Backyard Wisdom

Drought Taking Toll on Turf

My family and I don’t live in a neighborhood. We live on six acres tucked between two large land owners. So, I have never fallen victim to turf envy. You know—that burning desire for your lawn to be as lush and green as your neighbor’s.

At my house, turf exists for children and puppies to play on and to connect the flower beds. I can’t say that we have ever watered the grass at our house in the 16 years my husband and I have been married.

But that’s about to change. We have had so little rainfall since the first of the year that our zoysia lawn is turning brown and sounds crispy to walk on.

This Alabama publication has some good tips on watering your lawn as does this site from Missouri Extension.

On this week’s Backyard Wisdom, Alabama Extension’s turf expert Dr. David Han is going to share some advice on effectively watering your lawn.

Be sure and join us Saturdays at 2 on Troy Public Radio.

Step Out of Your Comfort Zone

Summer annuals are a great way to add bold swaths of color to your garden. There are a number of longtime favorites. Annual salvias, marigolds, geraniums, vinca and petunias are common choices for full-sun, while impatiens, coleus and begonias are safe choices for the shadier part of your garden.

But this year—why not step out of your comfort zone and try some new varieties of summer annuals?

On this week’s ‘Backyard Wisdom’, Kerry Smith will share some great new options for summer color. She will tell us more about angelonias which are known as summer snapdragons as well as a plant known as the chicken gizzard plant.

I’ve already added several of those to a shady part of my garden. They look great with the New Guinea impatiens that I’ve paired them with.

You can see some of the Alabama Agricultural Experiment Station's latest research on summer annuals here and at this page.

Be sure to join us at 2 p.m. Saturday on Troy Public Radio for ‘Backyard Wisdom’ with Kerry.

Sweet Potato Vine—A Great Choice for the Flower Garden

This year, I have more vines than ever growing in my garden. I have five different types growing now and have plans to plant a few more. One vine that I have growing in two locations is sweet potato vine.

If you haven’t added sweet potato vine to your garden before, you should give it a try this summer. Sweet potato vine is the same plant that you might find in the vegetable garden. But these varieties have been bred for their foliage not tubers.

I chose a variety called ‘Marguerite” for its bright yellow green foliage. Many of the accents plants I’ve planted this year are a similar chartreuse green to ‘Marguerite.”

I planted the vines in flowerbeds to soften the edges and to fill some odd shaped bare areas. While many people plant them in the ground as I did, they are also at home in hanging baskets and containers. The trailing tendrils of heart-shaped leaves give a softer look to containers and give a feeling of lush, tropical growth.

While this is the first year that I’ve planted ‘Marguerite”, I have grown a purple-colored variety named ‘Blackie’ many times. I have found them to be relatively pest- and disease-free. My biggest problem has been that deer find the vines tasty. On more than one summer morning, I have gone out into the garden to find the deer had done some “pruning” on my vines.

Sweet potato vines prefer full sun but will tolerate light shade. Keep the soil moderately moist at all times. When the soil gets too dry, the vines will noticeably wilt, but the plant revives quickly after a thorough watering.

Managing Rose Diseases

The dry spring has had one good result in my garden. Black spot on my roses has been kept at bay to some degree. I have said before that I’m a lazy gardener. I don’t like to spray plants for diseases. That is one reason I’ve been slowly replacing my roses that require regular spraying to keep black spot at bay with more disease resistant varieties.

But I have several favorite rose bushes that aren’t disease resistant that I plan on keeping so I will have to do some spraying to keep those healthy. But so far most of those are looking pretty good thanks to dry weather.

If you have questions on managing black spot and other rose diseases, be sure to tune in Backyard Wisdom on Saturday, May 12 on Troy Public Radio. Dr. Raymond Kessler will share some ideas on keeping your roses blooming all summer long.

You can find out more about rose diseases in Alabama here.

Adding Vines to My Garden

Mention the word vines in the landscape and many gardeners, especially novice ones, panic. They have visions of morning glory, Japanese honeysuckle, Chinese wisteria or even the dreaded kudzu consuming their yard and house.

But there are a number of vines that offer attractive foliage, flowers, fragrance or all three without being aggressive or invasive plants. I’m using three different types to camouflage the hog wire fencing of our very large compost area.

This year, I was pleased to see that my gloriosa lily planted in a large container had survived the winter. Gloriosa lily, Gloriosa superba, is a climber native to South Africa. The vines can reach 8 feet or more. Some words of caution about this plant—all parts of it are highly toxic. You may want to avoid this plant choice if you have young children or pets.

The gloriosa lily will take your breath away when it blooms. It has large, vivid blossoms usually in shades of red and yellow. One of the most striking qualities of the bloom is the way the petals curve backwards from the flower center.

This year a friend suggested I give black-eyed susan vine a try. This is the second vine I’m using to disguise the compost pile. I’ve planted two plants in an oversized container, and they are already beginning to work their way up the fence.

Black-eyed susan vine is Thunbergia alata. Norman Winters, a horticulturist with Mississippi State University, says the plant is underused. The vigorous annual vine climbs by twining itself around a support and has bright flowers in orange, yellow or white. While the coloration is similar to black-eyed susans (Rudbeckia), the flowers on Thunbergia are tube shaped instead of the composite flowers of Rudbeckia.

Since this wire fencing offers such a large area, I am also going to plant either purple hyacinth bean or perhaps scarlet runner beans. I haven’t yet decided which to plant. Who knows—I may wind up planting both.

I'll talk more about some other vines I have added to my garden in a future entry.

You can learn more about vines for Alabama in this publication from the Alabama Cooperative Extension System.