Gardening Tip

Rose Gardening Tasks Early Spring

2006-07-17T10:42:00.000-07:00

by: Theresa Sontag

When shoud you start preparing your rose garden for the onset of spring and summer? Well, if you live in an area where you can start seeing the promise of spring in late March or early April, then you're an "early spring" rose gardener. However, if you live where March and April still brings icy rain and snow, then just keep waiting out old man winter until your turn at spring arrives and then follow the tips in this article.

Early spring is a time of great activity in the rose garden as you prepare for the beautiful buds that will be sprouting almost any day. Here's a summary of what needs to be done in order to prepare your roses for the tough growing season that lies ahead.

If you covered your roses with dirt or mulch, your first step is to gently remove the protective materials so you can introduce your dormant bushes to the warming spring sun and rains that lie ahead.

Before beginning your spring pruning activities, cut back any dead and damaged canes that did not survive the winter. Be sure to clear away any debris and residue from around the bushes as well.

Prepare the soil to nurture your plants by adding some organic compounds. You can either buy pre-packaged organics from your favorite garden supplier, or you can mix up your own recipe using composted manure or mushroom compost, or any of the usual meal blends which can include alfalfa, cottonseed, fish or blood meal. See below for some suggestions.

Work your soil with a spade or hoe if it has become too compacted during the winter or if you notice standing water after watering your plants. Roses require well-drained soil to thrive.

After soil preparation is done you can plant any new additions to your garden including container grown roses.

Next it is time to begin your fungicide spraying regiment either immediately or, if you prefer to wait, approximately 14 days after you complete your pruning. Opinions on the best time differ. The choice is yours.

Remember to rotate through different fungicides during the year to prevent any fungi from becoming immune to any one product.

Don't use any pesticides unless you see evidence of damage, but remember to keep a sharp eye out for aphids which are as much a sign of spring as April showers are. Hit them with a blast of water to remove them, or apply insecticide in a mister to the affected areas.

Imagine how hungry you'd be if you just woke up from a long winter hibernation! Well, your Roses are hungry too. The best way to coax them from dormancy to budding is to feed them now and every other week through the remainder of the growing season. Water well after feeding! Feed with a fertilizer balanced for Nitrogen (N), Phosphates (P2O5) and Potash (K2O). Nitrogen stimulates the growth of leaves and canes and increases the size of the bush. Phosphate stimulates the growth of roots, canes and stems and speeds up flowering. Potash stimulates the production of top quality blooms and improves the drought and disease resistance of the plant. A good balanced fertilizer with these elements is 10-10-10.

Another popular spring fertilizer is Osmocote which is a controlled release fertilizer that releases nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium depending on soil temperature. The 18-6-12 (8 to 9 month term) formulation is recommended for this area. Osmocote is also available with trace elements added in a product with the name of Sierra 17-6-10 Plus Minors Controlled Release Fertilizer.

Beneficial Insects

2006-07-11T09:20:00.000-07:00

Mary Ann Ryan
Adams County Master Gardener

Beneficial insect is a relatively new buzz word for the home gardeners of today. This phrase – beneficial insect – refers to the good bugs, the bugs that eat other bugs that attack our garden plants – trees, shrubs and perennials. Beneficial insects are predators, parasites and pollinators that protect our plants and make them fruit.

The advantage of the beneficial insects are they improve the overall health of your plants, they lower dependence on pesticides, they save money that would be spent on costly pesticides as well as time spent on spraying plants, they will minimize exposure to humans and animals by toxic concentration of pesticides, they will promote natural populations of insects that feed on harmful pests and they help to protect our environment.

Some beneficial insects are insect specific, which means they will only eat certain bugs, like the lady bug. However, some are not specific, and will eat any insect they can reach, like the praying mantis.

Many of these insects you will find in your own garden and should become familiar.

The lady bugs have an enormous appetite for aphids – one of our most common plant pests. Some prefer scale insects and mites and are very effective on reducing infestations. The lady bug larvae are equally relentless predators. Their colorful, but ferocious appearance often causes unknowing gardeners to assume that they must be harmful. Nothing could be further from the truth.

The praying mantis is another widely recognized insect predator. Nymphs and adults alike lie in wait for an unlucky insect which strays too close, then strike out to grab it with their modified front legs.

As ugly as these may be, spiders are a man’s friend. They feed on fleas, lace-bugs, and eggs of Japanese beetles as well as sod webworms.

The Green Lacewing larvae are miniature monsters when viewed at close range. They are deadly enemies of small caterpillars, aphids, and other soft-bodied insects.

The lowly ground beetle, so common under logs and debris, is another friend of man. Both the larvae and adults are predaceous and feed on a wide variety of insects.

