Episode 3205

- [Narrator] 20 years ago, this backyard was bare land. The homeowners planted trees, laid out garden beds, and accentuated the ravine. Now they enjoy a breathtaking landscape with sweeping gorgeous garden beds. Troy Marden takes us along on a tour. Tammy Algood encourages us to think beyond the typical herbs for the home garden. And Marty DeHart discusses three common problems that can affect roses and has recommendations on how to treat them. Come along. In this garden, it's shade-loving hosta varieties that take center stage.

- Sometimes a sloped lot can be a challenge. But just west of Knoxville, Tennessee, Mary and Chris Albrecht have created a garden over the past 20 years that takes advantage of just such a sight. Well, Mary Albrecht and I go back to my college days, so it is a real honor for me to be here walking through your garden with you. Thank you so much for letting us come. And you and Chris have developed this garden over the past 20 years and, from the ground up, literally.

- Literally from the ground up. It was a bare farm, it used to be a farm, and it was spare land. We had this channel running through here, and that was one of the features we really wanted. We had to remind the contractor not to fill it in. He wanted just fill it in, and we're like, no, leave it be. And so we've laid the rock, we've developed the garden, and this is the oldest part right here.

- [Troy] Right, so you didn't, you had some, obviously a few big trees. But you've planted most of the trees yourself. And over 20 years created kind of a shady garden.

- [Mary] Yes, well, we had a lot of shade. We had that stump of a hackberry that only was removed a year ago. And so we had a lot of shade to begin with. And then of course we loved trees, so we planted a lot of trees, somewhere around 20 to 25 different trees over the years. Most of them about 15 to 20 years ago. And we started with the shade garden. I've always loved hostas, so that was the focal point, was the hostas. Ferns, and then the companion plants that go along with hostas. And then I have friends who know I love plants. So I get plants as gifts and try to find a place to put them in.

- Right, and I say the same thing all the time. Plants collect me. You know, I collect plants, but plants also collect me.

- They find their way to your garden.

- They do. So you have some interesting things in here. I love the brunnera with the silver foliage. That's a nice companion plant.

- Yes, it is.

- [Troy] Sometimes we don't see that as much over in the other end of the state, because it doesn't like our heat and humidity in the summertime quite so much, but. And your edgeworthia?

- It has, I was afraid I was going to lose it after the December freeze. In fact, you can't see it, but one of the bottom stems has a huge crack in it. And I was thinking I was gonna have to prune it back. But I've been waiting and waiting and it's doing fine.

- And it's rallied.

- It's come back.

- So the unusual thing about the edgeworthia is that it flowers in the middle of winter. Like late January, early February.

- Yeah, typically late, yeah, that's about when it flowers. But you know, when it flowers and you're walking past, all you can do is smell it.

- It's incredibly fragrant.

- It's wonderful.

- Yeah, yeah. Lots of hostas, you already mentioned.

- Lots of hostas, yeah.

- And everything from little tiny ones.

- Yeah, I've got a lot of minis, and most of them are in pots in another part of the garden. But I tend to gravitate towards the really big ones.

- Right, I do too.

- But, you know, that becomes a space issue.

- Sure, sure. Yeah, I love those hostas that get five feet across. And have big foliage.

- And I've got a few of those. I've got a few of those.

- Other kinds of favorite companion plants in here.

- Well, my husband dearly loves the astilbes, and he loves red astilbe, so I always try to find some red astilbes to add to the garden. And you know, I have to admit, I like them too. A lot of ferns, the hellebores, the Lenten roses, we started with a lot of them over in that area that were just seedlings that just reseeded from a friend of ours. They were neighbors, you need some of these for your yard. Okay, and over the years we've added named varieties. And of course those I maintained so that they don't reseed. 'Cause I want to keep the named varieties in their place. But, and I do have a few butterfly milkweed to help with the butterflies. And we--

- Good pollinator plant. And one for the monarchs.

- And the bees love the hosta flowers, they're normally covered with bees or hummingbirds, we'll get hummingbirds in on them.

