In the Garden with UC Master Gardeners
An informative garden podcast and weekly radio show on 88.9 FM KUCI Irvine, California, hosted by University of California Master Gardeners of Orange County, California. Podcasts cover home horticulture, pest management and sustainable landscape practices. Listen to researched based information on all things gardening. "In the Garden with UC Master Gardeners" airs Thursday mornings on 88.9 FM KUCI from 8:30 to 9:30 a.m.
In the Garden with UC Master Gardeners
This Month in the Garden - April
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Once again, it is time for another This Month In The Garden – our regular In The Garden with UC Master Gardeners show for what to do in the garden for a given month. It’s April so there is so much to focus on this month. It’s the “bloomiest time of the year”! Perennials from last year are taking off again! Vegetable gardening is always the big consideration right now so we’ll open the show with lots about everyone’s favorite veggie/fruit/veggie ... what have you – the Tomatoes! We’ll say tomatoes, plural, because you won’t believe the variety that is available. You’ll have a lot to decide in terms of color and size of fruit, ultimate size of plant, how you will support each plant. And of course, is the plant Determinate (D) or Indeterminate (I)? Learn what that means. Enough for an entire show on Tomatoes? Stay tuned for that coming soon!
The second half of the show is on Flowers! Our co-host Teena Spindler is the expert on that! She and Katrina Kirkeby have been doing these shows for around 12 years now and they play off each other wonderfully. Join us!
Welcome to In the Garden with University of California Master Gardeners. I'm Tina Spindler and I'm here with Katrina Kirkabee, and today we're going to talk about April.
SPEAKER_02Welcome, spring. How exciting. April in the garden.
SPEAKER_01Oh, there's so much happening. It's one of the busiest months. Last month we talked about the switch from cool season to warm season plants. We hope you got started in March. But you know, stuff happens and you might not have gotten started. Were you able to start switching over, Katrina?
SPEAKER_02Yes, we were able to start switching over, but you know, we're still switching, and as things go, we're planting more stuff and succession in the vegetable garden. So there's plenty of work to do for in March and April.
SPEAKER_01There is. And even though I got started with um some tomatoes and peppers, I didn't have room to start all of the things I wanted because my peas were still going and my lettuces were still going. So in April, I'm going to be planting uh, you know, more of the squash type plants and green beans so that I can have my full summer garden get going.
SPEAKER_02I know. It is so much fun to be in the garden right now. You know, everything, the weather is beautiful. Right now it's pretty been pretty hot. So I I don't know about you, but I tend to go early mornings gardening because it gets hot. It's been the weather's been so different this year.
SPEAKER_01In Southern California, we we had a very, very hot March that we weren't used to. And so the tomatoes did love it, I have to say. They they've grown like because I just bought small ones and they've tripled their size since I planted them. Yeah. So that the tomatoes liked it, but the cool season stuff, what spinach and lettuce I had, of course, that's all bolted as a result of the warm weather.
SPEAKER_02So needless to say, we're starting off today in the vegetable garden.
SPEAKER_01We've been talking about vegetables, so we're we have vegetables on our brain. And and we want we want to start with veggies because April is a really critical month for veggies in Southern California. As I mentioned, we have you know cool season and warm season, and the turnover time is pretty important. We do want to do that in in March and April. Uh, you can continue to plant warm season stuff in June and July, uh, May, June, and July. But think about it, if if you plant it early, you're gonna get the harvest earlier.
SPEAKER_02I get the harvest early and then you have less issues. You know, I find that you first of all, what we have to do if you haven't prepared your soil, prepare your soil, get your garden together, sharpen your tools, you know, just get everything laid out before you start doing stuff. Exactly. Sometimes I don't, but I get too excited. But I like getting stuff started early because, like you said, we get to start eating it earlier, and it's just it just starts the whole rotation.
SPEAKER_01Well, I'm such a glutton for tomatoes. Um, in years past, I would try and start them in the second half of February because I just want those tomatoes to eat so badly. But I learned my lesson because occasionally we do get some really cold nights at the end of February, and you can, you know, lose your tomatoes. So I quit doing that. Now I wait till March, but I'm sure I'm in a hurry to get them in in March. But if you haven't, uh go ahead and put them in in April. And uh the question is, you know, do you want to plant with six packs or do you want to plant four inches, or do you want to plant gallons? Uh personally, I would probably in April choose four-inch plants, uh, not the six packs. They're generally, you know, smaller. And again, I want to get the jump on you know those tomatoes and get them quickly. Uh, you can plant gallons if you can find them because they'll they'll be, gosh, what would you think those will be? 14, 18 inches tall if you buy them in a gallon.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, but I also find it doesn't take that long to go from the six inches to a gallon. I don't know. They're going really, really fast, and uh I tend to just get the the six inches are just really nice. And then what I also like about the six inches versus the or four inches versus the six pack, I like variety. I don't want six of one tomato plant. That they take up room. I love tomatoes, but unless I find somebody to give them to, I really don't want six. I want to try of the same thing. I'd rather have six, one of each.
SPEAKER_01So that's that's what I do too. Except for, there's only one type that I buy a six-pack of, and that's the Romas. And the reason I buy a six-pack of the Romas is those are for folks who don't know, that is a type of a tomato that you use to make sauces with. And the reason we use that to make sauces, two reasons. One, it's a meaty tomato, so there's a lot of tomato meat for your sauce. But the other reason is it's in the class of tomatoes called determinant, which means that they set their, they flower, set their fruit, and it matures kind of all at once. It's in a a short window. And the reason that's good for sauce is because you need lots of tomatoes to make sauce.
SPEAKER_02You know, I think we could segue right here because we haven't talked about this very recently, is there's two types of tomatoes, there's determinate and indeterminate. And so many people don't know the difference between the types. Now I tend to purchase mostly indeterminate because I look, Tina, why don't you explain the difference between determinate and indeterminate?
