Drought Tolerant Plants & Taking the Irritation Out of Irrigation - Interview with Tim DeGeest

Hello, my friends, across the fruited and rooted plane, It's time for
the Gardening Simplified Show with Stacy Hervella me, Rick weisst and our engineer and
producer Adrianna Robinson. We come to you from Beautiful Studio a here at Proven
Winners, Color Choice Shrubs and today, well, we're going to talk about
something that you've asked us to talk about. Drought. How dry I am
and Stacy, we're not talking about my dry bad dad jokes, although I
had a good one for you. Here you go, I have the world's
worst thesaurus. Not only is it terrible, it's terrible. Do you get
that. I do get that. I don't understand how it ties into drought
tolerance, but I get the joke. It's a dry drop. Ohkay,
Let's get to drought tolerance. Remember, plant drought can be triggered by a
water deficit in the soil or in the atmosphere, think wind or both and
Stacey coming up on today's show on our fourth segment, we'll talk about drip
irrigation. This is an issue that people struggle with. It is I mean,
I even when we don't have a drought here in Michigan, which we
often have had periods of drought over the last couple of years. You know,
living out here near the lake shore, my soil is just naturally dry.
So drought tolerance is a consideration that I use to pick plants and to
maintain my garden all the time, because my garden is just naturally dry.
It's very sunny, it's very sandy, and so I deal with a lot
of that and it's ready for those challenges whatever nature throws at it, I
hope. So wherever you live, it's a hot topic. And I know
as far as plant breeders are concerned too, plant breeders are looking at plants
that are drought tolerant, especially with the changes in climate that we've been seeing
worldwide over the past few years. Now, do some research when you think
about drought tolerant plants. In other words, don't assume that native plants are
synonymous with drought tolerance. Drought tolerant plants have built in features or characteristics that
make them drought tolerant. And I think, Stacy, right off the bat,
we have to say that a lot of drought tolerant plants have reduced leaf
surface or maybe even needles that make it a little easier to handle drought.
Definitely, reducing the leaf surface means fewer stomata. The stamata are the organ
of the plant that gives off water vapor when it's photosynthesizing. Somata means less
water vapor given off and therefore a good adaptation because that's the main way that
plants actually use the water that they're taking up through their roots. Light color
foliage is another one, sure, and that's why I pitched that to you,
because I knew you did encapsulate that beautifully. Some drought tolerant plants with
large leaves have deep indentations or sinuses between the lobes and the leaves to reduce
their leaf area. And another sign of drought tolerance, of course, stacey
is leaves that have a waxy or a glossy coating. And I think,
right off the bat, you think about plants like succulents. Yeah, definitely,
suculents are sort of the ultimate, But there's other adaptations I think that
people don't see and maybe don't consider, and that's roots. You know,
drought tolerant plants tend to have very deep roots that go deep into the soil.
They could be a tap roots, so they're going way down there and
they store a lot of water for the plant to use. And that might
be, you know, an adaptation that we don't really see, but it
is certainly one that helps the plant withstand those challenges. It's a great point
or thick, fleshy type roots. I'm thinking about Baptizia, which is a
favorite plant of both yours and mine, or day lilies, they tend to
stand up to drought conditions because of those roots st right. And you know,
that's a good point about daylilies, because you have plants that are drought
tolerant, and that means the plant will not die if it is in drought.
But that doesn't always mean that the plant is going to be at its
very best. Just like you yourself might not be at your best if you're
dehydrated. You're still alive, but you're not going to have your biggest,
boldest, brightest blooms, you know, all of that kind of stuff.
So it's important I think that when people understand that a plant is drought tolerant,
that they have reasonable expectations about what it's going to do. Now,
there certainly are drought tolerant plants out there that will still perform amazingly. Succulents
a great example in severe drought conditions. But a lot of the plants,
especially with native plants, they're simply drought tolerant. It doesn't mean that they
are going to do everything you see in that nice glossy picture on the plant
tag. If you really, you know, give them the worst possible conditions.
Good point. Also in other characteristics, the presence of fine hairs on
the leaves of some plants. I think about lamb's ear in the landscape.
Angel wings or Artemesia sinicio angel wings is a great example of it. Or
even Dichondra which has small leaves to boot along with the softer hairy foliage.
Again in indication and this plant's going to handle drought pretty well well. Dichondra.
Now there's a plant that you can't slow down. If you can slow
it down, good for you, because it's usually a pretty robust plant.
One I love to use in containers, but definitely can get a little bit
too enthusiastic. Another great example of the hairs on the leaves is potentilla.
Oh yeah, you know, we talk about happy faced potentilla from the proven
winner's color choice shrubs line and those hairs. What those do again, they're
reducing the leaf surface, but they're also trapping that water vapor and they can
kind of keep it around that leaf and reduce the need for evaporation because it's
keeping that humidity up right around that leaf very much same similar function to hairs
on people. Great point. Great point. So we throw a lot of
terminology around. Of course, zero escaping or zero escape a term used to
outline a landscaping sky style that employs these drought resistant plants. But we talk
about drought resistant, drought tolerant, drought avoidance, which doesn't mean the plant
runs away, but it is helped storage capacity, like you mentioned the succulents
to be able to handle dry periods or cactus. And then added to the
mix is the phrase water wise, being more water wise in our approach to
the landscape. Yeah, definitely. You know there, I think it's good
to understand that there is these varying degrees of what a plant can do,
and I think a lot of people do overwater their plants. There certainly are
plants that need an awful lot of water to do well, but On the
other hand, if a plant is properly cited for its needs and for your
climate, you might find that it doesn't need as much water as you might
have thought. A lot of times, if we are giving a plant an
excessive amount of water and it's not a pond plant, and it's not a
marginal plant that would be found on the edge of a pond, if we're
giving it a lot of water, that could indicate that maybe our soil is
not right for it, or that it needs more shade in our climate.
And so sometimes if you find yourself giving way too much water to a plant,
it's a queue to south and think about is there something better that you
could be doing to reduce that water need. You know, that's a great
point, Stacey, And as you mentioned that, I think about things like
soil amendments. Whether or not you agree there are soil amendments that will help.
Of course, we've talked about micro riisei before, or expensive polymers that
might not be practical but in some situations may be practical to help add or
retain some moisture to the soil. And then also humic and fuvic acids.