Hover flies, or flower flies, are common and important natural enemies of aphids and other small, slow-moving insects. The adults resemble bees or wasps, and are often seen visiting flowers, hovering over the flowers and darting around. Although hover fly larvae feed mainly on aphids, they will eat small caterpillars, thrips and other small insects. They have even been noted as predators of small European corn borer and corn earworm larvae.

Tachinid flies are parasites of other insects. After laying its eggs on the insect’s body, the fly maggots will burrow through their host’s skin and feed on its internal organs. The insect will die just as the larvae emerge and complete their life cycle.

The adults of the parasitic wasp vary considerably in size, form, and coloration, but the majority resembles slender wasps. They do not sting. They differ from the wasps that sting in that they have very long antennae. There are a great variety of hosts for these wasps such as caterpillars, moths, leafminers, wood-boring beetle larvae, flies, aphids, gypsy moth, weevils, and spiders. The larvae are internal parasites of the immature stages of the host. The parasite larva usually completes development in the host, and emerges from the host when an adult. The parasite kills the host.

The best known pollinator and man’s best friend among the insects is the honey bee.

Besides the pollinating services it renders, this insect provides us with honey which we eat and beeswax which we use in making candles, polishes, inks, and cosmetics. It is hard to imagine what life would be like without the natural pest control, flower pollination, and products provided to us by these beneficial insects.

Become familiar with these insects, as they are certainly beneficial to your garden.

The friendly, beneficial honeybee

2006-07-09T01:28:00.000-07:00

Kirsten S. Traynor
Frederick County Master Gardener Program

Many people fear bees, but the honeybee is our friend. There is a famous quote regarding the hard-toiling bee attributed to Albert Einstein. "If the bee disappeared off the surface of the globe, then man would only have four years left to live.'

The reasoning for his statement is bees are significant pollinators, pollinating over 60 different types of crops. Without pollinators, fruit trees and brambles would not produce a bountiful harvest, and all cucurbits such as cucumbers, squash, watermelons and pumpkins would not exist. You could argue we would still manage without those fruit and vegetables, but the beneficial bee also pollinates things such as clover, a common feed for cattle. So, indirectly the bee is responsible for successful beef production.

Unless you suffer from allergic reactions to bees, there is no reason to fear them. Honeybees are not out to attack you. They are usually of a very peaceful

nature and will not sting unless provoked. A honeybee stinger is a barbed ovipositor connected to the bee's poison sac. Due to this barb, the stinger, along with the poison sac and parts of the abdomen, rip out of a honeybee when she stings, causing the bee to die. Thus, the honeybee sacrifices her life to protect the colony.

When a person is stung by a bee, the poison sac will continue to pump poison, even after the bee dies. If you are ever stung by a bee, do not pull out the stinger straight. Instead, flick the stinger with your fingernail. This will cause the barbed stinger to release with the least amount of pain.

While being stung by bees may not sound appealing, there are many people who regularly have themselves stung to help treat diseases such as multiple sclerosis and arthritis. This is known as apitherapy — using bee products to prevent, heal or recover someone from one or more diseases and/or conditions.

If you do not want to go to the extreme of having yourself stung, you can still enjoy some of the wonders of bee products. It has been shown pollen allergies can be alleviated by eating honey from the area, since this honey contains trace amounts of local pollen sources. These small traces help desensitize the immune system. I heard another method of treating pollen allergies is to eat bee pollen on a regular basis. A source for bee

pollen can be difficult to locate as it is time consuming for the beekeeper to gather. However, some local beekeepers do sell it.

Honeybees live in a social structure called a colony. There are three different types of bees: queens, drones and workers.

In each bee colony there is only one queen. She is the focus of the entire hive. As long as she keeps laying fertilized eggs, other bees remain loyal to her, protecting her and feeding her. This queen is the mother of all bees in the hive. She is longer than the worker bees and drones. The queen also produces chemicals called pheromones. These pheromones are passed from bee to bee as they touch each other. The exchange of these secretions helps the colony communicate and is essential as a strong hive normally encompasses from 50,000 to 80,000 bees. Drones are male bees. They develop from unfertilized eggs the queen lays in larger cells. They are smaller in length than the queen, but larger and wider than the workers. Drones can not sting and do not have the ability to gather pollen. Their only function is to mate with virgin queens in the spring and summer. Once fall rolls around, drones become obsolete. Worker bees kick them out of the hive to protect their precious honey stores saved for the coming win-ter. Even during the spring and summer, drones only make up about 1 percent of a healthy hive.

