Dayton "Dirt" - March 21, 2014

The first day of spring has welcomed us with some colder and snowy weather with next week not looking like spring weather either. The question now is will March “go out like a lamb”? After a period of shut down production of cuttings from the Dummen Company of petunias because of the Tobacco Mosaic Virus TMV, production is flowing from shipments from Israel. The new crazytunias that were one of the series of virus infected petunias will now be available in our greenhouse although a little later in May. The funky variegated blooms should be a big hit with everyone. The nursery has been wild this past week with the receipt of several shipments, potting perennials, potting annual flowers, transferring our stock geraniums to bigger pots, trimming and cleaning up thousands of perennials from winter storage. Surprisingly, the plants fared well with a double cover of overwintering fabric in the covered polyhouses except there were some minor losses from mice chewing their way through the bottom of pots to get at roots and the tender crown of the plants. While most of the mice fell victim to our traps, there are some that just seem to escape. After a good trimming and cleaning away of the dead foliage from last year the plants are sprayed with a fungicide to kill a fungus called Botrytis that will rot them if left unchecked. This fungus grows well in humid environments with no air circulation which is just the case in the winter storage huts. At the nursery as well as everywhere, spring is almost sure to be about 10 days to 2 weeks off in the temperature department because of the prolonged cold weather. Chores in the landscape yard and garden most likely must be delayed from the “normal” schedule although much trimming may have to be delayed as winter damage just showing up now will not all be evident until even mid-may. We can only hope the insect and mite population did not fare well either. Tom