Things to Consider

For the new readers of the Horticulture Hotline, my To Do Lists are designed to help you target a few activities in your yard and in your home that will benefit you in the future. These lists are not designed to interfere with high school, college, or professional football games, sunset boating, shrimping, hunting, golfing, eating chicken wings at a local sports bar, oyster roasts, collecting oysters or clams from the local waters, or watching NASCAR on the couch with closed eyes! This is not designed to be a “honey do” list.

Do you have your preemergent product of choice on your lawn or in your beds? Prevent winter weeds now, so you will not have to fight them all winter and spring, taking time away from above activities.

Have you prepared your turf for the winter? With our fluctuating temperatures winter kill can be very devastating in this area. One day the temperature maybe 80 degrees and that night it could be in the 20’s. Centipede is particularly susceptible to winter kill. Manage your thatch levels, cut the grass at the right height for the species of grass (on the low end so the leaf blades do not trap the cold air around the crown of the grass plant), and correct any drainage issues (wet, low areas tend to winter kill the worst.)

Are you changing out flower beds for winter color? Be sure to till in plenty of Back To Nature’s Flower Bed Amendment. Flower Bed Amendment will add cotton burr compost, composted cattle manure, feather meal, cottonseed meal, and alfalfa meal to your soil. Talk about some good organic matter! Many gardeners in the Lowcountry swear by it (in a good way) and would not consider planting without it.

Have you thought about planting bulbs this fall for spring color? Now is the time to get your orders in. Early blooming bulbs are always a welcome sight after a long cold (?) Lowcountry winter. When planting bulbs, remember to add a little Flower Bed Amendment, bone meal, and/or 04-04-04 Sustane to the hole.

Do you plant ryegrass for that green grass all year? Be sure to check the amount of weed seeds listed on the seed tag, so you are not sowing more than you bargained for. If you put a preemergent herbicide in your beds just prior to seeding with rye, you can avoid unwanted ryegrass strangling your shrubs. Have you ever considered green paint as an alternative to ryegrass?

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

Perimeter Pest Control

After sending out our five star alerts on sod webworms, I had several people thank me for the “head’s up.” They were able to catch the damage early and have the grass recover from the munching very quickly.

We are still getting calls about this pest, so keep scouting your yard for areas of grass that look mowed; even though, you have not mowed them. Look for a high population of moths in your yard at dusk as well. The moth will fly up from the ground in a zigzag pattern and land again very quickly.

With the cooling weather, the time is right for killing roaches, spiders, and other nuisance invaders with a perimeter spray of insecticides around your house. I really do not like killing spiders because like snakes most of the spiders are considered beneficial. Unfortunately, spider and snakes get classified as “the only good one is a dead one” around here.

Establishing a barrier will keep unwanted guest out of your house as the weather cools. There are several products on the market that will nail these roaches (along with many other pests). Bifen, Viper, Cyonara Lawn and Garden, Tirade, Niban (“green”) and EcoPCO WP X (“green”) are a small sample of many products that are available.

Generally, treating the perimeter involves spraying 3 to 10 feet out from your house in the mulched areas. Apply plenty of water with the product to carry it down into the mulch where the pests are hiding. You could also use a granular product in these areas.

Also spray about 3 feet up the side of your house, around windows, porches, lights, garages, eaves, garbage areas and other areas where pests may be found. Read and follow label directions for the specifics of doing a perimeter treatment for the product you choose to use.

There are many new laws about the packaging and application of rodent killing products that went into effect this year. So if mice or rats have been an issue in the past, expect a change in your old favorite bait and how you apply it.

If you are not a “do it yourselfer”, there are a bunch of great Pest Management Professionals in the area that would love to do this treatment for you.

Sod Webworms

On Friday (09/02/11) we sent out a “Five Star Pest Alert” to our email subscribers at Possum’s Landscape and Pest Control Supply. In nine years, we have sent out less than 4 pest alerts, and I do not remember any being “5 Star”. We try not to abuse your email address; however, with the holiday weekend, we wanted to give you a head’s up before you had so uninvited guests munching on your yard while you were out of town or munching on some barbeque.

From me to the stores, “Please send this five star pest alert to email list.

Sod Web Worms are munching! Look for areas that appear to have been
mowed with a lot of brown grass pushed up to surface. Leaf blades are
chewed. Moths are visible and so are the worms.

Sevin, Bug Blaster and Tirade will easily control. You can use very
low rates, so it is not too expensive. Plan to apply twice.

Sod Web Worms can do a lot of damage at a time of year that the grass
will be slow to recover.”

The recent cloudy, rainy weather from Irene must have been perfect for the sod webworm to hatch and the larva begin to munch.

Moths in your lawn indicate sod webworm. The moths are the adult form of the sod webworm and they lay eggs in your grass. When these eggs hatch the worm-like larva stage of the sod webworm begins. The worm-like larva is the part of the life cycle that damages the turf. The sod webworm is a voracious eater that can damage large sections of your lawn very quickly. They feed on cloudy days and at night, so while you sleep, they eat.

One good thing is that they are very easy to eradicate, since their entire body is in contact with the ground. If worms of any type (sod webworm, army or cut worms) are attacking your grass it will appear that you have mowed your grass with a very dull mower blade at a slow speed and a low cutting height.

You can see the worm if you get into the border between the good grass and the munched on grass and spread the grass blades apart. The blades of the grass are tattered and have been chewed, so they are missing parts of the leaf blade.

If you see damage, be ready to apply control product, or they will do a lot of damage very quickly to your turf. Bt, EcoEXEMPT G, EcoPCO WP and Spinosad are organic controls that are very effective against young sod webworms. Sevin, Bug Blaster, Cyonara and Tirade will easily control the voracious chow-hound.

Hurricane - Not

What a difference a week makes! The hurricane went north of us and hardly did any damage to the Lowcountry trees in the process. Erosion along the beaches might be another situation, depending on where you live.

If the storm threat or the aftermath of the storm got you to look up into your trees for broken limbs, then the storm did some good. If your trees need some professional help, call a tree service now and get on their list. Once a storm is coming our way, most tree companies are too busy to work you into their schedule.

The wood in trees is very heavy. Gravity is always pulling the weight of the tree down towards the ground. Over the years insurance companies have revised the way they look at tree damage. If you have a big dead limb or a tree that is half rotten at the base hanging over your house, and you do not have an expert look at the situation and correct it, then the insurance company may not pay for the damages if it falls. Basically, they would rather you pay say 2000 dollars for the tree work than them pay 150,000 in damage to the house. Call your agent for the details of your policy.

Although it is still 90 degrees, the daylight hours and the start of football are making the weather feel like fall is not too far away. The recent rains did get some large patch started in several yards I noticed and the white flowers of Virginia Button Weed are visible peeking through the foliage of the turf grass.

Disarm G is a somewhat new fungicide on the market that can be used at very low rates for the prevention of brown patch. When conditions are favorable for disease development, you only need to apply 1.2 pounds of product per thousand square feet. So a 5000 square foot yard only needs 6 pounds every 14 to 28 days.

Any last fertilizing of turf with a nitrogen fertilizer should be done soon. Preemergent herbicides for the lawn and beds now will make your spring landscape much nicer. Treating your lawn and beds with Cyonora will keep mosquitoes, fleas, roaches, and other pests from bothering your pets, your shrubs, or yourself.

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

Hurricanes

The “H” word is being mentioned again and again on the news this morning. We have been lucky the past few years. The storms have gone the other way. You never like to wish bad upon your neighbor, but with a hurricane, you kind of have to…

In the old days, I would enjoy a hurricane. I can remember in the early 1980’s when Hurricane Bob hit the Lowcountry. At the last minute it was downgraded to a tropical storm; however, it still packed some good winds. I remember hurrying to get out to Wild Dunes before they closed the Ben Sawyer Bridge (back then that was the only bridge to Isle of Palms or Sullivan’s Island). Everyone was trying to leave the beaches; I was trying to get to the beach.

A group of us would enjoy watching the palms bend, the ocean churn, the trees dance in the high winds, transformers blowing up provided fireworks and the feel of the strength of the wind holding us up as we leaned into it.

Between the devastation of Hurricane Hugo in 1989, having 3 stores full of inventory and a house surrounded by pine trees, I have a much different view of hurricanes now.

Preparing your yard for a hurricane is a must. Any loose item can become a projectile. Bird feeders, lawn furniture, trash cans, recycle bends, hanging baskets, potted plants, grills and other items should be secured or brought indoors. Even category 1 storms can have microburst or small tornadoes associated with them, increasing damage a bunch.

The new ethanol gas really takes its toll on small engines. Check your chain saw, generator, and other gas powered tools to be sure they are going to work if you need them. Depending on your situation, be sure you have plenty of gas, oil to mix with your gas, bar oil, a spare chain, and a file for your chain saw. Safety glasses, gloves and ear protection are also good ideas. Remember more people get injured cleaning up from a hurricane than from the hurricane itself.

Usually after a few days of overcast rainy weather associated with hurricanes and tropical storms during this time of year, we see an explosion of sod webworms. The dark overcast days give them a chance to feed without birds or other predators eating them. Sod webworms can devour a yard that you have worked on all summer in a very short period of time.

The heavy rains this time of year can also cause an explosion of fungus. It is always best to treat fungus preventively with a good systemic product like Disarm, Cleary’s 3336, or Prophesy.

Calling a tree company to trim trees now is probably too late; however, you should still call and get on their list for the next time we are “in the cone”. Good luck!

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