SPEAKER_01Well, as I mentioned, the determinate kind of flowers set fruit and it matures in a relatively narrow time frame. Whereas the deter the indeterminates keep growing and growing and growing and until they die of disease or frost hits them. We've all probably experienced an indeterminate tomato that wants to climb up and over its cage, up and over a fence, up and over the whole garden, because they just don't quit growing and they don't quit setting fruit as long as the weather conditions are correct.
SPEAKER_02And you know, as for a home gardener, I don't need 50 tomatoes on Thursday. I would like some tomatoes on Monday and Tuesday and a little here and a little there. So if you're going to look for tomatoes and it's for your personal garden and you're not making sauce, look for possibly think about it indeterminate, because it's really nice where you could get tomatoes for a long period of time. Like how many tomatoes can you? I can eat a lot of tomatoes, but I can't eat 50 tomatoes at one time. So indeterminate is a really nice thing. And I also find out if I put it in the right place, that sometimes it's called wintering over. At the end of the season, I plant a few more tomato plants, and I might get tomatoes it get some tomatoes in December, January, February, and in March this year, I still had some uh sun gold tomatoes. That's amazing. So from last year. From last year. Wow. So they are kind of scrawny and you know, you don't get so many, but um so that's something to think about when you're looking at it is not only like what's the name of the tomato and how tall does it get, but look and see if it's determinate and indeterminate.
SPEAKER_01Right. One of the things that you may not realize if you see a tomato that's labeled patio tomato, that most likely will be determinant because it doesn't get as tall. And so when it's labeled patio, the implication is that you're gonna grow it in a pot on a patio. And so, just so you know, if you see one labeled patio something tomato, that means that it is a determinant tomato. So don't expect that it's going to, you know, give you tomatoes all year all year long. Um, but yeah, just choose the ones that you think you'll like. Uh, personally, I I choose just a couple heirlooms rather than the hybrids. The heirlooms are more susceptible to disease. Uh, some of them have amazing flavor, but I've had years where the heirlooms just got disease and I they just didn't do well. And since I have limited space, I usually choose to plant um some tried and true hybrids, you know, like celebrity or early girl or um big beef, uh, or as Katrina mentioned, um Sungold.
SPEAKER_02Sungold is a wonderful lit, it's my very favorite little cherry tomato. And I I can't we eat that like candy, and the little boy next door comes over and he stuffs his mouthful of them. So it's a if you can find it, it is just it's it's a one I you like sun gold, don't you?
SPEAKER_01I do. I always plant for the two cherries that I plant. I do Sungold and I do Sweet 100. That's a red one. And the reason I do the two is that if you make um a tomato salad kind of thing, to have the red and the gold together is super pretty. Or if you're gonna uh do um, I like to do kind of a skewer bruchetta as an appetizer where I put one of those mozzarella balls, a folded leaf of basil, and then the red tomato and the yellow tomato, the gold tomato, and it just makes a pretty appetizer on a long, you know, toothpick.
SPEAKER_02It it's beautiful, and also the salads with the color and multicolors, it's just super, super pretty. And throw some basil in there and some mozzarella, and you know, it's just this decadent dish, and it's not a big thing.
SPEAKER_01Oh, it's making me so hungry. There's no picking hungry. My mouth is watering. Um I can't wait. So, so yeah, and if you have very limited space, or you know, you're in a a townhome or you only have a patio, uh, the cherry tomatoes will give you the most bang for your buck because you get you know a lot of fruit over a long period of time. Uh planting like the big beef slicing tomato, wonderful to have those if you have the space. But uh the the bigger the tomato, the less fruit that you get in terms of numbers of fruit, and the longer it takes for it that fruit to mature and be ripe. And then you have a big plant.
SPEAKER_02Yes, you know, that's so if you're in a smaller place, realize that you have to have enough room for that larger plant. Exactly. And you know, a lot of people you're right, a lot of people don't think about it, they go, I want a big beefy tomato, but if it's just you and somebody else, that's a lot big tomato to you know to eat. And also it is takes up space. It does. Yeah, and it takes longer because I'm excited about getting tomatoes. I want something right away, so I kind of plant something like an early girl, and then something that takes longer, so because I know I'm not going to get that bigger tomato right away.
SPEAKER_01Right. So, um, and then just to note, you do need to be ready to trellis or uh cage your tomatoes right when you plant them. Don't make the mistake of planting them and say, Oh, I'll get back to that later, I'll get the cages later, because before you know it, that plant is starting to grow and it's falling over on the ground. So be sure you use either a stake method where you actually tie the main stem of the tomato to the stake and buy a tall stake, an eight-foot stake, pound it into the ground when you plant that tomato, and then tie it up. And then if you're using that stake method, it's a good idea to prune out the side shoots of that tomato because they're just eventually gonna lay on the ground. So you can prune out the side shoots and then just use that main stem tomato if you're gonna use this that kind of staking method. You can also get tomato cages, but but don't get the regular ones that you see at the big box stores, they're not gonna be big enough for your tomatoes. No, they're for you put your dahlias in them or something. They do. They're good for dahlias, they're good for peppers, actually. I use them on peppers. Yeah. Um, but if if you want to cage them, I recommend getting uh it's it's called concrete reinforcing wire, and it uh is like in a square. But the concrete reinforcing wire is uh in a flat sheet, and uh it's wire that is spaced about what would you say, four inches apart?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, about four or five, six inches, something like that apart.
SPEAKER_01And you just buy a sheet of it and then you turn turn it into a cylinder and just use zip ties to close the cylinder, and then use that as your tomato cage, uh, because that will give you about a three foot, two and a half, three foot in diameter cage. And then I hold them upright by by pounding a steak into the ground next to it and zip tie it to the steak. So that's another good way.
