Warmer temperatures this week, plus rain forecast for next week provides perfect conditions for your garden to really take off.
And along with growing plants, flowers, trees and shrubs come questions. The All Things Gardening inbox is full of queries about a variety of garden-related topics, and Charlie Nardozzi answers a few of them:
What's the best soil and compost for raised beds?
Q: I will be planting flowers and vegetables in two, 12" x 48" raised beds. How should I arrange them and what is the best soil - compost versus other types. - Nevin, in South Hero
A: When setting up your raised beds, orient them north/south. Arranging them this way — even though they are fairly narrow — will lessen the amount of shade. As far as the soil mixture goes, try either a 60/40 or a 50/50 blend of topsoil and compost, and you should be good to go.
Too much thyme on my hands
Q: Please help with thyme. When do I prune? What to do if it looks dead this time of year? I have large masses of different thyme in rock walks, gardens and raised beds. - Barb, via email
A: The ideal thyme to prune your various thyme crops is late April, but you can probably still do it now.
And when you prune thyme plants, do so with a heavy hand — cut them back by a third to a half. This helps the plant have less woody growth, and that pruning will stimulate new growth.
For weed control — rake or don't rake?
Q: I rake my gardens in the spring, when I also pull the canes and last year’s dead foliage. Loose, even matted leaves seem to be an ideal medium for chickweed, jewelweed, sheep sorrel, grass creeping in, ajuga ditto, etc. Even chopped leaves used as mulch are a minimal deterrent. I started out not raking, believing the leaves would be a good mulch, and it was a revelation when I tried raking, how it got rid of weeds, retained garden edges, and looked better! Many gardening advice sources now recommend not raking. Which one is better? - Ann, via email
A: Give the leaves another chance to do their job as weed deterrent. Allowing them to break down further over the fall and winter, especially thick oak leaves, is still beneficial. You can help the process along by chopping the leaves up a little bit and then using them as a mulch.
When you're going in with a rake and removing weeds, you're uprooting them in the moment. In the long run, though, using chopped leaves and other mulches are more helpful.
Next time, shred any leaves you're going to use, then cover the gardens with that mulch and let it be. And in the spring, when you're going in to remove those leaves, rake them out just a little bit, and then add back leaves or other mulches into the garden for ongoing weed prevention.
Addressing lumpy lawn woes
Q: I live in the New North End of Burlington. My back yard used to be smooth, but it has been lumpy and bumpy with patches of missing grass. About two weeks ago, I put down GrubX, but … the grass hasn’t grown back. What is happening? How can I flatten out the lumps so I can mow without the mower getting hung up on a lump? - Sharon, in Burlington
A: The grubs are probably eradicated from the treatment, so now it's time to build up the grass again.
Begin with a layer of topsoil, 3 to 4 inches thick, over the grassy area. Then overseed with a grass seed that's similar to what you're currently growing.
If you have a shady area, try grass seed like creeping fescue or sheep fescue, and then keep the lawn well watered.
And hopefully that will create a nice, thick, lush lawn that you won't have problems with in the future.
Diagnosing holey hydrangea branches
Q: When I was pruning my hydrangeas, I kept finding branches that were black on the end and had a hole in the middle. Do you know what causes this? - Dott, via email
A: This sounds like a fungal disease, like anthracnose or something similar. It is a common plague on hydrangeas.
As long as the branches that you cut back were still alive and the other branches on your shrub look okay, you needn't worry too much.
Remove the diseased branches and give the hydrangea a good pruning; that will open it up a lot and allow good air flow. That can go a long way in preventing the disease from coming back.
An ode to weeding a wet garden
Q: Raining for three days and there is standing and running water in much of my veggie garden. There are two-plus inches of water running over the surface, so I can slide my gloved hand down the roots of dandelions, etc. and pull the whole root out. Other weeds are coming up equally easily: goldenrod, even small, bush-type plants. Wonder if it will work on multiflora roses? I have heavy elbow-length gloves and loppers, and the rain is supposed to continue. - Linda, via email
A: After a few days of rain, when the soil is wet, pulling weeds is the perfect activity! And if you've got the kind of weeds with really strong roots, like quackgrass, rain-soaked soil is your friend.
Plus, weeding out the types with rhizome root systems will help your garden in the long term.
As far as going after the multiflora rose, go for it! It is a tough plant with hardy roots and plenty of thorns, but if you've got long gloves, elbow grease and rain-soaked soil, you might just win the battle.
Do I dig the no-dig garden if the rye is too tall?
Q: If I am trying to use the no-dig technique, but I want to use a cover crop like winter rye as I did last fall, how do I plant without turning over the six-inch tall winter rye? - Alison in Lincoln
A: This spring, if you've got winter rye coming up because you planted it last fall in your no-dig garden bed, you'll need to mow it down.
Set your mower blade really low and chop it down, then get some clear plastic and cover it for about a week. You'll essentially need to kill it off that way, because mowing it alone will not be enough. It'll keep regrowing.
The key is to plant some cover crops in your no-dig garden bed that naturally die back.
In the fall, go in and plant crops like oats, crimson clover, buckwheat, peas and beans. They'll grow, then die. And next spring, all you have to do is put compost over them for your no-dig garden bed to be ready for planting.
ICYMI: Vermont Edition's spring gardening show
In case you missed it, Charlie joined Vermont Edition host Mikaela Lefrak in front of a live audience from Vermont Public's Stetson Studio to answer questions on moldy soil, berry bushes, new flower varieties and more.
All Things Gardening is powered by you, our audience! Send us your toughest conundrums to gardening@vermontpublic.org and join the fun. Or better yet, leave a voicemail with your gardening question so we can use your voice on the air! Call Vermont Public at 1-800-639-2192.
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