May is Pumpkin-time

Springtime is in the air and we turn our thoughts towards... pumpkins. Yes, it's time to start thinking about them, specifically, pie pumpkins.




Benefits
The pie pumpkin (technically a fruit for you 'sticklers' out there) was almost lost to gardeners after the 1950s. Amy Goldman notes in The Compleat Squash : A Passionate Grower's Guide to Pumpkins, Squashes, and Gourds that with the advent of refrigeration, Americans no longer needed this vegetable for it's storage prowess. Commercial growers turned their wiles to jack-o-lantern cultivars. But the pie pumpkin is more than a storage king, it's a storehouse of beta-carotene, potassium, and fiber; a versatile performer in the kitchen; and most importantly, DELICIOUS.

Growing
Pie pumpkins are traditionally sold under cultivars such as ‘Sugar Treat,’ ‘Small Sugar,’ or ‘Sugar Pie.’ If you've grown those before, try an heirloom pie pumpkin like ‘Winter Luxury:’ a lace-skinned, eight-pound little gem with transparent, golden ocher flesh and delectably sweet. (If it doesn’t break your heart to cut one of these orange trophies open.)

Gail Damerow recommends in her book The Perfect Pumpkin that you plant pumpkins when the soil is regularly 70 degrees. Plan a space about ten feet in diameter, but feel free to grow other crops in that area that will be ready for harvest before the pumpkins spread (such as lettuce, cabbage, and green beans).

Pumpkins are heavy feeders and love compost-rich soil. Keep your pumpkin’s soil moist, but don't get the leaves wet as this will encourage powdery mildew or other diseases. Your pumpkins will be ready to harvest in September or October depending on the cultivar you choose and the growing season.

Cooking
Don't confuse the pie pumpkin with those gorgeous, orange giants you carve up for Hallowe'en; they're watery and stringy at best. The pie pumpkin is much smaller with yellow-orange, dense flesh that should be devoid of any stringiness.

Everyone has a favorite pie or bread recipe made with baked pumpkin, but pumpkin is more versatile than its luscious, mashed flesh. It's scrumptious diced and baked with apples, raisins, pecans, butter, brown sugar, and cinnamon. You will be amazed at how tasty pumpkin is cut julienne, sautéed quickly with butter and onions, or stir-fried with onions and red pepper flakes. MMM!

As you plan your garden, don't forget this rewarding member of the cucurbit family. It's another way to make your yard, your way.

Feed Your Soil

Every gardener amends his or her soil in some way at some time. One might add fertilizer, compost, and maybe even change pH. But what are the most effective things you can do for your soil? Can amendments harm your soil? The first step is to understand Iowa soils; the second is to understand your soil. Then amendments can begin.

Iowa Soil
Iowa soils are known for being among the best and most fertile soils in the world. Our soils are rich in phosphorous, potassium, and trace elements needed for healthy plants. In most cases, Iowa soils only need added nitrogen to perform well.

To be certain you know the nutrient content and pH of your soil; visit your local extension office. They will explain how to take a soil sample and will provide you an analysis for a small fee.

But if you have trouble soils or special needs, you may need other amendments.

Your Soil, Your Needs

Clay
A common problem, especially for people in new housing developments, is a soil that drains poorly. Setting water and sickly plants may indicate your soil is high in clay content. While past remedies for clay included additions of sand or gypsum, these two soil amendments can rarely be added in enough volume to change clay soils.

The most efficient addition to clay soils is compost. (Note, composted manure you see in stores will provide nitrogen, but will not provide the organic matter you need from compost.) Compost will add the organic matter needed to add structure to clay soil. This structure will permit the soil to drain more easily, provide for better nutrient uptake for plants, and allow more oxygen to reach plant roots. Often, only three inches of compost worked into the soil will begin to turn clay into tillable soil.

Sand
In rare cases, some Iowa soils drain too well and require water constantly. The best option to remedy this, again, is compost. Compost will boost sandy soil’s ability to retain moisture and nutrients for plants while giving structure to the soil.

pH
Sometimes it’s not the soil structure that can be a problem; it’s the pH. Most Iowa soils have a pH just above 7, or neutral pH. Most plants prefer a soil that’s slightly acidic, around 6.8. According to Iowa State’s Garden Soil Management if your soil tests above 7.2 or below 6.5, you may need to amend it, but you must test to be sure.

Often gardeners will add lime to ‘sweeten’ the soil or sulfur to make it more acid. Be cautious; adding too much sulfur, or too much lime, could damage your soil for years or even permanently! Check with your extension office before doing any pH amendments.

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So what’s best thing a gardener can do for their soil? Compost. It only makes up about 5% of soil, but it will add structure, balance poor soils, and add nitrogen with no risk of burning your plants no matter how much you add. Compost feeds your soil, so your soil can feed your plants.

A last question people always ask? Is there any difference between dirt and soil? Yes: dirt is misplaced soil. Good soil: the foundation to make your yard, your way.

Cool, Wet Spring: Can It Hurt Your Trees?

Our lush shade trees are one of the joys of living in eastern Iowa. Sprightly sugar maples, sturdy ash, and deep, dark Norway maples line our streets and form a cooling roof on our backyards. But if a prolonged, cool, wet spring arrives this year, (as we’re likely to have; our winters grow more mild every year) we should be on the lookout for a common enemy of our treasured trees: the fungal disease, anthracnose.

