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Education

• Could you please explain what is the university extensions and does it have any requirement to join the extension?

Family

• Do you have tips on gardening with children?

Food and Nutrition

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Garden

• By the end of June, our apple tree looked sickly, with faded, curling brown leaves. I am wondering if the leaves look the way they do because my husband doesn't spray regularly or because the tree is not getting enough water in our arid climate. When he does stick to a schedule, it seems that the leaves don't look much better. This is a tree that is nearly twenty years old. I have never noticed an infestation of bugs. Apples have gotten smaller and smaller by the year, most have worms. The tree is in our front yard and I really would like it to look healthy, regardless of whether or not we get eatable fruit. What should we do?
• do ants eat one another?
• How do I get rid of morning glory?
• How do I go about planting yams? We have already started the roots forming in a jar of water but need to know how to plant them. Thanks for your response. Duane
• how many eggplants do you get from one plant.
• I am wrapping up my garden for the year. I have been looking at adding horse manure to my garden soil to boost the organic matter in it. This year I added NutriMulch (turkey manure blend) and that worked out well, but was expensive. I'm concerned about the soil quality. I notice that it's pretty hard when in big dry clods. Would I be hurting my garden to add green horse manure now, and tilling it in? I've read a little about deficiencies in the soil because of too much horse manure, so if it's safe or even a good idea to add to a garden, how much is the right amount?
• I have 4 lovely crenshaw melons on my home garden vines -- 1 large, 2 medium, and 1 small. None of them have gone yellow/white yet! We survived the snow flakes last weekend (I covered everything), but I see we are about to get another "hit" this weekend! Is there ANYthing I can do to speed up their ripening?? I have cut back my watering of the vines, but sprinklers still go on automatically in the morning. Would any of the "usual" things people do to ripen melons indoors (paper bags, put them with a banana, etc.) do any good while they are still on the vine?? From everything I have read, if they are picked while they are still green, they will never ripen -- is this true? If I keep them well covered during our few nights of 32-33 due this weekend, will they survive on the vine to ripen?
• I have a climbing rose that I love and would like to take a cutting and start a new plant. What is the best way to do that?
• I have a lot of earwigs and spiders in my garden and flower beds. How can I kill them off without making my bed unsafe to plant vegetables in the future?
• I have a poinsettia that is about three years old. The first year it bloomed beautifully, then last year and now this year, just before the holidays, the leaves wither and fall off. I have not changed anything carewise. It is in an ideal place, gets plenty of dark hours, no drafts, filtered sun, and just enough water. Why is it doing this?
• I have cucumber plants that I started growing from seeds in march of this year. I replanted about 2 weeks ago into a 20 gallon tub. I put the plant in a back room where the sun comes in alot, it started growing really well then i put the plant out side during the day and bring it in at night. Since then the leaves have started turning brown on the edges and it doesn't look very good. I have a tomato plant also and it is doing just fine, its very green and getting bigger by the minute. Do you have any suggestions for me?
• I have just discovered an ant colony in my outdoor herb pot. I noticed soil build up around a couple of the herbs, thyme and rosemary and also soil build up around the drain holes. This pot is 20 inches across and 15 inches deep. How can I get rid of the ants without damaging the herbs or poisoning my family? Thank you.
• I have some pumpkins that are still green (October 9th). Is there any way they will become ripe?
• I have some shrubs that have been dying off in a wierd manner. Just sections at a time will completly die in a matter of a day or so, not even time to try and treat it. There are no outward signs of bugs and the rest of the shrub will be perfectly healthy. It has done this to more than one of my shrubs and also done this to more than one kind of shrub. It started last summer where I lost part of a couple and one hole shrub. I thought I had it taken care of by the end of the summer but when I mowed last week for the first time I noticed I have almost totaly lost another and there are spots on some others. The plants have been here for as many as 10 years or so and are very well taken care of. The only thing I can think of is about 3 years ago I put new plastic down and new bark, could the new plastic cause this.
• I have two Espalier apple trees and I would like to know when is the best time to prune them and should they produce every year or do they only produce by cycle's (every so many years)?
• I live in Dayton,Id. I seem to have a lot of trouble with blossom end rot on my tomatoes. What could I be doing wrong? To much water not enough or wrong fertilizer? Need suggestions.
• I planted 2 plum trees several years ago. The 3rd year I had a huge crop. The next 2 years the leaves had what I think is peach leaf curl or at least that's how it made the leaves look. I sprayed both years with no improvement. This year I've also sprayed but after blossoming, the leafing is very sickly, the leaves done even really form, they just make tiny clusters of pale spikes that look like tiny curled leaves. Is there anything I can so short of digging them out? Can they be saved or I am better off just starting from scratch? How to I make sure what is there doesn't contaminate the new trees? Thanks.
• I planted a garden last year and some animal kept eating it and we didn't yield anything from it. Aside from putting a fence around the garden is there anything else I could do?
• I planted tomatoes last weekend because it looked like we were going to have warm weather, but yikes! it says it will snow tonight. How can I protect my little tomato plants?
• I purchased several pepper plants from a local nursery this spring one of them I do not know if the fruit is a pepper. They are black fruit about the size of a grape, full of seeds, and they do not smell hot, all the others are jalapeno.
• I recently moved here from western Oregon, where they grew wonderful blueberries. Is it possible to grow blueberries here in Utah, Salt Lake County specifically? I've noticed that blueberries are not sold at the farmers' markets, and so far I haven't seen any blueberry bushes being sold in nurseries.
• I understand you have a service where you email spraying and care schedules to homeowners for home gardens and fruit trees. If so I would like to sign up. Please send me the info. Thanks, Mike