Gardening tips for July

July temperatures in southern New Mexico and western Texas are dry and hot. Please keep an eye on your watering systems. Make sure dripper and emitters and sprinkler heads are all working properly, before you go on vacation. Try not to rely on neighbors to water for you

The most common problem is usually the lawn. How much water does one need for their lawn? This is the most challenging question to answer. For cool season grasses such a fescue, rye, and bluegrass it's about 3" of water evenly distributed per week

For warm season grasses such a bermuda or hybrid bermuda is about 2" to 2 1/2" per week. This is during the hottest time of the year, usually June,July, and August. Your lawn will typically need less during the cooler months of the year, so please water responsibly. Just remember it is not how long you leave you watering system on but how much water you acutally apply to your lawn.

If you begin to notice "spots" on your lawn chances are it is suffering from dehydration. The easiest way to detect this is if your walk through your lawn and look back and noticed exactly where you were walking, then that is your sign that your lawn needs a drink of water.

If you begin to notice brown patches in your lawn and have ruled out a watering deficiency, you may want to examine the soil that is just under and check for grub worms. If you have grubs, you will NOT mistake them for anything else!

These guys are as big as your thumb and feed vigorously on grass roots. We have several products to help eliminate these "critter" such as BENEFICIAL NEMATODES, 24-hour grub killer and season long grub killer from Bayer.

If you have ruled out grubs and water as culprits for your brown patches, then the next thing to look out for is fungus. Sometimes the easiest way is to examine the individual blades of grass right next to the brown patch.

The grass stems may have unusual markings on them which may be compared to the "wrinkles or folds" on your finger. We carry both liquid and grannular fungicides to help combat this disease.

The heat can really take a toll on just about all non-native plants. Make sure you fertilze regularly. Most plant really are not picky about what you feed them just as long as you feed them something. Plants are like people that cannot just live on water alone, especially in our nutrient lacking soil.

If you find that even after using fertilzer regularly still does not "green-up" your plants, they may be lacking a secondary nutrient such as iron, sulphur, zinc or other micro nutrient. Products such as IRONITE, GROW-MORE CHELATED IRON, or FERTILOME SOIL ACIDIFIER can help return plants to their green lush look again.

Keep in mind that these products are to be used in conjunction with a regular fertilzing program and should not be substituted for fertilize. MEDICAP IRON IMPLANTS have proven to help severly chlorotic plants/trees where soil applications are not practical. Other issues to watch for are insects.

Spider mites thrive in the dry summer heat and can breed at phenominal rates. Spider mites often attack junipers, cypress, roses among a list of other plants. Sometimes an occasional "hosing off" with a strong stream of plain water can keep mites at bay without killing any beneficial insects in the proccess. These insects are very small (about the size of a speck of dust) and usually spin small webbing.

If you find that water is not working for you there are an number of insecticides available to rid your plants of these pests. Products such as ORHTO BUG-B-GON, GREENLIGHT NEEM OIL, SCHULTZ INSECT SPRAY, HIGH YIELD KELTHANE among other products will eradicate these mites.

Post by Gary Guzman