Jim Gill has joined the Wyoming Gardens Team after spending 36 years with the University of Wyoming Cooperative Extension Service as a University Extension Educator. He worked in the Big Horn Basin out of Worland with 4-H kids, farmers, ranchers, and homeowners. Jim says some of his most rewarding work was helping homeowners solve their yard and garden problems. Of course, some of the most productive flower, vegetable and fruit gardens are grown up in the Big Horn Basin. Jim considers himself an avid gardener always trying out some of the newer varieties.
He is a partner in the Gill Plant Company, helping folks in the area diversify their plant communities. They sell genetically diverse plant materials, much of it propagated from plants with Wyoming genetics. We are pleased to have Jim partnering up with us to bring you these articles for our newsletter and producing the radio segments played around the state on the Cowboy State News Network and other stations.
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Growing Pear Trees in Wyoming
by Jim Gill
Let's discuss growing pears. If you want to grow a pear in Wyoming, you best select a variety like Ure that is quite cold hardy. Ure is a zone 3 pear that grows a green-yellow, very juicy and approximately two inch in diameter fruit. You can expect these trees to ripen their fruit in mid to late August.
A University of Minnesota Release, Summercrisp is one of their hardiest pears and has excellent Fireblight resistance to boot. It produces a sweet and crisp eating pear that has excellent storage capacity. A University of South Dakota release is the Luscious Pear rated for Zone 4. It produces a small to medium sized pear that is juicy and sweet. This is excellent dessert pear and fire blight resistant too. This is a good pollinator for other pear trees. Fruit fresh from the tree --- I love it.
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Blue Oat Grass & Penstemon- A Great Landscaping Combination
Part of the art, and the fun, of landscape gardening is combining
different plants in a location that highlights their complementary
colors. A great combination is Blue Oat Grass and Pine Needle Penstemon. Click Here to watch a VIDEO of these two plants.
You can hear our radio segments about gardening every weekday on the Cowboy State News Network radio station near you.
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The Best Way to Water Your Lawn, to Save Money and Get Great Results
By Tom Heald
Watering your lawn consumes more water than anything else you will
ever do around your home, costing you money. And, it is not only
wasteful, but may not even do the job you are expecting it to do.
Figuring out the proper way to water your lawn is not that difficult, so
let's get started.
How Much Should You Really Water?
A traditional Kentucky
bluegrass lawn will need supplemental water in dry, windy Wyoming. How
much to apply? That depends - on your soil. My soil is different than
yours. Water will soak faster into sandy soil than a mostly clay soil.
Likewise, sandy soil will dry faster than
clay soil, so the sandy soil gets watered more frequently and for
shorter
periods of time. Clay soils need less
frequent but longer watering times.
Developing Healthy Soils for Your Wyoming Garden
by Jim Gill
Any successful gardener will tell you that producing the best flowers, tomatoes, grapes, etc starts with the soil they are produced in. Our Wyoming soils are notoriously low in organic matter. So that's a good starting place to improve our soil by adding composted plant materials. Composted manure is an excellent soil builder. This additional soil organic matter will aid the plants we grow by allowing more air exchange, water filtration, root development and much more.
Our soils tend to be quite alkaline on the Ph scale. I like to use some granulated sulfur to help counter the alkaline nature of our soils. Supplementing the major nutritive elements of the soil like nitrogen is important as well. Phosphorus is another important major element that needs to be supplemented in our soil from time to time.
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Using Thyme as a Lawn Alternative
By Tom Heald
Let's visit about lawn alternatives. Think of those hard to mow or water areas like around posts and benches or where the mower doesn't fit or on slopes or near foundations. Why have lawn in these areas?
There are plants that grow no taller than 3 inches and can be walked on and never be mowed. Consider the Thyme family of plants for the job. An oldie but a goodie is Wooly Thyme (Thymus praecox pseudolanuginosus) this ground hugging thyme spreads out to over a foot width with wool-gray foliage. In summer it produces a wonderful display of purple flowers.
Another Thyme to consider is 'Doone Valley' (thymus citriodoreuss 'Doon Valley') and what a treat for the senses. Enjoy the strongly lemon scented fragrance of this bi-colored plant that has dark green leaves flecked with yellow and in early summer produces pink clusters of flowers. At only 3 inches tall and 18 inches wide, this one is a standout! Think Thymes for a lawn alternative.
Meet the Wyoming Gardens Writers:
Let's discuss growing pears. If you want to grow a pear in Wyoming, you best select a variety like Ure that is quite cold hardy. Ure is a zone 3 pear that grows a green-yellow, very juicy and approximately two inch in diameter fruit. You can expect these trees to ripen their fruit in mid to late August.
On The Radio :
Any successful gardener will tell you that producing the best flowers, tomatoes, grapes, etc starts with the soil they are produced in. Our Wyoming soils are notoriously low in organic matter. So that's a good starting place to improve our soil by adding composted plant materials. Composted manure is an excellent soil builder. This additional soil organic matter will aid the plants we grow by allowing more air exchange, water filtration, root development and much more.
Let's visit about lawn alternatives. Think of those hard to mow or water areas like around posts and benches or where the mower doesn't fit or on slopes or near foundations. Why have lawn in these areas?
