Gardening Mistakes to Avoid ­— Part Two

Last time in this space we dealt with five gardening mistakes which many of us have made and wish to avoid making again. This week we take a look at five more of these. The National Garden Bureau is the source of these recommendations.

#6 – Burning the lawn with fertilizer

The gaffe: Some chemical fertilizers are strong enough that if they’re applied to excess, the nitrogen in them can brown grass. Uneven applications can also cause streakiness. Another all-too-common miscue is when careless lawn care workers dump granular fertilizer into their spreader and inadvertently spill some on the surrounding lawn. Those dumpings frequently cause brown lawn patches.

The lesson: Apply fertilizer according to listed amounts. Or switch to organic fertilizers or fertilizers that are high in slow-release nitrogen – both of which are far less likely to burn a lawn. Fill your spreaders on the driveway or other hard surfaces so you can sweep up spills.

#7 – Volcano Mulching

The gaffe: Adding too much mulch around a tree. Volcano mulching is the term for placing mulch in a funnel-like mound that runs up against tree trunks. Yeah, you’ll see even professional landscapers do this, but it’s harmful to the trees by causing bark rot and by giving cover to rodents (mice, chipmunks, and voles) that chew on tree bark. A mulch of more than three to four inches – even if not right up against the trunk – is also detrimental by “stealing” rain in dry conditions and by reducing the amount of oxygen reaching tree roots.

The lesson: Keep mulch a few inches back away from tree trunks, and limit mulch layers to no more than four inches. Two inches is plenty around perennials.

#8 – Messing with bulb foliage while it’s still green

The gaffe: Removing the bulb foliage early. The weeks after tulips, daffodils, hyacinths, and other spring bulbs finish blooming are very important because that’s when the foliage takes in sunlight that provides energy to recharge the bulbs for next year’s bloom. You’ll interfere with that recharge by cutting off foliage that’s still green or by reducing the surface area by braiding or tying the leaves, as many people do to “neaten” the post-bloom look.

The lesson: Don’t cut, braid, or otherwise mess with spring-bulb foliage until it’s at least started to yellow – signaling that most of the season’s photosynthesis work has been completed.

#9 – Digging up plants that aren’t dead

The gaffe: In areas with sub-freezing winters, you might think those crape myrtles, hardy hibiscus, butterfly bushes, figs, and other late-to-leaf-out plants are dead when just about everything else is already green and growing. Know that some plants – especially those native to warmer climates – wait until the weather is consistently warm before springing back to life in late spring. Until then, these might look leafless and dead when they’re actually just still dormant.

The lesson: If you don’t know what’s normal for your plants, at least wait until the end of April or even mid-May before digging them out for dead. You can also tell by scratching a little bark off leafless woody-plant stems. If there’s green underneath, there’s a good chance the plant is still snoozing but not dead.

#10 – Planting too early

The gaffe: Cold-climate gardeners are eager to get those petunias, tomatoes, and other summer annuals and veggies in the ground at the first sight of frost-free weather in spring. You might get a jump on the season some years, but many, many gardeners have watched their tender plants die when a frost follows a warm-up or two.

The lesson: Know your typical last-killing frost dates in spring, and then wait until at least then to plant frost-tender plants. At least wait until the all-time-late frost-free time is approaching and check the 10-day forecast to be sure nothing is even close to a freeze before planting. Just because garden centers and home centers are selling tender plants doesn’t mean they should go in the ground then.

Well… how many of these gardening gaffes have you committed?

Tim Lewis is a Georgia Green Industry Association Certified Plant Professional, gardening writer, former Perry High School horticulture instructor, and former horticulturalist at Henderson Village and Houston Springs. He and his wife, Susan, own and operate Lewis Farms Nursery located on Hwy 26 two miles east of Elko, where he was born and raised. He can be reached at (478)954-1507 or timlewis1@windstream.net.

HHJ News