Leaf Gall

 

                                             Leaf Gall Azalea

                                            Leaf Gall Camellia

                                            Notice How Thick The Leaf Is

Horticulture Hotline 04/01/24

By Bill Lamson-Scribner

 

With the amount of rain we had in March, I am seeing leaf gall in big numbers. I heard we had more than five inches above the normal rainfall amount in March for a total of eight inches. Of course, rainfall in the Charleston area varies greatly depending on your location. Have you noticed an azalea or a camellia whose leaves are 2-3 times the normal size and are thick and fleshy?

 

They have leaf gall. Leaf gall is a very common disease that affects camellias and azaleas while they are putting on new leaves in the spring. This disease affects Camellia sasanqua (the small leaf camellia that blooms in the fall) more than Camellia japonica (the large leaf camellia that blooms in the winter).  The cool nights, overhead irrigation and rains in the early spring make this disease flourish.  This disease in camellias is caused by the fungus Exobasidium camelliae. Sometimes galls can be caused by insects or mites as well. There is another fungus, Exobasidium vaccinnii, that affects azaleas in a very similar way. 

 

Leaf gall is the common name for this fungus.  The leaves become very large and fleshy.  The new growth is much thicker than normal and then the leaves break apart and release spores.  When the leaf breaks apart, you can see the lower part of the leaf turns white.  The disease spreads by wind and splashing water. A good layer of mulch will help with the splashing water.

 

The best control for leaf gall is to pick the infected leaves off as soon as you see them in the spring.  If you can pull them off before the spores develop, you can prevent the disease from spreading.  Once you pull them off, place them in a plastic bag (the one your newspaper comes in is handy, a dog poop bag, or any other plastic bag you might have around the house) and throw them away in the garbage or burn them in the ever so popular backyard fire pit. 

 

Usually, this disease does not require chemical treatment.  The manual pulling off leaves and limiting overhead irrigation in the spring, when the nights are cool, will keep it in check.  If you have a severe problem year after year, you could apply Mancozeb at bud break (the new growth in the early spring).  This control should be your last resort, and only used in severe cases when a good percentage of your leaves are affected. Leaves are the food factory. 

 

For this year, pull off as many infected leaves as you can.  Soon your plants should go back to producing its normal size leaves.  The leaves that were affected by leaf gall will soon wither, turn brown and fall off the shrub.

 

Soil test taken to Possum’s (check), preemergent product on lawn and beds (check), SeaHume on lawn and beds (check), 17-00-09 in beds (check), Perk on lawn (check), Citrus Leafminer Pheromone Traps in citrus (check), irrigation gone through and adjustments made (check), Dominion drench on plants with history of insect pest (check), lawnmower serviced (check), Cutless growth regulator for shrubs I don’t want to trim (check), Intice Perimeter around outside of house for roaches and other uninvited guest (check), preventive fungicide on turf with all the rain (check), Pots and good potting soil for color (check)…

 

Always read, understand, and follow product label. The product label is a Federal Law.

 

Our Fury Buddy

 

                                             Mole Tunnel

                                                      St. Augustine Runner - SeaHume

                                             Repel Those Moles!
                                                 

Horticulture Hotline 03/27/24

By Bill Lamson-Scribner

 

Moles are always a hot topic in the Lowcountry. I try to limit my writing about them to only once a year (or less – it has been 2 years); however, after walking through some neighborhoods and listening to the complaints in the Possum stores, it looks like the time has come. Moles are about ready to mate and have baby moles, so expect the activity to continue.

 

As with deer, raccoons, and possums, all the development has squeezed the mole to move into your yard. The mole that was happy eating insects and worms in a vacant lot is now moving to your yard as a house, apartment complex or shopping center is being constructed on its old home. I have even noticed some buffer areas between different neighborhoods that were once forest like being cleaned up and landscaped. Again, less habitat for the mole. Moles really do not have any natural predators to keep their numbers in check, other than some dogs and cats, so their numbers keep increasing.

