Shirley's Rose probably has "Balling"

Last week Shirley from Calgary phoned me at CBC radio in Calgary to ask about her Morden rose. It was forming large flower buds but instead of opening up normally the large fluffy buds fall off when she touches them. I was shocked and surprised. I had not heard of this problem - a cause of great excitement for me but obviously not for Shirley. When I was off the air I called Joan Altenhof at the Calgary Rose Society. Joan is one of the many people cooperatively  writing the  book "Growing Roses in Calgary" so she is in the know.

Joan immediately knew the problem - it is called  "Balling" - and  it is common in Morden Fireglow roses - so she assumed that Shirley's rose is this cultivar. Joan has solved the problem in her own garden by shovel pruning. If you are not familiar with this drastic measure - in involves digging up and tossing out the plant.  Joan has an extensive rose collection and numerous plants in the Morden group and only Fireglow regularly had this problem so obviously this plant is no longer growing in Joan's garden. Sometimes "Balling"  is caused by cool spring weather but since it was continuously happening with Morden Fireglow she felt it was just a problem with the plant. Because she has tossed the plant she couldn't send along a Fireglow image so she sent me balling in a different rose. In this photo you will see the flower bud also has Botrytis disease (ie browning) but balling doesn't always lead to Botrytis.

Blackberries are ready early!

Yes the wild foraging continues. This week the wild blackberries are ready and they are mother's nectar! Big bold and black. Even though it has been dry on the coast there seems to be more fruit than I can remember. Maybe it is a stress response - many plants bloom more if the conditions are stressful and the drought and heat on the coast this summer has definitely been over the top.

Most people think of the coast as lush and green but there is a very dry season in the summer when the lawns go brown and the plants just sit and wait.  We spread the fish compost this spring on the lawn and are on a modified watering program and it seems to have worked because the lawn was "pale" green until it rained and then it quickly brightened with the heavy rain the other night. 

Back to the blackberries ... pies to be made 

It's Summer and the photo is changing

Gardeners may have gotten used to my "professional photo" but that has now changed. I went on an amazing hike and had to include a photo among the blooms in Mount Assiniboine, BC. So beautiful a place I thought it was worth including for the time being. 

Right now I am continuing to hike and garden and gather wild foods as I spend August in my "retirement" home on the coast. 

Lacewing Larva

Yes- it's true - here is another photo from Terry Altenhof of a lacewing larva. Check out those giant mandibles! 

Predators to our rescue

Terry Altenhof took an amazing photo of the eggs of two predators in his rose garden. Both types of predators are seen here on a single leaf. These are the all important egg stage photos of the lady beetle and the lacewing. 

Why are they so important you might ask? They are important because people do not recognize the eggs of ladybugs and lacewings. Because they don't recognize them they might squish them at this fragile egg stage.  What a boon to the garden the larvae (ie. young hatchlings) and fully grown adults (ie ladybugs and lacewings)  are with their voracious appetites for aphids. Lacewings -see white eggs suspended on small stems-  and ladybeetles - see the yellow eggs - both eat aphids at both the larval and adult stage. Does anyone have a shortage of aphids this year? No - I didn't think so. We are already well into our second generation in Calgary. Maybe the ladybugs and lacewings will catch up to the aphids by fall. Cross your fingers and look for eggs and the young black larvae of lady bugs ... I wonder what a lacewing larva looks like?

Spittle Bug Photo from Ken

Ken has sent me a photo of his spittle bug... it literally looks like spit on your plant. Like aphids, this is a true bug and has the ability to feed directly from plant- sucking (or rather imbibing) plant sap. But first it secretes this "juice" that looks like spit and hides inside the spit while it feeds. This bug doesn't really do a lot of damage but like other plant feeding bugs may spread virus to plants it feeds on. 

Simply hose it off plants as you see it. No big deal.

Veggies on the Balcony

Little Kale is three and he keeps asking to go look at my balcony vegetable garden. I used to have a vegetable garden in the ground but that is a long story. The short story is that I gave Kale a little paintbrush last week and showed him the male and female squash flowers and showed him how he could take some pollen from the "boy" flower and move it to the "girl" flower.

