I have the best luck with killing stuff like this by cutting it off as low as I can, then drilling four or five (depending on stump size and what I'm trying to kill) 1/2" holes right on the woody side of the outer layers, and then putting straight round up in the holes. Idea is to get the roundup in contact with the cambian layer, which is the one right under the bark.

Thanks David, that's exactly what I'll do. I need to try that with some pesky Chinese Elm trees, too.

BTW, I was digging around the gooseberries today (they are going to get drip water this year - lucky them) and there are a few pups coming up. Think you'll want any of them this year? I will likely be in Cortez May 7 for a watershed meeting, or you can pick them up at my house or in Durango at DH's office. Seems like they are Pixwell variety.

I am waffling about killing the Golden Arborvitae. Will a handful of fertilizer help them grow their foliage back? I really like them when they aren't buck nekkid. The plain old green arborvitae are toast, though. They are just plain ugly to start with.

Cheers,
Michelle

Michelle, I'd love to have some gooseberry starts - I'll swap you some rooted cuttings of Salvia grandiflora? I've yet to find a decent photo of the intense blue, in the fall. http://www.highcountrygardens.com/catalog/product/84760/

And if you have any need for Sungold, Carbon, Theleslonki (sp) Pink Climber, OTV Brandywine, Aunt Gertie's Gold, Vorlon (stabilized cross between Cherokee Purple and Marianna's Peace), Kosovo, or hugely successful Ox heart tomato, give a holler, I've got gobs of seedlings I need to either pot up or throw out here soon.

I could meet you in town, or if you've the time, I'd be happy to show you around our garden, its about 2 miles north of 145 - I'm 1/4 mile south of Southwest Seed, if you had a need for any pasture seeds or something. I'll also be over in Durango weekend after this one for a soccer tournament.

Here is a link that might be useful: My neighbors

David, Let's go for the 10th in Durango - I ride with my neighbor to the water meetings, so I can't visit your garden this time. I'd like to see it this summer though! Let me know what time would be good to meet. I usually make a trip to town on the weekend anyway.

I would love to try the salvia and an ox heart or two. I am also overrun with tomato seedlings. Want any Best of Show (mix) or 4th of July? Also have small potted seedlings of garlic chives, hyssop, columbines, Little Dorritt sunflower, and lemon basil if you would like to try any of those.

Should I pot up the gooseberries now and baby them for a couple of weeks? Don't know if they need it or not.

Cheers,
Michelle

We could do that, or where/what time is your meeting in Cortez? I could swing by your meeting pretty easily

- Thinking here of what a circus Durango can be when the soccer tournaments are going on (and my limited knowledge of the town)

I don't know where the meeting is (I don't know Cortez at all), I'll have to ask, it starts at 4:00.

What time/where is your soccer tournament?

Cheers,
Michelle

They play up on the FLC Campus - My daughter plays on the Tri-City Soccer "Wolf Pack" - (Tri-City here refers to the Greater Cortez / Pleasant View / Dolores metroplex)

Here is a link that might be useful: soccer schedule

OK, Michelle, we're headed over tomorrow, friday, for an evening game, and then will be there all day Sat, and half day Sun. I potted up 3 ox hearts (the same ones Ian is talking about) and have 3 Salvia cuttings, which I'll put in a box and take with me Sat. and Sun.

I don't have a cell phone, but I drive an '07 blue Rav4 with the usual 4 corners bike racks, handicap plates, and an DOW "I'd rather be fishing" bumper sticker, along with the KSJD radio emblem of Dry Land Authenticity. I'll park in the handicap spaces at the football parking lot. In the fields, look for the flash bulbs against the sky; the fawning paparazzi.

I'm the old guy with really short white hair who limps.

Great - I will try to catch you at the 10:30 game. We will be the only ones there looking lost that don't have any kids. He has a brown ponytail, I have a reddish/brownish one & probably a ball cap. :-) I'm tall, tan face, and mid-30-ish. (I think I just described half of Durango!) Guess I'd better be carrying a plant with me. :-))))

Is there anything else from list I should bring besides some gooseberry starts? I ended up with three extra Purple Passion asparagus (from Stark Bros) - small roots. Want 'em? Any other seedlings?

I did get that sumac root dug out today - that was a chore! But now I have a Northstar Cherry in it's place, and life will be happier without sumac suckers popping up everywhere.

Cheers,
Michelle

You guys are FUNNY! I think you both need red carnations behind your ear or something! David, we need to get you and Digit together somehow. You both have HUGE gardens, and you both talk like youÂre barely able to get out of your wheel chairs! I donÂt believe youÂeither of you! I think IÂm gonna report you to the handicap parking police!

I think maybe the fawning paparrazi will be the best way to find youÂor, Michelle could just carry a chicken with herÂmaybe a bow around itÂs neck!

:-D
Skybird

Ok, Michelle, sounds good. I'd love to try a few asparagus. But other than that, I've got too much stuff to plant an' not enough places. See ya there!

Oh Skybird, if I took one chicken I have to take them all! :-) How about a blooming gooseberry twig behind the ear?

I have some bad news, on Sat. this event is happening:

Garden Club of Durango Annual Plant Sale Sat. May 10. 9-10:30am. Christ the King Lutheran Church, 495 Florida Rd, Come early for best choices.

ARGH! Since I'll be in town, I guess I have to go. :-) How can I be expected to control myself at a plant sale? Hmmm?

David, I'm glad you are taking these three asparagus. I dug my trench for the other 7 yesterday. The old patch of ditch asparagus is producing pretty well, so my motivation to dig a spot for the other 3 plants is low. I had tilled up a section of garden that the asparagus had colonized and there was an amazing gridwork of roots everywhere. I am sure there will be asparagus in the new raspberry bed! Hopefully they will be congenial bedmates.

Cheers,
Michelle

Oh, Skybird, I had to laugh today. It reflected your post above perfectly. A little lady was walking out of Walmart - she was an older lady who had checked out and was pushing her full shopping basket and dragging along a special heavy duty cart with eight 50# bags of grain. Yes, dragging 400# of grain with one hand behind her while pushing her full shopping cart with the other hand!

I offered to help her, and we went to her car - parked in the handicapped zone! She would have loaded it into the car herself, but I insisted on doing it for her. And she apologized for me doing the heavy lifting!!!!

She must be a GARDENER in her spare time, when she's not heaving grain bags around!

:-))))) Cheers,
Michelle

Gee, I should have had you here to help me today! I had to get the bale of soil I got yesterday out of my trunk. ItÂs 3.8 cubic feet, big and bulky, but IÂve managed to move these things around before! So I try to get it up over the back end of the trunk, and itÂs just not working! Boy, it sure seemed heavier than I remembered the last one to be! So I finally get it up over the edge and get it braced between me and the back end of the car, resting on the bumper, so I can get ahold of it to carry it thru the kitchen and out onto the deck. Got my hands into the folded plastic on both ends, lift itÂkinda, and get up the two steps into the house with it on a knee. Try to carry it to the deck door, and by then IÂm thinking that itÂs as heavy as I amÂwhatÂs going on here! I get about 5' into the house and simply canÂt hang on any more, so I drop it (it falls!), and I roll it end over end out onto the deck. By then I was wondering if I was imagining things, so I bring my beam scale down from upstairs and weigh it! Almost 90 pounds! I didnÂt believe it, so I checked the zero balance and then weighed myself to be sure the scale was sitting stably on the deckÂit wasÂso I weighed it again with it sitting a different direction on the scale just to be sure it was balanced properly. Same result! This thing must have soaked up a bunch of water when it was sitting outside! OMG! I dragged it across the deck and down the stairs and got the 2-wheeler out to move it where I wanted it. But at least I know IÂm not turning into a wimp in my olde ageÂyet at least!