You can purchase these in liquid Historically we think about healthy soils with rich organic
components, but if you don't have that, possibly the addition of humic and
fulvic acids something you might want to look at. And we'll put a link
there to our friends at Morgan Composting. We've talked to them before, ye
who are very much into that sort of thing. So a lot of the
organic, especially liquid fertilizers that you buy will have humic acid added to them,
so sometimes it's kind of like a two for one. You don't have
to go out and buy that product specifically. If you're buying that type of
fertilizer, it's going to be in there, so have that on your radar
as you think about drought resistance. Okay, quick limerick for you about drought.
When the ground is dry as dust, I have to readjust I drag
around the hoses to water all my roses before the blooms combust. My seedlings
are going to sprout despite this prolonged drought. I'll do a long rain dance
and then I'll wet my plants by turning on the spout. And we're going
to talk about how to turn that spout on. Like I said in segment
four when we talk to an expert about drip irrigation, Stacy, I'm sure
you have a long list of favorite plants. I'm going to quickly throw out
that Nepetta, lavender, Gomfrina baptisia. We mentioned that I love ornam mental
grasses for drought tolerance, and ornamental grasses have a telltale characteristic that I look
for in plants, and that is a really defined mid rib down the center
of the leaf. And many times when you see that, you'll see that
with houseplants like fycus. If it has a defined mid rib down the center
of the foliage, the foliage is able to fold on itself and conserve moisture
during periods of heat or drought. I think that's something always to look for,
all reducing that surface area. Very smart adaptation, Yeah, it is.
And of course there's many others again along the lines of small foliage when
you think about diamond frost, Euphorbia, Russian sage. Of course, also
your seatum's the Rock and Grow Proven Winners has the Rock and Grow series which
is beautiful blooms beautifully does a great job. Oh and getting back to the
grass's Stacey, I love Panicom's Prairie winds, Niagara, any of those switchgrasses
also stand up to drought quite well. Yeah. I love panic, especially
in fall. It has such a pretty airy look. And it's always kind
of amazing when a plant that's so tough has such a delicate look. You
weren't expecting that, You're expecting something a little you know more, I don't
know, harsh looking, Yeah, exactly, exactly, so beautiful Tustin SunFall,
sunflower heliopsis. So there are a lot of plants, guarrow, We've
talked about that before and really stands up to drought conditions. Now, of
course, one of the issues Stacey will also be the length of the drought.
We've talked about cold and cross before and heat zones. Well, the
length of the dry I mean when you're getting into two or three months,
I mean that's a game changer compared to let's say a one or two week
drought for sure. Yeah, definitely. So coming up segment four, drip
irrigation, we're going to take away the illusion of putting together drip irrigation.
But prior to that, Stacy's got a fabulous plant for us coming up in
Plants on Trial here on the Gardening Simplified Ship proven Winner's colored Choice Shrubs cares
about your success in the garden. That's why we trial and test all of
our shrubs for eight to ten years, making sure they outperform everything else on
the market. Look for them and the distinctive white container at your local garden
center. Greeting's gardening friends, and welcome to the Gardening Simplified Show. Welcome
back to the Gardening Simplified Show. I did want to add on our drought
tolerance conversation before we get into today's plant on trial that one of the really
important things to consider in a drought tolerant plant, and if it's actually experiencing
drought, is that it might go dormant. It might go dormant early,
and that doesn't mean that it died. So with your drought tolerant plants,
if you're having extreme conditions, don't just say, oh man, the thing
defoliated or it disappeared. A great example, I think, even though it's
not exactly a drought tolerant plant, would be something like bleeding heart. Right,
So bleeding heart comes out in spring, it looks amazing, and then
it just goes dormant. It just doesn't want to deal with the summer heat.
And that's totally normal for that plant unless it has a lot of water.
So a lot of other plants are going to employ a similar strategy of
just going dormant. They're just going to say, hey, it's too tough
for me out here. I'm going to conserve my resources. I'm going to
bed wake me up when conditions improve, which may not actually be until the
following spring. So when you have drought tolerant plants that are experiencing severe drought,
don't be too quick to write them off. Don't be too quick to
assume that they didn't make it. I like the way you phrase that,
Stacey employ strategy, and it causes me to think, yes, plants employ
a variety of strategies to deal with drought. Well they do. They don't
have much choice. They don't have much choice. They can't get up and
walk away, and no they can't. So anyway, be patient with the
weather, as of course, with your plant. So let's get to today's
plant on trial. It is double take scarlet flowering quints. Beautiful, such
a great plant, and I mean I'm going to go on about the many,
many ways that this is an excellent plant. But one of the things
that I love the most about it is simply its color. It is a
bright, lipstick red quince flower. And in the spring, you know,
yellow's fabulous, it's wonderful, and pink is good. All those colors are
good, but when you get that bright, searing red, there's really nothing
like it. And from you know, in a season that's so associated with
you know, softer colors, and it's so bold, and I'm just I'm
a sucker for any red flower. But I think Double Take Quins is one
of my all time favorites. It's fantastic, such a great plant. But
of course, as everyone knows, I always try to pick a plant on
trial that ties into the theme of the show, and I did indeed do
that with Double Take Scarlet and all of the Double Take Quins because there are
multiple colors available. I'll get to that later, hopefully if I remember.
And Double Take Flowering Quints have gutten. We've heard amazing reports all over the
country Texas, Oklahoma of this plant blooming its brains out despite drought in those
areas. Now, while we're not talking like deep desert drought, but certainly
Dallas most of northern Texas. Double take Scarlet quints is a plant that you
can put in your garden and even when spring starts to get hot and starts
to get dry, this thing will still be flowering, unscathed. So great
news for our zone seven and warmer friends, yes, and great yes for
us too because it is hardy to zone five and it shows similar drought tolerance
here. But I also picked double takes scarlet for today's plant on trial for
another reason, and that is that next weekend is Lunar New Year, and
Lunar New Year is typically associated with the color red and flowering quins. Now,
in Asia they celebrate the Lunar New Year with apricot and plums, and
those are beautiful plants, but not that they're not. The plants themselves are
relatively hardy, but because they bloom so early, they're usually in bloom in
February in milder climates for Lunar New Year, not well suited to a great
deal of the US. So Asian communities in the US have kind of switched
over it and used quints as one of the you know, highlights are of
the celebrations around Lunar New Year and I think this plant is the perfect plant
to celebrate Lunar New Year because again, it has that beautiful bright red color.