Female worker bees develop from fertilized eggs. However, worker bees are underdeveloped females lacking a mature reproductive system. They do not lay eggs, except when a colony goes queenless. Then, sometimes a hive will develop a laying worker. Since the worker has never mated, all eggs she lays will produce drones.

The worker bees perform all the tasks to keep the hive going. They do various types of work at different ages, including cleaning the hive; nursing baby bees; building combs; gathering water, pollen and nectar; or being an undertaker bee, whose responsibility it is to remove dead bees from the hive. They are also hive protectors, preventing other insects and animals from entering the hive.

It is because of the toil of the worker bees that we enjoy the transformation of nectar into honey. If you have only ever tasted store-bought honey, you are missing out on one of the sweetest delights possible. Store-bought honey is often adulterated with other sweeteners. Commercial honey is usually made from many different honey sources mixed together.

Honey purchased from local beekeepers is more delicate and diverse in taste. Their honey ranges in flavor and color from a light lemony green locust honey to a dark, deep molasses brown buckwheat honey. You can find many local beekeepers selling their honey at roadside stands and farmers' markets.

Bats - A Scary Surprise

2006-07-08T18:33:00.000-07:00

Mary Ann Ryan
Adams County Master Gardener

With Halloween just around the corner, witches, scarecrows, ugly monsters and bats are often on the kids' minds. But are bats really as scary as witches and monsters? I don't think so. There is some real value to having a bat colony near you, and not just at Halloween for the "fear factor".

What do you know about bats? Chances are what you think you might know, probably isn't true. Bats are not blind, nor are they rodents or birds. They are not going to "suck your blood". The reality of it is that many bats can see very well. They are mammals, like you and I. Most eat insects, except for the vampire bat, not found in our area. They depend greatly on sound and very good hearing to find food and to get around in the dark.

As a matter of fact, we greatly benefit from the bat population. Bats eat insects, including mosquitoes. One little brown bat can catch 1200 insects in an hour. A nursing mother bat eats more than her own body weight nightly - up to 4500 insects! This helps to control our insect population. They reseed cut forests. Bats pollinate flowers for us, which then provides us with food.

There are nine species of bats that live in the northeastern United States at least part of the year. The little brown bat and the big brown bat are the most common in Pennsylvania, but you may also see silver-haired, red and hoary forest-dwelling bats as well. Bats survive both the highest and the lowest temperatures of any American mammal. Hibernating red bats can survive temperatures as low as 23 degrees F., and little brown bats can rear young at 122 degrees F. Little brown bats can live up to 34 years, bur they reproduce slowly. Most species bear and nurse only on pup a year.

Now that you know that bats are beneficial, how can you attract them? Understanding where bats live is the first step. In the summer, many find trees to roost and raise their young. They will hide beneath tree bark, in tree crevices, and under the foliage. They live in caves, mines and caverns. Abandoned houses, buildings, and bridges can be a likely place to find bats. In the winter, some migrate south, while others hibernate in the caves and mines, and sometimes in buildings. Bat houses are a common way to attract bats to your yard. These are available on the retail market today, and if you're handy, you surely can find plans to build your own.

Bat houses can occupy from 50 to 200 or more bats, depending upon the chambers within the bat house. The bats will colonize wherever there is food. Near water would be a great location to place a bat house. The box should face southeast or southwest, so that they receive at least seven hours of direct sunlight per day during the spring and summer. The box should have at least 3 feet underneath it so the bats can enter and exit from the bottom.

Okay, so you're convinced that bats are beneficial, you may even want to build a bat box to start a colony near your home, but you don't want those bats in your house, or you may even have a bat or two in your attic now. What should you do to get rid of these beneficial mammals without hurting them or to keep them from entering your home? There are three steps to bat-proof your home. First, identify bat entrances. Locate the holes that bats may use to enter and exit the attic. Bats often enter at points where joined materials have warped, shrunk or pulled away from one another. Second, seal the holes to prevent their entry; and third, provide and alternative roost for the colony to occupy.

Timing of bat proofing is very important. Pups remain confined in the roost until they are old enough to fly, therefore, bat proofing should not be completed in May through July. Otherwise, the bat pups could be trapped inside the building. The best time for bat proofing is in January through April, before bats enter the roost, or in the fall, after the bats have left.

Here is the time line to exclude bats from your attic: "January through April: Install a bat box near the building in a location where it can receive seven hours of sunlight. May through August: Allow bats to remain in the building and watch them exit at dusk to identify openings. Sept through April: Seal openings." Ref.: Penn State: A Homeowners Guide to Northeastern Bats and Bat Problems.

As you can see, bats and people can live together quite comfortably, and necessarily. Instead of fearing bats, just enjoy watching them, and hope that they are close by. The benefits far out-weigh the problems.

