Q. As an avid killer of plants I can’t seem to get anything to grow outstanding well.  My asparagus attempt is especially disappointing.  I did as you suggested, mostly, and dug down as deep as my tiller would dig about 13″.  For better drainage I 2″ drilled holes another 12″ and filled them with gravel.  I feel that should be pretty good drainage. I ordered Jersey Knight asparagus and planted as per instructions. I had a very mixed bag.  Out of 10 crowns 5 have died.  1 shot up like a cannon but has since slowed its velocity.  The other 4 are in some stage of growing but not heartily. How do I figure out what I did wrong 9 times and right once? Jersey Knight? This is a Rutgers release as are all the “Jersey” types. In my opinion it has lower tolerance to desert heat than UC151 types which were bred in Riverside for the Coachella Valley. Eastern US, use Jersey types. Hot western areas of US, use UC151 types. They hold their spears longer. These should be very vigorous if the soil is amended properly and watered like they are growing in an irrigation ditch. Put asparagus crowns on their own valve OR put them on a tree valve but not a valve used for growing vegetables in vegetable beds. Planting depth for asparagus crowns is anywhere from 8 to 12 inches deep. The reason for this is because the crowns get bigger over time and planting them deeper helps them to last longer, over 25 years. A. Usually the reason for losing asparagus is watering them too often or bad drainage. The gravel was not a good idea. It did nothing for drainage and made it difficult to get straight spears if it improves drainage. If the soil has bad drainage then plant them on a mound about 12 inches high and 24 inches across. Plant them about 8 inches deep.  Planting asparagus at the University Orchard in North Las Vegas. Water and don’t water them again until the soil dries out in the area of the roots. How to know that? Use a soil moisture meter like you use for houseplants Buy them for $10 at Lowes or Home Depot.  Make sure it works. Those made in China sometimes work and sometimes don’t. That’s been my experience experience with well over a hundred of them. If the needle moves when you grab the tip it is probably okay. Otherwise stick the tip in a glass of water. Measure the soil moisture about 4 inches deep and water again ONLY if the needle gets to 5. Water them by hand if you have to and don’t hook them up to a valve that waters something else. They are always wrong for asparagus.  ‘Purple Passion’ asparagus spear straight as an arrow and long because the soil was sandy and not full of rocks.

Q. My little pummelo which came bare root in March has profuse flowering now in November.  The tree is small -5′- and would not support any pummelo sized fruit. Should I wrap it up for the winter and disregard the flowers? Pomello is a distant relative of grapefruit and enjoyed in many SE Asia countries like on our farm in the Philippines. Its tolerance to freezing temperatures is better than most limes but not as good as some oranges. Its chilling injury (refrigerator temps, think banana) is not well known but suggests it may exhibit chilling injury. Pomello grown in the Las Vegas area. A. In this particular case I don’t think any of the flowers would have set fruit anyway. Pomello that I know takes about six years to bear fruit. It may flower earlier than this but the fruit have to be pollinated and not abort the fruit.   Yes, protect the tree this winter if there are threatening temps below freezing.  I don’t know about chilling injury (temperatures not freezing but refrigerator like) to this fruit tree but there are some suggestions that it exists. More information on chilling injury of pomello https://allfruits.blogspot.com/search?q=pomello   More discussion on freezing injury of pomello http://tropicalfruitforum.com/index.php?topic=24319.0 Pomello growing in the Philippines. A.   