What is Anthracnose?
While anthracnose can affect a wide variety of plants, we’ll focus on its affect on trees in this article. Anthracnose, sometimes called leaf, shoot, or twig blight, is one of many fungal diseases affecting maple and ash trees, and as well as dogwoods and walnuts. North Dakota State University notes that anthracnose often occurs during prolonged cool, wet springs where it seems to be humid or moist all the time, allowing the fungi that cause it to be transmitted throughout the tree easily.

Do My Trees Have It?
Because a variety of fungi can start anthracnose, the earliest symptoms exhibited can vary. The outcome of anthracnose is often curled leaves, a portion of the leaf dying, or in some cases defoliation. Shade trees often recover from this with a second set of leaves that are not infected. In some cases, twigs or entire branches can die.

What Can I Do About It?
Anthracnose can overwinter and return if another cool, wet spring presents itself. Usually, unless affected trees defoliate year after year, anthracnose causes no permanent damage and will require no treatment. Often, a hot, dry summer will cause the anthracnose cycle to stop.

The best management of anthracnose as well as other fungal diseases is to control the culture of your trees.

1. Look for fungal and disease resistant varieties.

2. Plant trees and shrubs with their adult size in mind so they won’t crowd and discourage good airflow.

3. Prune trees in early spring to keep their crowns open to allow in light and air.

The University of California recommends that if you do have anthracnose, remove the leaves and twigs that fall to prevent cross-contamination; do not compost them. Ensure you are not over-watering and that your irrigation system is not keeping leaves constantly moist. Small trees with anthracnose may be treated with a fungicide when leaves are beginning to open in the spring, but large trees cannot be effectively treated this way.

The best way to know for sure if you have anthracnose is to contact your local extension office and bring in a sample of infected leaves. They can help diagnose the specific condition and recommend options for management.

Spring Lawn Care – What’s Enough?

One springtime task often in question is how to wake up your lawn. Folks in the neighborhood are power-raking, spraying, fertilizing, top-seeding, doing all of these, or nothing at all. What's right for you?

Wake up Your Lawn
Timing will vary depending upon the part of the country you're in, but Iowa State University offers simple recommendations for waking up your lawn:

1. Raking. Rake off matted leaves with a hand rake; power rakes encourage germination of weed seeds by exposing them to light.

2. Optional Aeration. Fall is best, but if you have a busy lawn (kids & dogs) and known compaction problems (setting water) plug-type aeration can help in the spring.

3. Optional Crabgrass Treatment. There are many options available, but they must be applied before April 10th in Iowa to be effective.

4. Optional Herbicide. To manage a greater than 10% weed population, a spring and fall broadleaf herbicide may reduce your current population by half.

5. Optional Fertilizer. Again, with busy lawns you may want to fertilize in the spring with 1 lb of nitrogen per 1000 sq. feet. If you do not have a busy lawn, you only need fertilize in the fall.

6. Optional Top Seeding. Spring seeding is much less successful than fall seeding because spring temperatures continue to warm or may become warm quickly. Both are unfavorable for grass germination. If you must seed in spring, do so not much beyond our last frost date, around April 29th.

7. Patching. For best results on fixing small bare spots, checkout the patch mix from Iowa State.

8. Mow Wisely. Set your mower deck to a minimum of 2 1/2 inches – higher mowing means fewer weeds and reduced watering (read: less expensive lawn care!). Make sure you have a sharp blade to start the year – less disease and cleaner cuts make your lawn look greener!

It's important to notice how many of these things are optional. Observe your lawn to understand its needs. You will only do the work you need and only spend the money you must to enjoy a beautiful yard (not what fertilizer programs tell you to spend).

If you have green grass and 100% coverage, your lawn is good! Often achieved with over fertilization, the dream of a dark green, carpet creates rapid, soft growth in constant risk of insect attacks, fungal diseases, high watering requirements, and an ever-growing maintenance list with escalating costs.

For the basics of yearly care, check out the Iowa State Turfgrass Management Calendar and remember you control your lawn, not the fertilizer companies!

Love of Soil

There's nothing more essential to gardening, of any kind, than soil. While there are many things we call soil: rocky bonsai soils, dusty cactus mixes, plastic bags of store-bought potting soils – there is nothing for the gardener that matches the soil of their native garden plot.

Because whether they are the coal-black soils of my childhood in northern Iowa, or the tans and browns of my home in eastern Iowa, those natural soils all share one quality that I believe every gardener appreciates, at least once a year: the smell. The dark, fragrant, complex scent of soil, especially as soil wakes up from winter, is a perfume that cannot be compared to the sweetest rose, fresh-baked bread, or the richest chocolate. If soil were rare, humans would mine for it deep into the earth simply to allow us to run our hands through it and release its bright perfume on being turned over.

Newly-opened spring ground unleashes a heady, transporting vapor on the gardener, as if Nature herself has put-the-coffee-on for visitors. Energizing, refreshing, eye opening, the first invigorating whiff of soil in the spring whisks me off my feet and I wake up as if from a long winter of sleep. It pulls up the corners of my mouth, then smiles back at me, and says, "The earth is alive again and we're just waiting for someone to come grow with us!"

If it were nothing else, the aroma of fresh soil is a call to action, a decree of happiness:

“Today is a new day, a new chance everyone is invited to enjoy!”

The cheery urgency of that smell can, at least for the moment, remind us of all the good things in life, and make all the frustrating things seem smaller. With such a mood-altering fragrance in the air how can one focus? How can one keep a mind on business, once this intoxicating invitation is made? Good luck trying, and good luck growing.