How Does Your Garden Grow?

[Rudy Taylor]

I don't want to hear about Kermie's Fruit of the Looms!

[kdfrawg]

I did, indeed, extract the term from thin air, I guess. (Is that better, Rudy?) But it was over 25 years ago, so I think the statute of limitations has run out and the charges should be dropped.

[Wilma]

Back to gardens as in flowers.  I have a cottonwood tree that is shedding  and filling my flower beds with leaves already.   I kind of have an idea of why they are shedding but could some of  ye mighty founts of information tell me why?

[MarineMom]

Our cottonwood is shedding as well and we have no idea why, we are guessing it was too much water but that doesen't really make sense so I am standing in line (queue) behind Wilma to find the real reason why they are doing it

[Judy Harder]

Wilma,

sometimes they get stressed with the heat.  And, yes the water early on could have something
to do with it.

I hope it isn't telling us that winter is a coming.....not yet anyway.

[Jo McDonald]

Right after Fred rakes the yard every morning, it is a beautiful green --- then Mr and Mrs. Cottonwood look down and say " Oh, my goodness, doesn't Fred know that we just carpeted his lawn yesterday with our nice brown leaves and here he is raking them up and bagging them, then off to the dumpster they go. So we will have to redo it I guess" AND  THEY DO JUST THAT---EVERY DAY  Poor Fred, back to the same task day after day.

  Those leaves really are a pain - the ones here have been shedding ever since they quit blowing their cotton fluffy stuff all over everywhere.
Pesky things !!1

[kdfrawg]

It probably is all that water early on and all the heat now. We have young oaks and maples in our back yard (maybe 8 - 10 years old) and they are certainly showing the effects of the heat. We have been watering them every other day; they are just too young to make it in this weather without a little help. Both oaks have started to brown but the maple seems to be holding up fairly well.

[flo]

Here's a question about leaves for you.  I do not have one tree in my yard, yet I have bagged 12-15 LARGE bags of leaves both falls that I have lived here.  The wind blows from the South and I get all those, then it blows from the north and I get all of those.  For some reason they don't go on across the street, just stop at my house.    If I'm gonna have all those leaves, wish I had some of the trees to enjoy the shade along with them.

[Diane Amberg]

 See, the leaves know who is friendly. Can you leave them and just mow over them several times, spread out the little bits and leave them to feed the yard?

[Wilma]

I would love to have them mulched and left on the grass but my son-in-law mows the yard and he isn't careful where the clippings go.  So they are thrown into the flower beds where they have to be cleaned out.  Normally the leaves would make good mulch but all the cottonwood leaves do is prevent the water from getting to the roots of the plants.  They are large and waxy and when they are several layers deep, water just runs to wherever it can get through, often not near the plants.  I don't complain about the mowing as I don't have to pay for it.