He did that last friday, touching both parts with his fingers as well as his paint brush. "It is so sticky" he said as he touched the girl flower. "All the better for the pollen to grab on to" I replied. Well, that was last friday and today - Monday- there is a little squash where his efforts were put to good use. It's amazing how much is ready on my tiny space - looks like rapini is on tap now as well as lettuce, basil, peas and parsley. The squash are only a few weeks away and the tomatoes are in full form but no red ones yet. The whole balcony is only 2 meters by 2 meters but it is the sunniest part of my yard because it is on the second story so it is ideal for sitting and pondering veggies!

Bloomerang Lilac Featured in MACLEAN'S magazine this week

 MACLEAN'S featured a plant (on page 44) this week!  It is totally amazing how far the breeders of this new lilac have gone to promote it. The article reads as if it is an exceptional plant that everyone will be clamoring for. In fact it seems like quite an ordinary plant so far and zone 3 gardeners (myself included) are still unsure if it is an improvement over the regular little leaf lilac (Syringa meyeri palibin). Both plants are supposed to bloom twice. Both are purple and both have a small habit. 

Here are two photos - the top is the new Bloomerang in bloom in late June in Calgary and the bottom one is a more mature "no name" little leaf lilac in Edmonton in late June. Neither one looks anything like the French lilac which is featured prominently in the MACLEAN'S piece (photo page 44, July 27, 2009 article).

As I said - the jury is out.

Powdery Mildew

In case you were wondering how powdery mildew differs from Fireblight here is a photo of powdery mildew on Dahlias on the older leaves. Not a pretty picture but definitely not fireblight!

On trees powdery mildew often looks like a very faint dusting of white on the leaves with some cupping of the leaves.

Fireblight- Yikes

A few weeks ago I was called in to look at an apple tree that had "fireblight"... it turned out it only had powdery mildew and the homeowner was relieved but I wondered how an arborist,  a neighbor and a homeowner could all be confused about this very distinctive disease so when I saw this Mountain Ash with actual fireblight I had to photograph it. 

The symptoms are very distinctive and you never forget them. The tree looks like it has been burned and sometimes only one or two branches are affected. In this case most of the tree in the park was affected. For the safety of the surrounding trees it should be removed. Check other references for more detail about this bacteria and it's control.

Favorite Peonies

I was chatting via e-mail with peony grower Bob Yaremko of Parkland Perennials in Northern Alberta (http://www.parkland-perennials.com) and since he mentioned the peonies are still in bloom there I happened to ask him what his favorite peony was....

Of course politically correct Bob loves all his peonies but especially Jean Ericksen, an anemone type with strong stems, secondary buds and a long blooming season. I am so glad I asked! We are soon coming up to Peony planting season and Bob sells by mail order so his website is worth a look. His prices are truly reasonable and plants have arrived in excellent shape in the past. 

Intensive gardening- remove tillers off corn

Remove side shoots - or tillers as they are known - from corn right now before it blooms to encourage stronger growth and more cobs on the stems left standing. We have such a short season if you leave all the stems some will not have time to produce filled in corn cobs. 

The corn will ripen faster and produce - on average- an extra cob for each tiller removed. See photo which shows main stem (which should be left) and side shoots, which should be removed now.

Veggie Tune-up

Well - it is time to cut back a few veggies to encourage really good root growth. I am talking about potatoes and carrots. If you trim off potato flowers now, the plant will send more energy into making potatoes. Simple and easy - just pinch off the blooms.

Carrots will form small twisted roots if they are not thinned properly so get out there and start "harvesting" the small carrots right now by thinning out the rows. Leave up to a cm between carrots when the final ones are thinned. 

Trim off the curlicue flowers forming on garlic now to encourage bigger garlic cloves (see photo)

PS Check the Calgary Herald this friday for more work to do this time of year.

PPS And pick your peas! You'll get more if you pick them as they form

Cottony Psyllid - aka dead ash trees- Revised

Listeners to CBC know a lady phoned in about her  Green ash tree  last week - it had not leafed out properly and she was worried about it. Just in case I didn't give enough information about this new pest, the  Cottony Pysllid, I thought I should add a quick blog. Dr. Ken Fry - Entomology instructor at Olds College reminds me this pest is only a problem on Manchurian and Black ash - not on green ash. If a green ash is suffering it is likely from ash plant bug (with noticeable black frass on leaves) or wooly ash aphid with similar curled leaves to the cottony psylllid. If the caller is certain she has a Green Ash that is likely the problem.

