that done, but then feel like you immediately have other things you need to get done. So planning will help you sort of consolidate the tasks that need to be done. It'll help you make the most out of those trips to the garden supply stores because you won't be you'll be able to better prep and better have an idea of what you're going to need from those stores. So number one is going to be prep uh planting. And then number two is prepping. So prepping all of these beds, making sure that if you're establishing a new planting of some landscaping plants, that you're conducting some soil tests. We have all the soil sampling supplies you need here at the extension office you can get for conducting a soil test on your soils. But going along the lines of more preparation, that might be also preparing the beds and making sure they're weed-free. Um, if you're in a garden, that might mean going and getting some compost and and having those beds filled and ready for ready for plants whenever it is time to plant.
SPEAKER_01What's happening right now in our area that gardeners should be paying attention to?
SPEAKER_00I think every single year we have plenty of false springs. We've had, gosh, I don't know, I don't know how many, two or three of them already this year.
SPEAKER_01It feels like we're it's like warm up, cool down, warm up, cool down. We don't know.
SPEAKER_00It goes from 80 degrees and then we have a cold front and storms roll through and then it's 32 degrees the next night.
SPEAKER_01So the power companies are loving it.
SPEAKER_00Oh, yeah, I'm sure. But the temperature swings that we have, it can be really easy to get tempted and want to go out and plant. And I think this happens every single year, but it's something we need to pay attention to. Our typical last frost date in North Carolina, the Piedmont region of North Carolina, tends to be about April 17th in this area. So the advice I like to give people is come about April 8th, April 10th, take a look at those 10-day forecasts. And if you see temperatures below 50, it's probably too early to plant. But some years you may see that come April 8th, April 9th, the temperatures are forecasted to be above 50 or well above 50. And I'm talking about nighttime low temperatures here. So if it is above 50 degrees, you can go ahead and plant most of your plants problem-free. The only exception there might be your tomatoes and peppers. Those two are a little bit more cold sensitive and they prefer soil temperatures of 50 or higher.
SPEAKER_01What plants or crops are ideal to start right now in Randolph County?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, so it really depends on whether you're starting from seed or you're purchasing transplants, or maybe you already have transplants. But in terms of things you can plant right now out on the garden, we really need to wait a couple weeks before getting the, or at the time of this airing, it would be about a week, I guess, before planting. Because again, we're looking at that April 17th date as our last potential frost date. So, in terms of direct sew stuff, if soil temperatures can support it, again, we're looking at soil temperatures of about 50 or higher, you can go ahead and direct sow things like cucumbers, things like squash, zucchini, many members of the cucurbit family. You can go ahead and sew now. In terms of those transplants, though, tomatoes, peppers, you want to wait until the temperatures hit about 50 degrees. Those sole temperatures hit about 50 degrees for those because they're a little bit more cold sensitive. So to kind of wrap all that back up and restate the question, we want to wait until about April 15th or so, April 15th, 17th to start planting uh most of our garden crops, summer garden crops, that is.
SPEAKER_01So for our busy bees out there who just, you know what, I want to have something, but I just my time is limited and or my attention is limited. It could be either one or a combination of both, like myself. What's something low maintenance that still looks great that you might can put in your yard or your garden? Uh, you pick the topic, but just something low maintenance that still looks pretty good.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, so my mind kind of immediately goes to landscaping plants whenever we're talking about low maintenance stuff that you know is easy, still looks good. I think one of the the classics is going to be azaleas. Um, azaleas, most of them are evergreen azaleas. Now, there's some azaleas that will drop their leaves in the wintertime, but the majority of them are evergreen azaleas, and there's a variety of different colors out there that you can purchase. And they're relatively low maintenance, and they're also well adapted to our soils because our soils tend to be naturally a little bit acidic. So, in terms of a low maintenance plant that isn't going to require a lot of upfront amendments to the soil that need to be done for it to be successful, azaleas are a good candidate for that. Another one that comes to mind would be any of the hollies. Hollies are generally not susceptible to any of the major diseases that things like arborvities or cypress plants may get. So they're a great candidate for a person looking for a low maintenance plant because, again, uh, they're really, really not going to be tolerant, really, really not going to be susceptible to any of those potential diseases that uh come in and wipe out some landscaping plants. In addition to that, too, hollies are deer resistant because if they're fed on by deer, they have a gene that whenever they have pruning on their lower limbs will cause the plant to go thorny. So the leaves will become thorny to at least deter the deer browsing on them. So they'll even be pretty tolerant to deer damage as well. Hollies, that is.
