Good Bug, Bad Bug
- On June 18, 2018
- By Meleah
- In Organic Gardening, Turf Grass, Uncategorized
- 1
Normally I enjoy gardening in the spring. But after reading seemingly endless headlines about spewing lava, flash floods and gaping sink holes while enduring our freak May blizzard followed by our freak May heat wave, I can’t enjoy myself because I keep wonder whether I’m acting like one of those stalwart band members on the deck of the sinking Titanic. ‘La, la, la … I’m pretty sure the world is coming to an end, but I think I’ll just plant these zinnias and cut back all my pretty shade plants that burned to a crisp in the boiling hot May sun … la, la, la.’
It helped that while I worked I was often able to watch dragonflies. It’s been a few years since we’ve had a lot of dragonflies in the yard, so I’m glad to see them back. I read up on dragonflies during their last visit and learned, among many other things, that I have been calling some insects dragonflies when they are actually damselflies. Both aquatic insects belong to the same order, Odonata, but if you look closely you’ll see that damselflies have slimmer bodies and their eyes are separated and somewhat protruding rather than flat and centered on their heads.
To easily tell the two apart, look at their wings when they are at rest. Dragonflies rest with their wings flat and parallel to the ground while damselflies hold their wings pressed together over their backs, like butterflies do. To learn more about these magical insects, go to the Minnesota Dragonfly Society’s site where you’ll find information on some of the 140 species that can be found in Minnesota. Nerd out more by getting yourself a nice dragonfly identification guide like Stokes Beginner’s Guide to Dragonflies by Blair Nikula, Jackie Sones and Donald and Lillian Stokes.
Bad Bugs—Japanese Beetles
Yes, in just over a month Japanese beetles will arrive and dive head first into having sex on our plants while also eating them and crapping all over the place during their god-forsaken 60-day life cycle. What can be done? I’ve said it before, but I want to say it again because people always ask about how to treat Japanese beetles: I don’t like to use chemicals to kill them or anything else. I just pluck (wear gloves) the gross beetles off of plants and toss them into a bucket of soapy water to DIE. If, however, you are thinking of trying to kill Japanese beetles with insecticides, University of Minnesota Extension Entomologist Jeff Hahn recently sent out an update letting people know that it is too late to do that this season because those suckers are already way too big to be affected by our puny chemical concoctions. You can get a jump on murdering next year’s beetle crop, though, if you apply insecticides to turfgrass from July through mid-September because that’s when females are laying fresh eggs.
But, before reaching for an insecticide, Hahn suggests that we ask ourselves why that seems like the answer. The reason: If grubs are destroying your lawn (usually large patches of yellow/brown grass but that can also be other things), and a good-looking lawn is important to you, then perhaps chemicals can help. If your aim, though, is to reduce the number of beetles having wild sex on your plants and just generally defiling your garden in innumerable ways, think again, because those monsters can fly a long way so treating your small patch of land will do zip.
And one more thing, if you do choose to use chemicals to kill Japanese beetles, please do some Googling to see what the preventative insecticides Hahn suggests (chlorantraniliprole, halofenizide, imidacloprid and chlothianidin) may also harm. I don’t know anything about most of these, but I can tell you that imidacloprid is a neonic and neonics harm bees, dragonflies and other insects.
I’m explaining all of this, not because I want to shame people who feel they need to treat a problem. Rather, I think it is far too common for experts to tell people what they can use to treat this or that problem, but they don’t also explain how those treatments might affect other living creatures and/or the planet. In my experience, when I give people ALL of that information, they often decide using chemicals isn’t worth it. But even when they don’t, at least they had all of the tools they needed to make an informed choice. And who wouldn’t want that?
Get Tickets Now for Lakewood’s Behind-the-Scenes Greenhouse Tours
- On April 06, 2018
- By Meleah
- In Uncategorized
- 0
If you’ve never wandered the beautiful grounds of Minneapolis’ Lakewood Cemetery, Earth Day would probably not be a great day to start since our Minnesota winter is hanging on strong this year. Undeterred, Lakewood is celebrating Earth Day by inviting the public to come for a visit anytime between 8 a.m. and 8 p.m. on April 22, 2018. The big attraction of the day is the chance to tour Lakewood’s expansive greenhouses. Tickets are free but your spot needs to be reserved here. A $5 donation is appreciated and proceeds will go toward Lakewood’s Permanent Care and Improvement Fund.
