seeds

With cooler months finally upon us, now is the time for planting some of my favorite winter annuals, one being the ever vibrant, versatile and easy to grow Nasturtium. Here are some things you may or may not know about this lovely little flower:

Nasturtiums are edible, flowers and leaves. The flowers make a beautiful addition to the top of any salad and add a peppery flavor. During the mid-twentieth century people used nasturtium seed pods as a replacement for pepper by drying out the seeds and grinding them. The bloom can be dusted with sugar and used to decorate a holiday cake.

Nasturtium Salad c/o Sunset Magazine

They’re not picky and grow well in any type of soil. They love sunshine and don’t like to stay wet.
They make a great companion plant. They help deter aphids, white fly, squash bugs and other pests. Plant alongside veggies like tomatoes, cabbage & broccoli.

Gill Garden Guide: Fall & Winter Annuals

-Whitney

That first cool front in fall sure does feel good, and with the new season comes new flowers and time to get back outside and garden. In South Texas September and October are the best months to spread wildflower seeds. With the prediction of a wetter and cooler fall, this is a perfect time to start planning that little bed or large meadow of spring blooming wildflowers.

Texas Bluebonnets (the state flower), Alamo Fire (the maroon bonnet), Texas Paintbrush, and Indian Blanket are all excellent single varieties. We also carry a wildflower mix which includes Coreopsis, Indian Blanket, Black-eyed Susan, Lemon Mint, Drummond Phlox, Cornflower, and Corn Poppy for a mixed show of spring color.

There are also low growing varieties or a Butterfly/hummingbird mixture. For shady areas, we have a shade mix and also a water wise mix.

Pick a spot in the yard, a flowerbed, or the easement strip and go wild this fall. It will reward you with beautiful blooms come spring.

-DeAnna

Starting your first cutting garden may be much easier than you would think. Planning your garden is the best way to start: a 3 foot x 10 foot garden bed will produce more than enough flowers to make a bouquet for yourself and a friend each week. Your garden plot must be in a place that receives at least 6-8 hours of sunlight every day. If you are unsure about the amount of full sun a certain spot receives each day, dedicate a day to checking the same spot hourly: from 8am until 5pm. Take notes each hour on what the sun conditions in that spot are. This may sound menial, but when planting near trees, the sunlight can be tricky! The next thing to consider is the location of your garden in reference to a viable water source. Keep it simple for yourself rather than having to constantly drag a garden hose. The final thought in choosing a location for your cutting garden is to place it out of sight. This may sound crazy to you, but will you be able to cut the beautiful flowers if you can see them from your favorite spot in the house or on the porch?

Creating your garden bed is the most important part of starting to grow any plants, especially cut flowers. You will need enough compost to add 6 inches to your 3’ x 10’ bed and enough mulch to cover 3-4 inches to cover your 3’ x 10’ bed. Feeding your plants with fertilizer is not the same thing as feeding your soil, you must plan to continuously add compost to be feeding your soil. You should be mindful of the hundreds of thousands beneficial microbes in the top 6 inches of your soil and your goal should be to constantly feed them and keep them in your garden as they are helping to keep the bad bugs away and to keep your garden soil aerated and stronger. By continuously adding organic matter, you are setting your garden up to become more self-sustainable each season.

My sweet boy, Baylor, always loves to inspect my freshly prepped garden beds. Photo courtesy of The Honey Bee & the Hound

To start making your 3’ x 10’ garden bed, first you must clear the designated area of any vegetation. Burn Out and Horticultural Vinegar are great organic herbicides. Once your bed area is free and clear of grass and weeds, you will start turning the soil in your bed simply by using a shovel. You will dig down as far as you can and place the shovel-full of dirt and make a pile of the dirt you have dug out. You should be digging out 3”-6” of soil. Next you will need a fork to put in the very bottom of the bed you have dug out to aerate and open the sub-soil. Your goal should be to make as many little holes in the very bottom of the bed as possible. Now you will need to get some compost, such as Cotton Burr Compost, to add about 3” of compost to the bottom of the newly dug-out bed. After you have added some compost, you will now add back in the soil that you have dug out to begin with. To top off your bed, you will add another 2”-3” of compost. Your end result should be a 3’ x 10’ bed that is raised about 6” above the ground. While this method of “double-digging” is much more labor-intensive than using a piece of machinery such as a tiller, but it more beneficial for your garden in many ways: it protects the beneficial insects and tiny microbes living in the top six inches of your soil that protect your plants from harmful pests and keeps the soil a healthy, living, necessary part of your healthy, happy flowers. It also helps to keep you accountable for your care of your garden – when you put that much work into starting a garden, you are bound to keep it up and to love and care for it often!

My favorite activity these days is riding around to find someone to share my flowers with! Photo courtesy of The Honey Bee & the Hound Cut Flower Farm

Next is the fun part: picking out the seeds to plant in your brand new garden bed! My three recommendations would be a Zinnia (Pumila Cut & Come Again), a Basil (such as Petra), and a
Sunflower. You will plant all of your seeds on a 6” x 6” grid. This will give the plants enough room to fully grow in while utilizing every bit of your space. With this combination of flowers you will easily have flowers for a bouquet that smells good and will come back week after week in your garden.

Fresh bouquets of zinnia and basil – photo courtesy of The Honey Bee & the Hound Cut Flower Farm

In order to maintain your new cut flower garden, you must stay on top of the weeds! The easiest way to get ahead of the weeds is to begin mulching your garden when your seedlings have grown 6” tall. Add 3” of mulch at a time using grass cuttings and old leaves that you have collected. This should allow you to have a whole season of no weeding necessary!

Enlisting your feathered ladies to help keep the weeds and pests down is always a good idea as long as they do not try to sit on your seedlings! – Photo courtesy of The Honey Bee & the Hound Cut Flower Farm

Lastly, when you go to cut your flowers be sure to do it in the cool part of the early mornings or late evenings. If you cut during the high noon sun, your flowers will likely wilt. Allow your flowers to sit in a bucket of water for at least six hours before beginning to arrange them in a bouquet. This allows them to get maximum hydration. Once you have gone through a season with your first cutting garden, I encourage you to begin looking for the seeds of the flowers that your mother and grandmother grew. This is what helps to make me feel so connected with my cutting gardens – I can cut the same bouquet that my late grandmother used to put on her dining room table and it makes me connect with her in a very special way. Enjoy!

To learn more, be sure to come to Gill’s on Airline this Saturday (September 10, 2016) for Emily’s Garden Talk:

”From Beginning to Bouquets – Cultivating Cut Flowers”

If you would like to connect with a local cut flower farm, visit

www.thehoneybeeandthehound.com

-Emily Capule, Flower Farmer and Gill’s Landscape Design Assistant

Having backyard chickens in urban neighborhoods is becoming more of a trend with each changing of (gardening) seasons. While many may think that having some hens running amuck in their gardens sounds like a lot of work or perhaps that they may not have enough room to keep them happy, the truth is that having some feathered ladies in the garden may take a lot of work off of your hands – and only about five square feet of space per chicken is required to keep everyone happy territorially.

Gills’ employees from Left to Right: Kady, Emily, Josh, all have backyard chickens of their own

The three main benefits of keeping backyard chickens, in my opinion, are as follows:

Natural Pest Control – Chickens absolutely love finding and eating bugs! When allowed to free range in your yard, you will find chickens scratching the ground to look for worms (and a lot of happy squawking if they find a chunky little grub worm!), and you will see your chickens sprinting around chasing mosquitos to grab out of the air. Not only is it eternally entertaining to watch the girls on bug-duty, it is extremely beneficial to your garden and to the peacefulness in your yard. I have watched chickens eat grasshoppers, worms, moths, fleas, snakes, ticks, aphids, scorpions, mosquitos, grubs, spiders, ants and termites. The girls will eat pests of any life-cycle including egg, larval stage and adults. This helps to keep the garden pest populations down which means less spraying that you have to do. The key is to allow your girls to have access to your gardens during the right times of the year. For example, you should not let your chickens in your garden if you have small seedlings growing as they may scratch them or sit on them accidentally. Keep your garden protected until the plants are established. And again, if you are growing fruit or vegetables, do not allow your chickens to reap the benefits of fresh food before you can! Do allow your chickens to roam through your freshly tilled garden as they will scout out the weed seeds to eat before they have a chance to sprout.
Natural Fertilizer – Chicken fertilizer is very beneficial if used responsibly. It is naturally extremely high in Nitrogen which could cause it to burn your plants if you do not allow it to sit for an amount of time. The easiest way to apply chicken fertilizer is to keep it mixed with your chicken’s bedding such as straw, hay or shavings. These are compostable materials and can be added to your garden in the way you would add any other compost or amendment. You have to clean their coops anyway so you might as well put it to good use in your garden! Another great assistance is the egg shells from your chicken’s bounty being used in your garden can add calcium and enrich the soil. When you crack the eggs, wash out the egg shells and allow them to dry. Then simply break them up and add them to your already-dug planting holes in your garden.
Urban Composting – I understand all of the benefits of having a compost bin but simply cannot keep one as A) I cannot stand the smell (and I don’t think my neighbors would appreciate it either and B) the bugs that are so attracted to the compost bin are a major turn off for me. I have always felt guilty throwing away table scraps and fruit/veggies that have gone off before having the chance to eat them. The chickens are living compost bins willing and able to take all of this guilt off of your hands! They are omnivorous so they can eat meat (although I do not condone feeding them chicken for obvious reasons) and they will eat just about anything else that you have had for dinner – with the exceptions of a few foods being unhealthy and poisonous for them to eat such as: candy, chocolate, sugar, raw potato peels, avocado skins and pits, raw or undercooked beans, salt and citrus along with a few various other items. Of course it is always a good idea to do a quick google search before feeding an animal anything that you are unsure of what the effect will be.

Enjoying the girls in the lower gardens at Emily’s house.

Raising your backyard chickens from day old chicks, in my opinion, is the most rewarding way to keep chickens. This gives you a chance to handle them from the time they are very young which makes them used to you, giving you a pet-like relationship with your backyard flock.

5 day old Silkie chicks

When you bring your new chicks home, you must keep them very warm at 95* F for the first week of their life and drop 5* F each week until they are maintained at regular daytime temperatures. The best way to do this is to keep a bulb and a thermometer in their coop. Of course it is important to practice proper safety methods with this such as not allowing the bulb to touch any surface in the coop and turning it off frequently to let it cool down.

Your new chicks will require a special type of feed called chick starter. You can purchase this medicated or unmedicated. The choice is yours, however, if you choose unmedicated you must diligently pay attention to the cleanliness of your coop and the distinct signs of health of your new chicks. Any unusual activity from one of your girls should be investigated immediately. Any symptoms can be found through a beginner chicken guide book or an online google search. www.backyardchickens.com is an excellent source of information and a great place to post questions/pictures of what’s going on in your flock. A trick that I have found helpful is to add a capful of organic apple cider vinegar to each gallon of water that your chicks drink. This helps to keep them drinking regularly as they like the taste and it also helps to keep them flushed out. Hens begin laying eggs between five and six months old. After three years of age, their laying rate begins to drop to one less egg per week.

The safety of your chickens should be your biggest concern when keeping backyard chickens. You must have a fenced-in yard if you want your chickens to free range, and even then they can take flight high enough to get over your fence. Fortunately, your chickens will not try to leave unless they are missing something that they need in your yard. If you have plenty of food and water, this should not happen. Next, you want to be sure that no outside predators can get into your yard, or your coop. In Corpus Christi, other than maintaining a safe coop, the concerns of predators are typically raccoons, opossums, coyotes, wild dogs, hawks and migratory birds. Be sure that your chickens have plenty of options to run to safety in a covered, hard to reach area to hide from predators that might have set their sights on your birds. The last safety concern is one that you may not immediately think of: your pet dogs and cats. If your pets go outside to roam around in your yard, you must remember that their first instinct is to hunt. You absolutely cannot leave your chickens out unprotected in your yard with your dogs. You must have an area to keep them safe and separated.

