When using potted plants in your Georgia community vegetable garden, start with healthy ones. Visit quality nurseries or plant stores and choose plants free from diseases and insects. You don’t want to bring home any problems. Check where the stem meets the soil for soft spots. Don’t choose plants that look wilted but have obviously been watered. That could be a sign of a soil borne disease.
Before planting your new vegetable plants, check the roots. Sometimes the plants can be root-bound or pot-bound. The plant was outgrowing the current container and the roots had no where to go in the pot but around the perimeter of the soil.
The roots of this plant need to be disturbed so they will easily grow in the new soil.
Before going into the ground these roots need to be broken apart so that they will venture out into the new soil. Otherwise, they may keep growing around the soil ball and the plants won’t thrive. Even after weeks of being in the ground, the plant will easily pull out of the planting hole. This is an unhealthy plant!
You can break apart roots with your hands or use scissors or a sharp knife (carefully!) to cut an incision into the root ball. You will need to go about 1 inch deep and about 3/4ths the way up on the root ball. After cutting gently pull the roots apart.
Cut about a 1 inch slit into opposite sides of the root ball.
Gently separate the roots using your hands.
Put the plant in the ground spreading the roots into the soil as much as possible. This may seem like tough love for an already developed root system but, your plants will be healthier and more productive in the long run. Remember, your local extension agent has all sorts of information on the correct way to plant just about anything!
As we think about purchasing plants for our Georgia community gardens, especially tomatoes, there are choices to be made. Is a hybrid the best choice? What exactly is a hybrid? What about heirlooms?
Today we are going to think back to our high school genetics class and discuss a bit about plant breeding. Pollen is located on the anther part of the stamen (male part). It is transferred by insect, wind, human hands, or other means to the stigma part of the flower (female part). This is pollination. There the pollen grows down the style to the ovary. That is fertilization. Any of that sound familiar?
A hybrid vegetable is created when a plant breeder deliberately controls pollination by cross-pollinating two different varieties of a plant. The parent plants are chosen for characteristics like fruit size, plant vigor, or disease resistance. The hope is that the resulting offspring will have the positive characteristics.
Millionaire Eggplant Hybrid
The parent designated as the female has the pollen-bearing anthers removed from the flowers. Pollen from a carefully chosen partner is moved to the female plant’s stigma by human hands. The chosen pollen is the only pollen that female receives. This is all very time consuming and carefully monitored. Scientifically it looks like this:
Parent 1 (P1) + Parent 2 (P2) —-> Hybrid (F1)
The resulting hybrid (hopefully) has wonderful characteristics like disease resistance, early maturing fruit, larger fruit, or whatever the plant breeder was trying to achieve. Before a hybrid is available to the consumer, it has gone through many field tests and trials. All this is why hybrids are more expensive plants.
One negative to hybrids is that you can’t save the seed. Seeds grown from hybrid plants do not provide plant types true-to-type. You need to purchase new hybrids year after year. Big Boy and Early Girl are examples of hybrid tomatoes. Millionaire and Early Midnight are popular hybrid eggplants.
Arkansas Traveler tomatoes ready to go in the ground.
Open pollinated vegetables are pollinated in the field by wind or natural pollinators to self or cross-pollinate. Plants that cross-pollinate need to be isolated from other varieties to produce seed that is true-to-type. Crops like tomatoes and beans tend to self-pollinate so saving useful seed is not difficult. Arkansas Traveler, Abraham Lincoln, and Cherokee Purple are popular open pollinated tomato varieties. Black Beauty is a popular open pollinated eggplant variety.
Heirlooms are generally open pollinated plant varieties that are over 50 years old. Traditionally the seed has been carefully saved and handed down from gardener to gardener. These are the plants most treasured.
So whether you choose hybrids, open pollinated plants, heirlooms, or a combination of these…
Source – Will Hudson and Kris Braman, UGA Extension Entomologists
Azalea lace bug and injury, Pest and Diseases Image Library, Bugwood.org
Azalea lacebugs overwinter as eggs and hatch in the spring. Early spring is a good time to control them before they become too numerous.
Azalea lace bug attacks azaleas and some rhododendrons. Azalea lace bugs mainly feed on the undersides of the leaves, leaving the top of the leaf with white to yellow stippling or flecking. Heavy lace bug feeding on azalea can reduce plant vigor and flowering and affects the overall look of the plant.
Adult azalea lace bugs are 1/8 inch long. The transparent wings are held flat on the back. Their wings are lacy with two grayish-brown cross-bands connected in the middle. Nymphs begin life clear but quickly turn black and spiny. The flask-shaped eggs are partially embedded in leaf tissue, usually on the bottom of the leaf, and often are covered with a black tar-like secretion.