If the tree is a Manchurian or Black ash it may have perfectly good leaves one year and be almost dead  the next year but I have suffered from this same problem and my tree is now dead completely and removed. There are no organic cures for this insect yet, but some of the larger tree care companies are now treating it. Again, Dr. Fry says "systemic insecticides injected into the tree have proven to be very effective against the cottony psyllid".

Everything  you need to know about this new pest is at the following web page:

http://www.landscape-alberta.com/pdf/Cottony_Psyllid_JUNE_%202006.pdf

Some Excellent Feedback!

Hello Donna, I wanted to let you know that we are really thrilled with your advice, which you gave us in November 2007.  

We are in Chinook Park ("white house" "kayakers") and the garage was not completed in time to do much last summer.  

However, we have now planted and have found your recommendations to be excellent.  

We are really enjoying the new plants and they all seem to like your choice of location.  

Thanks again, I look forward to your Herald columns and hope you are having a great summer.

Compost Tea - Details this Friday in the Calgary Herald

It seems like a never-ending topic but it is time to fertilize again and - as usual- I have chosen the organic route. This year I tried out my new compost tea maker (a Growing Solutions product purchased last fall in Oregon). Of course I used my own home-made worm castings for the compost component. They of course came from my can-o-worms worm bin... the garbage feeding these worms came .... okay you get the picture - this isn't just fertilizer - this is slow food for plants.

My friend asked why I do it. Why do I make tea when everyone else just opens a package. Well I make bread too and soup from home-made stock. Maybe I am weird but I want to try new and innovative things from scratch. (And this is not my first commercial tea maker - I had a Soil Soup unit a few years back).

So- after 24 hours and a trip to home depo to buy a new sprayer and figure out how to set it up and how to strain my tea I am the proud owner of too much tea. But- heh- I did notice a small change in the powdery mildew on my Dahlias today- Coincidence?

Check out the full article this Friday in the Calgary Herald.

Sea Asparagus - a little wild foraging

One of the advantages of visiting the seaside is indulging a new-found passion for foraging. During my last visit it was my delight to find sea asparagus growing wild on the west coast. A gourmet delicacy free for the taking!

Here are some photos of Marionette "picking" with her scissors, Chelsie and Cohen wandering the salt flats and a close-up of asparagus in case any readers are on the west coast in the next few weeks. This plant grows in the marshy areas between high and low tide in the mud flat areas. We googled how to cook sea asparagus and found a great fastfry using water chestnuts and oyster mushrooms. Delightful.

Wildflowers(?) in Bloom

On my way home yesterday I took the little train - it ends in Courtney on Vancouver Island and I was early for my plane so I took a little walk around. Imagine my surprise when I saw this "wildflower" meadow in a lot for sale downtown. Usually if a property is sold and the building is bulldozed the land is left to weeds. Good for the developer and the town! Of course these are not really wild flowers in the literal sense. Instead they are probably a mix from a commercial supplier - wildflowers are or should be local plants and many of these annuals are from Europe but - heh- it looks a lot better than an abandoned lot.

Last week Frost - This week Potatoes

Well it isn't just that the weather has gotten better- I have simply changed locales and come to our Island paradise.  Believe it or not the potatoes have taken over the garden which is only strange because I didn't plant any potatoes this year! Planting lettuce and celery in April was the last job before I left clean beds in April.  Here it is early June and I came back to (almost) full grown potatoes. Because baby potatoes make such a fine lunch we have decided to dig a few for that purpose. 

CBC Question: Will Sumac Grow Here?

 I had a caller ask about sumac on my CBC phone-in show this week so I decided to post a photo of Tiger Eyes sumac. It usually dies back in winter but meanwhile it makes a nice addition to the bed because of it's unusual colour and form. Smooth Sumac (Rhus glabra) and the native sumac (Rhus trilobata) also work here. I actually love the little native sumac because it is a small round shrub and is very drought tolerant and hardy - it never dies back in the winter.