SPEAKER_01I had no idea. That is that is new information for me. Thank you. I know one thing we see a lot around here are hostas. Would that be considered a low maintenance plant?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, absolutely. Hostas is another one. It's a classic plant that people love in their landscape. It's another one that's uh that's fairly easy to grow. Deer do like it, deer love it. So deer will feed on hostas. You will hear people saying that they actually will plant hostas on their property to encourage deer to go elsewhere on the property. I've heard people mention that as a strategy to keep them away from their garden. So if you do have hostas or you are going to grow hostas, they are a magnet for deer. So be sure not to plant many of those or any of those, preferably near spaces where you grow summer vegetables or or have a garden.
SPEAKER_01Yes. And real quick, real quick, while we're on this topic, the one little tree that we should not be planting in North Carolina is what? They put a bounty on it every spring.
SPEAKER_00Oh, you're talking about the Bradford pear. Yes, the stinky fish tree. The Bradford pear, sometimes called the calorie pear. So the a little bit of background on the calorie pear or Bradford pear, as it's as it's called. It was bred as a landscaping tree, obviously, and it was widely planted as a replacement for trees that are cities that were being wiped out by Dutch Elm disease. So a lot of, you know, you've heard of Elm Street in in many towns and cities. That was a very common plant, very common tree that cities had planted. And the the Bradford pear was seen as a potential replacement for a lot of the elm trees that were being wiped out. The unfortunate thing, and the reason that NC State has partnered with the Forestry Service and other organizations to put a bounty on on Bradford pear trees, is they actually crossbreed with wild populations of trees, and they result in these little saplings you see on the side of the road, typically on fence lines where birds have fed on the hybridized fruit and pooped out the seeds and planted the trees on the on the fence lines. But if you're driving around the country and you see these white blooms in typically mid to late February, when we have one of those false springs, that's usually hybrids of the calorie pear that is that is formed. And the unfortunate thing about these calorie pears or Bradford pears is all of them have thorns, the or most of them have thorns, the wild ones that grow. And they're just not a great tree to have hybridizing and and and spreading around the the county and state.
SPEAKER_01Yes, we we hear about those quite frequently around this time of year. So please don't plant those. Do yourself a favor, do your neighbors a favor, just don't plant those, pretty please. Okay, so I don't know if this is a hot topic in your world or a a power struggle or whatever, but raised beds versus in ground, what do you recommend?
SPEAKER_00So this one is up to personal preference. There is a place and a reason that you're gonna have raised beds, but ultimately it comes up, it comes down to personal preference. Now, the situation in which it may be beneficial to have a raised bed as opposed to an in-ground bed is if you know the place you're gonna be keeping your garden is naturally poorly drained. So you can do a pretty quick drainage test, or you may already know the site's poorly drained because it holds water constantly. But you can dig a hole about 12 to 14 inches deep, fill that hole full with water, brimming full of water, and come back 24 hours later. And if any amount of water still stands in that hole, that site is gonna be poorly drained. It's not gonna be a great site for supporting plant growth, especially garden crops. Now, it can support grass because you know grass roots say four to six inches deep, but most garden plants are gonna root a little bit deeper than that. And plants are living, breathing things, just like you and me. They need oxygen, they respire, and when their roots are waterlogged, their roots are covered in water for a prolonged period of time, their roots suffocate and they begin to rot. And that's the main reason you want to prevent plant, prevent or not plant in poorly drained sites. So if you know your site is poorly drained, that's where a raised bed really comes into its own. That's where you're really gonna want to consider or move to using raised beds. But there's other reasons people use raised beds as well. People use them because they're a little bit more accessible. You don't have to uh bow down all the way to the ground to work with your plants. Specifically, if you're raising those beds to maybe waist height, that's gonna be even more convenient because they're the plants are up where you need them to be, where you can work them a little bit easier. But ultimately it does come down to preference, or to an extent, it does come down to preference, I should say.