Now, if you live in zone five six seven, you're probably not
going to have double take quints in bloom in your yard for Lunar New Year.
But I know there are a number of cut flower growers who have picked
it up from us and sell the branches for Lunar New Year. Oh that's
great, and it's you know what, even if you don't get to enjoy
it for Lunar New Year, you're going to enjoy it in the garden when
it does bloom a little bit later in spring. Stacey, So you're saying
potentially I could force blooms on it like I would have for said, Yes,
you could, absolutely, And I'm glad you mentioned that because you can
because most spring flowering shrubs you can force, which is to say, you
know, depending on how much cold they've received, because they usually need a
certain number of chilling hours or cold in order for them to bloom properly.
If they've experienced that, you can cut them. You can bring them indoors
into a warm climate, and that branch thinks, wow, it's spring and
burst into bloom. I mean, it takes a lot more time than that.
But no quince I do have to say for trying to force it by
all means. I don't discourage you from trying, but it does take a
little bit longer than some of the other spring flowering shrubs to force. It
takes longer for the flowers to open. But if you have a quince in
your yard, by all means, bring some branches in right now. See
what happens. Eventually you'll have some gray flowers. So nothing ventured, nothing
gained. So, in addition to its heat and drought tolerance, and of
course significance for a lunar new year, the double take series of flowering quints
are thornless. That's a biggie. That is a biggie. Now, if
you've never grown quints and you're just thinking, well, well, sure,
it's great. It doesn't have thorns, it's really great. It doesn't have
thorns because quince thorns are large, they are unpleasant. They make it very
difficult to work around the plants. Oh, if I'm wearing shorts my legs,
thank you. They make it far less suitable as a cut flower,
because no one wants a branch in their house with big thorns sticking out all
over. And you know, one of the reasons that I think quints are
not very well favored, especially in more urban areas, is because of those
thorns. They can function as garbage catchers. So all the paper bags,
plastic bags, plastic bags, leaves, they can all get in the center
of that plant and accumulate, and then you know, the thorns have stuck
onto it, so imagine trying to clean it out. So no worries about
that. With the Double Takes series, it is completely thornless. I have
never even seen a little like thorny protuberance on it, Like some things they
say, oh this is thornless, but you still get some thorn like growths
on it. No thorns, protuberance, I'm writing that one down, Adrian.
Thorny protuberance. None of those on Double Take Scarlet, and it is
also double the flowers are double so and I think, to be fair,
I do find the conventional regular quints to be absolutely gorgeous with all of that
space. I've talked how much I love plants and flowers with space in them.
But Double Take Scarlet, with its double flowers, the blooms almost look
more like a rose or a camellia than a traditional quince. So it really
just has a very very different look to it. And it's doing all of
this in spite of drought. Now if, of course, in the spring,
if it's very hot and very dry unusually, so the flowers will last
longer if you can give it some water, give it some mulch. But
the plant will not be negatively impacted despite some drought, which is I think
is pretty impressive. That's very impressive. I would consider it a workhourse in
the landscape. But like you said, when they bloom, wow, it
not your socks. And they bloom for a really long time. Now,
they are a little bit later to bloom in spring than a lot of other
flowering trups. So these are not gonna You're not gonna get the ketchup and
mustard effect of having it bloom alongside. For Scythia blooms a little bit later.
Here, I'm must that. Well, that's how bright the colors are.
That's what I always think in my brain. That's how a new topic
for a future show. There you go, read that one down, all
right, So you're not gonna get them blooming together. But it's just going
to extend that spring show. And I think that's one of the things that's
that's really really nice about it and very versatile in the landscape. So a
lot of people will plant quints as a specimen, and I think it's lovely
that way. It has unique foliage too. It's foliage has sort of a
large leaf and then these little smaller leaves that subtenders surround the branch, so
it's a very distinctive look. Even when a quince isn't in bloom, you
can typically recognize the plant because of its unique foliage. But I love quints
as a hedge. And the double Take series does come right now in four
different colors. We have double take Orange, double take Peach, double take
scarlet, of course, today's plan on trial, and double take Eternal White,
which is our newest one beautiful white flower and that one actually reblooms into
summer, so that's a longer blooming one. So you can kind of imagine.
These colors are very harmonious. They look really nice together, and so
you could mix them up into a hedge for a multicolor hedge that would really
just be like nothing else. You've ever seen. Yeah, and I love
the peach When that's in bloom in the garden center and pots, it causes
people to stop and the tr oh, yeah, they're they're gonna want to
have it. And you know, it's a very versatile plant. It can
take full sun to part shade. Of course, the hotter and drier your
climate, the more shade it's going to want. But full sun here in
Michigan, no problem whatsoever. Even into his own six and seven, I
did want to briefly mention deer resistance because if you look up flowering quints in
deer resistance, most sources will say that quinn flowering quins are deer resistant.
Now Double Take A series less, so so there is kind of a drawback
to that thornlessness. The thorniness of those conventional varieties, I think is what
makes regular quints more dear resistant. I have grown the Double Take series.
I can tell you unequivocally it is not dear resistant. I did have to
take it out because they were loving life and they were loving my quints.
So I unfortunately can't grow it anymore. But four to five feet tall and
wide again, a great hedge plant, a great specimen plant and just an
all around beautiful plant to have in your garden, whether or not you are
experiencing drop. So you can see all the pictures of it and all the
information on our website at Gardeningsimplified on air dot com, or check us out
on YouTube or Instagram. We're gonna take a little bit of a break.
When we come back, we'll answer your gardening questions, so please stay tuned.
