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Questions and Answers:Q. How do I change the soil so the blooms in my hydrangeas will change color? A. Some hydrangeas such as the oak leaf or pee gee will remain white no matter what the soil conditions, However, the hydrangeas that most folks grow will have a change of flower color if the Ph of the soil changes. Changing the Ph of the soil is a risky process because if you add too much lime for acidic soil, to get a pink bloom, or aluminum sulfate for alkaline soil, to get a blue bloom, you can overdo it and cause long term damage to the plant and surrounding soil . There is no recipe on how much to add around the plant for the colors to change, so I would just be happy with the colors that I have or do a lot of experimenting. Q. When do I prune hydrangeas? A. Prune after they finish flowering in late spring. Hydrangeas bloom on old wood. In other words, they bloom on the stems they produced the year before. Q. I am thinking about holly plants around my house for a shrub. I heard that you need male and female plants to get the plants to produce berries. How can I tell the difference? A. Yaupon hollies need four males in the vicinity for one female plant to produce fruit. Therefore, fruit production on yaupons is sporadic unless you are good at identifying male and female flowers and they are in full bloom when you make the purchase. The same is true for our native possomhaw holly. Some good news is that burford, needlepoint and Nellie R. Stevens hollies have both male and female flowers and you should have berries on every plant. Q. My cedar trees are having a lot of trouble with bagworms. When should I spray to kill them? A. Bagworms feed in mid to late spring and that‘s when you spray. The time frame is important so you get to them before they seal themselves in their little bags to grow into moths. Start a regular spraying schedule April-June with any insecticide listed for bagworms. For organic control use Spinosad every two weeks during this period. Q. Will the Mexican Heather I purchased in the spring for a ground cover make it over the winter? A. We live in a zone where Mexican Heather makes it some winters and others it dies completely. Add mulch around the declining plants during the fall and wait until spring to see what comes back before trimming out the dead sections. Then, replace any plants that didn‘t make it through the winter. Q. I had a water softener put in that uses salt to soften the water. Will it damage my plants? A. Yes. Salt water is bad for almost any plant that we grow in our area. What I would do is add a by-pass of some kind for your garden watering or collect rainwater You can also look for salt tolerant plants when planning your landscape. Q. I have several prayer plants and they all have brown leaf edges. What causes this problem? A. Prayer plants or closet plants do not like to be dried out, and they like lots of humidity. Keep soil moist, but well drained, and occasionally flush with water to wash out any fertilizer salts that have accumulated in the soil. Fertilizer salt accumulation and dry soil will cause leaf edges to turn brown. Q. Why does my Mountain Laurel grow so slow? Is there anything I can do to speed it up? A. Fertilize with a lawn fertilizer that contains higher levels of nitrogen in the spring after bloom. Don’t overdo it or you will kill the plant. Click Here to Ask Me a Gardening Question
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