SPEAKER_01So, what should people be doing for lawn care right now? It's early April. What should what should we be focusing on?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, so two things come to mind fertilization and weed control. So when it comes to fertilization, we always want to make sure we're applying fertilizer to where it coincides with the growth cycle of our grasses. So with fescue grass and most and all cool season grasses, they actually have two periods during the year during which the majority of their growth occurs. So they have a flush of growth that occurs in the springtime, so April, May, typically is when they have a good flush of growth because they're going to need cooler temperatures to grow. The other style of grass that we see, maybe not as frequently planted in Randolph County, is warm season grasses. So think of Bermuda, centipede, Zoisha grass. Those grasses, they have the majority of their growth occur in the summer months. So June, July, August is when those plants or those grasses are really growing. So again, going back to we want the fertilization to coincide with the growth cycle. If you have cool season grasses, which the majority of Randolph County residents are going to have cool season grasses, now is a great time to fertilize. But if you do have warm season grasses by chance, you're listening and you have Zoisha or Bermuda grass, for example, you do want to wait until about June into early July to make those fertilization applications. The other one is uh weed control. So this is the time of year whenever the warm season grasses or warm season weeds begin to pop up. So summer weeds begin to pop up. So with the weed control, you'll need to go through and apply some sort of herbicide to control the weeds. That can be 2-4D, for example, to control most of the broadleaf weeds that occur in a in a cool season uh grass stand of grass. And then you can also utilize that same 2-4D on a warm season stand of grass, but that's going to kill those broadleaf weeds. So uh, for example, dandelions might may pop up and be a problem in a cool season stand of turf. A 2-4D will take out the dandelions that pop up. That's just one example of many that 2-4D will control.
SPEAKER_01What pest or plant problems should people watch out for right now?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, so there's always going to be a pest. We can make a podcast every single day on the pests that that people deal with in their gardens. Um, with the summer garden season approaching, though, I do want to talk about a couple of kind of the bigger pests that people deal with. Number one is going to be aphids. Aphids love to get on plants, they love to eat on plants. They're small, they come in a variety of different colors, and they do have six legs that you can look for to identify these pests. They also have two what are referred to as exhaust pipes. There's a better term for that that entomologists use, but casually people refer to them as exhaust pipes on the tail ends of the aphids. And they're going to feed on plants, typically on the bottom side of the leaves, by sucking out the juices inside of the leaves. So they're they're one that can be pretty problematic. They can wipe out plants pretty quickly. Another one is squash bugs and squash vine bores. Both of those love to attack squash and zucchini. So I've got two tips for that. The first one is to plant multiple rounds of squash or zucchini. So squash and zucchini, they they they mature very quickly in the garden, especially when the temperatures warm up. So as soon as you see your current squash or zucchini plants begin to bloom, that is a great time to go ahead and go ahead and direct seed or even start some inside indoors so that you can replace the plants as soon as they quit bearing fruit. So that's the number one tip is succession planting. Plant multiple rounds of squash because you know that they're going to get annihilated at some point by those pests. Number two is I've heard some other folks and seen some other folks online say that they're able to take aluminum foil and wrap around the vine portion where it connects to the soil, where it goes into the soil with the soil line. They wrap that in aluminum foil and that prevents the vine bore from getting in as easily, which is a very destructive pest on zucchini and squash. So very labor intensive. But if you've got two or three plants and a little bit of aluminum foil, you can do a pretty good job at controlling the squash vine bores on those.