Look for the first signs of damage on plants in full sun or in protected areas beginning in March and continuing throughout the summer. Lace bugs overwinter as eggs. There are four generations a year. Lace bug adults and nymphs live and feed on the underside of leaves. Look for white stippling on older leaves. Look under leaves to find lace bug life stages and black fecal spots. On azaleas with a lot of damage, the top of the leaf can become grey or silvery.
Azaleas can withstand a lot of lace bug injury without much reduction in growth or bloom. The damage however on the leaves is unsightly. Control is generally recommended for the spring when insects are few in numbers. Treating early also protects the new leaves from damage from these insects. Once a leaf is damaged, the injury will be visible until the leaf falls off the plant.
Time spring insecticide applications for the presence of the first generation nymphs, usually with the early warm weather in late February in south Georgia through March and April in central and north Georgia.
Late summer insecticide applications are also helpful. Lacebugs overwinter as eggs and managing adults now reduces the number of eggs on plants and the number of lacebugs you will see next spring. Once lacebugs are in the egg stage, insecticides will not effectively manage them.
Cultural controls for azalea lace bugs
Plant azaleas only in partial shade. Too much sun stresses the plant and can make lace bug injury worse.
Keep plants healthy with proper planting, fertilizing and watering.
One of the best things you can do is scout azaleas (particularly early in the season) to identify and control infestations before numbers increase and leaf damage is severe.
Chemical Controls
Contact insecticides include the pyrethroids (bifenthrin, cyfluthrin, cypermethrin, permethrin, etc.) and carbaryl (Sevin and others) as well as other insecticides.
The biggest concern with contact insecticides is getting full coverage. The chemical must be applied to the underside of the leaves. This is difficult with larger, fuller plants.
You may need to make more than one application for full control. Check plants three to four weeks after the first application to see if they need another treatment. Knocking the branches over a white piece of paper should dislodge the lace bugs and make them easier to see.
Systemic insecticides
Some systemic insecticides may be used as soil applications (liquid drenches and granular treatments) as well as sprays. Soil applied insecticides enter through the root system and then travel into the leaves.
Foliar sprays of systemic insecticides tend to work more quickly than soil application but soil applications give a longer residual control – up to several months.
Even though some soil applied systemic insecticides may take two weeks or longer to become active in the leaves of large plants, this is not a problem if plants are small or if application is made early enough in the season to provide protection for the first flush of new leaves.
Read and follow all label directions since systemic insecticides differ in the way they work in the plant.
For more information:
For pest management information see the Pest Management Handbook (Follow all label recommendations when using any pesticide)
Crop rotation is a huge part of integrated pest management (IPM) in Georgia vegetable production. It is an inexpensive tool in disease and nematode management. Correctly using crop rotation can cut down on pesticide use and result in healthier plants. Growing Vegetables Organically has some great information on this type of IPM.
As we are all planning our warm-season gardens crop rotation is something to consider. However, it is a whole lot easier to rotate crops around a 3 acre farm than it is to move them around a 32 square foot garden plot. How do we practice crop rotation in the community garden? It is even necessary?
Crop rotation has been around for centuries. Simply it is changing what is planted in a particular area each year. Planting the same crop year after year in the same location causes disease pathogens to build up and become a real problem. Rotating crops helps break this disease cycle. Also, since different crops use varying amounts of plant nutrients, crop rotation is a wise use of the nutrition in your soil.
Plants can be divided into families. Learn those plant groupings because many pathogens infect crops in the same families. The basic rule of crop rotation is:
Don’t plant crops from the same plant family in the same place every year.
Crop families:
Onion family (Alliaceae): chives, onions, garlic
Cole family (Brassicaceae): lettuce, collards, cabbage, broccoli, spinach
Squash family (Cucurbitaceae): pumpkins, watermelon, squash, cantaloupe
Bean family (Fabaceae): beans, peas
Tomato family (Solanaceae): tomatoes, peppers, eggplant
Since tomatoes and peppers are in the same family (Solanaceae), don’t plant tomatoes where you have been growing peppers. And, don’t follow squash with pumpkins (same Cucurbitaceae family). Many farmers follow a four year or even longer rotation plan. Their lettuce won’t see the same piece of soil for several years. This helps lower disease pressure and cuts down on fungicide use. Many Master Gardeners usually try for a three year rotation for a large garden area.
We know that crop rotation works to help create healthier plants but how does that translate in a Georgia community garden plot?