At proven Winner's Color Choice, we've got a shrub for every taste and
every space. Whether you're looking for an easy care rose and unforgettable hydrangea,
or something new and unique, you can be confident that the shrubs and the
white containers have been trialed and tested for your success. Look for them at
your local garden center. Greeting's gardening friends, and welcome back to the Gardening
Simplified Show. It's mailbag time. I love to answer people's questions, especially
right now. Everybody's wondering what's next, and we have some great questions this
week, So what's in the mailbag? Absolutely, As a matter of fact,
Janet sends us a question that has Stacy written all over it, so
I'll read the question and then Stacy take it away. I appreciate the clear
explanation of hardiness zones you provided in your video, especially the limitations of the
hardiness zone map, and by the way, you can look for that video
on YouTube. Stacey put together a great video that helps explain the hardiness zone
map. Yet these limitations raise a question for Janet. If the map only
addresses zones where a plant can survive the average lowest temperature, why are ranges
provided for plants? For example, easiatic jasmine is identified as a plant that
can survive in zones seven through nine. Temps in zone seven are always going
to be colder on average than those in zone nine, So why not simply
report that the plant can survive to zone seven. What does the upper end
of the range indicate. Does it mean the plant requires a period of cold
that these zones provide in winter? Wow, Janet, great question. It's
such a good question and it hits on one of my biggest pet peeves about
the hardiness zone system. So Janet, to answer it briefly, it's that
we give a range because that is unfortunately the very best tool we have at
the moment for addressing a plant's heat tolerance, which makes no sense, because
we just laid out that the hardiness zone system is based on cold tolerance,
so using it for heat tolerance is a little bit silly. But again,
we no longer have a heat tolerance system. There was one that was attempted
to be made, and of course there is the sunset zones, which talks
a lot about that addresses that, but it's only for California, So you
know, what are the rest of us to do. We use the upper
end of the hardiness zone to roughly indicate how much heat it can take.
So basically, when we say something like in your example, they are the
asiatic jasmine going up to USDA Zone nine, we're saying that it will basically
be able to grow in USDA Zone nine areas. That's the most heat it
can tolerate. However, here in the US USDA Zone nine is a can
mean a lot of different things. It can mean Florida, it can mean
Austin, Texas. It can mean Portland, Oregon. It can mean San
Francisco, it can mean la and all of those are vastly, vastly different
climates. So again, this is really where the system starts to fall apart,
because we can talk that it can rou take that, but take heat
in those areas. But again that's not the same amount of heat, that's
not the same amount of water. So the short answer, again Janet,
is we give the range because it's the best we can Sometimes in some cases
when a plant does need cold a chilling period like lilacs, cherries, you
know, apples, so forth, that we generally that will pertain to saying
in zone nine, no matter where you are, you're probably not you know,
or zone ten, you're not going to have enough cold hours for this
plant to bloom. But you know, I'm waiting for someone to do something
better. I would take on the task myself if I were up to it.
I am not. I don't know that much about gardening and hot climates.
So yeah, the answer is that we use it because it's the best
we can do for now, and it's a tool, and as I always
say, it's it's a great reason why people should shop locally at their local
independent garden center, so that they are getting advice from people who know what
it's like to garden there, know the challenge, and our stocking plants that
will actually be successful in the area. So it's the old adage. You're
in the ballpark. We're no longer in the parking lot. We're at least
in the ball or at least in the ballpark. Yes, all right,
so I'd like to visit the concession stands right now, get a hot dog?
All right? So, Stacy question we got on YouTube. Love listening
to the show as I do my garden work. I'm in Zone nine B,
northern California. My father gifted me some cannas when I moved into my
property five years ago. I usually cut them back to the ground when we
hit freezing temperatures. Since we had a mild winter, the foliage is still
decorating the garden. I'd love to ask the cana king Rick if he can
talk about growing, pruning and care of canas. And for folks watching on
YouTube or for those who are listening to the radio or a podcast, you
can go to the show notes at our website Gardeningsimplified on air dot com.
Two pictures I'm posting there. One a picture from Michio, who listens to
our show weekly in Japan in Tokyo and of course has a very similar heartiness
zone climate to our listener here on YouTube nine B zone seven eight nine right
in that area. Sent me a picture of what the canas look like right
now in Tokyo, just kind of making it through winter before the spring season
starts, and then also a picture of my canas in storage here in Michigan.
Unfortunately, I can't leave them in the ground, But if you're in
zone seven or warmer, and certainly in zone nine B, you should be
able to leave the rhizomes in the ground, which are just a fleshy underground
storage root, so to speak, and the plants will rejuvenate, especially if
cut back and given plenty of sunshine. I have found that cannas do require
a fair amount of fertilizer in order to be able to really get them to
bloom nicely and attract the hummingbirds. So zone six or warmer, maybe even
zone seven and warmer, We're going to lift the rhizomes out of the soil
infall, allow the soil to dry off them, put them in cool storage.
Cool I keep them at around forty five degrees right in that area over
winter before I can replant them next spring. But in Zone nine B,
I would say once things start to warm up a little bit and we get
into the spring season, a little bit of fertilizer, you should be good
to go. And if they're not looking that great, cut them back.
They rejuvenate well well. And you know, canas are definitely not drought tolerant,
since that is the theme of today's show. And yeah, if they
get too dry, they're not going to grow well. So I think that's
another thing to consider as you move into spring. If you have cannas in
the ground and you're not getting reliable spring rainfall, that you're going to want
to give them that extra boost of supplemental water so that they really get a
vigorous, you know, start to the season. Now, they did mention
pruning cannas, and I would not normally prune cannas during the growing season.
Do you think that they meant, you know, for these times when you
know, things start to look a little bit creddy, because that's exactly or
late season to rejuvenate them. And of course here in the north, we
as I said, lift or dig up these rhizomes, which gives us an
opportunity to grade them. And also that digging and dividing I think helps rejuvenate
them also, So in a warmer zone, from time to time, you
may want to dig them up also and divide the rhizomes and replant to rejuvenate
the growth and spread the love with your cana loving friends, like Rick did
with Adron and I last year. And now I think we're ready to start
spreading the love ourselves, because screw anything like mine. I've got way more
than you gave me at the end of the season. They're like the gift
that just keeps on giving. And you know, going back to the heartiness,
when I used to live in New York City, it was very common
to see canas growing in the beds along the sidewalks where someone had probably planted
them as summer color. But you know, being close to the building kind
of creates a little bit of a micro climate, and they would very often
survive even there. In some parts of New York City are considered like a
zone seven but zone six, So even if you have a protected spot,
and because cannas are so abundant in their growth, it might be worth experimenting
this season with planting some closer to your house or in a micro climate so
that you can experiment and see if they will actually make it. There is
a very good chance and again very low risk because you probably if you've grown
cannas, you probably have a lot more cannas. And that's a good point.
