Video of the Week: Flower Bed Design
Horticulture 2013 Indexed
All of the articles published in Horticulture 2013 are now indexed in two different ways. The first is based on date and lists articles in order from January through December. The second is indexed by subject. Indexing by date is easy if using a spreadsheet. However, indexing by subject is a very time consuming undertaking. One of our Johnson County Extension Master Gardeners, Carole Brandt, has completed this task for us the last five years. Many thanks to Carole in making these past articles much easier to find. You can access the lists at the following locations. (Ward Upham)
Date Index: http://www.ksre.ksu.edu/doc16587.ashx Subject Index: http://www.ksre.ksu.edu/doc16600.ashx
UPCOMING EVENTS
Retail Works: Spring Training for Garden Centers January 29, 2014 Manhattan, KS http://retailworks.weebly.com/
VEGETABLES
How Much Can a Vegetable Garden Save in Food Costs?
Gail Langellotto, Statewide Coordinator of the Oregon State University Master Gardener Program, wrote a blog post a couple years ago summarizing studies regarding the savings a home vegetable garden can provide.
Gail looked at 8 studies and summarized the results. Values were adjusted to 2012 values. Overall, gardens had an average value of $0.74 per square foot of garden and a median value of $0.62
per square foot. That would equal $148 for a modest 200 square foot garden using the average value. Most of these studies included the cost of establishing the garden the first year. These costs would certainly be less in the years following.
Also, interesting were the crops that provided the greatest return per square foot. Those crops were tomatoes, salad greens, beets, broccoli and potatoes. However, be sure to plant crops that will actually be eaten. Vegetables that will not be used are a waste of time and money. To see much more detail, go to Gail’s blog post at http://tinyurl.com/ajrnebb . (Ward Upham)
Tomato Test: Yield and Weight of Fruit
Tom Fowler, Horticulture Specialist with the University of Missouri Extension Service, took data on a large tomato planting in 2013. His study included 47 different varieties including those that some of our K-State Research & Extension Master Gardeners test for us. Tom went the extra mile and took yield data. Varieties included indeterminate and determinate types as well as heirloom and modern varieties. We will have a series of articles on what we can learn from this extensive study. However, there are a couple of caveats that must be considered when trying to interpret this test.
1. This is one year’s data. Always take a single year’s data with a grain of salt. Differing environmental conditions can have a significant impact on yield from year to year. A variety that does very well under certain conditions may not do well under less favorable conditions. Other varieties may be more forgiving and yield well under a wider range of conditions.
2. Speaking of environmental conditions, 2013 was much cooler than normal. Those conditions were not good early in the season as tomatoes got off to a slow start. However, the extreme heat we normally experience during summer was very brief this year allowing production to occur throughout much of the summer.
The top ten varieties for yield/plant and fruit size are listed below. We did not include cherry tomatoes or other small fruited types such as Roma.
The “I” stands for “indeterminate” and means these plants become very large and rangy. The “D” means these are determinate plants that will stay smaller and are easier to control. Determinate plants require less support and are often planted closer together than indeterminate types. We also note whether the variety is a modern variety (M) or an heirloom (H).
BHN 876 D M 24.4
Celebrity D M 24.0
Oxheart I H 19.8
Charger D M 19.3
Fruit Size
Aunt Ruby's German Green I H 0.72
German Queen I H 0.72
Hillbilly I H 0.65
Jubilee I H 0.52
Now for several comments.
There is some dispute as to what constitutes an heirloom variety. We will discuss that in a later article.
Heirlooms comprise several of the top ten in yield and all of the top ten in fruit size. Regardless, heirlooms are not commonly used by commercial growers. There are several reasons for this.
- Most heirlooms are not highly disease resistant. - Heirlooms are large, rangy plants and require more space than most modern varieties.
Even though yield per plant may be comparable, yield per acre rarely is. - Most heirlooms are soft and won’t ship well. - Modern determinate varieties often have yields that are more compressed. In other words,
they bear most of their fruit over a short period of time and therefore require fewer pickings. Actually, this is one of the characteristics we will be looking at to see if this still holds.
Even though heirlooms are not commonly used by commercial growers that must ship their produce, they can be a good choice for home gardeners or those that sell at farmer’s markets if
they can keep the plants healthy. Due to space constraints, we did not include all the varieties in this article. To see yield results for all varieties, go to
http://www.ksre.ksu.edu/doc16610.ashx
For a listing of the average weight of an individual tomato fruit, see: http://www.ksre.ksu.edu/doc16611.ashx
(Ward Upham)
Newer Fluorescent Lights Available for Indoor Gardeners
Many gardeners use fluorescent lights to start young vegetable and flower plants during the spring or to grow certain houseplants all year long.
