Plant Trees for Great Fall Colors
Here in Northeast Kansas, we think highly of our beautiful fall colors. While we certainly are not New England, there have been hundreds of sugar maples planted throughout the area, giving us a name for quality fall color in the Great Plains. Hiawatha, KS is known as the “City of Beautiful Maples” for this reason. […]
How to Prune Spireas
Ever since I graduated in Horticulture I have been getting questions about plants and their maintenance from friends and colleagues. That is what I want, but it sometimes gets old when the same questions are asked every year. Now what about my spireas? a coworker asked me yesterday. Can they be cut down now? Yes […]
What Will Grow Near a Black Walnut Tree?
Black Walnut trees are wonderful if you are a cabinet maker, eat the walnuts, or leave them as forage for wildlife, or use the husks to make a colorfast dye. But if you are a gardener, they provide a challenge, to say the least. A toxic chemical, juglone, diffuses from the roots into the soil, […]
Barkophile
Being a tree person leads to many different obsessions – fall color, fruit, shade, and bark. I first heard the term barkophile, not an actual word but very real, used at a conference in Iowa last winter. It has been used to describe arborists and landscapers who seek out trees for their bark characteristics. Everything […]
Plants that Look Great with Snow
#1 Interesting Bark Bark is less noticeable in the summer because it is covered by trees. Winter is the time where plants like this river birch shine! #2 Red Berries #3 Boulders #4 Low Branching Trees and #5 Perennial Seed Heads #6 Evergreens #7 Interesting Shapes […]
October
Lawn • Fall leaves should be removed to prevent suffocation and death of the grass. Rake them if they are piled heavily or mow them. A mulching mower will chop them finely and add humus to the soil. • Spray for weeds. Dandelions, henbit and chickweed are best controlled in the fall when the plants […]
March
Lawn • Spot treat broadleaf weeds (dandelions, henbit, and chickweed) in your lawn if necessary. Treat on a day that is 50 degrees or warmer. Rain or irrigation within 24 hours of application will reduce effectiveness. • Time to apply a pre-emergent to form a barrier for sprouting crabgrass. Apply crabgrass preventer in late March […]
Arboretum
Webster’s New Collegiate Dictionary defines an arboretum as a place where trees, shrubs and other plants are cultivated for scientific and educational purposes. Grimm’s Gardens arboretum consists of approximately thirty acres of former row-crop ground. In 1985, the first of this ground was taken out of crop production and seedling trees of hackberry, red cedar, […]