 

The weekly mowing (noise, vibration, wheels of the mower – run a mower over your yard all winter – will help with fire ants also) of your yard during the summer and the tight, actively growing grass seems to lower the mole activity some during the summer; however, the moles are out tunneling for food now. Once the grass starts actively growing and weaves itself together, along with regular moving, hopefully, the moles will move.

 

  I still recommend a 3-prong approach when controlling moles for the less adventurous people that do not want to trap and look at a dead mole.  These 3 steps are:

 

1. Kill the mole
2. Manage its food source
3. Repel other moles from your yard

 

Moles tunnel through your yard looking for food.  They usually have several main runs through your yard as well as secondary tunnels.  The secondary tunnels are where they collect their food, and once they have a gone down a secondary tunnel, they mark it with a scent and they will not return to that tunnel.  To kill a mole with bait or a trap, you must be able to locate the main tunnel.

 

A good way to locate the main runs is to take a stick and poke holes in the tunnels in your yard.  Next, mark where you made these holes.  The next morning come and check to see if the holes are plugged. If they are plugged, then you know you have a main tunnel.  The mole will only plug holes on the main tunnel.  That evening, open one of the holes that the mole plugged the night before and place bait (or trap) 5 feet on either side of the hole that you reopened.  When the mole comes back to re-plug the hole it will have to walk right over the bait (or trap).  These baits are very tasty to the mole, so the mole will usually eat the bait and die.

 

The baits that we regularly hear good results about are Mole Patrol and Talpirid.  I prefer Mole Patrol because it is one third the price and has 6 times the amount of bait placement as Talpirid.  Stay away from poison peanuts.  Moles do not eat peanuts. They eat insects and worms.

 

Controlling the food source is the next most important factor in managing moles on your property.  Depending on which doctor (PHD) you believe, the mole eats 85-125% of its body weight every day.  In human terms a 100 lb. person would eat 85-125 lbs of food per day. That is a lot of food! Think of Michael Phelps and all he eats from swimming in water. A mole is swimming in soil!

 

Using a product like Above and Below on a regular basis will do a good job in managing the mole’s food source.  Monitor your insect populations with a soap solution to determine how often you need to apply insecticides.  Use two ounces of lemon dish detergent in a five-gallon bucket of water and pour it slowly over your soil in the areas where you think you might have insects and see what comes to the surface. You might be surprised!  Some products get tied up in the thatch to kill surface insects (like ants), so be sure to get a product for sub-surface insects.

 

Castrol products (MoleGo, Mole, Vole and Gopher Repellent) and other repellents (Mole Stopper) work good as perimeter treatments to keep moles from re-infesting your property. Be sure there are not any moles on your property before you put out this barrier or you will trap them inside your landscape.  Make a 10–20-foot band treatment around the perimeter of your property.  Reapply these repellents as the label recommends. 

 

If you yard is free of moles right now, you can skip #1 and just manage their food source and repel them at the perimeter of your property.  Be sure your yard is free of moles before you skip #1 in this process.  If you take away the mole’s food source and he is in your yard already, he will really tear up your yard looking for food!

 

If all this sounds like too much work, try the mole and rodent smoke bombs or hire a professional!

 

Pine Pollen and oak pollen have been kept in check by the frequent rains. The Lowcountry is beautiful right now! SeaHume is making the grass explode in a healthy way.

 

Always read, understand, and follow product label. The product label is a Federal Law.

 

Bill Lamson-Scribner can be reached during the week at Possum’s Landscape and Pest Control Supply. Possum’s has three locations 481 Long Point Rd in Mt. Pleasant (971-9601), 3325 Business Circle in North Charleston (760-2600), or 606 Dupont Rd, in Charleston (766-1511). Bring your questions to a Possum’s location, or visit us at possumsupply.com. You can also call in your questions to “The Garden Clinic”, Saturdays from 10:00 AM to 11:00 AM, or listen to the replay of Saturday’s show, Sundays from 11:00 to noon on 1250 WTMA (The Big Talker). The Horticulture Hotline is available 24 / 7 at possumsupply.com. 

