How to Plant a Tree in Oklahoma Soil

Become a Master Gardener

Classes start in September each year. Register at our office on 15th Street for more information.

Garden

• Dig sweet potatoes and harvest pumpkins and winter squash.
• Remove green fruit from tomato plants when frost threatens.
• Harvest Oriental persimmons and pawpaws as they begin to change color.
  There is still time to plant radishes and mustard in the fall garden.
• Use a cold frame device to plant spinach, lettuce and various other cool-season crops for production most of the winter.
• Plant cool-season cover crops like Austrian winter peas, wheat, clover, and rye in otherwise fallow garden plots.
• Remove all debris from the garden to prevent overwintering of various garden pests.
• Start new planting bed preparations now with plenty of organic matter.

Lawn

• You can continue to replant or establish cool-season lawns like fescue.
• The mowing height for fescue should be lowered to approximately 2.5 inches for fall and winter cutting.
• Broadleaf weeds like dandelions can be easily controlled during October. Mow and neatly edge warm-season lawns before killing frost.

Landscape

While annuals provide a kaleidoscope of color, perennials are also a must to have in our gardens. They provide a wide variety of texture, shape and color that adds style and charisma to our flower beds. Most are herbaceous, which means they lose their foliage in the fall/winter and then re-emerge from the roots again next spring. They bloom once a year and grow in enlarging clusters such that every few years they become overcrowded, leading to a decline in blooms and an increase in susceptibility to disease. Therefore, while you don't have to replant these each year like annuals, their maintenance requirement includes dividing every few years. This thinning-out process improves overall blooming, allows you to control their overall size, and adds to your plant population.  

The best time to divide perennials is just after blooming has completed and the plant has gone inactive for the year. Plants that bloom early in the season are best divided in the fall, while the fall bloomers should be dug up and divided in the spring. Before digging up, water the plant well and trim the stems to about six inches long, as this helps to reduce water loss. When digging, be sure to keep as much of the root system with the plant as possible. Then, shake off the soil and either pull or cut the clump apart to get two or more divisions with roughly an equal number of roots and stems. To reduce drying out and overall shock to your plants, it is wise to prepare the new planting bed ahead of time so that the time the plants are out of the ground is minimal. The new hole should be amended with compost and a slow-release complete fertilizer. Discard unhealthy appearing plant parts.  

In general, the new division should be planted such that the crown (where the stem and roots meet) is at the ground level. One notable exception is Peonies, whose crowns should be about two inches deep. After replanting, they should be watered well to get the soil settled in and around the roots. After a couple of frosts, cover with 2-3 inches of any type of mulch. After winter, remove the mulch to help the ground warm up and they will soon reward you with new growth.  

Hostas are a very popular perennial for this area. Sometimes they will produce very well then, over time, bloom less. Take a look to see if they have lost their favorite shady spot. If they have, they should be transplanted back to a more shady location. They can tolerate a half day of morning sun but perform poorly if exposed to the hot afternoon sun. They can be successfully moved in either the fall or spring. Now is actually a good time to move them, as it gives the plants about 30 days before our first average frost in early November. If moved in the spring, do so just after new growth emerges.

For more information on perennials, please visit our website or call the OSU Extension Office to speak to a Master Gardener.  Happy Fall Gardening!

Building a New Flower Bed
So you want to build a flower bed. You could just dig a hole in your yard and drop those pretty plants you bought at the nursery in it. They might grow-for a while but then again they might not grow at all. If you really want to get your money's worth out of those plants, there are a number of factors you need to consider.

When building a new flower bed ask yourself, "where?" Select the location in your yard you would like to have a flower bed. Now ask yourself, "what?" Think about what types of flowers/plants you like. Do you like annuals, perennials, or a combination of the two? Do you need sun loving plants or shade loving plants in your selected location? Are they hardy in our zone? If a plant is not hardy in our zone, it is considered an annual and will not overwinter unless you are willing to do the extra work of digging it up every fall and replanting it every spring.

Once the decisions of where and what are made, there is still a lot of work to be done! So get on your garden duds and get rid of all those weeds and turf. You can do all this with good ol' manual labor, or you can take a shortcut and kill it off with a suitable chemical. Always read the label and pay careful attention to the instructions. You don't want to put those pretty plants in the ground too soon after spraying.

Now we have bare soil, but we still aren't ready to plant yet. Now the soil has to be prepped, amended and fertilized. Why? It improves the tilth, texture, aeration, and drainage. Add 3-4 inches of any combination of the following organic matter: peat, compost, leaves, dry grass clippings, well-rotted manure and fertilizer. Exactly how much fertilizer you will need is best determined by having a soil test done through your local extension office. Till this combination into your soil about 6-8 inches deep, but before you do, test the soil moisture. Grab a handful and squeeze it into a ball. If it crumbles when touched then till away, but if remains a tight ball, wait until it dries out a bit.

When should all this work be done? It can be done in the fall, in the spring or both. But once you are done you will be ready to plant those beautiful flowers. Don't forget to rake the soil even and add a slight slope for drainage and for heaven's sake don't water them to death! Enjoy your brand new flower bed.

Rejuvenating an Existing Flower Bed
Suppose you have an established bed...what should you do for next spring? You start with a little TLC in the fall. You don't have to dig everything up but you do have to put your garden to "bed" for the winter. Whether you have an annual bed, a perennial bed or a combination you have to clean your bed. You don't like sleeping in a dirty bed do you? Well neither do your plants!

Why must the flower bed be cleaned? It eliminates hiding and breeding sites for disease and pests. So pull up all the dead annuals, herbaceous plant debris, diseased perennials and cut back the healthy perennials. This should be done when the plants begin dying back as the temperatures cool, and should continue until after the first killing frost. After that happens, you may cut back healthy perennials to ground level, if you wish, but this is not totally necessary. They can be left until spring especially if they add winter interest.

My bed is clean-can I go to sleep now? Not quite yet, because  we still need to add the bedding. If you have an annual bed, just add some organic matter and till it in. Cover it with 2-3 inches of mulch and wait for spring. A perennial bed, on the other hand, should not be tilled, as we don't want to disturb the established root system. Just add 2-3 inches of mulch in the late fall. This is especially important to protect newly established plants from damage in case of heaving during the freeze and thaws of winter. More established perennial beds don't require as much protection but mulching them would still be beneficial. One last thing; cooler weather does not mean your plants no longer require water, so continue watering and make sure you get them one last time before the ground freezes because they aren't dormant yet.

At this point, all that is left to do is take it easy, and wait for spring!