The best way is for the community gardener to choose plants from different families each year. This isn’t always practical. A gardener wants to grow what his/her family likes to eat. That may mean beans every year. The #1 vegetable grown in community gardens is tomatoes – year after year!
So, maybe you work with your fellow community gardeners and rotate who grows tomatoes and you all agree to share the tomato harvest. This may not always work, either. Some gardeners want lots of tomatoes every year.
Move your pole beans to the other side of the plot this year. Buy your tomatoes from the farmers market this year and try growing squash. Better yet, try growing and eating something entirely new.
An old fashioned mattock may be your only tool for some modified rotation in your community garden plots.
At the very least Bob Westerfield, UGA vegetable specialist, recommends turning your soil over. Dig deeply bringing up soil that hasn’t been exposed to the sun. Go as deep as you are able. In a small way you are not rotating your plants but rotating your soil. Your UGA Extension agent can help you come up with a plan for crop rotation that will work for your situation.
The air temperatures may be warm but the soil temperatures are still cool.
Georgia’s recent warm daytime temperatures have home gardeners itching to dig in the soil and plant summer crops. But University of Georgia experts warn gardeners not to be tempted. Soil temperatures are still far too low for seeds to germinate and transplants to survive.
“In Georgia, we may have a warm front come in one day and a cold front a few days later,” said Bob Westerfield, a consumer horticulturist with UGA Cooperative Extension. “It may hit 75 degrees outside, but the air temperature isn’t important when it comes to gardening – the soil temperature is.”
“That soil’s not ready for tomatoes. Summer crops need from 60 to 65 degrees.” he said.
Green beans can handle temperatures of about 55 degrees, but it is still not quite warm enough for them. If gardeners ignore his advice and seed their gardens, he says the seeds won’t germinate.
Gardeners who cannot resist the temptation can still plant cold season crops like asparagus, beets, broccoli, carrots, cauliflower, collards, kale, lettuce, mustard, onions, peas, potatoes, radish, spinach and turnips.
To track the soil temperatures in your area of the state, Westerfield recommends two different strategies. Buy a soil thermometer or use a meat thermometer to test the soil in your garden plot or rely on UGA’s Georgia Automated Environmental Monitoring Network at www.georgiaweather.net.
Soil temperatures “creep up slowly” and Georgia soils should be ready to sow in seed by early-to-mid
Use www.georgiaweather.net to check soil temperatures in your area. The current soil temperatures in Griffin are in the 40s.
April, Westerfield said.
“And don’t be swayed by the vegetable transplants lining the garden center shelves,” he said. “Just because plants are in the stores doesn’t mean it’s time to plant them.” Contact your local UGA Extension Agent for more information.
For more information on vegetable gardening in Georgia, see the UGA Extension publication, “Vegetable Gardening in Georgia”.
Sharon Dowdy is a news editor with the University of Georgia College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences. Growing her own tomatoes has been beneficial for Sharon’s heart. She met her beau five years ago while buying tomato stakes at Home Depot.
Fire ants remain the most prevalent outdoor ant pest in most areas of the southern U.S. Throughout the U.S. we estimate the annual cost of fire ant control at over $6 billion. But the cost of this pest goes far beyond measurable dollars. Fire ants reduce the recreational value of our parks and backyards, disrupt wildlife populations, and send thousands to emergency rooms each year from their painful stings.
So as we get ready to enter fire ant season, it may be a good time to bring yourself and your staff up to speed on fire ant control. Many people are surprised to learn that fire ants are not an especially difficult pest to manage, once the biology and control tools are understood.
One of the best places to learn about fire ant management is the eXtension fire ant website, a place where the best information about fire ant is assembled by Extension agencies throughout the South. This information was recently summarized and presented in an informative webinar by Dr. Fudd Graham, fire ant specialist with Auburn University. Dr. Graham focuses on fire ant biology and use of baits for fire ant control.
It’s worth knowing something about how fire ant baits work because they are the most economical, ecologically friendly, and effective control methods for fire ants. The webinar will provide you or your technician with an hour of training that should pay for itself many times over.
Mike Merchant is an entomology specialist for Texas AgriLife Extension. He works with pest management professionals, school facilities managers, extension volunteers, researchers and other extension professionals. His areas of specialty center on research on insects affecting man including spiders, scorpions, fire ants, termites and others. His program also focuses on training school maintenance professionals in principles of integrated pest management (IPM). His goal is to make schools healthier, cleaner places to study and live.
Chef Seth Freedman is a Southern man with New York chef training. That can be the best of both worlds! He still cooks with his grandmother’s cast iron skillet but using advanced culinary techniques.