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, a few years ago, I got a wild hare and I was like, I am gonna plant myself a little garden in a little raised bed. And I did not do my homework, you know. I very much again, my brain is all over the place sometimes, and I just planted them and wished for the best for them. And they grew and I did get some squash, I got some cucumbers, and then I went out there one day and I saw those little squash bugs, and I was like, what is what is this? I was so offended because I mean, nature should just do this for me, right? It does not work that way. And the bugs are part of nature too. They are, they are, they're just living their life there, and I was just trying to live mine, and it didn't work out for either one of us, really. And I work here, right? Like I had all these resources at my fingertips, but I was like, no, just gonna wing it. Did not work out. So with that, let just segues right into my next question. How can extension help someone who's having trouble with their plants?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, so like Chastity just mentioned, we're a wealth of resources here at the Extension Office. We are happy to help you out with any plant problems you have. I have people coming by, it seems like on the daily in the summertime with bugs or plant samples and all kinds of different things they want me to help them identify. So I think identification of your plant problems and insects is one of the biggest things that Extension can do to help you. But also, not only will we identify it or will I identify it, but I'll help you figure out a solution that's both practical and effective at preventing that problem or getting rid of it for you. So I'm in the example of uh caterpillars, for example, it's one pest we haven't talked about. There's many, many different sprays out there. But I understand that most people want to keep their gardens as organic as possible. You don't want to go spraying chemicals on your garden that you know you're eventually going to consume the vegetables out of. So in the example of caterpillars, there's a lot of organics out there that you can apply that can control those caterpillars. So that's just one example of how we can help you provide both practical and effective solutions that control on these pests and problems.
SPEAKER_01One could say that's what I was trying to do, right? I was just going, I was just trying to be organic with my little raised garden bit. Only I didn't have knowledge to do that either. So it's fine. So what is the resource or service that we offer that people might not know about?
SPEAKER_00I offer a lot of different classes and uh classes from gardening to grafting to mushroom production. And I think that's one thing that that people they they often tell me when they come to those programs. They say, I never knew this existed, and I'm so thankful that I know it exists. And they ask how they can sign up to learn more about classes that I offer. I think that's the number one thing that people may fail to realize that we offer an extension is all these all these different classes and programs and workshops on how to deal with these problems and deal with these issues in the garden. So, in the example of plant bingo that we're gonna offer next week, going back to practical and effective solutions, one of the things we're gonna talk about, it's not going to be just pure plant bingo, pure having fun, but we're gonna also talk about the different garden crops that people grow and practical advice like what varieties to grow and what to do whenever certain issues pop up on these plants. So that's an example of a program that we offer that provides you with that information.
SPEAKER_01One thing that I know you're trying to get back off the ground here in Randolph County is the Extension Master Gardener program. I know you've held one information session and you've got some more planned. Just for some folks that may be interested, you do you want to just give a little plug about what that looks like and what that involves? Because we may have some listeners that's like, you know what? I I really want to do this. So give them your spiel.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. So the Extension Master Gardener program is a program where volunteers are educated on a variety of different gardening topics. And the name can sound intimidating. Extension Master Gardener program. I think that a better name for the program would be Extension Gardener Volunteer, because you don't have to know everything just because you're a Master Gardener. The key is you're willing to volunteer. You're willing to learn and you're willing to make an effort at providing programs and spreading this information in the county. You do not have to know everything there is about gardening. So the Extension Master Gardener program is a will consist of a core training this summer that will take place. It'll be about a 40-hour trip, 40 hours worth of instructional training. I do my best to make it a good blend of hands-on and kind of classroom lecture style learning. And I like to tell people that it's very similar to a college course in the sense that there's a good blend of laboratory session, hands-on activities, and a good blend of lectures where you're going to sit down and you're going to learn in more of a classroom style setting. So it's very experiential learning, lots of experiential learning, lots of hands-on and classroom style learning.
