and limited flowering. If
you’re able to, incorporating
compost into the soil profile
(no more than 2” dug about
12” deep) can improve your
soil and provide some slow-
release long-term nutrients for
your plants.
Weeds – Were you overrun
by weeds last year? Consider
adding 3-4” of mulch to your
garden bed. This will reduce
how many weeds can germi-
nate and will make removing
those that do grow much sim-
pler. Landscape fabric may
help in the short term but is
not recommended for garden
beds as it can clog with fine
particles over time and may
cause the soil underneath to
become anaerobic.
These are just a few very ba-
sic thoughts about getting our
perennial beds going this
year, if you want more details
or ideas on anything dis-
cussed here please call our
office!
Is your ornamental bed start-
ing to look a little tired?
There are a lot of things you
can do this time of year to get
them refreshed and ready for
a Colorado summer. First off
assess what the problems
were last year.
Water – did you struggle to
get enough water on the bed?
Or were your plants occasion-
ally swimming? Overhead
irrigation is great for turf, but
can be problematic for orna-
mental beds. Consider switch-
ing out a sprinkler head for a
drip irrigation system. There
are some excellent drip sys-
tems that can put out as much
or as little water as you want.
Look for in-line emitter line,
micro-sprinklers, or soaker
hose depending on
your plants. Drip
systems have be-
come very easy to
assemble and main-
tain. If you have a
drip system already
take a few minutes
to check emitters
and make sure they
have not clogged
and are spraying
effectively.
Poor growth – Poor
growth could be due
to many aspects
including water as
we discussed above,
too much or too
little sun, fertilizer,
poor soil etc. Ensure
the plants you have are suited
to your conditions. As land-
scapes mature generally shade
increases and so the plants
need to shift towards being
more tolerant of shade. Or
perhaps you’ve lost a mature
tree and shade plants can no
longer grow well in the new
sunny environ-
ment.
Assess whether
your plants are
getting suffi-
cient or too
much fertilizer.
Both can cause
problems. Too
much fertilizer
may cause a lot
of green growth
Preparing your ornamental garden beds
I N S I D E
T H I S I S S U E :
Low tunnels–
low cost
season
extension
2
Romantica
Roses
3
Planting Peas
in the garden
4
A D A M S C O U N T Y
E X T E N S I O N
Horticulture Newsletter W I N T E R 2 0 1 8
I N T R O D U C T I O N
Welcome to the Ad-
ams County Exten-
sion Horticulture
Newsletter. If you do
not wish to receive
this newsletter in the
future simply respond
to
ehammond@adcogov
.org that you wish to
be removed from the
list.
P A G E 2
Soil
temperatures
can be much
higher under a
low tunnel than
in surrounding
areas giving a
head start to the
season!
Extending the growing season affordably
Recently I decided to
install a couple of low
tunnels in our home
vegetable garden. Low
tunnels are basically a
series of short arches
placed over a garden
bed that are used to
support a covering of
some type. The idea is
to heat the air and soil
under the covering dur-
ing the day then to re-
tain some of that heat,
especially the heat radiated by the warm soil,
during the night.
We went with a simple design which only re-
quired some old rebar we had laying around,
PVC pipe and some plastic greenhouse covering
we bought online. Pound the rebar into soil at
regular intervals along the bed then slip the PVC
pipes over them on one side of the bed. Bend
each pipe and slip it onto rebar on the opposite
side. There are formulas available online
to determine the length of the PVC you need
form to an arch of a given height but essentially
if your beds are three to four feet in width you
want to cut the PVC pipe to a length about one
foot wider than the bed.
We chose to install four arches per eight foot
bed. The more arches you have the better the
tunnel will hold up vs. wind and snow.
After installing the arches we placed the green-
house plastic over them and secured it with
clamps. They make really slick clamps designed
specifically for this purpose but I don’t have
them. Again this is a simple and inexpensive de-
sign and does have some drawbacks. The PVC
pipe will oxidize in the sun and become brittle
over time. Eventually it will have to be re-
placed. I’m planning on spray painting the ones
we used this summer to extend their life. There
are also stronger designs out there that utilize
metal hoops. A quick internet search will yield
lots of interesting designs which are almost cer-
tainly stronger and more durable.