Yeah, I know, I'm giving them away to the neighbors. The
mailman came by the other day. I gave him a couple of them,
So what is this? Do I eat this? What do I do with
this? But good point, Sacey, because there is a difference between the
rhizomes being in the ground or being in a container. Also, especially if
you're in one of these marginal zones where maybe it gets a little too cold,
so zone nine B Northern California, wonderful. I think you should have
loads of fun with your can and you won't have to worry about them busting
through your container like I did and then having to destroy your whole container to
get the cannas out. So that's all we have time for on the mailbag
this week. If you have gardening questions, please don't hesitate to reach out
to us help EHLP at Gardenings Simplified on air dot com, or just visit
Gardening Simplified on air dot com and use our contact form. We're going to
take a little break. When we come back. We've got a special guest
for branching news, so please stay tuned. The Gardening Simplified Show is brought
to you by Proven Winner's Color Choice Shrubs. Our award winning flowering shrubs and
evergreens have been trialed and tested for your success so you enjoy more beauty and
less work. Look for Proven Winners Color Choice Shrubs and the distinctive white container
at your local garden center. Welcome back to the Gardening Simplified Show. It's
time for branching news. Not breaking news, but branching news. We don't
make this stuff up. As a matter of fact. Today excited about this
in interview with Tim Degeeste from Site one Landscape Supply and what we're going to
try to do is take the mystery, the illusion out of drip irrigation.
Tim, thanks for joining us on the Gardening Simplified Show. Yeah. Thanks,
it's pleasure to be here. Great to have you here, Stacey.
We get a lot of comments from people saying I'm going to make watering easier.
I mean, I think drip irrigation is the way to do it.
As I have said many times, watering is my least favorite garden shore and
the times that I have had a drip system in my garden. I could
only describe it as pure luxury because my plants looked amazing and I never lifted
a finger. That's a good way to put it, pure luxury. So
let's start from the top, tim, I'm gonna guess first on the agenda.
We have to have a water source, right, I mean I would
think that would help correct. Yes, hard to water without water, right,
So if we're looking to take care of some drip irrigation for containers,
can I use a typical fawcet like I would with a garden hose? Yeah,
most definitely can. So both a faucet and a garden hose is a
good source of water to you. So do I have to worry about water
pressure? No? Not necessarily, Okay, no, all right, So
drip systems are low pressure systems, right, so you don't have to worry
about having enough pressure. But what about city water versus well? Are there
any iterations there? No? Not, really, they're both set up about
the same pressure. If you have an accurate working well that honestly would drip.
In micro irrigation, which are the two things that we're going to get
into today, you don't want to have too much pressure. You want to
keep your pressure low on those. So okay, that's the most important.
So we're starting with that water source. I have to figure out a way
to attach it to the faucet. Correct. How are we going to do
that? There's a number of different ways that you can do that. I
brought a couple examples with me as a simple hose bib to pipe thread way.
You just thread that right onto your spicket or the end of your hose
and you can hook your pipe up. My bet hook your pipe up to
that. And then they also have and there's a number of different manufacturers out
there. I happen to bring a Hunter one with me. This is a
timer that you can hook onto your spicket or a hose as well, I
suppose. And then this one's a Bluetooth enabled so you control it from your
phone. If this is something where you just want to run your irrigation and
walk away and forget about it, this is the perfect way to do it
and don't have to turn your water on or anything. You know, today
everything is bluetooth. I just got a new refrigerator and it has a Bluetooth
control for it. I'm like when Am I ever going to use my phone
to adjust my refrigerator? Oh? Well yeah, but that's that's interesting.
So it's uh, just hooked that onto your spicket and then on the bottom
you can see some threads there. You just thread onto that and run your
drip from there. So if you have the timer there, does that take
care of like any pressure? It has everything kind of built into it,
so you don't need an additional adapter or backflow prevention on that. Not.
No, this is just simply a time Okay. Rainboard does make a hose
spicket kit I think they call it, and that has a small check valve
as well as a filter in there and a pressure regulator in there as well.
I don't have one of those with me today. I think anybody can
go online and buy one of those, which brings up a point, tim
and that is you know, you have some components to share with us here
today to help take some of the mystery out. But there is, like
anything else, all sorts of choice on the market. Correct, Yes,
there is. I mean I just brought a very small sampling of examples of
what there is. You can I mean, it's almost endless these days,
the number of different components that you can use. So I just kind of
brought maybe some of the more common, simpler components to use. Okay,
and no matter, sorry, Rick, but no matter what brand you're using,
you're going to find similar. Whatever we're learning about today is going to
apply for any brand, any kind of kit that people are going to buy,
no matter where. Right, but the basics are pretty similar. Yeah,
yep, it's all the same stuff. You know, Rainbird makes another
one of these. It's very similar. It's shaped a little differently, but
the hookups are all identical to it. So all right, so we have
the connection to the fawcet and if you don't want to have to go out
there all the time turning it on and off, we can get a timer.
By the way, Tim rough Ballpark timer is running what kind of range.
As far as cost is concerned, this particular timer right here, I
think is about eighty dollars and you can spend I mean, I mean one
hundred and fifty to one hundred and eighty dollars on a timer for faucets.
Obviously, when you get into your commercial grade multiple zones, you know,
watering your lawn and plants and everything at the same time they get a lot
more expensive than that. But okay, so at this price point, are
you going to have a timer that's going to let you do a schedule for
multiple days of the week, multiple times of the day. So I know
that was one thing that we did with my system. Yep, yep,
So this one right here can do that with And this is just the one
zone timer kit. They make these up to four zones, so you can
get one, two or four zones, and you can schedule different days,
different times, I think, multiple times per day as well. So really
anything you can think of you can program with that. So nice. So
that's the brains of the operation brains, all right. So now we're gonna
connect to the brain. What are we gonna do? Tim What comes next?
So I'm gonna use this as my example here. So pretend this is
our timer, but you hook that onto your faucet and then you would put
on your pipe from there, it just simply just fits right on there.
