Dan Boehlke Horticulturist

thehill.com

What is blooming in your yard on April 1st? These flowers are coming into bloom slowly as the weather warms and if the sun shines.

Our very fresh home made porch pots or twig pots will again be available at Country Aire Antiques where they will be on sale from December 5th through the 8th. There are not too many, so be sure to get there early as they are sure to sell out quickly. We also have a few antique lath stars decorated for the holidays.

The miracle of Monarchs! Plant Aster, Liatris, and other nectar plants for food and Milkweeds for larva rearing to encourage the Monarch butterflies and other species as well. This summer seems to have been kind to butterflies and we can do more to ensure their success.

Happy zucchini hunting! Hope you are having a good summer.

Vegan Trophy Hunter

Boehlkes Country Garden is having a sale at 6096 Jackson St. in CEDARBURG. Our Perennial Plant and Garden Decor sale is this Friday, May 31, and Saturday, June 1. Watch for our sign on Main St. south of downtown, Cedarburg. The sale runs from 9 to 4 each day. Lots of nice perennials, succulents, and garden themed decorations, all at inexpensive prices. All this along with other families collectibles! Come and join us!

Answers for the last Garden Geek questions are:
1. Glory of the snow; Chionodoxa forbesii
2. Scilla or Squills; Scilla sibirica
3. Snowdrops; Galanthus spp.
4. Grape Hyacinth; Muscari armeniacum
5. Dutch Crocus; Crocus vernus
6. Puschkinia; Puschkinia libanitica

Garden Geek No.5 The small dutch flower bulbs are often overlooked for the large tulips, daffodils and hyacinths. Can you identify these nice little flowers from the spring garden?

Shrub pruning no.2. This post will discuss what I call "drop crotch" pruning. The example plant is a standard Burning Bush, Euonymus alatus. These shrubs grow to small tree size and often need to be size controlled for their location. This is a good reason to know the size characteristics of particular plants, when placing them. When size control is desired, most often people will shear the tips all to one flat plane. This produces a solid mat of growth which acts like an umbrella, shading the interior of the shrub from light, leading to the overall weakening of the plant. The idea is to find a branch that you would like to shorten and follow the branch down into the bush and select a side branch or crotch at which to cut the selected branch. Repeat that with each branch, selecting a different depth into the shrub. This will produce fewer stubs and staggered new growth, thus eliminating the umbrella effect.

Garden Geek Answers:
3. American Elm, Ulmus americana. Because this tree is wind pollinated, the pollen is carried in the air all around us and irritates many people.
4. Native P***y Willow, Salix discolor. These are the male flowers that begin the season very early as silvery grey "pu***es". The yellow puffs are the staminate male flowers.

Garden Geek Questions- Everything is bursting into bloom right now so we have two plants to identify.
3. This is a early blooming tree, and the hint is that it is one of the culprits that are making allergy sufferers miserable right now. This flower is wind pollinated and has no showy petals. (first two pictures)
4. This shrub produces catkins, which have now burst into yellow powder puffs of staminate flowers. (second two pictures)
Have any ideas?

Garden Geek Segment - 2.
The answers to last weeks question was: American Hazelnut, Corylus americana. The female flowers is a tiny rose-magenta dot on the diagonal russet stem in the lower center of the second picture.
This week, we have another early blooming bush or small tree that produces elongated bright red fruits, what is this plant?