- I was just gonna say I the hostas in bloom at the house now, my hummingbirds keep going back and forth too.

- Yes, they love them.

- So we've moved across your dry creek bed now. Not always dry, you said it does does actually carry water. It's there for a purpose. And now you have this kind of green island back here on the backside of the yard. Again, lots more hostas, some of your big ones that you mentioned earlier, but some other really interesting architectural plants too, like the Acanthus.

- [Mary] This is acanthus morning candle. And it's been here for about two years now. This we call our keyhole bed. And we have the Delaware pink azalea, which is a cutting off of another plant that we have. And we're gonna let it just eventually fill in this area. But we've got a bunch of different hellebore varieties and of course more hostas. And then the lilies unfortunately have already bloomed out. But they were very striking before, they were blooming before the acanthus was in flower. So it was a nice sequence of events. And then on the other side we've got another large hosta called Dancing Queen. Or is it Dancing Darling? It's one or the other. I've got both.

- [Troy] Nice, nice ruffled edge on that one.

- [Mary] Yes it is. and it's done flowering. It had some very nice tall spikes on it.

- [Troy] You know, a lot of people don't think about flowers on hostas.

- You're right.

- [Troy] But I love them when they are in bloom. Again, we mentioned earlier, the bees love them, the hummingbirds love them.

- [Mary] And the breeders are working towards a red flower. That's one of their goals. Now, I haven't seen one yet, but they're working on it.

- They're working on it.

- Just like they're working on the red petioles on the leaves. They're trying to get more red into the plant. But yeah, hostas come in from white through pale lavenders and into deeper purples. So there's a lot of variation that most people don't even think about. But I'm not interested in breeding them. So when they're done flowering, I don't want the seed to take away from the plants. So I remove the flower stalks when I'm done.

- Remove flower stalks, yeah, yeah. And then that way all the energy goes back into the plant to building the plant. Not to to going to seed.

- Yeah, exactly.

- So how many varieties of hosta do you have?

- I have around 225 varieties I think.

- That's a pretty good collection.

- It it's a good collection. It's grown over time and I didn't realize how many I had till I started paying attention to the number of labels I have to make.

- Right, right, well, you know, and like we've already mentioned, the nice thing about hosta is they come in every size from, you know, an inch and a half or two inches tall to five feet, so you can really mix them in, and tuck them in and tuck little plants up in next to bigger plants, and it's really.

- And I tend to plant, so they're spaced at--

- Maximum.

- Not maximum, but close to maximum, 'cause I want 'em to fill in. I'm not one that digs and divides and moves things.

- I want to see a clump.

- I want a clump. I want 'em to look spectacular.

- I'm with you.

- I want them to look what they're supposed to look like. Like that's some Sum of All. And it's got huge foliage. And it's starting to really show off. And that's what I want.

- Sure. And you've got a nice patch of Sweet Woodruff over here. I know we were talking a little bit about dry shade. And that seems to be a plant that really is taking the dryness over here a little bit better.

- Than some of the hostas are, so yeah, I have to rethink this area because of the redbud just having such a high water demand on the soil.

- Sure. You know, it's nice to even create these little vignettes with potted plants. And in this case, Mary has used carnivorous plants, like these pitcher plants, just in containers. She says they're hardy, they stay out all winter long, and as long as you keep them damp, they're bog plants, so as long as you keep them damp during the summertime, they grow just fine in containers. Well, in addition to plants, you also have some nice pieces of garden art here and there.

- Over the years we've added a few pieces. We have the fish from Fish in the Garden. And they're just whimsical, they're cute, they're fun. Our granddaughter dearly loves 'em.

- [Troy] Right, and then they're in the river of--

- And they're in the river of acorus, the acorus, the Japanese sweet flag. And they always kind of get a lot of people commenting on those. So we, when we travel, we always, you know, pick up plants, or find something for the garden. And we just enjoy adding a few things for people to talk about. You know, it's more than just the plants. There's other things that you can do in a garden.