 

 

Make Life Easy

 

                                                      Makes Life Easy!

Horticulture Hotline 03/18/24

By Bill Lamson-Scribner

 

I often hear, “Bill, I do not want to fertilize my lawn because I don’t want to mow it.” Or the ever popular, “Bill, no one feeds the trees in the forest, and they do fine.” And “I don’t want to fertilize my shrubs because they will grow and I will have to hedge them.”

 

You would not stop eating just because you got to a certain height. If you have children, you would not stop feeding them. Plants, like people, need certain nutrients to remain healthy. In an urban environment, we need to supply our plants nutrients. Taking a soil test is the best way to determine what nutrients your landscape needs. In a forest where leaves, limbs, trees fall to the forest floor and are recycled into nutrients by microorganisms, trees can fend for themselves; however, in your yard where leaves are raked up, limbs are picked up, there is competition from grass usually, limited root space, root damage from building, and compaction among other things, we must feed our trees.

 

My mom’s landscape design requires a lot of pruning, especially the foundation plants that surround her house. Hollies, ligustrum, pineapple guava, pittosporum, azaleas, cleyera, anise, camellias, and several others, need regular attention. To make her life easier and mine, I use a product called Cutless PGR. I use it right now in the spring and again in the fall. Neither one of us own a pair of hedge trimmers! Cutless is a granular product and very easy to use.

 

Last year I introduced Cutless PGR to a large landscape company. I told him to just try one bag and test it out in the field for himself. He applied it to some plants and did not to others and he saw the difference for himself. Although we talked about many other things throughout the fall and winter, he never mentioned to me about the results he had and I never asked him about it because I did not know if he had time to do his testing. Well, he called me the other day asking when I was going to treat my mother’s house because he had such awesome results using the Cutless. Saving labor, not pruning from ladders, not running hedge trimmers, not picking up clippings, not filling up the landfill with debris, not having to maintain hedge trimmers, and allowing his employees to focus on other things in the landscape is a huge benefit for him and his customers. Depending on how you value your time, give one bag a try and see if you are a believer!

 

If you want to reduce your mowing, consider using a growth regulator. With generic products available, these products have become very affordable. They were very affordable before they went generic with the time, fuel and wear and tear of equipment that was saved. Now there is much less “sticker shock.”

 

I mix up a weed killer, insecticide, fungicide, fertilizer, growth regulator and a few secret ingredients together and stop my St. Augustine from growing for a month during the summer. When it starts to grow, I spray it again. I still fertilize, but no mowing. I have less gray leaf spot disease and my roots grow deeper because there is less energy going to top growth. Very nice!

 

I worked with a football field that has an Elaeagnus hedge that covers the chain-linked fence that surrounds the stadium. The groundskeeper was trimming this hedge monthly during the growing season and hating it. He started using a growth regulator twice a year and barely does any pruning to it at all now. Elaeagnus are infamous for being a pain in the landscape with their wild growth habit. The groundskeeper went from standing on a ladder pruning a 6-to-8-foot hedge, and raking up the debris and disposing of it to just walking by and spraying a product. If he got busy with other projects and did have to prune some, the debris was so little that he could just run over it with a mower and mulch it in place. He was happy, happy, happy.

 

Check out growth regulators for edging a sidewalk, along a fence, for a shrub, or a groundcover, and save some time this year.

 

Always read, understand, and follow product label. The product label is a Federal Law.

 

Bill Lamson-Scribner can be reached during the week at Possum’s Landscape and Pest Control Supply. Possum’s has three locations 481 Long Point Rd in Mt. Pleasant (971-9601), 3325 Business Circle in North Charleston (760-2600), or 606 Dupont Rd, in Charleston (766-1511). Bring your questions to a Possum’s location, or visit us at possumsupply.com. You can also call in your questions to “The Garden Clinic”, Saturdays from 10:00 AM to 11:00 AM, or listen to the replay of Saturday’s show, Sundays from 11:00 to noon on 1250 WTMA  (The Big Talker). The Horticulture Hotline is available 24 / 7 at possumsupply.com.