Owner of Forage and Flame, Seth specializes in catering for groups large and small. He enjoys educating people about cooking locally grown food. In addition to Forage and Flame, Seth is a partner at Peach Dish where you can order fresh ingredients with recipes and have them delivered to your home for preparation. And, Seth loves his greens!
Recently he shared a kale recipe at the Georgia Organics conference. For those of us who are not kale lovers, we were impressed. I asked Seth if I could share the recipe and tips and he happily said “YES!”.
Kale and Apple Salad
1 bunch of kale
2 TBSP apple cider vinegar
1/4 cup olive oil
2 tsp honey
2 apples (crisp and sweet)
salt and pepper to taste
1. Remove stalks from the kale and discard them. Wash leaves and slice them thinly.
Massaging the kale is the most important step in the recipe.
2. Dice apples into 1/4 inch cubes.
3. In a large bowl, mix vinegar with honey and ground pepper. Drizzle in the 1/4 cup of olive oil while whisking. Pour dressing into another container.
4. Add kale and a small sprinkle of salt to the large bowl. Using your clean, bare hands massage the kale with the dressing left on the sides of the bowl. Seth says to squeeze them so that you are actually bruising or breaking the greens a bit. Squeeze, mash, massage – really get in there. This helps take some of the bitterness out of the greens and is the secret to this recipe!
5. Pour the rest of the dressing over the kale and add the apple dices. Adjust seasoning, toss and serve.
Seth says that really any Georgia grown green will work in this recipe – mustard greens, collards – whatever you have growing in your garden plot. Remember the squeezing, mashing, massaging is the key!
Let us know if you prepare this recipe and what you think of it. If you would like to contact Seth you can reach him at seth@peachdish.com. Thanks again, Seth, for sharing your expertise!
Asian or granulate ambrosia beetles are tiny (<1/8″) wood-boring insects that attack the trunks of young and weakened trees and shrubs. Ambrosia beetles tunnel into stems and construct galleries where they raise their young. Beetles carry on their bodies a fungus that grows in these galleries producing ambrosia which feeds both adults and larvae. Ambrosia beetles can also carry the spores of disease pathogens that infect the tree. The growth of these fungi can lead to weakening or death of the tree.
As ambrosia beetles tunnel, they push sawdust out through their entry hole. This sawdust can cling together forming short ‘toothpicks’ sticking from the infested stem. These toothpicks make it easy to identify ambrosia beetle attacks.
Wind or rain may destroy these toothpicks leaving just the small holes and scattered sawdust from the beetle. Since the entry holes are only about the size of a #2 pencil lead, close inspection is necessary to detect these attacks in time to treat. Ambrosia beetles attack many types of trees and shrubs including crape myrtles, cherries, oaks, sweet gums, pecans, peaches and others.
The ambrosia beetle’s first flight occurs with mild weather typically in February but possibly as early as January. Cold weather will put them off for a while, but we usually see a big emergence of the granulate ambrosia beetle ranging from February in south Georgia to early March in north Georgia.
Young trees in nurseries and trees that have been in landscapes for less than three years old are vulnerable to attack even if they are not obviously stressed. This is especially true during the green-up period. Prompt action can save these trees if the number of attacks (“toothpicks”) is less than 4 – 5 per tree.
Growers of nursery trees and shrubs, as well as landscapers with new trees, can apply a spray to protect vulnerable trees. The spray should be repeated every 10 – 14 days until the plants are completely leafed out.
If applied in time, pyrethroid insecticides can repel the beetles even after plants are attacked. Pyrethroids like permethrin (Pounce, Astro), Talstar, Decathlon, or others will work. Once the trees have leafed out completely, they are less attractive to the beetles unless the trees are under stress. Prevent stress to shrubs and trees to lower chance of ambrosia beetle injury.
Spray affected trees, being careful to cover the trunk completely. Monitor the trees for signs of wilting of the new leaves, a sign that a pathogen has been introduced. Once the wilting starts, the tree will probably die. Do not assume the attack will be fatal, since trees may recover. Also watch treated trees to see if new toothpicks develop – a sign that the ambrosia beetles are still active.
Nursery trees that are attacked should be sprayed and separated from the rest of the block (if possible), and watched closely for signs of wilting. Nursery trees that are attacked but don’t wilt may not need to be destroyed. If they leaf out and seem healthy and no further toothpick formation is noted, then the small holes will heal quickly and leave no permanent damage.
If you see toothpicks on larger trees, the tree is probably severely stressed. If attacks are confined to one limb, pruning is an option. If the attacks are on the main stem, prepare to remove the tree if it dies.