- [Troy] Sure, well, it has been an absolute pleasure to be here. So good to see you after all this time.

- [Mary] It was great.

- And who knew that, you know, one day so many years later, here we would end up on television together of all things. So thank you so much for having us.

- You are welcome, it's been a real pleasure. I thoroughly enjoyed us reminiscing and having a good time, and visiting and helping you out.

- Thank you.

- What a beautiful herb garden that the Nashville Herb Society has put in here at Cheekwood Botanical Gardens in Nashville. And we have an expert, Cindy Winker with the Herb Society. And I have to say fellow enthusiastic cook. And you're in charge of this wonderful culinary herb garden that I'm envious of. Let's talk about some herbs that are a little different. Because we know 'em and grow 'em as far as basil, parsley, oregano, but you've got some unusual ones.

- We do, we have some really fun herbs. The lovage is a really great place to start. It looks like celery, acts like celery, tastes like celery. You can use it as a celery substitute in cooking. You can, it makes a great straw for a Bloody Mary because the stems are hollow. So when you cut that stem off, you've got a lovage straw and you can use it to decorate your Bloody Mary and doubles as a straw. It is perennial here. So you can see this is a new one, but you can see the small ones that are beginning to come up after the winter.

- And for some reason my grandmother called this smallage. But it doesn't stay very small, it can get pretty tall.

- About two feet. So it will get about two feet tall. But you know, the interesting thing about herbs, they've been with us since the beginning of mankind, so they have all kinds of legends and stories. And so your grandma probably had some, something that mattered to her.

- Exactly.

- And that's why she called it smallage. But it will get about two feet tall. And cut it back in the wintertime, and mulch it heavily, and it pops its little head right back up in the spring.

- And obviously it's a sun lover.

- Sun lover, and most of these, like the sun, you know, a little bit of shade in our hot Tennessee afternoons doesn't hurt. None of them are offended by that.

- That's right, and neither am I.

- Yeah, exactly, exactly.

- And let's go over here to this other one that I absolutely love, sorrel. So tell me all about this, because a lot of people don't think of it as an herb.

- Right, and I think it's one of those herbs that can almost be used as a vegetable. Used as a little bit of both. But it is one that would enjoy some afternoon shade. And we get more shade than you realize here in this garden. It is perennial. It will pop back up again, do the same thing, cut it back, mulch it, and up it comes. This is a plant from the last several years. So this is new, newly sprung this year.

- And I tend to use it kind of like spinach.

- You can use it like spinach, you can pop it in some eggs, you can do all kinds of things. But it has a bright flavor that really livens stuff up. It makes a great lovage soup. And those recipes are, you know, kind of all over the internet. You know, but it makes a great soup, good in them. And any of those things that you could use spinach for, really.

- That's kind of how I use it. And mine, I never get it to bloom, because I'm cutting on it all the time.

- Mine at home bloomed and I thought, how'd that happen? so yeah, I do, we pop it off.

- And let's talk about another brightener. Lemon Verbena.

- Lemon verbena has become one of my favorite herbs. It is not perennial here. It is in warmer locations, but it's not here. Occasionally it will winter over and come back up in the garden, but it is only occasionally. You harvest it when it's at least 10 inches tall. You usually cut about a quarter of the stem off, cut it at a joint. So it continues to, you know, bush out and multiply. It is the most intense, of all the lemon scented herbs, It has the most of that per square inch of all of the lemon scented herbs.

- It almost, it's kind of got a sticky feel to it.

- It does, it does. And so when you cook with it, you make a lot of syrups with it, or a lot of infusions, and you strain that out. I make a great verbena cream that I pour over berries in the summertime that I have tossed in a lemon verbena syrup. It's delicious.

- It's very perfumy.

- Very perfumy. And you usually want to make some sort of infusion outta those leaves because they're hard. They're a little sticky. And so it really works really good. You have to chop it really, really, really fine if you're gonna use it in a cookie or a cake or a bread. You can use it as a substitute for lemon vests, I mean zest. I'm sorry, how many times have you gone, I need lemon zest. I don't have any. We can pop into the garden. You can harvest some lemon verbena, chop it up really, really, really fine. Then you've got a substitute for lemon zest.

