Desert Horticulture

Italian cypress is a Mediterranean plant which means it can survive in hot Mojave Desert residential landscapes. But some problems exist that can turn these plants into a brown mess like watering too often, planting them in the wrong soil, pests and even borers! These can get big! Can you control their height? Come and learn about where and if these plants should be in your landscape, how to take care of them including pruning and what to do if they are turning brown. 

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Roses do beautifully in the desert for about 8 months of the year. The worst time is the middle of summer but they must be planted and irrigated correctly. Learn how to select, plant and grow roses so they stay beautiful all year long in the desert. 

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Fall freezing temps are particularly wicked because they can catch plants off-guard, unprepared for a freeze. If you applied a high nitrogen fertilizer to these plants this is exactly why its a no-no. Learn what you can do to protect your plants from these potentially freezing temps.

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Landscapes designed and installed for the desert should be special in many different ways if we want it to provide comfort for outside activities and still save water and keep electric costs low during the summer months. Join me in this podcast that is a companion piece for my class of the same name offered in late October on Eventbrite. I will discuss the more important aspects of home landscapes intended for the desert from the design through plant selection and irrigation. Many things can go wrong but having a landscape that you enjoy will make it a pleasure to fix it when there is a problem.

Sign up for my class, "Fix Your Landscape" on Eventbrite which can be found here. Look for this as an online class beginning in 2020.

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Lawns are difficult to maintain in the desert. If you don't establish it the right way in the beginning it will be that much more difficult later. This episode describes the importance of irrigation for desert lawns and learning how to do it right, fertilizers to apply and when, mowing mistakes and how to correct them and the "green ops" of desert lawn care: aerification and dethatching.

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Lawns are sometimes inferred to be the scourge the desert environment. But they are sometimes necessary. Learn when they should be considered, where they should be located, designed and installed as an integral part of a desert landscape. 

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There are two ways to produce tomatoes in the Fall in the Mojave Desert; by shearing plants or planting seed in the summer. Both will work. Something I forgot to mention is to make sure your pruners or scissors for shearing tomato plants is sharp and sanitized. Listen to this podcast and learn how to do it. All this and more in todays Desert Horticulture podcast.

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This podcast is about the relationship between fertilizers and organics in desert soils. If the organics in a soil aren't enough, fertilizers don't work as well. There is also the danger of having too much organics in desert soils. Different plants perform best with the right amount of organics in the soil. Their overall health and reaction to applied fertilizers are best when the level of organics in the soil match the plants growing there. Learn this and more on todays Desert Horticulture. 

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In this episode of Desert Horticulture I discuss the grasshopper invasion in Las Vegas and how they differ from locust invasions, the Cicada Killer Wasps and what to do about them if anything, and fruit salad trees. Think twice before you buy one. All this and much more in this Desert Horticulture podcast.

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This desert horticulture podcast discusses different methods of controlling aphids in landscape trees, using drip tubing instead of drip emitters for irrigating trees in the landscape and how to manage shrubs like Butterfly Bush that grow better in colder climates. Join me in this episode of desert horticulture.

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