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Question of the Week
 Q. When should you aerate and overseed a fescue lawn?
 A. Spring and autumn are both good times to aerate and overseed lawns.
You can generally count on natural rainfall and cool temperatures during
these times, which will encourage seed germination and lush, thick growth.
If you're pulling plugs with a power aerator, just leave the plugs on the lawn
and rainfall will help dissolve them. By next spring you'll have a healthy
lawn full of thick, new grass.
November's Garden II
1. There are still gardening chores that can be done now to help
reduce insect and disease problems next year. Bagworms, for example,
can be picked off evergreen and tossed into the trash. This is a very
helpful practice because most of the bagworms hanging on plants
are dead female cases filled with eggs that will hatch next June.
Taking the time to remove them now can help reduce bagworms damage and
in many cases eliminate the need for sprays next year. Another insect
that can also be controlled now by hand picking is the Eastern
Tent Caterpillar. Their egg masses, which resemble small 1/2 - 1 inch
long pieces of black styrofoam attached to small branches, can
be picked off now. Look for them on wild cherries, fruit trees
and crabapples.
2. Perennials and annual flower beds should also be cleaned.
Removal of dead plants can help to reduce disease and insect
problems next year. Many diseases as well as insect
pests and their eggs over-winter on plant debris.
Once the garden is cleaned of plant debris and weeds you should
mulch the crown of the perennials. The mulch will help prevent
the crowns from heaving out of the soil as the soil freezes and
thaws during winter.
3. If lime is required it too can be added at this time so
that the winter freezing and thawing will work it into the soil
profile.
4. If you have roses you should cut them back to a height
of about 30 inches to prevent them from whipping back and
forth by winter winds and working loose.
5. Within the next week all shade trees, except for oaks,
will have shed their leaves. Leaves are a valuable source of
organic matter for your garden soil. Don’t bag them for sending
to a dump, but rather compost them for use next year. Shredded
leaves compost more quickly, you can shred them by running over
them a few times with the lawn mower. The addition of 10-6-4
fertilizer mixed with the leaves will help stimulate microbial
action. In many cases is not even necessary to rake leaves but
simply mow over them several times to chop them into small pieces
that will disintegrate into the lawn. Some towns have programs
where leaves are collected and stored in centralized locations
for use by gardeners at a later time.
6. November is a good time to prune trees once they have
changed color and dropping leaves. If removing large limbs
first make an undercut to prevent the limb from ripping the
bark from the trunk. Another technique is to maintain the
branch bark collar when removing a limb. The branch collar
is the some what swollen area found at the base of branches.
This area will produce the healing tissue that will close the
wound. A properly made cut will be round. The application of
a pruning sealer is not recommended.
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