SPEAKER_01And once you've gone through the program, it's it can be a great way to meet people who have a like interest, like yourself, and that you got a passion for it. But the other thing you kind of got to have a passion for to be a part of that program is volunteering and a passion for sharing what you know or what you've learned with the community because that would be part of it. Like you have to log some volunteer hours and with that, maybe go out to our different partners, whether it be an elementary school or the YMCA, places like that that are interested in having a gardening program, or even if it's just a one-off program, it's just a one-time thing. Like we can call on you to do that and have faith that you're going to provide that research-based information that comes straight from NC State and AT down to Cody from Cody to you. So that's the kind of person we're looking for. I think it's a very worthwhile program. And you just have to be the right fit. So if that sounds like you, give Cody a call. Or just go on our Eventbrite and sign up for one of the information sessions and learn even more about it and uh just get excited about it and join.
SPEAKER_00Absolutely. Yeah, you I kind of covered the education side of things that you'll receive out of the Master Gardener program. And Chastity just did a great job of covering kind of what you provide to the program in terms of volunteer service and things like that. So I'll also say we have a lot of great facilities here at the New Ag Center that Master Gardeners will certainly get their hands busy with, like the demonstration and teaching orchard, the demonstration and teaching greenhouse, and the demonstration raised beds. So maybe you're a person that doesn't really want to go and offer a program and be more of a lecturer style educator. Well, you can certainly partner and and help us achieve our goals of educating people by helping us maintain the demonstration beds and being more of a behind the scenes but still very impactful volunteer with the program.
SPEAKER_01Absolutely. And let me tell you, since we've moved into this building, winter was kind of like an adjustment, just getting getting used to being here, learning the little quirks of everything. And now that these little false springs have come about, Cody's office is like two doors down from mine. And every day he's just like a blur. He's either running by my office door on his way out to work in the greenhouse or in the orchard, or I can see him out my window. And he's just out there, just back and forth and back and forth and back and forth. And if he's not doing that, then he's like just booking it on the gator from the workshop, getting some kind of tool or something he needs and back to the orchard. And so you could be a part of that. And this is all new. So you could be a part of establishing this awesome thing. And we need you, we need your help. It's a lot of work, but it can reach a lot of people once it's established and done. And we're gonna have field trips out here, different schools, different kinds of community groups, and then individual programs. So there's so much hands-on education that can happen, but we need you to help it happen.
SPEAKER_00And there are some other things in the works too. We the Master Gardener program is a pretty massive time commitment, I will admit. It it is a lot of time that we ask of you to come to monthly meetings and make that initial investment in your schedule to come out and and be here for all of the initial training. But there's some things on the horizon we're experimenting and maybe looking into offering a program or offering or starting a program where volunteers can be on reserve in a sense, where we kind of call upon you when we need you. So we're looking at doing something like that too.
SPEAKER_01Absolutely. We'll take you at any level. Whether you want to go all the way to the Master Gardener program, or you just like, well, I've got I've got a couple hours here and there every month I can spare, and I just want to get my hands dirty. We'll make it work. You just show up.
SPEAKER_00Not quite just show up.
SPEAKER_01Preferably call first. Let's let's get to know each other a little bit before we we jump on in. But chances are we're gonna take you. All right. So some Cody questions. What's your personal favorite thing to grow and why? Like what do you got going on at your house right now?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, so um I like to talking about low maintenance landscaping stuff. I like to keep stuff as low maintenance as possible. I just went through a couple days ago and pruned all of my azaleas. They were starting to bud out on butt out on their blooms, starting to produce some blooms, but I'm a little very late on that, admittingly. I was very busy with mushroom workshops and stuff. So I wasn't able to get to that in February like I wished I would have been able to. But um pruning my landscape right now. This weekend, actually, I was going through and refreshing all of my raised garden beds and getting some soil put in those, some compost put in those to get them ready for the gardening season this year. So I enjoy landscaping things. I'll admit I'm not much of a of a lawn person. I'm more of a if it's green and it needs to be mowed, I'll mow it. But I don't really get too into uh really trying to have a perfectly manicured lawn, but I do do appreciate learning a lot about lawn care.