Groundskeepers are busy tending thousands of flowers in the greenhouses right now in anticipation of spring, so even if it is still cold and snowy outside, the greenhouses will feel like paradise. After the tour, attendees will have a chance to pot up a plant to take home if they would like to.
Event Details
Space is limited so reserving your time slot is a good idea. Get your advance ticket now. Greenhouse tours are approximately 25-30 minutes long, and are offered between 10 a.m. and 3 p.m. The planting activity takes place in the greenhouse immediately following each tour.
- Lakewood is located at 3600 Hennepin Avenue in Minneapolis
- Parking is available along roads inside the cemetery
- This event is open to the public; all are welcome to visit the grounds during open hours from 8:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m. (spring/summer visiting hours). Self-guided tour brochures of art and history at Lakewood will also be available; visitors can download Lakewood’s mobile app for more tour options.
About Lakewood: Situated just steps from Lake Calhoun, Lakewood has one of the country’s largest cemetery greenhouse operations. I’ve been to a few talks on Lakewood’s unique horticultural history so I could have explained some of that to you but, happily, they provided me with a very detailed press release to share, so what follows are interesting tidbits I’ve adapted from that.
The grounds, which are open to the public, include 250 acres of gardens that are home to beautifully designed containers and beds as well as old-growth trees and rare native plants. “Lakewood was designed in the ‘rural’ or ‘garden’ cemetery landscape movement popular in the late nineteenth century when Lakewood was founded,” says Lakewood president Ronald Gjerde, Jr. Because the park system was just getting started when Lakewood opened in 1871, the cemetery’s grounds were one of the first public green spaces in Minneapolis. Over the years, lessons learned in the cemetery gardens have helped shape the development of horticulture in Minnesota.
In the early 1900s, Lakewood was the largest floral wholesaler west of Chicago. The cemetery housed and maintained six large greenhouses, each longer than a football field. One of the present day Lakewood greenhouses is the oldest standing and continually operating greenhouse in the state. The energy crisis of the 1970s forced many cemetery greenhouse operations across the country to close, but Lakewood continued operating by reducing the size and number of its greenhouses and switching to more efficient, sustainable options. To learn more about Lakewood’s greenhouse history, check out this video.
How to Help Bumble Bees
The plight of honeybees is well publicized. But you don’t hear much about other bees that need our help, and that’s too bad because many other kinds of bees are also disappearing fast. In this column, I’m hoping to raise awareness about what’s happening to bumble bees, particularly the rusty patched bumble bee. It’s not too late to help.
Of the 48 bumble bee species in North America, several are considered to be in decline for a variety of reasons. But in December of 2016, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service declared that the rusty patched bumble bee (Bombus affinis) was endangered because their numbers had declined by 87 percent over the past 20 years.
One of Minnesota’s declining bumble bee species, the rusty patched bumble bee was the first bee species in the continental U.S. to be declared endangered, but it probably won’t be the last. Minnesota is one of the few states where rusty patched bumble bees can still be found, and they are most commonly spotted in the Twin Cities area.
Reasons for the decline of bumble bees mirror those of other bees: pesticide use, climate change, habitat loss and disease have all seemingly contributed to their demise. The situation is dire, but there are positive things gardeners can do to help. A good place to start is to stop using pesticides, or at least limit their use. Next, if you have a big yard and can allow a small space or two to include a few little piles of leaves or brush, queen bumble bees will thank you for the nice places to nest.
Because bumble bees are out early in spring and are active before many plants are in bloom, consider adding some early-spring-flowering bulbs, perennials, shrubs and trees to your yard, like plums, hazelnut, witch hazel, willows, grape hyacinth, scilla (one of my favorite spring plants), snowdrops, crocus, hellebore and Virginia bluebells. Of course, there are many other plants that can be added to your gardens to help bumble bees and other pollinators too.