Traditionally, we have used fixtures with T-12 lamps suspended a few inches above the tops of the plants. However, there are newer lamps that may be a better choice for some indoor gardens. These are known as T-8 and T-5 lamps. The number after the “T” refers to the diameter of the lamp in eighths of an inch. Therefore, a T-12 lamp is 12/8
or 1.5 inches in diameter and are what most people are familiar with. A T-8 is 8/8 or 1 inch in diameter, and a T-5 is 5/8 of an inch in diameter.
So, does a smaller diameter mean less light? Not at all. In fact, the T-5 is the brightest of the three. A T-12 lamp puts out 1,500 to 3,200 lumens for a 48-inch lamp. This lamp has a life of between 10,000 and 20,000 hours. The T-8 lamp produces 2,800 lumens and has a 30,00 - 40,000-hour life expectancy. The T-5 is rated at 5,000 lumens but lasts only 30,000 hours. Well, actually 30,000 hours is a long time. If you had your lamps turned on for 12 hours every day, it would take almost 7 years to reach the 30,000-hour mark.
Another advantage for these newer lamps is they use less electricity per lumen. Our traditional 48-inch T-12 is rated at 40 watts. However, there are newer styles of T-12's that are 34 watts. The T-8 is rated at 32 watts and the T-5 at 54 watts.
This sounds too good to be true. Are there drawbacks? Of course there are. First is cost. Let’s start with T-5's. Even though T-5 lamps produce more light, the lamps are more expensive and harder to find. Also, you must have special T-5 fixtures which are also more expensive.
So, what about the T-8's? First, you cannot use your existing T-12 fixtures for T-8's unless that fixture is specifically rated for both. However, the price for T-8 lamps and fixtures is not that much more than T-12's. Such was not always the case as it wasn’t that long ago that T-8' lamps and fixtures were much more expensive. Also, they are now very easy to find.
The question becomes, is it worth it? If you have a T-12 fixture that is rated for T-12's only and
Now is a Good Time to Design Your Landscape
The dark, cold days of winter are a good time to dream and plan for the upcoming growing season. Have you always wanted to landscape your home but didn’t know where to start? We offer a number of publications available to help you accomplish your dream. This collection includes everything from general landscaping publications such as “Residential Landscape Design,” to specific works such as “Energy Efficient Landscaping,” “Landscaping the Farmstead,” “Naturalistic Landscaping” and “Low-Maintenance Landscaping.”
You can download printed publications free of charge from http://www.hfrr.ksu.edu/DesktopDefault.aspx?tabid=600 or request printed copies from your local K-State Research and Extension office. There may be a small charge for printed copies of larger publications. If you need to know how to contact your local extension office, go to http://www.ksre.ksu.edu/Map.aspx and mouse over your county. (Ward Upham)
Plants for Winter Interest
It’s January—are you craving some green?
Green can be hard to come by in the cold months of living in the Great Plains. It’s nice to have some indoor foliage in December with all of the festive decorations, but what are we to do when the holidays are packed away?
Herein lies the great secret of the four-season garden (MY secret, anyway): You only need one interesting plant to tide you over until spring, but it needs to be where you can see it (when driving up to the house or from your favorite window). More
is always better, but just one can keep your gardening spirits going. Growing up, I always thought that the four-season garden was a bit of a myth in our part of the world. Aside from all of the weedy Eastern Redcedar, we don’t have a lot of evergreen plants that really, truly thrive. But I’ve come to change my mind about our evergreen plant options. The list is still shorter than I would like, but we do have choices.
Evergreen tree species that grow well in our area are mostly composed of pine (pinyon,
ponderosa, loblolly, and white just to name a few) and juniper with a few cedars, spruces, cypresses and arborvitae thrown in the lot. Options for shrubs are more varied and include hollies, barberry, euonymus, nandina, boxwood, bayberry, yew, Oregon grapeholly, cotoneaster, abelia and viburnum.
However much “green” evergreens bring to the winter season, they aren’t the only plants with interesting features when it’s cold outside. Dogwood shrubs are prized for their bright winter stems (usually red, but some yellow cultivars) while Japanese Kerria maintains green stems throughout the cold months. Shrubs with berries that persist into the winter include barberry, cotoneaster, indiancurrant coralberry, red chokeberry, viburnum and holly (some with red berries and others with black fruit).
