Rock County

Have a garden question? Get help from Plant Health Advisers. We are still weeks away from our first “hard frost” but broad-leaf weed control is best done after that time!  The frost will crack the waxy cuticle on the leaf surface allowing for better absorption of the herbicide.  Also, the herbicide will be moved to [...]

Have a garden question? Get help from Plant Health Advisers. Don’t forget that the fall is one of the times to apply a systemic insecticide to your susceptible trees and shrubs in order to reduce Japanese beetle feeding damage next year.  The active ingredient imidacloprid (often sold as the product Bayer Advanced Tree and Shrub [...]

Have a garden question? Get help from Plant Health Advisers. Cover crops are plants grown to improve the soil, increase crop growth, protect the soil from rain, which damages structure and promotes erosion, and build the soil through contributions of organic matter and nutrients. As they grow, the roots of cover crops loosen tight or [...]

Have a garden question? Get help from Plant Health Advisers. Your lawn may be looking a bit worse for the wear after this temperamental season.  Now is the time to tend to turf!  As the weather cools (well, compared to July’s heat) our cool season grasses become more active and you can help reinvigorate your [...]

Have a garden question? Get help from Plant Health Advisers. Emerald ash borer (EAB) has been found in Racine County.  Let me repeat that… RACINE COUNTY.  Not Rock County. Racine. At this time, there have been no reportes of EAB in Rock County. If you suspect an ash tree to be infested call 1-800-462-2803 or [...]

Have a garden question? Get help from Plant Health Advisers. At the start of the season, turf grass professionals were thrilled with the introduction of  new product, Imprelis, a post emergence broad-leaf weed herbicide (product description here).  The thrill quickly disappeared as other landscape professionals began reporting drifting damage to a wide variety of woody [...]

Have a garden question? Get help from Plant Health Advisers. I worked up a sweat walking from my front door to the car this morning.  Cheryl A. Skjolaas, our Agricultural Safety Specialist, emailed the following advice: Hot weather is here. Extreme heat can be dangerous. Last year, thousands of workers in the United States got [...]

 Have a garden question? Get help from Plant Health Advisers. Avid gardeners will notice annual recurrences in the garden, or unrelated coinciding cycles.  This is called phenology. The word phenology is derived from the Greek word phaino meaning “to show” or “to appear”.  Phenology is a branch of science that studies the relationships between periodic [...]

Have a garden question? Get help from Plant Health Advisers. During last week’s Wisconsin Horticulture Update there were two really interesting conversations.  In the first, Kelly Kearns, WI DNR, discussed the presence of potentially invasive plants in our garden centers.  Jim Kerns with the Turfgrass Diagnostic Lab (and no relation to Kelly) talked about the side effects on [...]

Have a garden question? Get help from Plant Health Advisers. The garden help-line frequently gets questions that fall outside of the gardening realm.  Commmon questions include critters moving into the home when the weather outside isn’t insect-friendly.  This year we’ve already had to do a spider ID (it wasn’t poisonous).  In the past I’ve had [...]