 Q. I think you addressed this not too long ago but I give your Saturday articles to my neighbor so I’m not sure what you said. The attached photos show two trees the builder put in my front yard two years ago.  I think they are Texas Ash?  Ash trees with leaf scorch. Most likely this microclimate in the landscape is too hot for this tree. Aha. This is a hot location if it is south or west facing. The irrigated area under this ash canopy is too small. Expand the area and apply water to a wider area. I have three yellow emitters and now water these trees twice per week for 15 minutes.  (I can’t remember how many gallons the yellow ones due in an hour)! A. Ash trees don’t like the heat all that much. All of them including Arizona ash. So surrounded by rock (even though it is five feet away from the trunk) is not the best thing for it. The roots of this tree can’t keep up with the demand by this tree for more water. The main reason you are seeing the leaves burning on the outside (leaf scorch) is either because the soil needs improvement or the soil is staying too wet or both. If you can make that basin covered in wood chips about three feet wider from the trunk it will help. Rake the rock back, get more scalloped pavers and make it bigger.  Also, the wood chips should be about four inches deep. Keep the wood chips from the tree trunk about six inches. It helps to put a thin layer of compost on the soil surface under the wood chips. If this is a burden then sprinkle it on the top of the wood chips and water it in with a hose. Mixing it into the hole at planting time should have been done at planting time but some of the less expensive plantings (I have heard rumors of this happening with some “special deals” from nurseries) don’t use much amendment at planting time or not much mixed in the soil or the holes are dug too small or all of the above. I am not sure how you are watering that tree (one of the ash). There needs to be AT LEAST four drip emitters to that tree at planting time about 12 inches from the trunk and enough water applied to wet the soil 18 inches deep each time you water. After the first couple of days the watering should NEVER be daily. The first couple of days daily watering is okay to get the soil wet and get rid of air bubbles. The soil needs to dry out between irrigations.  A long piece of rebar or any thin piece of steel can be used to judge how deep the water gets after an irrigation. Shrubs less than 3 feet tall irrigate to 12 inches deep, medium sized shrubs and trees to 10 feet tall irrigate to 18 inches deep, if 20 feet tall then water to 24 inches deep and big trees water 36 inches deep. Use a four foot piece of rebar from Lowes or Home Depot to judge if watering is deep enough. If not, water more minutes or add drip emitters or get some that deliver more water until it gets that deep. In mid summer three times a week is plenty if they are all alone and no other plants for the ash tree roots to get water from. Right now once or maybe twice a week is plenty. In about two or three years you better add more drip emitters in another ring out past these emitters about 18 inches away. 

Learn how much water to give your landscape plants and when to do it on this episode of Desert Horticulture. Stay ahead of the drought curve and water when it is windy. Don’t wait for the next irrigation cycle.

I received a question about ash tree flowers from a reader but I thought about ash trees in general. This podcast talks about my concerns when planting ash trees in any landscape in the desert southwest.  

 Diane and Tom have been growing herbs, greens, and microgreens in the desert and marketed them to chefs, restaurants and homeowners for decades. Learn what has worked for them and why.  Diane and Tom working in their Boulder City, Nevada, herb and greens garden. The growing area is protected from birds and other varmints by screening. Ground squirrels were particularly troublesome this past 2020 and they were relocated to a different part of time. Diane tending one of her herb beds. The soils are enriched with compost, woodchips, alfalfa hay and all natural fertilizers. Raised beds are protected from birds by screening and the woodchips enriched the soil in the growing areas. Overhead irrigation is preferred for watering as it gives better water distribution for the seedlings and transplants. You can see that this way of gardening stimulates herbs and greens which are supplied to local chefs and restaurants as well as the public through local farmers markets. Inside the “greenhouse” which is used primarily for raising microgreens and transplants. Not much light is needed during the summer. This temporary greenhouse is cooled and the humidity raised with swamp coolers. The covering is polycarbonate. Those plants needing more light are grown closer to the sidewalls. Seeds for microgreens are soaked overnight in sanitized buckets for sprouting and then seeded in sanitized trays.

Q. I would like to plant a pomegranate tree this Fall but I am worried that the weather is going to be cooling down soon. Do you think I missed my opportunity for planting, and should I wait for Spring? Young pomegranate trees vary in cold hardiness but most like to be planted with woodchips rather than rock as a mulch. A. Just because it is getting colder doesn’t mean you can’t plant. Ideally you want a few weeks of root growth in the Fall after planting. The timing may not be optimum for root growth when soil temperatures are cold, but it will still work out. If you find a variety you like, get it in the ground.             Temperate plant roots (like pomegranate) grow best when soil temperatures are between 60 to 75F but they still grow even when soil temperatures are as low as 45F. They just don’t grow as fast. Try to plant early enough so that there are 4 to 5 weeks of warm soil temperatures before the soil gets cold.             How to estimate the soil temperature? The best way is to buy a soil thermometer for about $15 and measure for yourself but otherwise you can make a rough approximation. Surface mulch, rock or woodchips, conserve soil warmth in the Fall and insulate soil from heat in the Spring and Summer months.             In my experience, using your sense of touch is accurate to within about 5 degrees F of temperatures ranging from the refrigerator (40F) to the spa (105F).             Fall planting (early) is always superior to Spring planting (late) of winter hardy plants.

