Garden Talk! for the Heartland Garden Enthusiast

Grow Native! workshop April 1

Missouri Blueberry School March 17-18

Growing lettuce

How do insects survive the winter?

Garden tips for March

Upcoming events

http://extension.missouri.edu/adair/gardentalk.aspx March 2017

University of Missouri System, Lincoln University, U.S. Department of Agriculture & Local University Extension Councils Cooperating

Equal opportunity/ADA institution

What’s Inside

Jennifer Schutter University of Missouri Extension Horticulture Specialist 660-665-9866 schutterjl@missouri.edu

If you need this newsletter in alternative format, please contact

Jennifer Schutter at the Adair County Extension Center.

STRAW BALE GARDENING OFFERS OPTIONS FOR GARDENERS

OVERCOME POOR SOIL AND LIMITED SPACE You can’t grow turkey in the straw. However, you can grow side dishes and floral centerpieces for a turkey dinner in the straw. Straw bale gardens are becoming popular with growers who are plagued with poor soil or limited gar-den space. Straw bale gardening combines container gardening and raised-bed gardening into one green-thumb package. You can grow many vegetables, fruits and flowers in a straw bale garden. Cool-season varieties can be planted as early as mid-March if you cover plants with protective materials such as clear plastic or floating row cover.

Use bales of straw, not hay, for gardening. Hay contains weed seeds and usually is too dense for best results. Choose bales held together tightly with twine. Farmers and local farm supply stores are good sources for straw. Avoid bales made from wheat or oats treated with an herbicide during production.

To assemble a straw bale garden, first choose a location that gets at least six to eight hours of direct sun. Once bales are watered, they become heavy and hard to move. If bales are placed on the ground, it is best to put them on a base of thick layers of newspaper to control weeds. Set bales so that twine is on the out-side and cut ends face up. Place bales in single rows to allow best access, air cir-culation and sun exposure. Successful straw bale gardening begins with condi-tioning the bales. This involves adding water and nitrogen to help bales partially decompose. This helps prevent nutrient tie-up once plants are added.

Nitrogen deficiency is common in straw bale gardening. This happens when the soil microbes take nitrogen away from garden plants as they break down the organic matter in straw. If leaves turn yellow, you need to add more nitrogen. To condition bales, soak them with water daily for 12 days. On days one, three and five, add ½ cup of a high-nitrogen fertilizer such as urea, ammoni-um nitrate or a lawn fertilizer to each bale. If you use lawn fertilizer, make sure it is not the “weed and feed” type, which contains herbicides that would harm gar-den plants. Continue to water to activate the microbes and break down the straw. On days seven and nine, add only ¼ cup high-nitrogen fertilizer. On the 11th day, add 1 cup of a general-purpose fertilizer such as a 12-12-12 mix to each bale. Af-ter the 12th day, touch the bale to check for heat. If it is cool to touch, you can plant.

To plant, dig small pockets or holes into the straw and set plants into the holes. Fill the holes with soilless medium and cover the plant’s roots. Water the base of the plant to settle the medium around the root system. If planting seeds, put a layer of sterile potting media on top of the bale and tamp it down into the

(Continued on page 2)

“Anyone who thinks gardening begins in

the spring and ends in the fall is missing the best part of the whole year; for gardening

begins in January with the dream.”

- Josephine Nuese

GROW NATIVE WORKSHOP APRIL 1

Location: Missouri Department of Conservation, 3500 S. Baltimore, Kirksville, MO.

9:00–9:30 a.m. Registration, light breakfast and coffee, view exhibits

9:30–9:45 a.m. Welcome and introductions

9:45–10:45 a.m. Ed Spevak: Native Pollinators: Who are they? Why should we care? How can we help?

10:45–11:00 a.m. Break, view exhibits

11:00–12:00 p.m. Alan Branhagan: Midwestern Native Small Trees and Large Shrubs

12:00–1:00 p.m. Lunch

1:00–1:45 p.m. Dan Getman: Become a Citizen Scientist and Help Save Monarchs; Claire Peckosh: Germination and Propagation of Native Seeds: John Murphy: Native Plants in the Landscape—on Your Acreage or Farm

1:45–2:00 p.m. Break, view exhibits

2:00–3:00 p.m. Bill Ruppert: Using Native Plants in a Designed Landscape Setting

3:00 p.m. Workshop ends

Registration Fee includes workshop, lunch and light breakfast, and handouts. $30 for Missouri Prairie Foundation and Grow Native! members. $40 for nonmembers.