SPEAKER_02You know, and that's it, it's a really good way, and but there's also some other taller that might be a little bit easier to assemble because not everybody is as um handy as you are, Tina, or have a husband that's really good at helping out. So there's some already pre-made that are and you could stack them like four feet and or three feet and another four feet on top of it, but just don't go and buy those cute little colorful ones that are kind of almost like in a V shape at the box store. They they you your tomatoes will outgrow that.
SPEAKER_01They will. Unless it's a determinate tomato, you you could probably use that for a determinate tomato.
SPEAKER_02And there's a place for determinate, you know, those little patio tomatoes, you have a small, you're in a condo and you have a small little area, those potato pat patio pot uh tomatoes can work really nice, but just realize you're going to be getting them all at one time. Right. So if you go on vacation, you might have to have them when you come back, or you might freeze them or dehydrate them or do something, but you're or have a party and invite a bunch of people over. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Um, the final uh way to trellis tomatoes, which is what I do, is uh to use that concrete reinforcing wire uh to grow them on a trellis. So you just leave the concrete reinforcing wire uh flat, you pound in the tree stakes, those you know, tall eight-foot tree stakes into the ground as far apart as the width of the concrete reinforcing wire. You just zip tie that concrete reinforcing wire to the tree posts and plant your tomatoes there, and then as the side chutes grow and the main chute grow, you just tie them with that green tape to your uh trellis wire. And uh so now you're growing it kind of if you know the term a spallier, uh, when they grow trees flat horizontally against a wall, that's called a spaliering. You're basically a spaling this tomato, and the advantage of that is it takes up less space instead of a you know three-foot-wide tomato cage, you're growing your tomato in about a six-inch wide space, which means that in front of that tomato you can plant other stuff, you know, peppers or eggplant or whatever.
SPEAKER_02And it's also beautiful, and it also gets a lot of air to the plant, so it helps with disease and pests, and you could see things happening. So it's a really lovely way to do it, especially if you have a smaller garden, it is very uh space efficient.
SPEAKER_01And that's why I do it um, because I I have raised beds um that are you know five feet by uh ten feet, and that way I can get about you know four tomato plants along that you know 10-foot row of trellisine material, um, and it works great. So it's time to plant tomatoes, everybody.
SPEAKER_02Tomatoes is there's nothing like homegrown tomato.
SPEAKER_01There's not. They're so good.
SPEAKER_02They're so good. Uh Tina, when you were talking about the green tape, well, you can buy the green tape pretty much at any box store or nursery, and it's kind of a stretchy tape. And what I like about it is it doesn't touch your plant. So it it's very gentle on your plant, and they it comes in uh like kind of like masking tape rolls, you know, and it's different widths, and it's it's just a nice thing to have in your garden toolkit to tie things up with, and the green kind of matches everything, so it it it doesn't ruin your aesthetics, and it's just a wonderful little tape to keep around.
SPEAKER_01Yes, but if if you are um uh conscious about being uh you know recycling things, um the other thing that I've done is I've cut up old t-shirts and used strips of t-shirts, you know, to tie up the tomatoes. Um not as uh unobtrusive because you have this white t-shirt, but it it's also flexible and um it's not plastic. So if if folks are you know anti-plastic, that's that's another thought. But the other thing I wanted to mention about those trellises, uh, and of course you can buy trellises if you don't, you know, want to use this concrete reinforcing wire. But the other thing that's great about um using these trellises in your veggie garden is that you can use them to also grow peas and green beans and some of the squashes. You can grow cucumber, you know, along a trellis, and then that takes up less space. Um, you could even do zucchini, it's a little harder to tie up. Um, so I often don't try to tie up the zucchini, but but you can if you want. Uh so consider using trellises uh to you know preserve space so that you can grow more stuff.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, it's it's great, especially in limited spaces. It's wonderful. If we have a lot of space, it's still nice. You know, we have a um in one of our vegetable gardens, we have a um wire fence that goes around it. And we use that as part of our trellis. Oh, yeah, that's just let it grow up that wire fence and you know, we tie it off, and it's wonderful.
SPEAKER_01That's that's nice. Then you don't have to install anything. Um, so anyway, before we move from veggies, let's just summarize what you want to plant this time of year. Uh, you want to plant the tomatoes, as we've discussed, peppers, eggplant, anything in the squash family, and that would include cucumbers, zucchini, pumpkins, watermelon, all of that stuff is in the squash family. Uh, just remember that a lot of the squash family plants like melons and uh the squashes, like zucchini and other squashes, take a lot of space. So be sure that you are doing it uh in an area where you where you have sufficient space. Because at one uh you know, a watermelon plant will will spread, gosh, what would you say, uh, Katrina, in like an eight-foot circle if you oh more than that. I mean, we have ours running 20 feet down a whole row. There you go. I don't grow them because I don't have space.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, we don't grow, you know, we have to be very big. I have a bigger vegetable garden than Tina does, but we still, even though how big ours is, we have to be particular because these things can really, really, really grow. And sometimes if you have a smaller garden, you might opt for smaller plants and then you have more production and greater variety. So when you're planting this, if do you want to just have a pumpkin plant in your whole garden? Right. If you have a small garden, because it's gonna take up your small garden, a pumpkin plant, or do you want to have you know a little bit of this and a little bit of that? I would personally choose having numerous vegetables that I could come and get and they grow more, um, and I could get it more frequently than growing a pumpkin. Now, I tell you, I don't know about you, Tina. I've grown pumpkins before. They never come at Halloween.
SPEAKER_01It's usually before Halloween.
SPEAKER_02We get them before Halloween, and I'm like, oh my goodness. So um, if you decide to grow some of these larger plants, just be aware it will either take up your whole garden or it'll grow over your whole garden, or you'll get so frustrated you'll pull up the darn thing before it gets where it produced because you can't have anything else in it.
