Garden Plot
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- Wash. state woman spots stolen car in drive-thru
- Exhibition of secretly shot photos upsets NYers
- Deer smashes Pa. bus windshield, takes short ride
- Texas senior, 18, bags 800-pound record alligator
- Conn. chef set to feast on cicadas during invasion
Mike McGrath
WTOP's Garden Editor Mike McGrath is:
* Host of the nationally syndicated Public Radio show, You Bet Your Garden
* Contributing Editor and columnist for Greenprints magazine
* Former Editor-in-Chief of ORGANIC GARDENING magazine
* Author of books on Tomatoes, Compost, Seed saving and Kitchen Gardening
* Mike makes several appearances around town. Click for more.
* Do you have a question for Mike? Email him at mikemcg@ptd.net. (Please include your name, location and the topic in the subject line)
End of August garden tips
The possibility of Hurricane Irene dropping by might make it hard to cross most items off of our big fall "Honey do" list this weekend, but here's what needs to be done sometime over the next month.
It's lawn care time
WTOP's Garden Guru Mike McGrath offers up advice for your fall lawn.
Blister beetles and baby stink bugs
Blister beetles are dangerous farm pests.
Calcium's the answer for tomato troubles
Gayle from Fairfax has a common complaint. She writes: "This is the second year in a row that my balcony tomatoes have ALL succumbed to blossom end rot. Every. Stinking. One."
Avoid this herbicide, if you love your trees
WTOP's Mike McGrath says you need to make sure your lawn care company isn't using Imprelis, if you have spruce or pine trees.
Wonderful water features and bustin' some bugs
The annual Parade of Ponds organized by Premier Ponds of Burtonsville, Md. is a great way to see lots of examples of the different ways you can use water in the landscape.
Goats, grass and yellowjackets, oh my!
Some invasive plants can cause problems, but nuking vast stretches of habitat with herbicides and axes does more environmental damage than any plant could hope to achieve.
Garlic oil sprays will banish mosquitos
Listeners have been asking about the same thing: the non-toxic backyard ‘foggers' made from garlic oil that keep mosquitoes—and gnats and ticks—away from your outdoor space for a solid month.
What causes lawn mushrooms?
And, should you be worried about the dog eating them?
You can't ‘peacefully co-exist' with a groundhog
Groundhogs are notoriously untrustworthy when it comes to eating plants. They also undermine human structures with their complicated burrows.
'New lawn in April…shot down in May'
Diane in Colonial Beach writes: "We had our lawn reseeded in April. They tilled it up, removed the old lawn, brought in top soil and sowed fresh seed. The grass came up okay, but it's already burning up and we continue to have a really hard time with weeds and the ground being rock hard. Any suggestions?"
Getting rid of Japanese beetles
Mike McGrath offers advice on how to prevent beetles and how to harvest your garlic.
Choosing the right mulch and battling moss
In a recent university study, two inches of yard waste compost outperformed all other mulches — and it provided all the food its plants required.
How to avoid 'mulchrooms' and battling squirrels
Advice for those of you battling squirrels, the servants of Satan, and for tomato plants that don't have eggshells added to them.
Termites, ticks and last-minute tomato tips
As I've been stressing for more than a decade, "mulch" does NOT mean "wood." In fact, wood is the second-worst mulch material you can use.
How high should your lawn be?
Lawn height shouldn't change with the seasons.
Tomato planting time arrives
Now is planting time, but make sure the temperatures at night are in the high 40s.
Happy Easter! Here's how to achieve stink bug relief
I was recently contacted by a gentleman from Delaware who was sick of these alien pests invading his home in the fall, so he constructed a trap that intercepts them as they swarm outside.
Ants, clover, bees and 'skeeters!
Sprays do not work against ants because the vast majority of the pests, and the all-important queen, are in hidden nests that the sprays never reach.
Mulch isn't bad, but mulch does not mean wood
The problem is that wood and bark mulches have been heavily marketed to homeowners ever since landfills stopped accepting wood waste.
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