Gardening This Weekend: October 10, 2024

I work hard at this part of e-gardens each week because I know most of you look through it for details of things you need to be doing. I list the most critical ones here. Take a gander, gardener.

PLANT
• Nursery stock as garden centers reduce their inventories before winter. This is a great time for planting. It gives the plants many months to get established before summer.
• Ryegrass now that temperatures are finally cooling. Get fallen leaves off the lawn before sowing to be sure you get uniform distribution of the seeds. Keep new seedings moist at all times.
• Pansies, violas, pinks, snapdragons, ornamental cabbage and kale and other cold-hardy annual color can be planted now.
• Finish dividing spring-flowering perennials, including violets, candytuft, thrift and Louisiana phlox, Shasta daisies, iris, daylilies, purple coneflowers, gloriosa daisies and others.
• Tulips and Dutch hyacinths can be bought now, while selections are still great, but they need to go into the fridge at 45 degrees for the next two months, then planted mid-December. They will not bloom normally without the “pre-chilling” treatment. Daffodils and grape hyacinths can be planted immediately.

PRUNE
• Erratic and dying shoots from shrubs and vines but save major reshaping for January, just before new growth of spring kicks in.
• Dead or damaged branches from shade trees before they go bare for the winter. It’s difficult to tell which limbs need to be removed once everything is bare.
• Lawn to keep it at the same height you’ve been using all summer and fall. Letting grass grow tall in the fall weakens the grass and makes it more vulnerable to invasion by weeds. Mowing also keeps fallen leaves from matting down on the grass.

FERTILIZE
• Winter annuals with high-nitrogen, water-soluble plant food every two weeks as long as they’re growing actively.
• Patio pots and hanging baskets you intend to keep with high-nitrogen, water-soluble plant food one last time before bringing them indoors for winter.
• Fescue and rye with high-nitrogen fertilizer to promote vigorous growth this fall.

ON THE LOOKOUT
• Dead branches within oaks and other large trees that are remnants of the extreme cold of February 2021 and subsequent droughts. Have them removed before they fall. They are now dry and very brittle, also very heavy. They can do significant damage and cause serious injuries should they fall.
• Brown patch in St. Augustine. (Now called “large patch by some university turf people.”) This fungus will likely be ramping up at full speed across Texas after the rains and with cooler weather. It appears suddenly in round patches, usually in grass that has been wet at night. Affected blades turn yellow, then brown. They pull loose easily from the runners. Treat with an approved fungicide. Azoxystrobin is labeled for the patch diseases in turfgrasses.
• To kill existing turf and weeds in places where you want to create new beds for spring plantings, apply a glyphosate-only herbicide by spraying precisely within the bed’s boundaries. It will kill the vegetation without contaminating the soil. This is just about your last chance for such an application for this year.
• Watch roses for signs of rose rosette virus. Destroy affected plants (including roots) at once to limit its spread. Here is information I leave on my website’s home page.