It’s not unusual in this wet year to have a pest problem. Bewildered? Get help at plant clinics run by Colorado State University Extension or your garden center. Bring in a plant or a sample with the bug — in a sealable bag so it doesn’t infect other plants.
PEST AND DISEASE WATCH
• Ascochyta leaf blight, a fungus, is showing up on cool-season grasses. Large, irregular patches quickly turn straw-colored and will appear dead. The turf will recover since it only affects leaves, not the roots. Just keep giving your lawn what it needs; fungicides are not recommended. More:
• Plant damage caused by a tiny, wedge-shaped translucent mite, the eriophyid mite, can be shocking. Leaves or plant tissue appears deformed, stunted, blistered, bronzed or enlarged. Get professional confirmation that you have this insect, though, because its damage can mimic diseases or harm from herbicides. In many cases, the plant will be fine — just prune off damage. More: www.ext.colostate.edu/ptlk/1400-8.html
• Clematis wilt, where one shoot or the entire plant collapses — in some cases, overnight — happens during the summer. The cause is not 100 percent known. The plant should recover in time if only one or two shoots are affected. More: clematisinternational.com /wilt.html
• Cytospera canker affects stressed or weakened trees and shrubs, including ash, apple, aspen, birch, elm, cottonwood, peach, willow and spruce. The fungi cause cankers (discolored, sunken areas) in the bark or branch dieback. The primary control methods are prevention, planting resistant varieties, removing infected limbs (properly sanitizing tools between cuts is a must). More: www.ext.colostate.edu/pubs/Garden/02937.html
IN THE LANDSCAPE
• Settle into a daily maintenance and monitoring routine in the garden. Make it a fun adventure — coax the kids or grandkids outside. Give them easy chores like watering and looking for ripe cherry tomatoes to eat warm off the vine.
• Regularly water and fertilize containers. Lapses may affect bloom and health, especially vegetable containers.
• Empty excess water from container trays to prevent creating mosquito habitat and sending salts from fertilizers back up into roots.
• Remove spent or dried-up blooms on annuals and perennials to encourage repeat blooming. Annuals may need a midsummer haircut to encourage new, healthy growth.
• Continue installing new plants, but realize you’ll need to make sure they’re adequately watered. If you can’t get them in the ground, try transplanting them to bigger pots first so they’ll dry out less quickly.
• Consider entering your best crops or flowers for judging at your local county fair: countyfairgrounds.net/colorado/colorado.php
• If footprints or mower tracks remain an hour or longer, it’s time. Same thing if the grass turns a bit grayish/blue in color. The best indicator: Poke a long screwdriver in the turf (or anywhere in the landscape). If it goes down easily, the ground is moist. If you need to push, the area needs water. Water deeply, but infrequently. More: www.ext.colostate.edu/pubs/garden/07199.html
• If you have apply ½ to 1 pound of nitrogen per 1,000 square feet before Aug. 1. This will get you improved growth and color. More: www.ext.colostate.edu/pubs/garden/07224.html
• Wait until mid-August to fertilize cool-season grasses including Kentucky bluegrass, fescues and rye grass. Don’t forget to use the cheap and easy way to add valuable nutrients to your lawn all though the growing season — just leave your grass clippings to break down.
VEGETABLES AND HERBS
• Remove and compost (or eat, if they’re still good) any remaining disease-free cool-season crops.
• Keep the vegetable garden evenly watered; avoid overwatering. Water vegetables with drip irrigation, soaker hoses or by hand. To prevent disease, avoid overhead watering. Aim at the base of each plant instead.
• Mulch with disease-free grass clippings or weed-free straw to keep the bed moist.
• Carry a basket and clean shears to harvest berries, vegetables, fruits and herbs. The best time to harvest is early morning; next best is evening when it’s cooler.
• Harvest ripe vegetables on a regular basis. Picking mature fruit/vegetables signals the plant to keep producing.
• During flowering and fruiting, beans need more water than other crops. Dropped blossoms, tadpole-shaped shaped beans and gray-green foliage instead of dark green are signs they need more water.
• Harvest snap beans 50-80 days after planting. Pick when they are 3 to 5 inches long and while seeds are small and tender. Large bumps indicate seeds that are too mature.
• Beets can be harvested as small as 1½ inch in diameter. Older, larger roots are fibrous and less tasty. Leaf tops may have brown areas that are the result of leafminers that lay eggs in leaf tissue (it happens on spinach and chard leaves, too). Remove badly damaged leaves and destroy them — don’t leave them on the ground because larvae will complete the life cycle and give you more leafminers. You can exclude leafminers by using light-weight row covers.
• Who wants food? Some vegetables react to a high-nitrogen fertilizer routine with more leafy growth and less fruit, but These heavy feeders include corn, potatoes, broccoli, cabbage, cauliflower, kale, Brussels sprouts, kohlrabi. Give tomatoes, eggplant and peppers a side-dressing when their first fruits are 1 inch in diameter. Side-dress corn when it’s a foot tall, then again one month later. How do you side-dress? Sprinkler fertilizer over the soil away from plants’ stems, then water in. Be sparing with the fertilizer. More: www.ext.colostate.edu/pubs/garden/07247.html
• The third season of vegetable gardening has begun (if you have room). Planting in mid-July allows longer-maturing plants time to grow for harvest in 60 days (faster cool season crops like lettuce and arugula can be seeded later in August). There are many choices — green beans, cucumber, okra, New Zealand spinach, summer squash, parsley, peas, bunching onion, cauliflower, Swiss chard, cabbage, Brussels sprouts, celery, beets, basil and cilantro.
• Herbs like thyme and chives appreciate a haircut now to remove spent seed heads (unless you’re saving the seeds). New leaves will quickly emerge.
Betty Cahill:
