10 | The Tribune | Weekend
Friday, November 12, 2021
gardening
Day length, flowers, and fungus
G
ood day, gardeners and yardeners! The cool weather that we have had in the last week (at least in New Providence) has been a nice respite from the heat and the shorter day length is triggering flowering in some plants and herbs. Euphorbia pulcherrima (poinsettia, yes, it’s just about that time again) begin their flowering now locally, and some of my crops such as an early batch of lettuce and dill have already blasted through and are setting seed already. I am now onto planting our second round of edible crops. It’s a perfect time if there ever was one, to get a round of edibles in the ground or into containers. Look at the price of broccoli in the grocery stores.You can grow that! Plant 1, 3 or 12 every other week for the next 12 or 16 weeks, and you’ll have all the broccoli you can eat for months on end once it is able to get to the point of producing the desired parts (the head, florets and stalk) for much less. The head of broccoli that we eat is actually the flower bud, each tiny piece is a flower (florets) that once open reduces the quality of the broccoli edibility. Timing is key as with most things. With the poinsettia’s colouring it is technically a bract, not a true leaf, and it is triggered to colour up to entice pollinators to the flowers which are quite small and inconspicuous (that’s the little yellow bits that show up in several weeks’ time on the tips of the colored bracts). Whitefly can be quite a contentious pest on poinsettias. When purchasing, be sure to give a quick inspection on the underside of the leaves and bracts to ensure that they are free of whitefly. Once they are taken home or to the office, there is always going to be opportunity for whitefly to establish a population. Most poinsettias are treated with systemic pesticides to reduce the chances of whitefly but having a bottle of a basic nontoxic pesticide on hand is always recommended. Once planted in the ground or a larger container in the garden, the risk of whitefly diminishes and systemics become far less necessary. Pests can be dealt with by spraying nontoxic horticultural oils
or pesticides. With the waning daylight for the next several weeks, or 39 days to be exact from this publish date, I find it important to get any supplemental watering done as early as possible in the day, for a few reasons. Amongst them is the potting, planting, garden media (soil, if you must) does not dry out as quickly as it does in the longer days and higher heat of summer. Another is that water on leaves that doesn’t dry before dark is an easy spot for fungus to establish, most of which will cause minor spotting, or at worst, plant death by systemic rot, especially when combined with potting or planting media that contains high water content for longer periods. Drastic, I know. Yet there are days when watering gets done late. Poinsettia leaves easily develop spots when water sits overnight, there’s not much to be done at that point, avoidance is preemptive. Broccoli and cauliflower heads that have water sitting on them overnight can develop dark spots from fungus having found a target. Again, avoidance is preemptive, but if such things do develop then a spray of an appropriate fungicide will reduce further damage if it is caught early enough. Orchids that I have tied in trees are loving this weather, budding and flowering. The risk of fungus causing spots on the leaves of orchids increases with the waning daylight as well. Avoid watering later in the day. Established lawn growth rates are slowing down and using less water. Lawn grass also risks fungus spotting or rot when watered late in the day and not allowed to dry before dark, at this time of year. All in all, it is a beautiful time of year to be in the garden, and I do hope that you can get into it! It’s good for the heart and for the body, for the mind and
for the soul. It’s good for the young and for the old, the firm and for the infirm, and it is fun! Grow on, gardeners. As always, I wish you happy gardening. • Adam Boorman is the nursery manager at the Fox Hill Nursery. You can contact him with any questions you may have, or topics you would like to see discussed, at gardening242@gmail.com. at gardening242@ gmail.com.