Information found in Penn State's "A Homeowner's Guide to Northeastern Bats and Bat Problems", Penn State's "Wildlife Damage Control #4".

Accidental Orange Invader

2006-07-07T19:44:00.000-07:00

Charlie Metz
Frederick County Master Gardener Program

This is the time of the year that an insect invades our homes and creates a lot of annoyance. It is recognized by its orange and black color. It is the Ladybird Beetle. It is called an accidental invader because it comes into our homes for no apparent reason except that it thinks it is a nice place to be.

The Ladybird beetle is the common name given to over 6000 species of similar looking insects. As kids we all remember holding a ladybug in our hand and asking it to fly away because its mother's house was burning down. I don't ever remember wanting to kill this insect because it seemed so harmless. What I didn't know was that it really is quite a beneficial insect. Ladybugs have a huge appetite for aphids and scales, and are quite successful at their control.

The species of lady bird beetle that invades our homes is the Asian Lady Beetle, Harmonia axyridis. This insect was brought here in the 1980s to control the aphid population which gardeners are all too familiar with. This multicolored dome-shaped insect is about one-third of an inch long with a yellow-orange color with 19 black spots. It also has a distinctive W -shape black spot on its head. This is the adult stage that we are familiar with.

The larval stage is the time in a ladybird's life that it eats the most. The larval stage of the ladybird beetle appears to resemble an alligator. It has a segmented body with 6 long legs. It is mostly black with a few orange markings. It has no wings at this stage. A single ladybird beetle can eat up to 5000 aphids in its lifetime, most of them in its larval stage. You may have seen this insect stage before and had no idea it was a ladybird beetle. Don't spray insecticides at this time. The ladybird beetle larvae will take care of almost all of your aphids.

The adult stage is the reproductive stage. The insect has wings so it can fly around and find a mate. The ladybird beetle reproduces a few times each year. She lays up to 300 eggs near a colony of aphids. When the eggs hatch the smorgasbord begins for the larvae.

At the adult stage, the ladybug still eats aphids, but since there really are no aphids around in the fall and early spring, they tend to congregate in windows on the south side of houses. This is when their large numbers can become a nuisance. I don't know how they get into my house, but they come in by the hundreds.

You can leave them alone or if you don't want them around they can be handpicked or vacuumed up. Insecticides are not recommended. These insects are harmless, eating nothing in your house and causing no disease. Whatever you do, they should disappear in a few weeks.

Some preventive measures you can take include planting a shade tree on the south side of your house to eliminate the sunny areas they tend to congregate in. You can also caulk and seal your south facing windows and doors.

Controlling the friendly Carpenter Bee

2006-07-07T08:10:00.000-07:00

Jim Seymour
Carroll County Master Gardener

They are back. A week ago I stepped off our screened back deck and it was eyeball to eyeball with me. Hovering, looking, waiting. They are black and yellow and very quick. They are the Carpenter Bees.

These bumblebee-sized bees are borers. The drill holes in your wooden porch, garage, railings, outdoor wooden furniture and dead tree limbs. Their holes are almost perfectly round and range in size from a dime to a nickel.

Once inside they make a right angle turn and continue to bore down the grain of the wood forming a series of cells. The female carpenter bee deposits the pollen and nectar collected from flowers into each cell and then places an egg on these food masses. Once the larva has finished feeding it pupates into an adult carpenter bee before cold weather sets in.

Male and female bees that survive the winter mate and bore nests the following spring, usually April through June selecting the same sites from year to year.

The female does all the work in the nest-gallery. She makes as many as six sealed cells in a four to six inch tunnel. Development time from egg to adult is between one and three months. This boring can weaken wooden structures and make them unsafe. The yellow sawdust and waste matter may soil vehicles, furniture, deck surfaces and clothing, and is a good indicator of active nesting sites.

The female bee like any wasp or bee can sting but it is uncommon. On the other hand the yellow-faced male carpenter bee has no stinger and establishes a territory over several active tunnels by aggressively flying at whatever threatens his territory. The yellow marking on the males "forehead" almost forms a perfect square pattern. This marking helps to make identification quite easy. The male is harmless.

The most effective deterrent to these winged saw mills is a well painted structure. If tunnels are evident, treatment with an insecticide and sealing of the tunnel is recommend. Any wasp, hornet and bee aerosols are effective and most likely the easiest control materials to use.

Apply the aerosol material into the tunnel entrances and along exposed surfaces. After 2 days close the tunnel with a deep plug of putty or caulking compound. I recommend applying insecticides after dark to avoid possible stings by the female. Reinspection should confirm that activities have ended.