I'm not gonna put it on all the way because once it's on, it
doesn't come off. But you just put your pipe on there and you run
it out to wherever you want to water. And so from here we can
go a number of different routes. You can do micro irrigation, you can
do drip irrigation with your micro irrigation. You can do multi ports so you
can water different pots. So this is a six port adapter here. And
what you do is you take the spaghetti tubing we call it, and you
just put it onto each different port and out of that you can run this
spaghetti tubing. I mean, I've seen people run it ten to twenty feet
before. But you gotta be careful because hose and water. Your hose is
like a break, right, water goes through it and it kind of squeezes
down on it and you're not going to get your pressure or your water volume
out at the end depending how long can you run your tube? So okay,
I'm just messing this mic up. Okay, so before we go down
that road, tim, let me ask a question because I know our listeners,
our viewers are probably thinking this. I know I'm thinking it. Glue,
glue, glue, put that pipe on that end, and I'm thinking,
like a good plumber, I'm gonna have to glue that thing. Now,
I'm not good with glue. I make a mess. I tend to
glue stick things together that aren't supposed to be stuck together. Or you know,
like when I paint, I take the lid off the can, set
it down someplace, and then invariably I step on it. So do I
need to use glue? You do not need to use glue. Thank goodness.
Now you can get into PVC where you do need to use glue with
PVC. With our drip irrigation, these are all compression fitting. So you
just put them on there and no glue is needed at all. Matter of
fact, you have to cut the pipe off in order to get it off.
It doesn't just pull on and off. So all of these components that
I brought today, no glue is needed at all. So the only thing
that I would add is on a rigid pipe like this. Right, here's
a schedule ADPVC riser. You would probably want to put a little teflon tape
on the end of that, just to help keep that sealed. Is it
necessary? No, but it might drip a little bit if you don't.
So, so the brown tube is extending out, and we want to either
put a spaghetti strap in there, or some sort of tea or a saddle
tea or something. How do we do that? Do we poke a hole
in the pipe with a screwdriver? How does that work too? Yeah,
So let me just I guess, go over the two different types of the
irrigation that I brought. So the first type is your drip pipe. We
call this. This has emitters in there. I'm pointing at the two emitters.
You can see the small little holes in there. These put out point
nine gallons per hour in this particular pipe. I brought their spaced out at
twelve inch spacing, so you can go through and run this. If you've
got a big planter with multiple plants and stuff, you would just run this
tube on the ground next to all your plants. And the way that this
works is it just drips out at point nine gallons per hour, so it's
a very minimal amount of water and at about six inches of depth, So
you got to think below the surface of the soil, your water is going
to cone out. So at six inches of depth, you're gonna have a
nice even layer of water saturating soil for the roots. On the top of
the ground. You're gonna look and you'll see in between the soil is going
to be dry, and that's Honestly, the biggest misconception with irrigation is if
plants are overwatered or underwatered, they look the same, they start welting,
they'll brown out and all that stuff. Everybody's first reaction is, my plant
needs water, right a lot of times and I was a contractor for twenty
five plus years, nine out of ten times they're getting too much water,
you know, And so you just got to be very careful that you're not
over watering. And if you ever want a check to make sure, just
go down six inches and you'll see if the soil is water or not.
And then what in terms of a drip system, what options do you have
if you're overwatering? Do you just pull back on the schedule or yep,
just water in less time? You know, typically on a drip with this
point nine gallons per hour, i'd say half an hour to forty five minutes
is a good time to run it, depending on your soil again too right,
and get into heavy clay or sand or whatever else. But that's and
of course the weather and when it's hotter and sunnier, you're going to need
to run it more right. And then that's where the schedule the timer comes
in, you can just adjust that based on and that's what makes the bluetooth
say too right, because you can sit in your living room chair and just
adjust your watering schedule right, which is great. No, senator, forget
it. Yes, we are chatting with Tim Degeese from Site one Landscape Supply.
And for folks who are listening to the podcast or listening to us on
radio, thanks so much for tuning us in. We appreciate it. And
you may want to venture over to YouTube so you can see Tim and the
components and also the pictures that Adriana adds to the show as we go.
It really really does help. So a lot of options there, Tim,
Yeah, yeah, And so that's just the drip and then you can get
into your micro irrigation is what it's called. And this tube is essentially it's
the same as your drip tubing, only this does not have emitters in it.
It's a blank tube and from here you can punch in. This is
our own emtter. This one is zero point five gallons per hour. I
brought a handfull of others. They all put out different amounts of water.
I believe the black one is unrestricted flow. So however much water you can
push through this, you'll get out. And what you can do is you
can just plug your spaghetti tube into that, and then you can use one
of these steaks right here. You just push your spaghetti tube through the steak
and just put it in the ground and it's just going to drip right there
on that particular plant. So these are very handy for pots like smaller pots
eighteen inch, twelve inch, twenty four inch diameter. You can put one
or two of these in every pot where you might not have enough room to
you know, put your drip pipe into or whatever. So I'd say the
drip is for your larger areas, your larger beds, and then if you're
doing individual pots and stuff, I would recommend doing your micro irrigation drip like
this. We also have different sprays and bubblers. This one is a spray,
and this one is adjustable all the way up to three hundred and sixty
degrees down to I think thirty degrees I believe it is, So you just
turn that top to adjust that. They also make little bubblers, you know.
I mean that's I could really go on and on with the different varieties
and stuff that they have for that. And then also they have extensions as
well. This is just a blank tube extension. You can cut this off
at different heights and you just screw that onto the steak here and then here's
a spray here that you would just put in on the top right there.
So if you need a little more heights for that, or you know,
whatever you need. So, I mean it's just amazing. There's almost unlimited
flexibility now for anything. You could want to do any plant water needs,
all with one system. So you know, you talked about the different zones,
but even within a single zone, you can have some plants that are
getting way more water and some plants that are getting less. And that's I
mean that versatility is really unmatched. Yeah, and that's you know these you
know, different emitters with a different amount of water that they put out.
That's a great point. You know, some plants less water, some plants
more water. You can do two or three per plant. They make different
they make te's and all that stuff. So you could come off of off
of here, you know, and then run two pipes, you know,
for you know, two of your where did I put that? But you
know you could do two different emitters off of you know, a single So
it's kind of like Legos for gardening. Once you see all the different components,
you can really build out your own system for whatever you need it to
be. That's a great analogy. Legos is perfect, though. Yeah.