Unlike honeybees, bumble bees don’t have a lot of honey stored in their nests, so they depend on available flowers.The University of Minnesota’s bee lab has a lot of helpful information on bees on its website, including Plants for Minnesota Bees, which lists several flowering plants that bees like that are suited to most home landscapes. Remember to include plants that offer nectar and pollen because bees need both the protein from pollen and the carbohydrates from nectar to survive.
In addition to planting bumble bee favorites like blueberries, tomatoes, borage, sage, oregano and thyme, here are some standouts to consider from the bee lab’s list, as well as other sources:
- Anise hyssop (Agastache foeniculum)
- Autumn joy sedum (Hylotelephium telephium)
- Beebalm (Monarda fistulosa)
- Catmint (Nepeta x fassenii)
- Cup plant (Silphium perfoliatum)
- Culver’s root (Veronicastrum virginicum)
- Honeysuckle vine (Lonicera)
- Ironweed (Vernonia fasiculata)
- Partridge pea (Chamaecrista fasciculata)
- Primroses (Primula vulgaris)
- Rough blazingstar (Liatris aspera)
- Sea holly (Eryngium maritimum)
- Stiff goldenrod (Solidago rigida)
- Wild geranium (Geranium maculatum)
To learn more about bumble bees, including more information on why they are disappearing and what their needs are in terms of habitat, nesting and overwintering, have a look at this section of the Xerces Society’s website.
I’d also like to suggest two great books about pollinators by local authors: Pollinator Friendly Gardening by Rhonda Hayes and Pollinators of Native Plants by Heather Holm.
—A version of this story appeared in Northern Gardener magazine.
Cold Weather Plant Lust
- On February 22, 2018
- By Meleah
- In Perennials, Plant Spotlight, Uncategorized
- 0
Hey, so, before I start talking about plants, let me explain the confusion with my last post. You may have noticed that I was going on about how I’d changed the name of my blog to Livin’ Thing and yet all you saw was my old Everyday Gardener banner at the top of the page. Technical difficulties, folks. Technical difficulties. But all of that is fixed now, we think.
So onward and upward as they say. It’s been a long, excruciatingly cold winter here in Minnesota so I’ve been comforting myself with dreams about what to plant when the weather warms up. My list of “Wow, I love that!” plants gets longer all the time, so I just try to pick a few each year to try. No firm decisions have been made yet, but here are a few of 2018’s contenders, in case you’d like to look them up and see if you like them too. One thing to note, these are not new plants, just a bunch of not-often-seen lovelies that I’m thinking about.
‘Othello’ ligularia (Ligularia dentata ‘Othello’): I love ligularia for its gorgeous lily-pad-like foliage, and wonderful yellow flowers that open later in the summer when other things are tired and ragged. This variety seems particular nice because its blooms look a lot like daisies, and it grows to only about 2 to 3 feet tall and 18 to 24 inches wide. Like all ligularias, ‘Othello’ does best in shade to part shade, and requires more moisture than many perennials. So plant this with other water-loving shade plants like astilbe, foxglove, black snakeroot, Rodger’s flower (Rodgersia) and foam flower. Plants are hard to Zone 4.
‘Raydon’s Favorite’ aromatic aster (Symphyotrichum oblongifolium ‘Raydon’s Favorite’): Asters get a bad rap for being tall and gangly. But there are many asters out there that don’t behave like that. This one is among them, growing to just 2 to 3 feet tall and wide. If you’d like to keep bees happy with fall flowers, ‘Raydon’s Favorite’ is a great choice with its lovely lavender blooms. Full sun is best and plants are hardy to Zone 4.