SPEAKER_01Right. So I will I will mention though, um my my son um has you know young children, one's a young elementary school child, and and because he's my son and was inundated with gardening his whole life, he has volunteered to be the parent, the you know, volunteer for their little school garden. And he does plant uh watermelon and pumpkin every year because it's such a treat and so amazing for the children. So you plant it, you know, this time of year or next month, and then by the time they come back in September, you have pumpkins and watermelons for them to see. Now that works at the school garden because even though they have raised beds, he'll let the pumpkin or the watermelon plants spill over, you know, into the pathways so that you know there's enough room for it to grow. But if you do have kids, uh you might want to try growing, you know, one of those just because it's so much fun for them to see it. Well, I have fun with it anyway.
SPEAKER_02But you here's another idea. If you have fruit trees, we have fruit trees on a hill, and I always run out of space, even though we have two huge vegetable gardens, and I will plant cantaloupes and pumpkins and whatever on the hill. On the hill where it gets water from my fruit trees, and then it cascades down the hill where I have more room for it.
SPEAKER_01What a great idea!
SPEAKER_02It works out really well, and it's like I've run out, I can't believe we've run out of room, but that's a lot of that's a place where I'll plant a lot of my larger vining plants and just lit a cascade down the hill.
SPEAKER_01Great idea. If you have water, that's the key in California. You got you got to make sure you have access to regular water.
SPEAKER_02Well, and I put them where I have the fruit trees. So they're right. Yeah, the other roots are right at the drip line. Yeah, perfect. So the fruit tree gets a little bit, and my watermelon gets a little bit, and my cantaloupe gets a little bit, and you know it's Tends to work out and it saves room in my vegetable garden.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. Before we leave vegetables, I want to finish our list of what to plant. And I don't think I mentioned beans yet. And there's, you know, the green beans, the vining beans, and then there's also the beans that you can uh, you know, harvest in shell beans, dry beans. Those are all good to plant this year. If I I don't have that much room, so I l usually limit myself to the green beans, and I love the French filet type green beans because they're narrow and sweet and tender.
SPEAKER_02You turn me on to those. Those are my favorite. Aren't they great? Well, they're wonderful. I just I can't believe I like grew the others, you know, or just really happy with these now. It's life is so much easier. Yeah, I love those.
SPEAKER_01And then some folks do like to plant corn, um, particularly if you have a big garden. Um, I don't plant it because I don't have enough room for corn. And even Katrina, I don't think you plant corn anymore.
SPEAKER_02Not anymore. I mean, it takes up so much so much space for what you get, and then the problem of pest, and it's just you'd rather plant other things and life is too busy.
SPEAKER_01If you do want to plant corn though, um do plant it in a square, not in a single row, because they need to pollinate each other. And if they're in a square rather than a long line, the pollination will be better. And also only plant one variety of corn because corn will cross-pollinate. And so if you think you're getting, you know, you want white corn and yellow corn, if they cross-pollinate each other, you're not gonna be sure of you know which one you're you're gonna get. So unless you have a very large garden and you can separate them with some distance, uh it's better to just plant one variety so you know what you're gonna get.
SPEAKER_02And before we do leave vegetable gardens, two things I want to cover is it could be hot this month, and we have these baby vegetables. So you don't want they need water, their little root systems aren't very strong or very deep yet. So you gotta make sure they're that you water them. Okay, on a hot day, you gotta go out and check and make sure they have the enough water that they could survive.
SPEAKER_01So they'll be so important. And and I'll just share one of my tips. Um, if I have just planted and we do get like Santa Ana conditions where everything's gonna be way hot and sunny, um, I've been known to grab my beach umbrellas and put the beach umbrellas in the raised bed so that they are shading those plants for you know a day or two while the weather is super hot. Yeah. Yeah. So just make sure they don't blow away. Yeah, if the wind's blowing, you can't you can't do it.
SPEAKER_02But if it's had my beach umbrella end up in my neighbor's yard.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, but if the wind's not blowing and it's just when it's hot, you can you can shade it with a beach umbrella. So make sure they're watered, and also we need to talk a little bit about pests. We do, and this will apply to we're gonna talk about flowers in a minute, but um, but this will apply to both veggie gardens and uh flower gardens. So April is a big month for snails and all pests. So be sure you're baiting for snails. Uh, there's different kinds of bait out there. Uh there's one that is um iron-based, and that one is organic, it just adds iron to the soil. If you are in a vegetable garden and you want to have organic products, then you know look for that one. Um also don't put bait out while you have pets outside or small children, uh, because they may think that it's something they should pick up and eat. Uh, so always bait or spray, you know, when kids and pets are not around. If you're using some sprays like insecticidal soap to control aphids because aphids get pretty busy during April, do any of your spraying in the morning when it's cool. You do not want to put spray on plants in the heat of the day. Um, it can, depending on the type of spray, it can burn your plants. And then the other one that I use a lot this time of year is um BT, Bacillus theryngensis, and that is an organic product that kills uh the larva of different you know, moths, and but it also kills the larva of butterflies. So the reason that we use it uh in the vegetable garden is for those lovely tomato hornworms, those nasty green tomato hornworms. Uh the BT will control the larvae of that. So those insecticidal soap, the BT are probably and the snail bait are probably my three products that I use the most. Same here. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02And do you uh tend to, I tend to make a barrier of the snail bait. And I just kind of put a barrier around my plants. So I don't have to do every plant, but on the outside of the edge of the boxes or of the raised beds, I put the snail bait because once they crawl over it, that's when they get it. So it's like putting a fort around your your goods.
