Did you know that there are 2 conditions that kill more plants than all the bugs put together that attack our plants? We talk more about these two situations with customers than any other plant problems. Are you ready for this? One situation is too much water(poor drainage) and the other is too little water(drought conditions). I know this sounds like double talk but this all boils down to stress, and I mean severe stress, on the plants’ system. When we understand this it really isn’t difficult to take care of the situation so let me try and explain this here in as few words as possible so that you get the drift.

If you have heavy clay soils in your yard, and who doesn’t here in the Miami Valley, you need to do a simple test of the soil’s drainage where you are going to plant, especially if it is a plant that requires really good drainage, or in other words, can’t sit in water for more than an hour. Most of the good plants that we would like to have for several years fall into this category. If you will notice you don’t see many happy rhododendrons, azaleas or andromada and some desirable trees in this area and one of the reasons is that we have heavy clay soils.

The simple test for drainage consists of digging a hole about 6” X 6” by12” deep. Fill this hole with water and let it drain away. As soon as the water has soaked into the soil fill the hole the second time, this time the water should soak into the ground within an hour. If this doesn’t occur your soil does not drain adequately to support growing plants that require well drained soils. What happens during rainy periods is that the air pores in the soil fill up with water and remain saturated for extended periods. When the roots are deprived of air they begin to deteriorate and rot. When several cycles of saturated soils occur in a relatively short period of time, for a few weeks or even months, the plant declines because the roots system is shutting down due to a lack of air to the roots. Here is a schematic that shows this.

The other stress that affects plants is the lack of moisture and this occurs primarily when plants are newly planted and the roots are still in the original root ball. Another time this situation is critical is during extended drought periods. Remember that newly planted plants need frequent watering for up 2 years when the plants finally have adequate time to get their new roots far enough out into the soil where they are growing.

So it can be too much or too little water that causes the majority of life threatening situations for plants. Hopefully this info will help to keep this in the forefront of your mind when you are working with your plants.

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32 years of growing
Meadow View Growers
www.meadowview.com

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