Answers From Gertie


Below are some of the questions received by Gertie......


Tina, from Cicero IN

I would like to create a living privacy screen on my property with a mixture of trees. We have planted some white pine and fur trees, but they are very small and will take a long time to grow. I would like to mix in some fast growing trees, any ideas?

Dear Tina,
Here are a few suggestions:

Arborvitae, Thuja occidentalis 'Techny.' A fast growing, columnar plant with dark-green foliage. 8-10 feet high, 5-6 feet wide. Prefers moist soil but tolerates good humus soil.

Douglas-fir, Psuedostuga mensiesii (taxifolia). Fast growing with an open, pyramidal form and dense, dark green evergreen foliage. 50-80 feet high, 12-18 feet wide. Grows in any good soil if moist.

Hemlock, Canada, Tsuga canadensis. Medium to fast growing, gracefully pyramidal with slightly drooping branches. Rich dark-green foliage. 40-70 feet high and 20-35 feet wide, but can be held to 3-4 feet with proper pruning. Needs moist, but well-drained soil.

Hemlock, Carolina, Tsuga caroliniana. Fast growing and deeper in color, more compact, and more tolerant of city conditions than the Canada hemlock. 40-50 feet high by 20-25 feet wide. Needs rich, moist soil.

Dawn Redwood, Metasequoia glyptostroboides. The foliage is similiar to a bald cypress tree but the shape of the trunk differs. It is wide at the base with horizontal branches, which can be limbed up or left to grow. Growing 80 to 100 feet tall, these trees were around when the dinosaurs roamed the earth.

Also a fast grower is the Japanese Yoshino Cherry, Prunus yedoensis. It has white flowers in the spring. It has a lovely rounded habit growing 40 to 50 feet tall. It is the predominant flowering tree in Washington D.C.

For a lower-growing screen, mixing redbud and dogwood might work IF the site is out of the wind.

Alternate old-fashioned lilac and forsythia. The color and the smell are wonderful in the spring.

Finally, I would strongly recommend that you stay away from anything advertised as "instant hedge," like Russian olive or "instant tree" like the hybrid Poplar. These kinds of trees and shrubs are very fast growers -- and very fast dyers -- and have a very short life span.



Cristine from San Luis Obispo, California

My tomato plants look healthy, but the blossoms dry up and fall off before any fruit can form. What can be the problem?

Hi, Blossom drop is caused by high heat. Tomatoes set fruit in temperatures between 55 and 75 degrees. When they don't set fruit their blossoms drop off. A blossom set spray can be used for cooler temperatures but the fruit is often misshapen. It doesn't work in warmer temperatures.

Ladybugs Everywhere

We recently moved into an old house somewhat in the country. Since we have moved in 6 months ago, (October) I have noticed there are quite a few ladybugs in the house. I have seen them from the upstairs bedrooms, the bottom floor kitchen area, and the basement (which is a damp area). I find them either dead or alive.
My question is, why are these lasybugs living in my house??? Where are they coming from?? are they breeding in my house??, or coming in from the outside? We are in a farming community and at first I thought that they were coming in from other gardens, but now I am starting to wonder seeing as winter came and went, and throughout the whole season, there were still ladybugs! Could you please help me come to some kind of conclusion to this? any suggestions would be greatly appreciated!!

Signed, Rebecca

Dear Rebecca,
There are different types of lady beetles. Some go to warm places to hibernate for the winter. The Asian lady beetles come into people's homes for the winter. Since there is no food source most of them die. Their food would be sugar water or fruit. Lady beetles are also meat eaters and feed on aphids in the garden which is what makes them friendly to gardeners.

They leave the house in the spring as mysteriously as they come into the house in the fall. Many people complain about hundreds of them on their ceilings, some alive and some dead. I suggest using a vacuum cleaner to get rid of them. Some people enjoy having a few in the house in the winter and actually put out shallow bowls of sugar water for them.

I had one person write to me that they hired a company to get rid of them chemically, but they were sick from the chemicals for weeks.

You could try making sugar water traps for them. Place a small amount of sugar water in the bottom of a jar and cover it with a funnel made from plastic wrap and secured with a rubberband. Cut a hole in the tip of the cone just large enough for a lady beetle to fit through. They should enter but not be able to exit.

I hope this helps.



Starting a Tomato Garden on Topless soil

I live in a sub division that has removed most of the top soil. I have tried to have a vegetable garden for the past 2 years and have put miracle grow and top soil in the garden spot. I have not been able to grow very good tomato's so this year I thought I would put down 12-12-12 fertilizer and lime but I don't know if I should put this down now or put it down when I am tilling. Can you help? Thank you.