While perhaps less colorful selections, plants offering dried seed and flower heads can be very interesting in the winter. Hydrangea, perennial sedum and ornamental grasses come to mind for this category. In fact, while I have a soapbox to stand on, let me beg you to leave your ornamental grasses standing until spring. One of their principal uses is winter interest and I’ve found myself admiring several varieties already this year. They look beautiful with a bit of snow or ice defining the seed heads. It frustrates me quite a bit when I see them cut back to the ground in the fall—what a waste!
Two more features for winter interest, though not “green,” are exfoliating bark (ninebark and beautybush) and contorted stems (Harry Lauder’s walking stick and corkscrew willow). I’m sure we’ll cover many of these species in detail in future articles, but for now, don’t give up hope for enjoying the outdoors. Spend this quiet time of year planning your landscape and hunting down fun ideas for plant-related projects that interest you. I’ll keep ‘em coming if you’ll keep reading. Now, go curl up with some catalogs, books and a steaming cup of hot chocolate—you won’t regret it. (Cheryl Boyer)
All-America Selection Winners for 2014
All-America Selections tests and introduces new flowers and vegetables each year that have done well in trials across North America. This year there were six vegetable winners, two bedding plant winners and one flower winner that were either national winners or “Heartland” regional winners.
Descriptions and images below are taken directly from All-America Selection materials. For more detailed information including how to grow, see http://www.all-americaselections.org/winners/index.cfm
Vegetables
Bean Mascotte 2014 AAS Vegetable Award Winner Award Type: National
Dwarf French extra fine bean well adapted for window boxes and pots as well as for the garden. Straight, long, round, and stringless extra-fine pods are deliciously crisp.
Cucumber Pick a Bushel F1 2014 AAS Vegetable Award Winner Award Type: Regional (Heartland, Great Lakes)
This Regional AAS Winner is great for northern areas because it is early to set fruit, offers a prolific quantity of fruit and is a compact bush-type cucumber spreading only about 24 inches. Pick a Bushel offers a sweeter tasting light-green cucumber with a nice firm texture, perfect for pickling when harvested early. Fruits left on the bush-type vines longer can get up to 6” long and can be enjoyed fresh in salads. For those gardeners looking for a cucumber that can be grown in patio containers, Pick a Bushel is a great option.
Pepper Mama Mia Giallo F1 2014 AAS Vegetable Award Winner Award Type: National
Judges declared this a “great yellow pepper” because of the huge yield, uniform shape and smooth skin of the long tapered fruits and the beautiful yellow/gold color when mature. ‘Mama Mia Giallo’ has a nice sweet flavor that is excellent either fresh or roasted.
For gardeners eager for their harvest, this pepper offers ripe fruits 95 days after transplanting. An added bonus is the somewhat compact 24” plant that takes up less space and offers disease tolerance to Tobacco mosaic virus.
Tomato Chef's Choice Orange F1 2014 AAS Vegetable Award Winner Award Type: National
Heirloom orange hybrid indeterminate tomato with deep orange beefsteak shaped fruit. Flavor is sweet and mild, while flesh is firm and tasty.
Tomato Fantastico F1 2014 AAS Vegetable Award Winner Award Type: National
Very flavorful unique determinate bush tomato with grape shaped fruit. Each plant produces up to 12 pounds--about 350 glossy red ½ ounce fruit.
Tomato Mountain Merit F1 2014 AAS Vegetable Award Winner Award Type: Regional (Heartland)
This medium to large round red beefsteak tomato offers mild garden-tomato flavor and its great array of disease resistance ensures a good yield of slicing tomatoes for sandwiches and burgers.
Flowers
Penstemon Arabesque™ Red F1 2014 AAS Flower Award Winner Award Type: Regional (Heartland, Mountain/Southwest, West/Northwest)
Another AAS Winner for the pollinator garden that the hummingbirds will love! Plus, the first ever penstemon to become an AAS Winner in more than eighty years of trialing. This beauty is a
season-long repeat bloomer with large tubular blooms almost one inch across. Arabesque Red is best started indoors then transplanted to get a longer bloom time. Great for combination containers and can be used as an annual or as a perennial for gardens in zones 6-9.
Bedding Plants
Gaura Sparkle White 2014 AAS Bedding Plant Award Winner Award Type: National
Floriferous and graceful plant with an exceptionally long period of bloom. Early flowering with more controlled habit and excellent branching. Will give a home gardener a great show in containers and garden beds.
Petunia African Sunset F1 2014 AAS Bedding Plant Award Winner Award Type: National
Plants bloom prolifically all season long with a show of attractive designer color orange hued flowers. Mounded spreading plants are 12 inches tall spread up to 20 inches. (Ward Upham)
Contributors: Cheryl Boyer, Nursery Crops Specialist; Ward Upham, Extension Associate
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