Q. I live in the St. George Utah area and use your horticulture advice regarding many of the plants in my yard. Three small questions if I may ask? 1) Is your advice, on the broad list of subjects flower-plants-shrubs- trees, ok to follow for this area? 2) I have never raised vegetables before and would the Moapa publication be a good guide for this area for a beginner grower? 3) I have two Arizona Ash on my South West side of the yard. 15 ft apart on a drip line. One had aphids this year which I watched closely and removed them with chemical spray.  However, the lower limbs continued to have leaf curl all summer with no bugs and no real damage to the leaf other than the curl. A1. I view your climate similar to Kingman AZ and Pahrump NV. It doesn’t get as hot as LV and it can get a bit colder. You have an excellent extension guy in Rick Hefflebower located on the way to Hurricane. By all means use my information as best you can but if you aren’t sure about something run it by Rick and get his take on it. I think your soils are better than LV and you may or may not need as much soil amendment as we do in LV. The color of your soil should tell you. Certainly if you are growing vegetables or annual flowers you ALWAYS will need to add it. A2. I attached his pamphlet for you and my planting calendar. whenever you can get local information is usually better.  You have some excellent gardeners in Washington county. I think Dr. Wittwer has some excellent info in his Moapa Valley vegetable guide but just tailor it to your climate. I think you are colder than our 3000 ft elevation I have on my calendar. I could be wrong but that is my take on it. A.3. I think you may be more isolated in St George regarding ash decline but that is always my concern in the LV area. I saw this ash disease active in the LV community in the late 1980s so it is coming if you don’t have it. The use of chemicals or not is a personal choice. I don’t support one side or the other. I use chemicals when all else fails. I don’t believe in throwing out the baby with the bath water. Probably the biggest factor is wind. If its windy then irrigate that day and throw out the one day between irrigations rule. Listen to my podcast on heat and plants and it will apply to St George I think.  

 Fall months are busy in desert residential landscapes. Learn what you should be doing this fall in your home landscape.

Q. I have a ten-year-old Bartlett pear tree and the pears are kind of small, about 3 inches long. The label says they ripen in August but mine are not ripe until end of October. November. I pick them, leave them out in kitchen and they become juicy and ripe. I water the trees heavily once a week and the fruit improve. Is there any way to make tree produce larger fruit? Comice pear growing in southern Nevada. A. Bartlett pear has the potential here for getting the same size as in the stores with the same or better quality. It is a matter of how many fruit there are compared to the number of leaves. If there are a lot of fruit and not enough leaves to support the fruit, the fruit will be smaller.  Harvested Bartlett pear in southern Nevada.             For Bartlett pear you should have about 45 to 50 leaves for each piece of fruit so that they can get larger. The fruit is produced on spurs that form an average of five fruit per cluster. Remove all but one fruit per cluster when the fruit has recently set and is still very small. This may be hard to judge when the fruit is just starting out in the spring but try removing all but one of the fruit in each cluster. If you want the fruit larger, next year remove more. Do it when they are small. Don’t wait. The remaining fruit will get larger. This is called “thinning the crop” or just plain “thinning”.             Fruit also needs water present to expand and get big when its growing. Make sure the tree gets adequate water while the fruit is enlarging. If the tree doesn’t, the fruit will not grow as much. I don’t know if your watering is often enough or not. But in midsummer I would guess the trees should be watered deeply two or three times a week. Once a week is good in the Fall when it cools off. Bartlett pear ready for harvesting, still immature yet for fresh eating.             Pick Bartlett pears when they are still green, but the green has changed from dark green to light green. Your label is wrong. Harvesting should be in about late September or early October, not August. If you aren’t sure, pick one and cut it open to look at the seeds. The seeds should be all brown then go ahead and pick them. Picking may last two weeks as they don’t all get ready to pick at once.     Pick the fruit before they turn yellow because this keeps the fruit texture buttery instead of gritty. Then let them ripen in a cool place out of the sun until they are ready to eat in a few days. When you get them from the store they are sometimes green. Ripen them like that before eating them.