5 things to do in the garden this week:
Fruit trees. Start strategizing fruit tree planting now as the beginning of fall — a favorable time to plant trees in general — is just around the corner. Although many deciduous fruit trees are self-fertile and will produce a sizable crop planted individually, you will always get more fruit if there is a pollenizer tree nearby. (This goes for avocado varieties as well.) For example, a Santa Rosa plum yields a nice crop on its own but will yield more fruit when a Burgundy plum is adjacent to it. Similarly, a Pink Lady apple tree can fruit on its own, but its crop will be larger with an Anna apple in the vicinity. Some trees such as sweet cherry absolutely require an accompanying pollenizer tree to fruit. In our warm winter climate, for example, you could select Minnie Royal and Royal Lee cherry varieties for tandem planting. All of the aforementioned fruit tree varieties are available at Otto & Sons Nursery in Fillmore (ottoandsonsnursery.com).
Vegetables. Succession planting is a practice where you plant a crop over a period of weeks or months instead of all at once. This practice is most popularly employed when planting salad greens such as lettuce, arugula, and mustard, as well as radishes, since they are crops that take 60 days or less to grow from seed into harvestable form. These salad ingredients can be planted throughout the year so that by consistent sowing of their seeds, your salad ingredients will be available for dinner every evening. In truth, every vegetable is a candidate for succession planting, albeit over one or two seasons where most warm-weather crops and most cool weather crops are concerned.
Herbs. Parsley is a stalwart selection for the herb garden. I once met a gardener in Saugus who harvested parsley several times a week, 52 weeks a year. It must be said that his soil was ideal for growing parsley, which self-sowed continuously so he never had to plant seeds. This soil was heavily amended with aged horse manure in which red wiggler worms thrived. Horse manure containing alfalfa hay is an ideal medium for vermicomposting (vermis means worm in Latin), which yields worm castings (a euphemism for worm poop), the best soil amendment under the sun. If you don’t have horse manure handy, you can used shredded newspaper or corrugated cardboard for vermicomposting instead. What makes manure ideal for vermicomposting is its water-holding capacity since worms grow best where moisture is constantly available. Red wigglers are found wherever fish bait is sold and you can order them online as well.
Ornamentals. Cousin Itt (Acacia cognata) is a multi-purpose selection that looks good everywhere. We normally associate weeping foliage with trees but, in this case, like the iconic character in the Addams family, foliar tresses are pleasantly pendant even though Cousin Itt is classified somewhere between a ground cover and a compact shrub. Plant it to fill up your parkway strip between sidewalk and street or in front of a low block wall for a softening effect. Once established, it needs little care other than an occasional deep soak. It grows slowly but eventually reaches a height of 2-3 feet with a girth of 4-6 feet.
If you suspect any tree or shrub is suffering from drought stress, and its roots are dense or the surrounding soil is compacted, consider watering with a deep root irrigation device. A deep root irrigator is a perforated metal rod with a pointed tip that is plunged into the ground. You attach a hose to the top of the rod and water flows down and out through the perforations. You move the irrigator around the drip line or canopy perimeter line of the tree since that’s where the feeder roots that take up water are most actively growing. Root irrigators vary from 24 to 48 inches in length. Although nearly all the water a tree requires is absorbed in roots growing only a few inches beneath the soil surface, having a reserve of water below, as it moves upwards in the soil through capillary action, will benefit these shallow roots. Root irrigators are available for $30-40 through online vendors.