Yeah, So, I mean, the one thing that I would caution people
to be aware of is not to use too much water, right, I
mean, through a hose bib spict, you're gonna get about five to six
gallons per minute, depending maybe four in some cases. And so if you
just keep adding and adding and adding, eventually you're not gonna have enough water.
You know. To do that, that's where you need multiple zones.
So if you got one of these with a two zone or a four zone,
then you can just keep adding different zones to it. So I'm going
to back up the bus just a little bit. The main line. The
brown tubing that you have there, when we put I'm calling it a saddle
tea, maybe it's called something else. But when you put that in there,
what am I punching that hole with? So I don't mess this up.
This right here, this is what you're talking about. So here's a
handy little tool that they make for that. Do you need a tool?
No, you don't, but if you don't have really strong fingers and everything
else, that's very handy. But what you do is you so on these
things. There's two different I don't know if I can hold that so you
can see it or not, but once got a like a piercing barb to
it, and the other one does not have the tip on there, and
so what you want to do is probably the colored side. There's a little
hole in here, and you just put that in there and then you just
punch it right through into your pipe. I could handle that. Yeah,
it's pretty simple. So there it is. Now what if you make a
mistake? Do they have plugs? They do make a plug for that,
and I did happen to bring one here somewhere. Oh here it is.
So there's a there's a plug that you can just take this out and plug
that into it. So there's even some edit capability behind it. I mean
not excessively, but yes, honestly, it's it's a lot easier just to
cutch part pipe and start with a new piece of pipe. I'll say that
from experience. But you can plug them if you need to. So couple
more practical questions. Tim As I'm looking at this and thinking about doing this
this summer, the main line as I run that out to my containers,
should I sink that underground or can it just be left above ground? Yes,
definitely you can. I mean, with your blank pipe, you can
bury this as deep as you need to. Okay, right, and even
I'm sorry that's with the emitters. But your blank line, you can bury
that as deep as you need to. With your emitters. Actually, the
best course of action is to put this on the ground and cover it with
malts or something like that. Right, Malts preventsiveaporation, helps keep things moist
and stuff like that. But all these components are you can bury all of
them, so okay. And then for us folks here in the North,
I mean, we have people all over the country, all over the world
who listen watch the show. Some are fortunate enough to be in warmer than
zone eight climates here in Michigan, where it can freeze like a brick in
January. Do I have to disassemble the whole thing involved. No, you
do not have to disassemble it. The best thing to do is, I
mean, you're going to have water in your lines right, here's a cap
that you would just put on the end of your main line and all you'd
have to do is just unscrew this and let the water just run right out
of it. So so I used to take mine down when I had it,
just you know, because mine was mostly for the patio in for pots,
and yeah, we would just take it apart and just kind of you
know it, even the tubing even kind of rolled up back to its natural
you know, rolled form, and it was very very easy, uh,
to deal with. So yeah, we didn't have to worry about that at
all. Now, how many containers since you know, I think a lot
of people, you know, a lot of people have an in ground irrigation's
conventional system. It's watering their lawn. But so I think when it comes
to the containers, people don't want to rely on their neighbors when they go
on vacation, et cetera. That's where I think a lot of our listeners,
especially our look for So just in general, do you have any kind
of guideline on how many containers you can count on like a one zone system
to do? I know it'll depend on the size and the plants, but
yeah, many, many, right, I mean, so these these emitters
right here, I mean the point five gallons per hour and you have you
know, let's just say five gowns per minute that you're working with, right,
So I mean you have to do that math. Right, So it's
now you put me on the spot. But I'll say, like one hundred
different containers or more than that, you'll never be I mean, if somebody
has that many containers, I want to see it. You know, it's
gonna be pretty cool. You know, Wow, that's amazing. So you
don't have to have a huge financial investment to easily take care of like all
your day. No, And I would say for a couple two three hundred
dollars or less, you can get a long ways with us and your water
savings that you're going to realize through that, I mean aside from the time.
Yes, I mean compared to a conventional system, this uses so much
less water it does, Yes, and drip irrigation other parts of the country,
Michigan we're an exception. We have water everywhere, right, different parts
of the country they have water restrictions, and there's a lot of areas of
the country that do require drip irrigation, and that sort of thing because of
the efficiency of it. You know, you don't have evaporation runoff or anything
like that. So I'm getting back to that clock because I'm thinking about buying
one of those, and I'm looking at and I'm thinking, Okay, is
there a way I can add fertilizer to this thing? There is, but
we would have to get a lot more detailed with your components and stuff like
that. But furtigation is what you're referring to fertilizing through irrigation. You need
a separate pump and all that stuff to inject your fertilizer into your line.
Injection, that's what That's the word I was trying to come up with.
Yes, so I'd get some sort of injector. But your point is potentially
that is available to homeowners such as myself. It is. It definitely is
okay, So now I have a quick question on that because thinking about,
you know, how I'm going about gardening in the summer. I've got my
irrigation. It's keeping my containers happy. But oh shoot, now I need
to fertilize. Can I use this with like a v or a splitter at
my hose end so I can still have one end free for the hose to
fill up a bucket water and can et cetera. I definitely can for sure.
I mean, it's just two hose bibs, right, you thread that
onto one hose bib and your second host bib is available. So now I
probably you know, depending on how much you're irrigating, right, you may
want to not turn your holes on when it's irrigating. But you know,
if you're only doing five, six, ten pots or something, you probably
have enough water that you can do that as well. And if it's only
running you know, thirty forty or something, I'll find another time to do
it, you know. And in all this talk, as far as the
mechanics are concerned, I don't think we should lose sight of the fact that
the drip irrigation is really beneficial to the plants. If we are keeping water
off the foliage, maybe there's betritis or other issues, potential problems, Stacey,
I think it's just healthy to drip irrigate that water at the base.
Oh yeah, best tomatoes I ever had, best peppers. I mean,
if you grow vegetables and containers, drip irrigation is going to be a total,
total game changer. For you. Yeah, and your roses too,
right. The biggest thing, sure, the holes in the leaves of roses.
You know, well I'm thinking cucumbers, you know, I deal with
downy mildew, powdery mildew, and and that's just ideal for it. So
Tim, give us the raw rass speech. And by the way, we
are chatting with Tim Degeese. Site one Landscape Supply a national company. Correct,
Correct, you're in the US and Canada. Okay, Site one Landscape
Supply, Tim de Geese and uh, Tim, First of all, website
what is the website for site one? Site one dot com? Www.