SPEAKER_01That is a that is a great idea. And I actually do it um at the bottom of my raised bed, you know, where the plants on the pathway, right? Around that edge of the pathway, so that as they're walking to the raised bed, they don't even get a chance to get in it.
SPEAKER_02Um, so and it's real, real important. We're also excited about planting, but it's right now is if you pay attention to any of the insects or the problems that you might be having, like the aphids, investment now for a future gain. Because if you catch it right away, it is so much easier to deal with. And those aphids you can spray off a lot of times just with a hose. You can't. And I have learned my lesson, like, oh, I just don't I don't like dealing with pests like I've done before in the past. Oh, let me just do it tomorrow or the next day or the next day. And then by the time I get to it, the plants infested. So if you see something, take a moment and take care of it now. Yeah, you really it's you'll save so much time and you'll have healthier plants and life will be easier. That's for sure.
SPEAKER_01So, yeah, so let's move on to the pretty part of the garden. Oh, this is Tina's favorite part. She's smiling already. Tina is our flower girl. Yes, I love flowers. Uh, and and the reason I especially love April is because everything's blooming. It's the bloomiest month of the year. It's so beautiful. Yeah. It is just you may still have some of your um cold season annuals, like your snapdragons and and stock uh might still be blooming, but but they're gonna poop out as the weather gets hot. Uh so this is the month to plant and and last month. I started planting last month, our our warm season annuals. And also it's the month to plant the blooming perennials because you'll notice a ton of perennials start blooming in April. And so that means the nurseries will be selling them because they love to sell things that are in blue.
SPEAKER_02Also help sometimes. I'll see a name on something, I go, what is that plant? So when they're blooming, I'm like, oh yeah, that's that's that plant.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. So anyway, the thing you want to look for in the nursery, hopefully you can find them in six packs because those are a lot more, you know, reasonably priced. And if you have a a a decent sized yard, um you know, a six-pack will will do you a lot better than than a five-dollar single, you know, four-inch plant. But anyway, the ones that you want to look for, um, my favorites anyway, are Aduratum, um, Silocha, Marigolds, Cosmos, Nicoshiana. Uh, of course, you you can you can buy um petunias. Um I'm over petunias. I think I just saw too many petunias over my lifetime, but but they do provide wonderful color, so you can often find petunias, um, verbena, uh, sweetelisum, of course, lobelia. And in the shade, um consider coleus. I I have come to really love coleus, you know, because it has that different colored foliage, and that's a great way to get some color in the shade. Now, have you had any issues with mewleybugs? I have not.
SPEAKER_02Could do you get those on your stopped growing of years ago. I just had problems with bugs. Bummer. So maybe it's time to I maybe I know a little bit more about gardening now than I did.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yeah. Yeah, no, I haven't had, uh, but I don't I often don't plant, I plant a few in the ground, uh, but I mostly plant them in the pots in pots. So maybe that's one reason why I don't have as many problems is I do love coleus in pots. And you know, there's they they come in all different kinds of colors. They're beautiful. One of my favorites is just the kind of the lime green one. Yes, because I like to plant that with um other shade flowers, and then the lime green is just a really nice contrast to, you know, like a yellow begonia or or a pink begonia or something. So uh yeah, consider those. Um I would wait to plant zinnias until next month, till May. Zinnia really like a lot of heat. Uh, so I I typically don't plant those until a little bit later. Um but if you're at the nursery and you find zinnias in six packs and you just are gonna get them, don't worry about it. You know, it's just if you still have some cool season stuff that hasn't finished, then have that be your zinnias spot, you know, and and plant your zinnias there in in May. Do you have favorites um annuals for warm season?
SPEAKER_02Oh, you know, it changes. You know, we're so blessed to have so many things that we could grow here. Oh, yeah, for sure. Yeah, no, I just it's I don't know, I guess what hits me that year.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, and and another thing in April that's fun to do when you're at the nursery, particularly if you have pots, um, is to actually use your little cart to like design your pot. And so you pick something that's blooming. Um, and say you're not gonna buy a f a four-inch, um, you're gonna buy the six-pack, but grab the four-inch that's blooming and just start arranging things. And so, you know, you get this, you get this four-inch uh, and and remember when you do pots, you want to follow the thriller, spiller, filler. Okay, explain what that is. Not everybody knows that. Um so the thriller is something that's bright and and perhaps a bit tall, and then the spiller is something that's going to hang over the edge of your pot, and then the filler is you know what you you might plant in between.
SPEAKER_02So you'll end up with a three-dimensional plant. Yes. So it's really it layers your plant, it layers the colors, it makes it more interesting to look at.
SPEAKER_01And so if you see, say, this, you know, really spectacular sage, you know, a really one of these red sages, right? Maybe that's your thriller. You know, you put that in the middle of your pot. And then and then you look around and you see some of the smaller yellow um marigolds, right? Ooh, red and yellow, you know, that's such a bright combination. And then you're like, okay, well, what's gonna spill? Well, maybe I'll just get lobelias easy. You can't kill lobelia. Maybe I'll get the blue lobelia. So then you've got this red and this this yellow and this blue lobelia, and you've designed it in your cart, and you're like, whoa, that looks pretty good. And it looks like I know what I'm doing. Um, and and you can, you know, obviously do it with plants that you don't know, but you see them in the nursery, and you go, Oh, I like that, and I like this, and you just see how they look together, and and then you and you can do it even with um non-flowering things, because one of the thrillers I like to use is some of the the dwarf flaxes, you know, that have the different colored leaves. Some of them come in like that uh purpley kind of leaf, or some are like a lime green kind of leaf. So that can be your thriller, and then you can put your color flowering plants, you know, around it.
SPEAKER_02Now, one thing you have to be aware of, you don't mix shade with full sun when you're doing this. Okay. So you have to stay in the area. If you're picking like three plants out, do three sun plants or do three shade plants because it might look pretty together, but you're gonna if you mix them, you're gonna kill something. Yep, that's for sure.