So, is it worth the effort? We have had the tun-
nels out in our garden for almost two
months and for us it certainly has been. We
planted cool season greens, as well as some
broccoli, in the tunnels late in February and
they germinated incredibly uniformly. I
assume this was due to both more constant
and
warmer
soil tem-
perature
under the
tunnel
and possi-
bly to the
elevated
humidity
in the
tunnel. In
the mid-
dle of
March the
afternoon
soil tem-
perature under the tunnel was over 10 de-
grees warmer than the soil in one of our un-
covered beds. We are hoping to use the
bump in soil temperature to give an early
start to our peppers this year.
The tunnels do require some maintenance
and have some limitations. Chiefly they
need to be opened and then closed on warm
and\or sunny days to prevent the plants in-
side from cooking. In the late spring you
will need to do this nearly every day which
kind of ties you to garden. The covering
also will normally have to be taken com-
pletely off once the season gets started and
reattached in the fall. It can be difficult or
impossible to get taller crops under the tun-
nels in the fall.
On the whole though, I think that low tun-
nels are a great option for many backyard
veggie gardeners. They are relatively cheap
and easy to install and can be a very effec-
tive way of adding a few weeks or more to
both ends of the growing season.
H O R T I C U L T U R E N E W S L E T T E R
Master Gardener’s corner: by Barbara Carvallo P A G E 3
The Romanticas – New Roses by Meilland
The Meilland family has been growing roses in the South of France since the 1850’s. In 1932 Antoine Meil-
land, founder of Meilland International SA, entered into a contract with the Conard-Pyle Company better
known as Star Roses of West Grove, Pennsylvania. Together they have marketed Meilland-bred roses in the
United States for over 70 years.
Meilland’s roses are notoriously large, lush and covered with blooms. Many are shrubs standing 3’ to 4’ tall,
spreading prolifically and particularly well adapted to wide border gardens. Others are gorgeous hybrid teas,
climbers, miniature climbers and miniatures – all with the habit of blooming profusely. Roses by Meilland are
very hardy and easy to care for once established.
Today Meilland remains a family owned and operated concern with thousands of acres of nurseries in France,
Spain, Netherlands and the United States. Wherever they are, the roses of the House of Meilland are unique in
their beauty, durability and versatility.
The newest variety is a collection of roses known as the Romanticas. They represent a marriage of the old and
the new. Old world roses rich in fragrance with bulky flowers of many petals now share the disease resistance
and exceptional garden performance of modern roses.
The roses featured here are as follows:
Michelangelo
Allegro
Princesses Charlene De Monaco
Traviata
All photos courtesy of Meilland.com https://meilland.com/en/garden-roses-collection/romantica-roses/
We’re nearing the end of our window for getting a spring planting of peas in the garden, but there’s
still some time! If you’re a pea aficionado you can prepare peas by soaking them in a “germination
chamber” i.e. a plastic bag with a wet paper towel in it for about 24 hours before you plant the peas
outside. This will give them a head start as well as
allowing peas to germinate in the warmth of your
home. Peas will germinate in soils as low as 45
degrees Fahrenheit but like warmer temperatures.
Generally they like to germinate warm and grow
cool.
Plant your peas an inch or two apart in rows. If
you’re growing traditional rows you want them
spaced 12-15” apart. If you’re looking to do a
block style planting you can plant a little more
closely, but at least 6-8” apart. The peas should be
about an inch deep in the soil. Make sure you wa-
ter them in well after planting.
As they start to come up it’s important to check
whether your peas are a bush or climbing variety.
Climbing peas will require some form of staking for
best production. Bush varieties “climb” onto them-
selves as they mature and do not require additional
support.
By June you should start seeing flowers and soon after
that start getting peas. If you can resist eating them all
right there, in the garden then you are a stronger per-
son than I! Happy pea gardening!
9755 Henderson Rd
Brighton CO 80601
Phone: 303-637-8100
E-mail: [email protected]
http://www.colostate.edu/Depts/CoopExt/
Adams/
Adams County Extension
Planting Peas