Some chicken fun facts:

Chickens do not have teeth. They have a gizzard that has tiny stones which grinds up the food that they swallow whole.
Chickens lay between 100 and 300 eggs per year, at a rate of one per day. The eggs are only fertilized if there is a rooster around.
Chickens begin communicating before they are born. The Momma Hen makes a purring sound to her unhatched eggs and the chicks can begin peeping back to her while they are still inside the eggs.
Chickens know who you are – they can learn up to 100 different faces.
Chickens have prehistoric roots. They are believed to be the closest living ancestor of the Tyrannosaurus rex.

Three Silkies enjoying the nasturtiums.

-Emily Capule

Emily, a Landscape Design Assistant here at Gill’s, loves orchids. Before joining us, she worked at the Naples Botanical Gardens in Naples, Florida, growing orchids. Emily, pictured here, shares her knowledge – enjoy!

Orchidacaea is the largest flowering plant family in the world. This family has more than 25,000 documented species which is about four times the number of mammal species in the world today! The Royal Horticultural Society estimates that we are close to nearing half a million hybridized varieties, along with new orchids being created in labs or discovered every day.

Orchids are a very diverse plant species as they occur naturally on every continent except Antarctica. They can grow as epiphytes which attach to trees, lithophytes which attach to rocks, or terrestrial which grow in the ground like most plants. They are known for being the tropical, bright-colored beauties in the rainforests and they are also known for being the state flower of Minnesota – the Showy Lady’s slipper. Orchids also occur in every color except for true black or true blue – if you see these colors it is likely that they are either dyed or you are seeing a very vibrant spectrum of purple.

Perhaps the most beneficial orchid is Vanilla planifolia – the vanilla plant. This is a vining species whose roots start in the ground and began to attach to a tree and vine to the top. When this orchid flower is pollinated and creates a seed pod, the seeds are the little black specs that you see in your vanilla bean ice cream! This is the only orchid that is being farmed for industrial purposed in the food and cosmetic industry.

The one thing that almost every orchid species has in common is their floral arrangement: The outer three flower parts are sepals and the inner three flower parts are beautifully colored petals. A fun fact is that a study has been done to prove that humans have such a fascination with orchids because the orchid flower has bilateral symmetry – like a human face – which makes humans have an affinity to caring for them. It has been said that “When someone looks at an orchid, it looks back at you.”

Orchids can see out of reach for many of us as they are one of the oldest plants to live on Earth – over ten million years! On average they take seven years to grow from seed to flower! And people have been known to catch “orchid fever” when collecting them (read the book Orchid Fever by Eric Hansen!) But, it is important to not became intimidated by orchids. In fact, they require a certain amount of neglect in order for them to grow happily. Here are some tips for growing your own orchid collection:

Here in Corpus Christi, you can grow your orchids outside year round – only needing to bring them inside if the temperature is going to drop below 40 degrees, or 45 if you want to play it safe.
Keeping in mind that most of the orchids you will find for sale grow epiphytically on tree trunks, they receive dappled light under the tree canopy. Try to mimic that environment always. If you are growing indoors, Eastern facing light is always best as it is the cool, bright light of the morning.
Next, think again of the natural environment of your orchid. The root systems are exposed in nature and not potted. A good way to mimic this is to water once a week by leaching the pot, allowing the water to drain through the bottom for a few minutes. Never let your orchid sit in water as this will rot its roots – this would never happen in nature because after a rain storm the wind would dry the orchid’s roots. Air flow is vital to the health of your orchid.
Fertilizing your orchid should be thought of as giving a vitamin supplement. You should not fertilize with the intention of encouraging blooming. You will want to feed a balanced fertilized, like Fertilome Water Soluble Plant Food 20-20-20, and remember the “weekly/weakly” solution: feed fertilizer once a week at a 50% dilution rate.
Pest control is best done with a preventative mindset rather than waiting until you have a problem to treat it. I believe the best preventative is neem oil (Natural Guard Neem Ready To Use) – this is an organic treatment that you can apply to your orchids twice a month. The crucial part of applying neem oil is to be sure to never apply it in temperatures over 85 degrees or in the sunlight as it can burn the leaves of your plants. The best solution is to spray in the evenings so that it has all night to dry.
Repotting your orchid should only occur when your plant’s roots began growing over the side and attaching to the pot. It is normal to have aerial roots that stick out of the pot. Simply remove your orchid from the pot, throw away all of the old bark or sphagnum moss mixture, clean up the roots by pulling dead roots away with your hands (try to avoid cutting anything) and then re-pot in a bark mixture.
A special note on Phalaenopsis, the most popular orchid kept as a houseplant, is that this particular orchid does part of its photosynthetic process through its roots – this makes it very important to keep it potted in a clear plastic container so that its roots can see the light

Please take some time to enjoy some of the beautiful orchids in my life and find some inspiration to be patient with yours!

–Emily

Artichokes are gorgeous plants. They’re just pretty! They have large arching silver spiked leaves, and add drama to any landscape. If you want a good crop of artichokes, try these tips to improve your harvest. Artichokes are deep rooted, so prep your soil at least 8 inches deep with Cattle Manure or Cotton Burr Compost spaded or tilled in. We have small pots of artichoke in stock or you can plant by seed. Keep your seedling or seeds moist but not soaked for at least a month. Artichokes grow for about 100 days before you’ll see any harvest potential, so be patient! They’re very slow growing in the cold, but actually need those chilled hours to build their root system. Harvest the buds before they bloom, and you’ll be munching on artichoke hearts in no time. But if you want to see something extraordinary, let them bloom! You’ll be amazed.

-Marta

The weather was warm & dry last week and I have been watering a little each morning and evening. It is keeping our plants perky. I did our first Hastagro feeding on October 17^th, after fixing my cutoff hose with a new end and invested in a new hand sprinkler. My old one was used as a chew toy. Even though we hoed and pulled weeds before prepping our garden….guess what’s already coming back? The war is coming and I am hoping to have a new secret weapon to use…its organic, smells great and it works….more on that soon. Our seeds are sprouting nicely; all the transplants doing well, the mystery chewers have found the swiss chard already. Think I’ll start with a pan of beer for snails and slugs. If that does not fix it, I will try Dipel Dust or Spinosad. Both are natural and very effective for most chewing critters!

Maybe then I’ll drink the beer☺

-Debbie

Last week, I shared my before & after soil prep of our veggie garden at home. I tried to plant before last Friday’s rain but did not make it. Good thing, as I realized I had a few areas holding too much water. So after some shoveling to correct the problem, we planted our hearts out Saturday evening and Sunday afternoon. We planted by transplants, tuscano kale, seabor kale, redbor kale, broccoli, cauliflower, green cabbage, red cabbage, bright lights chard, rubarb chard, tango celery, thyme, dill, and an artichoke for fun. Then we sowed Botanical Interest seeds of cherry belle radish, purple top white globe turnip, cilantro, kuroda carrots, carnival blend carrots, gourmet blend beets, and red sails lettuce. Before seeding in our root beds, I mixed Bio-tone and Rocket Fuel in the soil. Both of these are very beneficial in root development. As we planted transplants, we added just Bio-tone into the hole, mixed it with the soil, and then planted. This is because we foliar feed with Hasta Gro which helps with both root and plant development. Our last step was a few bales of pine straw to help with water, weeds and looks. Now we say a blessing and a prayer that our garden will be bountiful with plenty to share!

-Debbie

seeds

Emily, a Landscape Design Assistant here at Gill’s, loves orchids. Before joining us, she worked at the Naples Botanical Gardens in Naples, Florida, growing orchids. Emily, pictured here, shares her knowledge – enjoy!

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