SPEAKER_01Uh, and the same in your garden beds, you know, make sure that you're um sticking to the right the same watering.
SPEAKER_02You just get so excited when we're going, oh, that looks really pretty from this section. We'll take it from that section, but you need to stay in the same section when you're doing the pots. Yes, you do. And you also have to with pots, they tend to need more, you know, you need to water them. So I I tend to fill more on pots than you do because I'm not as good at watering my pots, even though I've done pots and pots and all kinds of other things.
SPEAKER_01I am just not well, you have a lot of elevations in your garden too. So when you have to go up and down stairs to water things, that that's a deterrent to watering, right?
SPEAKER_02Too much, you know, and I just get sidetracked on something else, and even though I just forget. So I tend to plant more things in the ground that has the automatic watering system, which works. We're all different, right? Yeah. And some people are better at it. And I love your pots. If you were at Tina's house, she has these beautiful pots everywhere, and it's just so lovely and it's welcoming, and it and it helps, it creates a flow into your house. And every time I walk up, I go, Oh, these are so beautiful.
SPEAKER_01But but you'll you'll notice though that my pots are always close to the house because then I will water them. If if I start putting pot, like I tried doing pots under some trees, you know, to give some color, and they died because I never took the time to walk out there and water the pots that were under the trees. You know, I just would get busy. So the pots that do well are the ones that are close to my entrances and exits at the house.
SPEAKER_02And you know what, and that's wonderful because that you create such a beautiful entrance to your house. It it makes it the colors and it's welcoming. So maybe we should do a show on that sometime. So it's just walking up to your house with these pots that you have, a lot of them are three-dimensional, and you just come up and they they attract your eye and they flow into your house, and it's just really, really pretty.
SPEAKER_01Well, and uh, Katrina mentioned three-dimensional, and and that's because I do try and follow that thriller, filler, spiller concept. But the other thing you can do is at the entrance to my house, I have a couple of pretty tall pots. They're like, I don't know, two and a half feet tall. And and right now I don't have smaller pots around them, but if I'm having a party, I will buy some plants, you know, that are already potted and blooming. This is my cheat for having parties, and um, and they're usually in plastic pots, so I will just drop those plastic pots into my own, you know, shorter pots and place those around the taller pot. And now you, you know, it looks like you're walking into a garden as you walk to the front door.
SPEAKER_02Spectacular.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, so that that's a a cheat because we are getting into party season, right? April, we have uh Easter holiday and Mother's Day. We have Mother's Day and Father's Day's Day and Fourth of July and graduations and so uh, you know, just and weddings and you know Fourth of July. Yeah. So just um keep in mind these, you know, little uh tricks that you can do to really make your your entryway or your patio area pop.
SPEAKER_02And you know, I love how you taught me that years ago about having a nice cut some nice pots, and then you just kind of replace it as a season happens and it looks beautiful.
SPEAKER_01And and don't feel bad. You don't have to plant every pot yourself. You can go, like I said, you know, go to the big box retailers when you're having a party and you know, spend 15 bucks on, you know, maybe two or three pots. In the end, it's cheaper than buying fresh flowers, cut flowers, right? Um, and you you end up having something really pretty for your party. And it'll last for you know three months or so before before it's done. Uh but before while we're on plants and planting, let's get back to what we're gonna plant in the garden. And one thing we haven't talked about that much, we should probably do a whole show on it, is plants that attract beneficials. Yes. And I don't know if we've done a show on that. I guess we've done butterfly gardens, so that's kind of the same thing. But in any event, um, since we are gonna be planting a lot this month, I just wanted to mention um that it's a good idea to consider beneficials, you know, in your flower beds, because then you're gonna have to do less pest control. Yes. And you're gonna have a more diverse garden. Yes. And you're gonna attract butterflies, which you know, we all just love to sit out there and watch the butterflies. So let's just go through a quick list of um beautiful flowering plants that will add color to your garden, but that will also attract beneficials. So uh achelia is also called yarrow, and that's I love the um, oh gosh, I'm drawing a blank. Moonshine. Moonshine. I love moonshine. Moonshine Achelia is my favorite. It's this bright almost neon yellow, and it gets this big flat flower head that looks beautiful if you pick it and put it in a bouquet. Um, asters, I I planted a perennial aster, I don't know, eight years ago, and it's just now blooming in the garden again. And it's just a surprise to me every year because I forget it's kind of in the back or the side of one of my beds, and sure enough, these beautiful little blue flowers come up uh every year. So asters are uh fun. Uh chamomile, great um beneficial plant, attracts a lot of butterflies. Uh in the veggie garden, um, cilantro, of course it bolts, but don't be sad if it bolts because the flower is going to attract some beneficial um insects. Uh cleome, if you've never planted cleom, it gets really tall, um, like three, four feet tall, I think. Yeah, I think it's a pink, uh pink, stalky kind of flower. So really striking if you have room for tall things in your garden. Try Cleome. My go-to every year. First, first thing I ever planted from seed when I was eight years old, Cosmos. So I plant those every year. Uh, they'll even self-sow. I find Cosmos growing in my yard. Mine self-sow. I have them in my yard right now every year. They show up wherever they walk. So Cosmos, great. Lots of daisies. Um, people who listen to the show know I always talk about my Shasta daisies, and I've made Katrina take some for her yard. I love my shasta daisies.
SPEAKER_02I call them Tina's daisies, they're no longer Shasta daisies, they're Tina's daisies.
