KICK OFF ’24 IN GRAND GARDENING STYLE AT MERCER’S 50th ANNY!
By BRENDA BEUST SMITH
If the picture above of Mercer Botanic Garden’s new renovated Forest Floor pond and waterfall with its now-blooming Encore azalea isn’t enough to pop your eyes, how about this below? Another of Mercer’s Encore azaleas . . .
Free refreshments and garden tours (unless lightning) will follow opening celebrations. While you’re there, visit Precinct 1’s Arboretum on the west side of Aldine-Westfield, adding 200+/- acres to the 180-acres of Mercer Botanic Garden on the East side. Everything’s free!
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Meanwhile . . . This is HOUSTON, folks. We have/expect to have at least some year-round blooms & harvests — despite floods, hurricanes, scorching heat, drought, freezes, ice & snow (not to mention insects!). Pick the right flowers/crops and at least some should always breeze right through (albeit maybe with short recovery periods). But YOU have to stay informed about new, hardier varieties and our two botanical gardens are great places to learn. Across town from Mercer, in our SE quadrant, an equally great place to see winter gardening stars — Houston Botanic Garden — is gearing UP for it’s array of plants & activities. Check HBC calendar of events on above link.
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. . WE’RE BACK ON TOP!Folks here still insist on huge St. Augustine lawns! As a result: harris-county-tops-country-in-gasoline-powered-lawn– equipment-pollution.
IF YOU MUST HAVE/MOW A LAWN, do know that while dandelions are a good nutrition source for bees (DON’T MOW DOWN!), they’re far from the only sources (as oft-publicized). Valuable late winter/early spring resources, especially for native bees > wildflower.org/expert/show.php?id=6723.
Above, even mowed dandelions usually continue blooming, albeit on shorter stems!
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Brenda Beust Smith’s column is based on her 40+ years as
Houston Chronicle’s Lazy Gardener — Email: lazygardenerbrenda@gmail.com Note: This column focuses ONLY on the Greater Houston area.
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NEWS FROM THE WONDERFUL WORLD OF SOIL AND PLANTS # 268
Subject: Christmas tree mulch Music video on Prairies
We hear a lot on the news about recycling your Christmas tree and getting some free mulch. So, let us look at the pros and cons of this type mulch.
PROS:
Low cost
Nice fragrance
Protects soil from erosion and temperature variations Slugs and snails do not like to crawl across it
Strong scent may repel some insects
Like most mulches it reduces weed issues
Over time it will degrade and add organic matter to one’s soil
CONS:
Highly flammable
High carbon to nitrogen (C:N) ratio may cause nutrient tie-up, if a thick layer is used
Few nutrients released as it breaks down, compared to other organic mulches
Being composed of a single or limited number of species, it does not provide food for a wide range of beneficial microbes as compared to native mulches
Highly variable in particle shape and size
When freshly ground, the mulch is often very sticky from the conifer sap which can transfer to hands and clothing
Not be as attractive as other types of mulch Slower to break down and improve soil quality
May contain a high level of contaminates from flocking, tinsel, broken up ornaments to other decorations that were left on the tree and were ground up.
May have possible herbicide contamination
Comments:
Depending on the quality control, type grinding or chipping equipment used, the mulch may vary from each recycling location as to particle size, chip shape, and contamination.
Ground mulches will knit together and be more resistant to erosion and washing out than chipped mulch. Different brands of grinders will use different screening plates resulting in wide variation in chip size and shape.
Most Christmas trees are conifers and are more of a pioneer species that grow in poor soils, hence the mulch produced is not as nutrient rich compared to other species of trees. A few of the more common species are Firs, Spruces, Pines, Hemlock, and a few others depending on where one lives.
The tree barks and needles frequently contain the chemical suberin, a naturally occurring substance that waterproofs (helps the plant shed water) and prevents the bark and needles from being broken down by microbes.
In addition to suberin, the barks and needles contain waxes that also help waterproof the tree. When this mulch is first applied it may reduce or repel rain preventing it from being absorbed into the soil for a few weeks until some of these chemicals break down.
Some plant species are sensitive to the chemicals in this type mulch. It is known that Christmas tree mulch will reduce the growth of tomatoes, marigolds, and a few others until it biodegrades.
Growers of Christmas trees often use glyphosate-based herbicides like Round Up for weed control around the tree. The waxes and other chemicals protect the tree from absorbing the toxic chemical and dying. However, once the tree
as been turned into mulch, the herbicide will wash off and get into the soil. The concentrations are not usually high enough to kill the plants but it stunts the growth of many species of plants.
For those of us that love our prairies and grasslandsthis was shared with me a few days ago. It is a great prairie music video with lots of beautiful ecosystem shots! It is less than 5 minutes.
View video here.
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ABOUT US
BRENDA BEUST SMITH WE KNOW HER BEST AS THE LAZY GARDENER . . . but Brenda Beust Smith is also:
- a national award-winning writer & editor
- a nationally-published writer & photographer
- a national horticultural speaker
- a former Houston Chronicle reporter
When the Chronicle discontinued Brenda’s 45-year-old Lazy Gardener” print column — started in the early ’70s as a fun side-project to reporting, it then ranked as the longestrunning, continuously-published local newspaper column in the Greater Houston area. The name, she says, is not just fun, it’s true. Brenda’s gradual sideways step from reporter into gardening writing led first to an 18-year series of when-to-do-what Lazy Gardener Calendars, then to her Lazy Gardener’s Guide book which morphed into her Lazy Gardener’s Guide on CD, which she now emails free upon request. Brenda became a Harris County Master Gardener and, over the years, served on theboards of many Greater Houston area horticulture organizations. She hosted local radio and TV shows, most notably a 10+-year Lazy Gardener specialty shows on HoustonPBS (Ch. 8) and her call-in “EcoGardening” show on KPFT-FM. For over three decades, Brenda served as Assistant Production Manager of the GARDEN CLUB OF AMERICA’S “BULLETIN” magazine. Although still an active broad-based freelance writer, Brenda’s main focus now is THE LAZY GARDENER & FRIENDS HOUSTON GARDEN NEWSLETTER with John Ferguson and Pablo Hernandez of Nature’s Way Resources. A native of New Orleans and graduate of St. Agnes Academy and the University of Houston, Brenda lives in Humble, TX, and is married to the retired Aldine High School Coach Bill Smith. They have one son, Blake. Regarding this newsletter, Brenda is the lead writer, originator of it and the daily inspiration for it. We so appreciate the way she has made gardening such a fun way to celebrate life together for such a long time.
JOHN FERGUSON John is a native Houstonian and has over 27 years of business experience. He owns Nature’s Way Resources, a composting company that specializes in high quality compost, mulch, and soil mixes. He holds a MS degree in Physics and Geology and is a licensed Soil Scientist in Texas. John has won many awards in horticulture and environmental issues. He represents the composting industry on the Houston-Galveston Area Council for solid waste. His personal garden has been featured in several horticultural books and “Better Homes and Gardens” magazine. His business has been recognized in the Wall Street Journal for the quality and value of their products. He is a member of the Physics Honor Society and many other professional societies. John is is the co-author of the book Organic Management for the Professional. For this newsletter, John contributes articles regularly and is responsible for publishing it.
PABLO HERNANDEZ Pablo Hernandez is the special projects coordinator for Nature’s Way Resources. His realm of responsibilities include: serving as a webmaster, IT support, technical problem solving/troubleshooting, metrics management and quality control. Pablo helps this newsletter happen from a technical support standpoint.
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