By Kathleen Cue, Nebraska Extension Horticulture Educator
Looking forward to the vegetable garden this spring, it’s easy to think that now that the flood waters have receded, our gardening season can carry on as usual. While many of the callers to Extension are aware of potential dangers of gardening on a flooded site, the exact way forward is a little unclear. Here is a synopsis of how flooding affects food safety in our vegetable gardens and orchards.
By Kathleen Cue, Nebraska Extension Horticulture Educator
As morel mushroom hunting season approaches, be mindful of food safety. It’s important to remember flood waters don’t carry just water. There is a host of unsavory things that are downright dangerous—
▪Human disease pathogens from raw sewage,
▪Pesticides carried from farm fields and lawns on soil particles and plant residue,
▪And rubber and petroleum products from cars, boats and farm equipment.
By Kathleen Cue, Nebraska Extension Horticulture Assistant Educator
The 2019 spring flood has had a devastating impact for all parts of the landscape, including trees. While the extent of the damage to trees may not be realized for years, how and if trees survive depend on several factors.
▪Certainly that the floods came when the trees were dormant is a factor in their favor. Flooding is always hardest on actively growing trees.
By Kathleen Cue, Nebraska Extension Horticulture Assistant Educator
Trees in native undisturbed sites live, on average, to be about 150 years old. Downtown trees have a life expectancy of 7-17 years; suburban trees 30-40 years; and rural trees 60-70 years. Why is there such a difference in life expectancy between trees in native sites than those in disturbed sites? Certainly there are acute factors, like hail, herbicide drift and insect infestations that can kill trees but the chronic issues overwhelmingly pre-dispose trees to shortened lifespans.
While difficult to see, pre-disposing effects are basically unhealthy environments. This leads to unhappy trees with dysfunctional roots. Some common pre-disposing factors include:
By Kathleen Cue, Nebraska Extension Horticulture Educator
Peach leaf curl is prevalent this spring. The fungal pathogen, Taphrina deformans, causes puckering of leaves and unusual coloration, with bright red, yellow, lime green, or a combination of all three colors on one leaf. Infection occurs at bud swell and bud break, when spores, overwintering on twigs and buds, infect emerging leaves. The distortion of leaves inhibits photosynthesis and early defoliation occurs, all of which affects the tree’s ability to produce peaches. If infection is severe and occurs over several growing seasons, the disease weakens the tree.
By Kathleen Cue, Nebraska Extension Horticulture Educator
Cooks love the earliness that fresh asparagus provides. Gardeners love it because it’s perennial and relatively worry-free. If you’ve not grown asparagus, this spring would be a good time to plant a few crowns to find out for yourself just how easy it is to grow.