SPEAKER_01And they just they will self-sew too, but they're not invasive and they're bulletproof. The pests don't bug them, they're great cut flowers. Uh so and and there's other daisies besides shastas, but those happen to be my favorite. Um, another thing for the veggie garden, dill. Um, dill attracts um that sulfur-colored butterfly, the yellow one. Oh, so pretty. Um, baby's breath. Um, I have trouble getting that to grow. Do you ever grow that? No, I've never grown baby's breath. I've I've tried it. Um, it doesn't last very long for me. So maybe fun to plant, but not long-living. Honeysuckle. Oh, we love honeysuckle. The smell of that. Lantana, another bulletproof plant. Lavender, of course. Um, we love lavender.
SPEAKER_02Backing up to Lantana, there's so many different types. And I just went, I had to move one of my lantanas because it got so big that it was like kind of taking over my lemon tree, and I needed my lemons. So I went out and bought another one because it was too big to transplant. And so many bees and butterflies. And it's just, I just it's it's just crazy.
SPEAKER_01It's wonderful. I think Lantana is probably the one that attracts the most bees and butterflies in my yard. I don't know why. Maybe it's just the the species that we have here, but um, that thing is always covered with with little flying things, it seems like all year, all summer long, all the whole time it's blooming.
SPEAKER_02And I love having both of those in my yard. You know, bees and butterflies, and it's like near my garden and like avocado trees, and it's all good. It is.
SPEAKER_01Um, so uh let's continue with our list. Oh, lemon balm, that's lovely. Nosturtium, um, catmint, uh, parsley in the garden, Queen Anne's lace. I I got a six-pack of Queen Anne's Lace last year. I was so excited to find it in a six-pack, and it just made me so happy. For for people who don't know, Queen Anne's Lace grows, gosh, almost three feet tall, I think. And it's just this white lacy, um, you know, real feathery kind of blossom. Um, I don't pick it, but it just in the background and scattered through your garden, oh, it's just such a lovely cottage garden kind of feel. So if you can find it, it's it's pretty fun. Um, scented geraniums, uh, marigolds, sages, uh, all kinds of sunflowers. Um, and and those will attract birds too once the seeds come. And that's pretty fun if you have uh kids to watch the birds sit there and peck the seeds out of the sunflower.
SPEAKER_02I I have some big kids that are like retired.
SPEAKER_01And they like to watch it too. I'm one of them. Um And then uh zinnias, of course, any kind of wildflower um attracts beneficials. Um and most herbs, you know, like thyme oregano, most herbs attract beneficials.
SPEAKER_02Even if you don't have a vegetable garden, I will plant those in my flower garden. Oh, thanks for mentioning that. You know, I love herbs in my I because it's for me, I have a big vegetable garden, but it's down the hill. And sometimes I just need a little bit of herb, and I have them growing with my vegetables and along, you know, in other places. And it's wonderful.
SPEAKER_01It is absolutely and people don't know that that that's oregano, they just think it's a ground cover, you know, but it's oregano.
SPEAKER_02It's oregano, and I have, you know, I I have my rosemary little bush growing that I could just walk out the door and grab it. And I have a lot of herbs that are close to the front door that it just makes it usable. You know how you were talking about the pots, yeah you don't want to go so far away. And uh same thing with me, some herbs. If I don't think about going to the vegetable garden or out the front door or out the back door, and I could just make it easy, make it easy, or have herbs in the veggie garden, but have a pot, you know.
SPEAKER_01A strawberry pot is actually one of my favorite things to gift people, a strawberry pot full of herbs. Because think about it, a strawberry pot has what, eight, ten openings in it, and you put a different herb in each of those openings of the strawberry plant, and then you give it as like a shower gift, you know, wedding shower gift or a housewarming gift, and people are just so excited, you know, because now they have in the summer, you know, a little bit of basil and a little bit of um, you know, thyme and and just all of it. Some oregano it's uh, you know, and and squeeze some parsley in there, even if it's summer, you know, and and uh it's just super fun. It's a great way to introduce people to cooking with herbs and gardening with herbs is to do it in a pot, give it for a gift.
SPEAKER_02I tell you, I love how I it's so hard for me to go to the store and buy spend so much money on a little package of herbs when I just might need a little bit, and I could just walk out the front door and it's like next to my mandarin tree or next to my roses, and I could go sniff snip and there I am.
SPEAKER_01Oh yeah, because you know the last thing you want to do is spend four dollars on a pack of herbs and you use a sprig of it, and then the rest of it turns into slime in your refrigerator. So yeah, no, plant herbs, they're they're the best, and plant them in your flower flower beds. I think I mentioned that that uh your garden is full of flowers this time of year, maybe the last of the the daffodils and other spring bulbs, spring blooming bulbs that you planted in the fall. As those dot blooming, don't cut off the foliage. Be sure you let the foliage wither and and turn brown. And I know it looks ugly, but you need to do that if you want those daffodils or Dutch iris to come back next year. Um, if you don't care if they come back next year, you can cut the foliage off, but they need that foliage to make the food so that the bulb blooms again next year. But because I love bulbs, you can now plant summer bulbs. So don't give up hope, don't be sad. Uh we had that heat spell in March, and it kind of put an end to my my lovely friegias and and ranunculus that were blooming so beautifully because they don't like the heat. Um, so I went out and I bought some dahlias and I planted some dahlias.