SPEAKER_01Yes. And then out here, see, we keep him so busy at work, he really has to have those load maintenance plants at home. Tell us just real quickly what is going on out here in the orchard, what we've got planted, and what by the time we air this podcast, the whole thing will be planted and done. So tell us what's gonna be out there.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, so I I've been able to just rattle this right off the top of my head. I've I've said it so many times, explaining it to people, but we're gonna have apples. We're gonna have both high-density apples and traditional density apples. I'll explain what that means here in just a minute. We'll also have pears, we'll have peaches, cherries, plums, and Christmas trees on the tree fruit side of the demonstration orchard. The difference between high density apples and traditional density apples is high density apples can squeeze in about four to five times the number of trees per acre. You're planting them at a much higher density, hence the name there. They're grown on a different rootstock, they're grown on a full dwarf rootstock that maintains that tree at about eight to ten feet high. So that tree at its maximum height will be about 10 feet tall, depending on the cultivar that you choose. And the traditional density trees, they're about 150 to 180 trees per acre. And those are planted on a different rootstock that allows that tree to get a bit larger. So they do require a bit more space, about 14 to 18 feet tall, depending on the cultivar with those trees. So we don't have anywhere near an acre worth of apples out there, thankfully. That'd be a ton of work for me. We only have uh two rows of each, two rows of the high density and two rows of the traditional density. So about 55 to 60 trees in total. And then on the small fruit side of things, or I'm calling it small fruit, but uh think of like berries, grapes, things like that. So we've got vinifera grapes, sometimes they're referred to as wine grapes. So these are going to be varieties of grapes that you can use to produce wines with. They're not commonly grown in Randolph County, but they can be grown in Randolph County. There's been some research and some breeding programs that have developed varieties that are suitable for our area. We'll also have muscadines, we'll have blackberries, raspberries, blueberries, and figs as well. So a variety of different fruit crops. All in all, the orchard footprint is about 0.8 of an acre worth of land that's occupied here at the Ag Center.
SPEAKER_01And how long will it take before we start seeing fruit from some of these things?
SPEAKER_00It depends on what exact crop you're referring to. So apples, it can take three to five years, depending on how good of a job I do at establishing those trees. Some of the other crops, like blackberries, for example, we could potentially see a small fruit crop off of those next year. So really exciting.
SPEAKER_01Very cool. Yes, and we're gonna use the things that are is grown out there for different programs. Uh, like Jennifer may use it for um some cooking programs. Uh, Sophie may use it for local foods. Obviously, 4-H may use it. And of course, Cody's gonna use it on the growing, maintaining side of things. But we've got big plans.
SPEAKER_00Sophie and I have plans to offer a program where we literally will talk to small farmers about how they can take it from planting it all the way to turning it into a value-added product. So think of blackberries, for example. We could teach farmers, small-scale farmers, or any size farmer how to take a crop and grow it from a plant all the way up to harvest it and turning that harvested product into a value-added product that is shelf stable. Take, think of blackberry pies that can be frozen or blackberry jam, for example. So that's a really exciting program that Sophie and I have in the works.
SPEAKER_01Cody, I think that we've covered a lot today. And we've covered lawns and gardens and beginners and old hats and the Master Gardener program and some upcoming programs, some future plans, the orchard, so on, so forth. We've covered a lot of stuff today. So I thank you for being here. You're always easy to talk to. Appreciate that very much. Is there anything else you want to add before we go?
SPEAKER_00I think all I'll add is is if you're not already, sign up for my newsletter. You can go to our website, scroll down to the bottom, click stay in touch with us, and sign up for my newsletter. That way you can hear more about the exciting programs that I offer, but also be notified about other relevant gardening topics and read some articles and learn more.
SPEAKER_01Yes, and of course, always you can Google us, uh, give us a call, 336-318-6000. That'll go to our main line and give you an option to choose any one of our agents or staff members, and we'll be happy to help you. Thank you for helping us break down what people should be doing right now to set themselves up for success this season. It's clear that a little timing, planning, and the right information can go a long way in the garden and landscape. Next time on Under the Green, we'll be joined by Hannah, our digital skills agent, to talk about how technology, connectivity, and digital literacy are opening new doors for our community from everyday skills to opportunities you may not even realize are available. Thanks for listening, and we'll see you next time right here under the green.