Home Gardening

North Mississippi Gardening Tips
March, 2005

LAWNS

For those of us who failed to apply a pre-emerge herbicide last fall to control winter weeds in our lawn, it’s time to get out the lawnmower and begin mowing our crop of weeds before seed heads are produced to perpetuate our mistake for another year. You can treat established winter annual weeds in dormant turfgrass this month with post-emerge herbicides.

Late in the month apply a pre-emerge herbicide to prevent germination of summer annual weeds. Do not apply post-emerge herbicides to warm season grasses during “spring transition.”  In north Mississippi warm season grasses begin the spring transition to active growth in mid to late April into May.   Post-emerge herbicide applications on warm season grasses are safe after May 15th.

Don’t be tempted to fertilize your warm season turfgrass before the middle of May. All you will be doing is feeding your weeds.  Do fertilize your cool season turfgrass like tall fescue and Kentucky bluegrass this month.

Contact your local Extension office to request a copy of publication #1322, Establish and Manage your Home Lawn.

TREES AND SHRUBS

Finish pruning roses and summer flowering shrubs, like crapemyrtle as soon as possible.   In my opinion, the only pruning that should ever be done on trees is to remove damaged or wayward limbs.  If you find yourself having to prune your trees or shrubs to keep them in bounds you probably have them in the wrong place!  Always, always consider the ultimate height and spread of any plant before you choose a location.

Climbing roses like ‘Blaze,’ ‘New Dawn,’ and the climbing hybrid teas should be pruned by thinning out the older canes leaving the long, young branches, which produce the best blossoms. Continue planting dormant bare-root roses through this month.  Container-grown roses can be planted now through April.

Begin a complete rose spray program as soon as new leaves begin to emerge late this month.  Apply a combination spray containing a fungicide and an insecticide.  Read and follow label recommendations.  Completely cover all foliage, canes and mulch surrounding the rose plant when spraying pesticides.

FRUITS AND NUTS

Finish pruning all fruit trees and grapevines as soon as possible.  Coincide the spring fertilizer application on fruit trees with bud swell.  It’s time to fertilize when the developing bud has cracked its brown shell revealing green tissue.  Depending on the weather, this generally happens in mid to late March in our area of the state.  It is always best to base your rate and frequency of fertilization on a soil test, but the following general recommendations can be used.  For apples, peaches, nectarines and plums use one-half to one pound of 15-15-15 per year of age of the tree.  Do not exceed a maximum of 15 pounds per tree for apples and five pounds per tree for peaches, nectarines and plums.  If you do not know the age of your trees, apply two pounds of 15-15-15 per inch in diameter of the tree measured just above the soil line.  This translates into about a pound for newly planted trees. 

For newly planted fruit trees spread the fertilizer around the edge of the hole you dug when planting.  For established trees spread the fertilizer in a wide circle away from the trunk, but not beyond the spread of the outermost branches.  I always feel like I have done a better job if I lightly scratch the surface of the soil around the tree after I have applied the fertilizer.  It makes me feel better and if we get a torrential rain at least some of the fertilizer will more easily penetrate the soil surface before it is washed into the ditch or my neighbor’s yard.

VEGETABLES

Continue to set out cool-season vegetable transplants of cabbage, broccoli, collards, and cauliflower throughout the month.  Get those Irish potatoes and onion sets in the ground by March 15th for best results.  Seed cool-season vegetables like beets, carrots, mustard, radish, English peas, leaf lettuce and turnips this month.  Finish planning your summer vegetable garden and purchase the rest of your needed seed supplies from the local farmer’s co-op or garden center.   Don’t fall into the trap of the “over zealous gardener” and think you need to plant a 100-foot row of everything.  If you plant a 100-foot row of summer squash, eggplant, bell pepper or cucumbers expect to harvest 100-150 pounds of each of these vegetables!  That’s great if you’re feeding a large army, but it’s too much if you’re feeding the average family of four.

FLOWERS

Time to cut down all of those dead, “not so ornamental anymore” grasses before new growth starts from the crown.  I’ll tell you a little secret.  If you perchance wait till after the new growth starts and you whack it off with the dead part—don’t fret.   By the middle of the summer when the new growth is head high no one will be the wiser. 

If you haven’t cleaned off the dead tops of last year’s annuals and perennials in your beds yet, do it now.  Take advantage of the nice days this month to get a jump on the weeds in your flowerbeds.  Remove all weeds, being particular not to pull up those little volunteer flower seedlings.  Once the beds are clean, apply a pre-emerge herbicide in those beds that you don’t want any flower or weed seedlings to emerge.  Do not apply a mulch yet, as the ground is still cold and the mulch will delay warming of the soil and growth of the emerging perennials and summer bulbs.

Now is the time to divide and transplant daylilies, hosta, phlox and other summer and fall blooming perennials before the tops become to large and are easily broken.

Lelia Scott Kelly, Ph.D., writes North Mississippi Gardening Tips monthly and is a Horticulture Specialist with the Mississippi State University Extension Service. Her office is in the North Mississippi Research & Extension Center, Verona.