SPEAKER_02Dahlias, there's so many types of dahlias. And you know, you make an investment in that bulb. You buy a bulb, and that bulb could last you for years.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, and they won't look like the bulbs that you plant in the fall because they're not a bulb shape. Um, they're a rhizome, and so they have kind of like these dangly finger, fat finger-looking things, but we kind of call them bulbs because you plant them like you do other bulbs. And for dahlias, um, you want to be full sun, they absolutely want full sun, and so you want to dig a hole for them, and I dig it about 10 inches deep by 10 inches wide, and I mix in some soil amendment and some fertilizer, and then you want to spread those little dahlia fingers kind of over the soil, and then you'll it's pretty obvious where the the new growth is going to come from because when I planted mine, um it was already even starting to bud out. You could see a little knob starting to grow, and then you want to cover them up, and um, they'll eventually want to be about five four to five inches deep, but I have found that when I cut just barely cover them, and then as the new growth comes out, I put a little more soil around it as it grows, that that way uh they get to be um sturdier and not be uh as prone to maybe like being knocked and broken off, you know, right when they first come out. So, yeah, so covered the tuber up with about two inches of soil, and then as it grows up through that soil, cover it with more soil. You want to put in a steak, just like tomatoes, when you plant it, uh, because those dahlias, for the most part, unless you buy the ones in the six packs, are gonna get tall. They get between, you know, two and a half feet to the the giant dahlias get, the dinner plate dahlias get four to five feet tall. I had one as tall as me a couple years ago.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I I've gotten the tall one. So you have to also when you look to buy the buy them, you need to see how big they're going to get. Because there's some cute little dahlias that will go nice in the sweet little pot. And then there's some you could look straight in, you know, face to face with them, and they take up a lot of room. And I have before because I like big dinner, yeah, I like big dahlias. Well, you need to have space for the big dahlias. So what I finally learned is like I have some smaller pots, so the smaller ones go in the smaller pots. But when you look at that bulb, you don't necessarily know. So you need to read about it because are you going to be getting an 18-inch plant or are you going to get a 48-inch plant?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, and it'll tell you, right? They come in like little bags that have a little cardboard label on them. And so you just look at the back and it will tell you that it gets 36 inches tall or 48 inches tall.
SPEAKER_02It's real, real simple, but you can't just go in and say, I like that color, I like that color, and I like that one, and then plant them all the same. So you got to look at the back and say, this is how much room it needs, and this is how tall it gets. And then you could find a happy place for that particular one because you don't want to plant an 18-inch one behind a four-foot plant, no, or plant a four-foot plant in front of all your other plants. Yes. So just take, just read what it says on the label, like most things. Yes.
SPEAKER_01And they are heavy feeders. I I do add a little fertilizer in the planting hole when I plant them, but um, they will bloom and bloom and bloom. But but it is a good idea if you want that to keep happening, that you do fertilize them, you know, regularly throughout the growing season. Uh, the other thing that I try to remember to do, although sometimes I forget, but once um you see the plant and it has three complete sets of leaves, you can pinch off the top of that plant to get it to branch. If you want it makes a fuller plant. But many years I don't do that because I forget. But just a hint: if you want a fuller plant, um you can pinch off the top of it once there's three sets of leaves on the plant.
SPEAKER_02And I personally think they're prettier when we pinch off the top, but I also forget because it's one of those pot issues I have. Yeah. I like dais so much, they go in pots, but I'm tend to be neglectful. So they're still pretty if you don't pinch them, but if you can pinch them, it just makes a uh what would you say more lush, more full?
SPEAKER_01It does, more full and less, less gangly, you know, because if you just uh you you you have to put a stake for the taller ones and you will tie it to the stake or it'll fall over. But if you pinch it, then you're gonna get a bushier plant and it doesn't look as gangly as as if you do if you it's prettier. Yeah, it's prettier. So quickly, because we're running out of time, um, also plant uh perennials, whatever lovely perennials attract your eye in the the garden centers, you know, grab them. It's a great time to plant them because they're in bloom, you get to see what they're gonna look like. So add perennials if you have tickle the roots, tickle the roots when you plant them. The perennials are usually in one gallon pots if they're blooming. You can find them in four inches, but they're not usually blooming when they're in a four-inch size. So if you want to see what they look like, look for those one-gallon plants. And um, of course, bait for snails, as we talked about after you plant this stuff. Dig a good planting hole, add amendment, add fertilizer when you plant them all. Perhaps some mulch on top of everything when you're done. Yes, mulching plants is wonderful. It keeps the weeds down, it keeps uh the um soil temp moderate, keeps the water in the ground. So mulching is always good. Last thing we're gonna talk about since before we finish flowers, actually before we finish the show because we're out of time, is roses. Uh, the roses, as we mentioned earlier, it's their first blush bloom this month, usually, uh, which is I think always the most beautiful because they look the most perfect and they're usually disease-free at that point. But I do want to mention after that first blush, you do want to fertilize your roses because if you want them to have that prolific bloom over and over again over the summer, you need to fertilize after every bloom cycle and deadhead. So as the blooms you know fade, deadhead, and that just means cut them, the stems, down to a five-leaflet leaf that is facing out from the plant, not towards the middle of the plant, because that's the direction that the new growth will happen, and you want that new growth to point out, not in to the middle of the plant. Anything you'd like to add, Katrina?
SPEAKER_02Yes, yes. I would like to add after you've done all this and why you're doing it, have fun in the garden. It is a beautiful time to be out there and just stay out there after you're done working, find a chair or a place to sit and enjoy your work because it's a really pretty time of the year.
SPEAKER_01It's a gorgeous time of the year. And I know I'm always like, oh, my garden isn't perfect enough or my patio furniture isn't clean enough to entertain. Don't do that. Just take your leaf blower out there, blow off your patio, and invite somebody over for appetizers or a little cool drink.
SPEAKER_02And if those people don't come over, invite your pet, yeah, just go outside, just enjoy. I forget sometimes to go out and just sit there and go, this is a beautiful place to be. I don't have to be working all the time in the garden.
SPEAKER_01And folks will folks will be happy because I sometimes think I have to fix a whole meal. You don't have folks over for you know a little appetizer or a dessert or something. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Tea. Tea tea.
SPEAKER_02Anything, tea in the garden, cocktails, whatever.
SPEAKER_01Oh anyway, thanks so much for listening. Um, have a great April in your garden.
SPEAKER_02And enjoy.