Site one dot com And that's site s I t e like a landscaping site
because it can be a lot of different ways to go about this particular word.
You might get an optimologist site one. Yeah, exactly. And I
had a great question and went right out of my head. Well I have
a good question. So you know, I think that we've definitely made the
case. There's so many advantages. But I think a lot of people when
they start looking online or wherever for the system, they're kind of like where
do I start because there are a lot and they start to say, well,
this one does this many hundred feet. This one is two hundred feet
of tubing or whatever. How like, what is that first step to deciding
what your actual needs are going to be? So you can start researching a
kit or you know, however you're going to go about this, Yeah,
most definitely. So again you have to kind of almost work backwards from that
scenario, right, So with your drip pipe and your ematters, your point
nine gallons per hour, so figure out how many feet you want to run
this, right, and then you know, divide that or you know,
by twelve, and then you figure that all out, right, So,
so by measuring the space from your spigot, your your hose bib all around
to the area that you're getting your plants and everything else, right, and
then you'll figure out how many emtters you have times point you know, point
nine gallons per hour. Convert that to gallons per minute, and then it
tells you and is that flow rate pretty consistent through across all drip and micro
irrigation systems? Yes? Yes? And then you know with these emitters and
stuff like that. So we had mentioned you have some plants that might not
meet as much water as other plants. So then you would want to go
through. Okay, to put a point five gallon per hour on this one,
maybe the next one might be two gallons per hour, that sort of
thing. So you just got to kind of make a list of all the
different emitters or the water that you're requiring and then convert that to gallons per
minute. And then you know, a typical hostspecket you're gonna be about four
to five six gallons per minute, and you can easily measure your on flow
rate just with a bucket or whichever. Yeah. Sure, and Tim,
we've used that brown hose throughout this segment. But if I wanted to do
the Tim Allen thing, get a little more horse power. Is that why
you brought the black Yeah? So this is this is poly pipe. It's
a lot more rigid than this pipe. This stuff does kink a little,
you know, fairly easily. And so you know, I'm just thinking,
you know, I'm decks or whatever else, right, and you're going to
have this running all over the place, Somebody steps on it, kicks it,
whatever, it could kink easy. So then you could just do polypipe
or PVC as you had mentioned, But then you need glue, you know,
and with polypipe, and I don't think I've got a poly fitting here,
but you would want to put the fittings are are very similar to this.
However, you're going to want to put a clamp on that fitting just
to help it from getting pushed off. But it's it's just a way to
kind of keep it a little cleaner, neater, you know. I mean,
I guess that's kind of the downside. Without getting me. You could
run this under your deck boards, you could run it anywhere you want,
right, you know, to get it into your flower pots or whatever.
But however, you want to keep it neat. And that's the reason I'm
asking the question tim as far as horsepower is concerned, because all joking aside,
a lot of people will use these components for hanging baskets. If you
have numerous hanging baskets across the a front porch or whatever it may be,
somehow I got to get that water up there. You and I just question
if I have the pressure to do it. Yeah, and you will,
you know. I mean, I don't know if I would run more than
like four or five hanging baskets from the spaghetti tubing. But this is uh,
you know, this stuff is a lot more flexible, and you can
hide it a little easier that way, right, So you can go up
a column, you know, and then run it across your overhang or whatever
else. And then what you would do is you would just tee off of
that, you know, into each of your flowering basket down. Oh so
you're saying I would use that spaghetti as my mainline source. Yeah, I
mean I would come off your off of your controller with a larger pipe,
you know, and then when you're gonna go run up and say you've got
four hanging baskets up here, right, then I would just run my spaghetti
tube being up and over and then I would tee down onto that. So
now with that, you might not have as much water, and you might
want to water them a little longer, you know, then half a hour
or forty five minutes, just to make sure they get saturated enough, right,
especially since most people are doing ferns. So he goes there, you
go. So once you're on the front porch and they're dripping on your head,
you know they've been Yes, well, hopefully that should not happen as
much with drip as is compared to you know, watering with a hose where
you're not gonna have to worry about it overflowing the top, right. Yeah,
And if you start seeing water drip out of the bottom, then you're
watering probably a little too much, right, So no more you know of
those icky stains from the water dripping down all summer. It's I'm telling you,
I'm a fan. This is like getting me back in the spirit.
I haven't done it since I lived in New York, but I'm raring to
go now for this season. I'm going to do it this summer. And
fortunately I have tim on my cell phone my speed for when I will run
into trouble. But hopefully this has helped take some of the mystery out of
drip irrigation. Certainly beneficial for the plants and beneficial for us as people.
So with the drip to with the emitters, the inline drip there, can
you walk on that? So like say that you have it in a bed,
like can it take foot traffic? You have kids, you have pets.
I think that's a concern for a lot of people who do want to
drip in ground. Is it going to be able to take the daily abuse
of the yard? Yeah, yeah, I definitely will you know, any
kind of like if you put mult over top of it and stuff, it
will definitely help that out. But yeah, you can walk on this,
it'll be fine. I think with this stuff, you just want to be
careful that it doesn't get kinked off like that. Right. You can step
on it, you know, and it's not going to kink kick off.
So it's when you really bend it. It's when you bend it. So
a lot of people when they're putting this onto fittings and stuff, they're pushing
so hard and then it kinks over and they're like, you know, I'll
got it on, but then I got a big kink right there type of
thing, you know. So that's the important thing with this is not to
kink it off, but it can definitely handle foot traffic very well. Well
I don't know about you, Stacy, but Tim's given me some confidence.
Oh yeah, well I had confidence. I didn't have motivation, and now
I have a motivation. We got both two birds with one stone. That's
fantastic. Tim Degee's site One Landscape Supply. Tim, thanks so much for
joining us on the Gardening Simplified Show. I know our listeners and our viewers
are going to really appreciate this, and we have confidence and motivation to get
the job done this summer. Thank you, Yeah, no problem, Thanks
for having me well. Tim is obviously a fountain of knowledge pun intended about
drip irrigation, So if you want to hear our entire conversation and get everything
you can out of drip irrigation, please join us on the podcast or YouTube
version. In the meantime, I want to thank you Rick, and thank
you Adriana, and of course thanks to all of you for joining us.
We'll see you next week.