Dear Tomato Lover, If you live in Indiana chances are that you do not need to add lime to your soil. Indiana has a limestone base so most soils are alkaline not acidic. Farmers, especially those who grow corn, add lime to their soil because they put such high amounts of nitrogen in their soil. Tomatoes prefer a slightly acidic soil with a pH of 6.2 to 6.8. If you do add fertilizer it should be
5-10-5 or 6-10-4.

The most important thing you could do for your garden is to add compost. Compost is teeming with microbes and nutrients that the plants need. Start a compost bin this summer. Right now you can save your fresh vegetable and fruit scraps and also coffee grounds. Dig a hole just deep enough to bury them in your garden and let nature take it's course. In the spring after the ground is workable (not too wet) till in compost/manure which you can buy in bags.

Don't add fertilizer until the plants are established. Mulch with straw and the next year till the straw into the soil for compost.

There are also differences in types of tomatoes. Try several different kinds. Many times the newer hybrids that have been improved not to have cracks or to produce tomatoes sooner have less flavor. I have been growing Brandywine tomatoes for several years now. They are an heirloom variety and they do get cracks on the top but they are full of flavor.

Source: Vegetable Gardening, Tomatoes - Purdue University, April 1993



Mary from Noblesville Indiana asks,

Does one divide a dendranthema the same way as a chrysanthemum? When do you think the best time of year is for this job? Thanks!

Dear Mary, I have found that dendranthema's divide and transplant almost any time of the growing season. But it's always best to do it when conditions are least stressful. Cooler and wetter weather is always best.



Mary Beth from Avon Indiana writes,

"We love to grow tomatoes in the summer, but our crop has been reduced the last two years due to green worms, or tomato worms we call them. They are pesky and hard to see on the plants. Is there anything that we could do as a preventative? I hate to spray anything that we will be eating."



Dear Mary Beth, I have better luck finding tomato hornworms in the morning or just before twilight. I don't know why, but I can always find them better at those two times of the day.

Also you can plant companion plants that will draw parasitic wasps to you garden. Any flowering plant which produces nectar (cosmos, coneflower, coreopsis, etc.) will also draw the meat-eating insects. Have you ever seen a tomato hornworm with tiny raised white capsules on it's back? These are the cocoons of the parasitic wasp and they are eating the insides of the hornworm.

Another good practice is to rotate your crops. Try putting your tomatoes in another spot next year. I rotate my cucumbers and tomatoes each year.





Laura from Fishers, Indiana writes,

How can I remove a large area of grass (without digging it up) so that I can turn this same area into a flower bed.

Dear Laura,
The best way to turn sod into a garden is to smother the sod. Put several layers of newspaper on top of the sod and then cover the sod with composting materials, such as: grass clippings, weeds, leaves, etc.. By next year you will have a rich new flower bed. The sod and newspaper will be turned into fertile soil. I have had success at starting this process in March and having the area ready by June. When I start later than that, the garden is not ready until next summer.



A gardener from Noblesville, Indiana writes,

What can we do about moles, we have them really bad, they kill the grass and ruin our flower beds. Do you have any suggestions? We have used mole traps, but they don't work very well at all. HELP!!

Dear Gardener, Trapping is the most effective and reliable way to get rid of moles. Home remedies, like castor oil or moth balls, do little to reduce the population. In many cases, you will only succeed in relocating the moles to another part of your yard. Using poison or bait is usually ineffective, also. Trapping requires patience, practice and persistence. Traps must be set properly and checked often. Begin by locating a main runway. Look for runways that: (1) follow a fairly straight course for some distance; (2) seem to connect two mounds or two runway systems; (3) follow fences, walls or other artificial borders; or (4) follow a woody perimeter, a field or yard. Poke small holes in the runway. Moles will repair these in a day or two if you have actually located a main runway. Harpoon traps should be set on the main runways and checked daily. Tamp the soil down with your foot before placing the trap. Be sure the trap is centered over the runway and the supporting spikes don't cut into the tunnel below. Take care not to tread on or disturb any other portion of the runway system.

Source: In The Grow, Purdue University, March, 1997



Dale from Noblesville, Indiana writes,

Gert..Hi..my neighbor and I disagree on lawn care; mine is beautiful, lush, three inches long; his is 1 inch and awful. our common area is becoming overrun with a clover kind of look;I don't have a clue as to the name of the weed; suggestions to control? thanks Dale

Dear Dale, According to Zac Reicher, Extension turfgrass specialist at Purdue, clover is a sign of weak grass. "White clover often appears in lawns that have too little water or too little fertilizer," he says. Reicher says the best method for controlling clover is to increase the annual fertilization of the lawn. Apply a minimum of one pound of nitrogen fertilizer per 1,000 square feet in September and one and a half pounds of nitrogen per 1,000 square feet in November. In between these fertilizer applications, apply a broadleaf herbicide in mid-October. Don't forget to keep your mower set at three inches or higher. Fertilizer and herbicides do little to help if you mow too low.

Source: Turf Tips 7/18/97 Purdue University



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