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October 2006

October 31, 2006

Michigan Program Replaces Lost Ash Trees

Certain Michiganresidents who have lost ash trees to the emerald ash borer (EAB) can purchase replacement trees as part of a new program called Restoration of Our Trees (ROOT). Sixteen hundred trees are available for the pilot program, which officials hope will expand to help replace the millions of trees killed by this pest. Eight local partners will each have two hundred seven-gallon landscape quality trees, including sugar maples, red maples, gingkoes, tuliptrees, red oaks and littleleaf lindens.

October 31, 2006

EAB Part of Federal Invasives Study

The US Department of Agriculture has awarded a total of $1.1 million to universities in seven states to study the economic effects of preventing, controlling or eradicating invasive pests and diseases. The University of Toledois specifically working on the costs and benefits of various approaches to the emerald ash borer issue. Other universities are studying economic implications of battling invasive weeds and livestock diseases, including avian influenza, as well as modeling general responses to invasive organisms.

October 30, 2006

Ohio 's Green Industry Continues to Grow

The Ohio Nursery & Landscape Association reports that Ohio ’s green industry grew 48% between 2001 and 2005, growing to over $4 billion. Landscape services make up the largest segment with over $1 billion in sales during 2005. Retail garden center sales grew 29%, or 6.6% annually during this 4-year stretch, with $677 million in sales in 2005.

October 29, 2006

Winter Storm Precedes Average Frost Date

The Cleveland area experiences its first frost of the season by today, on average. This year the first frost in the Hopkins Airport area came on October 9th, earlier than it has come in 9 out of 10 years. Yesterday the wintery weather continued with a thunderstorm producing snow pellets (graupel) around 3/8-inch in diameter. The hail-like graupel came down heavily for several minutes around noon, then tapered off into sleet, creating accumulations up to 1 inch deep in certain areas. Surprisingly late in the season, considering the early cold, most trees still had a lot of their leaves, until the heavy precipitation stripped them off.

October 28, 2006

Daylight Saving Time Ends

Even though there has been precious little daylight coming through the clouds lately, today is the last day of Daylight Saving Time. At 2 am, clocks "fall back" one hour, giving most of us an extra hour of sleep, and giving those on the red-eye shift an extra hour of work . Please remember to change the batteries in your smoke alarms too, as a working smoke alarm doubles your chances of surviving a fire.

Next year we will "spring ahead" much earlier, on the second Sunday of March instead of the first Sunday of April. We will "fall back" one week later on the first Sunday of November, under the Energy Policy Act of 2005.

October 27, 2006

Gale's Westlake Christmas Open House

The Christmas Open House at Gale's Westlake Garden Center will be Saturday, November 4 from 9 am to 7 pm, and Sunday, November 5 from 9 am to 6 pm. Free refreshments will be served. Preview the holiday splendor at Gale's Westlake , and earn rewards - for every $50 spent during Open House weekend, receive a free $5 gift card to be used between November 10 and December 15. 

October 26, 2006

Learn Organic Lawn Care

The steadily growing organics market has a new advocate. SafeLawns.org is an international organization promoting organic lawn care, with a national kickoff in March 2007 in Washington , D.C. Over 35 million acres of the USare grown as lawns. The effort is being led by HGTV host and People Places & Plants magazine editor Paul Tukey. In addition to television, radio and print publications, more than one hundred garden writers and industry professionals support the campaign. How-to videos on natural lawn care produced by Paul Tukey and lawn-care experts are now available on the web site www.safelawns.org, and should be available on DVD by early 2007. 

October 25, 2006

Earthworms May Plant Weed Seeds

Giant ragweed is a prolific and hard-to-control weed in Ohio agriculture, despite producing relatively few seeds that have low germination rates, don’t last long in the soil, and often get eaten by wildlife. Dr. Emilie Regnier, an Ohio State University weed scientist, found that this weed’s success is largely due to earthworms. Giant ragweed seeds were scattered on the soil surface in a grid pattern in the evening, and the following day most of the seeds were grouped around burrows of the common nightcrawler. Seeds are eventually drawn down into the burrows where they are protected from seed-eating animals, and about two-thirds of the seeds eventually sprout.

Earthworms are known to disperse small weed seeds by ingesting them and ejecting them in their casts, and they are known to gather miscellaneous objects to their burrows, including bits of glass, string, and twigs, but they have never before been observed collecting seeds. One theory is that giant ragweed seeds are irregularly shaped and particularly easy to grasp.

Earthworms do far too much good for garden soil to consider eliminating them. Instead, try to remove weeds before they flower to prevent the production of seeds.

October 22, 2006

Juncos Arrive, Hummingbirds Leave

The first junco (or snowbird) of the season showed up in my garden yesterday, scratching under the bird feeders with some white-throated sparrows. Although it missed the first flakes of winter almost two weeks ago, it is just in time for the snow predicted for Monday and Tuesday.

Our hummingbirds have mostly gone for the season, so nectar feeders should be taken down, cleaned, and stored for next spring. Occasionally there will be some stragglers who migrate late or got lost. If you have a hummingbird still visiting your feeders, it is okay to keep feeding it. The bird will not be tempted to stay the winter. Just make sure that feeders are not allowed to freeze overnight. Only six months until feeders go back up on Sunday, April 15, 2007!

© 2007 Roger S. Bolger.

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