Next time I get a bale of soil IÂll let you know so you can be here to unload it for me,
Skybird

What are you, Skybird, half Amazonian ant? :-) Was Charles Atlas your daddy? :-))

One year we got 120# haybales. UGH. It is amazing when you have to carry or lift them every day how strong you get. Just carry that peat bale a little every day. I dare ya! :-)))

Cheers,
Michelle

Michelle, the field we'll be on is the first one to the NW-W of the concession stand in the parking lot, or the one right behind the row of porta potties.

See ya.

OH, I just looked at the schedule, the above field is #2, we're on #3, the one behind #2. Number #2 is this afternoon and tomorrow morning. We won yesterday, 2:1.

We won today both games, beating club teams from Albuquerque. Good soccer, good fun games. Michelle, the plants arrived home safely, and the asparaguses already planted. I'll pot up the gooseberry until I can get a decent bed prepped.

How does one grow gooseberries? I know they're considered, around here, The berry to grow, and I am totally gooseberry ignorant.

I'll pass along some tips here soon about the sorghum - its frost sensitive. Ask Steve about the beans - I'd sent him some, and he tried 'em, and he's still alive.

At least this year, I gotta go to a RMForum plant swap, not like last year, where I just sat at home with a hankie and ate ice cream.

:-) Trading is fun, and kicking a$$ at soccer is more fun.

Can't wait to try the sorghum since I saw pictures of it growing. Thanks for bringing seeds along.

What was the variety of beans??

Gooseberries - I never did anything special with them. The fact sheets about planting them say well drained loam, lots of mulch. Mine are in dry clay, no mulch. :-) Never fertilized.

It says to:
"Prune gooseberries and currants at planting by cutting all canes (upright shoots) back by half, then prune the
plants annually. To prune, thin canes, leaving a mix of 1, 2, 3 and 4-year old canes. A total of 12 to 16 canes is a
good number for a mature plant"

Guess I will try pruning. My shrubs (~7 yrs old) are pretty productive without pruning, it will be interesting to see how much better they do. :-)

Cheers,
Michelle

Ok, we lost the last game, and since this tournament was decided on points, came in who-knows, as the rest of the teams were playing later, and we came on home.

The beans are "Kings Banquet", originally given to me by some folks whose grandparents homesteaded here, and we've looked and researched around earlier - Seed Savers Exchange has this as the only place they've been seen. Maybe it's some other variety, but with a different name, or it well could have been brought in by the Italian migrants to the area, or some other source. I just have no idea. I sent some to Steve a few years ago, and he's still alive. I've sent some to some market farmers out in California, and they say it's a customer favorite. I sure like them. Great fresh, for me, anyway, they have some flavor. They also do a long time on the vine when they're tender, can well, and the dry seeds are good as well. I usually plant them in the same row I do the peas - peas come out, these go in. I'd suggest picking them at different sizes to see what / where you like them the best. As with any pole bean, as long as you pick them, they keep producing.

Re multi-colored sorghum, this is fun. The plants look like corn. I dunno how old that seed is, maybe 4 years? Anywho, best results ever were planting 3 seeds per cell about now, germinating them, pinching off all but one, then setting them out after frost about 1 ft spacing, for as much room as you want to devote, but at least a 6 ft by 6 ft plot. I used a 15 - 15 - 15 fertilizer, spread it about 1 pellet per dime, watered well through June and it was established. once in July, once in Aug. Things were over my head.

You could also plant them directly about now - just thin them to 1 / sq foot.

Re that Salvia grandiflora, again it takes until the 3rd year to get up to knock 'em dead status. So year one and two are establishing the plant. Pinch the shoot tips when they're 6" high. Then again when they're a foot high. That for the first 2 years. The third year, pinch the tips every 6" of growth until either you get fed up with it, or it's August, then watch the show.

All good fun ;->.

We're up to Grand Junction for another tournament this coming weekend, then we start swimming season.