To register submit one registration form (available from the Adair County Extension office) and payment for each attendee. Make checks paya-ble to Missouri Prairie Foundation and mail by Friday, March 25 to: Grow Native!, PO Box 200 Columbia, MO 65205.

You may also register and pay by credit card at grownative.org.

MISSOURI BLUEBERRY SCHOOL MARCH 17-18 The Missouri Blueberry School is planned for March 17-18 at Mis-souri State University's Darr School of Agriculture Bond Building, Spring-field. The school will offer educational sessions and a tour of innovative blueberry farms. The keynote speaker will be Dr. Bill Cline of North Carolina State University.

Speakers will address establishing new blueberry plantings, reno-vating existing plantings, creative marketing strategies for blueberries, blueberry production practices, and updates on blueberry insect issues (including spotted wing drosophila and brown marmorated stink bug).

Registration for the school costs $80 for the first member of a farm or family and $60 for each additional farm or family. The fee includes Fri-day educational sessions, a Saturday tour and lunch and educational mate-rials.

Registration can be done online at http://extension.missouri. edu/greene (preferred method) or by calling (417) 881-8909.

bale. Plant seeds according to package instructions.

Straw contains few nutri-ents, so feed the plants with a wa-ter-soluble, liquid fertilizer solu-tion on a regular basis. However, do not over-fertilize plants grow-ing in straw bales. Otherwise, you end up with plants lush with abundant vegetative growth and little fruit. Too much nitrogen causes pollen abortion and flow-ers fall off.

Be especially careful not to over-fertilize vining crops such as cucumbers and melons. For sweeter-tasting melons, cut back on water when the fruits begin to size. Continue to keep bales ade-quately watered during the grow-ing season. Drip lines or soaker hoses may be helpful and elimi-nate hand watering. Straw bales provide conditions for good root growth, especially for tomatoes. You will see few weeds, but mushrooms may appear. Discard them. Earthworms like the nutri-ent-enriched bales and help plants thrive. You should see few-er pests than in conventional gar-dening.

Salad greens are a perfect choice for straw bale gardening. You can enjoy greens up to frost, and even after frost with protec-tion. Tomatoes, peppers, and egg-plant also grow well in straw. Alt-hough space in a straw bale gar-den is limited, avoid the tempta-tion to crowd plants. Space them as you would if growing in soil. MU Extension’s “Vegetable Plant-ing Calendar” (G6201) lists typi-cal spacing for garden vegetables. It is available for download at ex-tension.missouri.edu/p/g6201. Unfortunately, straw bales last only one growing season. Howev-er, used bales make excellent compost.

Source: David Trinklein, 573-882-9631.

There are many different kinds of lettuces and salad greens that are easy to grow and provide a nutri-tious, attractive, and tasty mix for your salad bowl. March is a time to prepare your beds and containers for planting cool-season vegetables like lettuce, spinach, radishes, kale, and others.

Leaf lettuces are fast growing plants that are ready for harvest in as little as 45 days, even less for a light harvest of baby leaves. Leaves may be bright green or rich red, and have wavy or notched edges. You can harvest the entire plant or extend your har-vest by selectively picking the outer leaves.

Butterhead lettuce, also called bibb or Boston lettuce, has especially tender, succulent leaves that form a loose head. The leaves of some varieties are tinged with red.

Head lettuce includes the familiar' Iceberg' vari-ety and forms a firm head of crisp, juicy leaves.

Romaine lettuce is also known as cos. It forms a loose head of sturdy, elongated green leaves. Ro-maine and leaf lettuce are the highest in nutrition among all the lettuces.

Salad greens such as arugula, corn salad and mi-

zuna are cold-tolerant and easy to grow, offer an early harvest, and add zest, nutrition, and interest to your salad bowl.

Lettuce is tol-erant of cool soil and weather and can be planted in a well-prepared seedbed 4 weeks before your last frost date. Lettuce seeds are small, so make sure you have raked the seedbed smooth and removed stones and large clods of soil so the germinating seeds can make their way through to the surface.

Wide row planting works well for a lettuce crop. Simply scatter the seeds thinly over the surface and just barely cover them with soil; the seeds need light to ger-minate. Keep the seedbed moist but not soggy until seeds sprout. Thin when seedlings have several sets of leaves. But all those tender young thinnings needn't go to waste; just toss them into the salad bowl. Follow the directions on the seed packet for the correct spacing for the kind of lettuce you're growing.

GROWING LETTUCE

HOW DO INSECTS SURVIVE THE WINTER? By: Katie Kammler, MU Extension horticulture specialist, St. Genevieve

Produced monthly at the Adair County University of Missouri Extension Center, 503 E. Northtown Road, Kirksville, MO

63501 Ph. 660-665-9866 Fax 660-665-9876

Editor: Jennifer Schutter Production: Vanessa Miller and our fabulous Master Gardener volunteers

University of Missouri Extension provides equal opportunity to all

participants in extension programs and activities, and for all employees and applicants for employment on the basis of their demonstrated ability and competence without discrimination on the basis of their race, color,

religion, sex, sexual orientation, national origin, age, disability or status as a protected veteran.

Garden Talk!

UPCOMING EVENTS

March 11: Gardener’s Palette, John Wood Community College, Quincy, IL.

March 11: Pollinator Day, sponsored by North Central Missouri Beekeepers Association. Macon High School Cafeteria, 702 N Missouri St, Macon MO. No cost to attend. For more information or to RSVP, contact Bob Brammer at rbrammer@cvalley.net or 660-415-6480.

March 24: Garden workshop, Little Dixie Library in Moberly, 2-4 pm. Topics: monarch waystations and raising monarch caterpillars the first hour. Grow-ing cool-season vegetables the second weekend. To register con-tact the Randolph County Exten-sion office at 660-269-9656.

April 1: Grow Native workshop, Kirksville. (see page 2)

May 6: Magic City Master Gardener Plant Sale, 8:00-1:00, James Youth Cabin in Rothwell Park, Moberly, MO. There will be a variety of plants and rain bar-rels for sale.

May 27: Kirksville Master Gardener plant sale, Kirksville Farmers’ Market.

June 15-16: State Master Gardener Conference, Columbia, MO.

GARDENING TIPS FOR MARCH VEGETABLES ALL MONTH: Fertilize the garden as soil is prepared for planting. U

Cultivate weeds and remove old, dead stalks of last years’ growth from the

asparagus bed before new spears emerge. Asparagus and rhubarb roots should be planted as soon as the ground can

be worked. Plant peas, lettuce, radishes, mustard greens, turnips, Irish potatoes, spin-

ach, and onions (seeds and sets) outdoors. Plant beets, carrots, parsley, and parsnip seeds outdoors. Set out broccoli,

cabbage, Brussels sprouts, Chinese cabbage, and cauliflower transplants into the garden.

Start seeds of tomatoes, peppers, and eggplants indoors.

ORNAMENTALS: To control Iris borer, destroy old foliage before new growth begins. Fertilize bulbs with a “bulb booster” formulation broadcast over the plant-

ing beds. Loosen winter mulches from perennials cautiously. Apply a balanced ferti-

lizer such as 6-12-12 to perennial beds when new growth appears. Dormant mail order plants should be unwrapped immediately. Keep roots

from drying out. Trees, shrubs, and perennials may be planted as soon as they become

available at local nurseries. Seeds of hardy annuals such as larkspur, bachelor’s buttons, Shirley and

California poppies should be direct sown in the garden now. Heavy pruning of trees should be complete before growth occurs. Trees

should not be pruned while the new leaves are growing. Summer and fall blooming perennials should be divided in spring. Apply sulfur to the soils around acid-loving plants such as Azaleas, Rhodo-

dendrons, Hollies, and Dogwoods. Use a granular formulation at the rate of ½ pound per 100 square feet.

Spring bedding plants such as pansies and toadflax may be planted now.

Gradually start to pull back mulch from rose bushes.

FRUITS: Gradually remove mulch from strawberries as the weather begins to warm. Continue pruning grapes. Bleeding causes no injury to the vines. Continue pruning apple trees. Burn or destroy all prunings to minimize

insect or disease occurrence. Apply dormant oil sprays now. Choose a dry day when freezing tempera-

tures are not expected. Spray peach trees with a fungicide for the control of peach leaf curl disease. Aphids begin to hatch on fruit trees as the buds begin to open. Peaches and nectarines should be pruned just before they bloom. Mulch all bramble fruits for weed control.

LAWN AND TURF: Mow lawns low to remove old growth before new growth begins. Apply broadleaf herbicides now for control of cool-season perennial and

annual weeds. These must not be applied to areas that will be seeded soon. Thin spots and bare patches in the lawn can be over-seeded now.

Source: Missouri Botanical Garden