Considering the history of this pest in Georgia, there is a good chance that any given nursery or landscape will suffer little or no damage and spraying will not be necessary. Watch susceptible trees or shrubs closely for beetle attacks.
Traps can be used to monitor the activity of this pest. For more information on constructing Ambrosia beetle traps see Activity Monitoring in this publication.
Kale plants are loose leaves and do not form heads. Photo courtesy of Purdue University.
Kale seems to be the vegetable of the year. The nutritive properties of kale are legendary. It is high in vitamins A and C and loaded with fiber. You can find it raw in salads, sautéed in stir-fries, fried into chips, steamed in to a side dish and pureed into smoothies. The good news for community gardeners in Georgia is that kale is easy to grow. It is a cool-season crop and March is the time to plant kale transplants outdoors.
March weather in Georgia can be tricky. If you have grown your own transplants from seed indoors, it is imperative that you harden off your plants. Give them a chance to acclimate to being outdoors by setting them out in a protected area, like on a porch, during a sunny day with no wind. Leave them out only during the day at first. Gradually expose them to a less protected area and then let them be out overnight. Once they are in the garden, protect them from wind. Wind can dry out the plant and damage the plant tissues.
Add compost to the kale bed before planting or add high nitrogen amendments such as blood meal or cottonseed meal. Nitrogen is important since you are growing the plants for the leaves. Space the transplants 18 to 24 inches apart since the plants will get large. Mulch helps keep soil temperatures and moisture even.
Many gardeners say the key to tender kale is the watering. Keep the transplants well watered. As they grow make sure they get about 1 inch of water per week. During the cool temperatures of spring, it is easy to forget to water.
When the plants are ready for harvesting, start with the outer and lower leaves. Remember the smaller leaves will be more tender and would probably be better in salads then the tougher, larger leaves. As the soil temperatures warm up you will find the plant grows faster. As it approaches really warm weather and longer days your established plants may bolt sending up a flower stalk. This is your cue to replace the kale crop with a warm-season vegetable.
Varieties such as “Vates”, “Dwarf Siberian” or “Red Russian” are popular with Georgia gardeners. If you don’t have room in your early spring garden for growing kale, consider putting it in your fall garden.
Next week we will have a kale recipe from a famous Georgia chef. It is a good one!
Resolve to live more sustainably in 2015 by creating a compost pile or bin to help reduce waste.
Worms in Compost – photo by Sharon Dowdy
Many items thrown into the trash can be sorted out and composted and benefits go well beyond waste reduction. Compost can be used to improve garden soil and make landscapes and vegetable gardens more productive. With a little organization and a designated space, gardeners can amend their own soil through composting.
Start by finding a space where the compost can “cook.” The location should be in full sun, at least 3 feet by 3 feet by 3 feet, out of the way and with good drainage.
A compost container can be bought or built with materials like welded wire, fencing, pallets or blocks. Open spaces should be left on the container’s sides to allow good air circulation through the pile, and the bottom should be open to the ground.
Just like cooking a meal, cooking compost involves following a recipe. Almost any organic plant material
Compost bins at the North Fulton Annex Community Garden
can be used for composting, including grass clippings, leaves, flowers, annual weeds, twigs, chopped brush, old vegetable plants, straw and sawdust.
Avoid composting diseased plants, weeds and seeds or invasive weeds, like morning glory. Vegetable peelings and coffee grounds can also be composted, but avoid adding meats, bones and fats that may attract animals.
For best decomposition, mix a variety of materials. Most compost piles are layered with whatever organic material is available at a given time. The smaller the pieces of organic matter, the faster they will decompose. Once a layer of organic matter is added, add a little garden soil or animal manure. This adds fungi, bacteria, insects and worms to the pile and helps speed up the decomposition process.
Keep the pile moist, but not too wet. To speed up the decomposition process and prevent odors, use a shovel to mix the pile once a month. Compost is completely “cooked” and ready when it looks like rich, crumbly earth and the original organic material is no longer recognizable.
With every mix of the pile, some ready-to-use compost should be available. This compost can be added to the soil before planting vegetables or trees, shrubs or flowers. It can also be used as mulch on the soil surface, or as a potting soil for container plants.
Completely cooked compost will slowly release nutrients into the soil, but don’t rely on it for fertilization. Your plants will still need to be fertilized appropriately.
Mary Carol Sheffield is the University of Georgia Cooperative Extension agricultural and natural resources agent in Paulding County. Mary Carol’s vegetable garden is small to match her children! They love to help her there and have their own kid size tools and gloves.