Cup plant (Silphium perfoliatum): This prairie native is really striking because plants can grow to 8 to 10 feet tall and about 3 feet wide or more. I’ve seen these in the back of people’s gardens a few times, and I’m always wowed by them. The name comes from the cup-like shape that is formed where the leaves of the plant meet the stems. It is said that wildlife and pollinators can sometimes get a sip of water from those rain-filled cups. That’s a reason to buy this plant, right there! The yellow blooms look like a cross between daisies and sunflowers. If you want to try these, put them in the back of the garden in a sunny spot. To keep them from being too tall and gangly, I recommend cutting them back by half in early summer before they set blooms. Plants are hardy to Zone 4.
Purple Japanese burnet (Sanguisorba tenuifolia ‘Purpurea’): I’m not totally sure about this one. Look it up online and you’ll see what I mean. With its little purple pipe cleaner-like blooms perched atop long grassy spikes, it’s either cool looking or just too weedy for my taste. But I keep going back to it because those little pipe cleaners are pretty neat. Plants grow to 3 to 4 feet tall and 2 feet wide. The long stems emerge from a nice-looking clump of foliage close to the ground. Hard to Zone 4, this beauty should be planted in full sun and needs moist soil.
‘Purple Prince’ epimedium (Epimedium grandiflorum ‘Purple Prince’): If you don’t have epimedium in your garden, run out and get some as soon as spring comes. I’ve only recently added some at my house, and I can’t say enough good things about these pretty perennials. Like most other epimediums, ‘Purple Prince’ has dainty heart-shaped leaves that last all season and look great. Purple, almost orchid-like flowers, appear in spring and plants grow 12 to 15 inches tall and wide. Full-sun to partial shade is best, and plants are hardy to Zone 4. This epimedium is not commonly sold but can be found online at Rare Find Nursery in Jackson, New Jersey.
‘Golden Fleece’ goldenrod (Solidago sphacelata ‘Golden Fleece’): If you haven’t yet noticed, I can be a sucker for late-blooming flowers. Not only do I appreciate having something in bloom from August and into fall, I love to see bees happily finding something to nourish themselves with when other flowers are long spent. Goldenrod is always a bee favorite and ‘Golden Fleece’ is unique in that it grows to only 12 to 18 inches tall and wide, making it much more compact that other varieties. Plants will do best in full sun, but can take partial shade, and are hardy to Zone 4.
Awesome Things About Ants
- On February 20, 2018
- By Meleah
- In Bugs, Natural Wonders, Uncategorized
- 1
Hello Everyday Gardener readers. Welcome to Livin’ Thing. As you can see, I’ve renamed my blog and successfully transported my past posts, and you, to this lovely new space where I plan to write about gardening, of course, but also all sorts of other livin’ things, including humans. Rest assured, though,that I do not plan to write about dieting, as a neighbor friend feared when she misread my new blog title as Livin’ THIN. Ha! No.
No, for this post I’d like to talk about ants. As a Master Gardener, I often volunteer to answer questions at our booth at various events, like the State Fair and farmers markets. People ask about all sorts of different things, but mostly they want to know how to kill stuff: gophers, moles, voles, rabbits and bugs of all types, especially ants. People really seem to hate ants, and I don’t get that because, with the exception of horrors like fire ants, they are actually quite beneficial, harmless and fascinating to watch. Also, I’ve seen the movie A Bug’s Life too many times to count and, well, if that doesn’t change your perspective on ants, nothing will.
But let me try. Here are just a few reasons why ants should be considered friends rather than pests to get rid of:
They are Fun and Interesting to Watch
My husband Mike and I spend quite a bit of time watching ants while drinking wine and eating supper in the backyard. Sometimes we conduct “experiments” to see what they’ll do. Like the time we put a small dollop of hummus on a low table and watched as one ant found it and took a teeny tiny bit back to the colony. Within minutes a long line of ants was marching up the table leg from a crack in the patio, each one gathering a portion of hummus nearly too small for us to see before carrying it back down the table leg to the colony below. On and on they went, and we imagined them putting a call out underground that went something like: “OMG, you would not BELIEVE what we found out there, you guys!” By morning, almost all of the hummus was gone, but there were still a few ants working to get every last bit. We hope they enjoyed it. Also, further totally unscientific testing revealed those ants preferred mashed potatoes over hummus if given the choice.