- And let's talk about one that we don't normally think of as another herb that obviously does, again, very well.

- It does, it likes, it will get kind of tired in the summertime.

- Salad burnet.

- Salad burnet. that's exactly right. Again, one of the things I love about herbs is that they kind of have this really interesting history. And the Romans carry that into battle with them because it's also medicinal, and it controls bleeding. So they would carry that into battle with 'em, thinking if they got a wound it could prevent the hemorrhage and save their lives. But it's in the rose family, which I think is kind of unusual. And you can use the leaves in eggs, salads, anything that wants that bright, bright flavor.

- Yeah, it's just kind of, it's one of those things that in my mind that, what is that? You taste it but you're not exactly sure what it is.

- Exactly, exactly.

- But it's delicious.

- It's a fun easy, and all of these are really easy herbs to grow.

- Well, and that's what we like, don't we? We like things that just kind of take care of themselves.

- Exactly, exactly.

- And speaking of taking care.

- Speaking of taking care of itself, and everybody else.

- We have got horseradish. And tell me how you have done this. Because you've got this in a pot.

- So we have it in a bottomless pot. Horseradish is considered invasive. It will absolutely take over. There's several plants in here that would have a main taproot, and that's the big horseradish that you would see if you bought it fresh. You can dig it, cut those taproots off, or cut the little extensions of the tap roots off. Stick 'em anywhere, they will grow everywhere. If I were to dig this up and think I had completely eradicated it, next spring, I would come back and it would be here.

- So you, it just fools you.

- Yeah, yeah. You harvest it, generally it's a long time to harvest horseradishes, so if you plant it in the spring, you wanna harvest it in the fall. And you can, there's a lot of ways to preserve it. I think the best way is cold and dry. Cool and dry somewhere. But it's, you can eat the little leaves, when you get these new little leaves down here, they have a little bit of a pop. And you can cut them up, put it in a salad. And it has just a little pop in your salad. It's a fun thing to grow as long as you contain it and don't let it take over your garden because it will.

- Does this need a lot of water? 'Cause it looks like it would.

- It gets water pretty regularly. I don't think you can overwater it. You know, you can over water any tuberous and then they just turn to mush. So once it's established, you have to let, I would let it dry out between waterings, or let nature take care of it.

- And when you pick the little leaves, you're picking the babies.

- I'm picking the babies.

- You're not doing anything with these right here.

- These are bitter. But these little babies just are pop.

- Cindy, what about this makes it so invasive? This horseradish?

- Well, this is the yummy part. It's also the invasive part. These are the roots of the horseradish. And these babies will just spread and spread and spread underneath the soil so much so that you don't even see them because they're so pervasive, invasive. But this is the yummy part. This is great to put on your meat, that you can use in the culinary part. But they are--

- And it gets much bigger. Like you said.

- It gets much bigger. The taproot, these were the side runners off of the taproot in my garden. The taproot in my garden will be about that big. It will be really large.

- What about the flowers? Can you do anything with that?

- Tammy, I've not done anything with the flowers. And I let mine go again because it's kind of wild. And I get the horseradish off it, which is really what I'm growing it for.

- I suppose it would be a great garnish.

- Correct, correct. But I've not ever used them for anything specific. So herbs that can be dried, and almost all of these are able to be dried. Thyme and winter savory is another, herbs that we haven't even talked about this morning. But you can just harvest them. You harvest them in the morning when they're, early in the morning, they're at their most flavorful. Let them dry out on their own. And then you can use a dehydrator or you can use a grocery bag, a brown grocery bag. Take the dry herbs. When I say dry, I mean not wet with moisture, water or whatever you've washed them with. Let that go away. Put them in the brown paper bag, roll it up nice and tight, stick it in a cool dark place. And then weeks, go back, pull 'em out, strip 'em off, put 'em in your jars, and you have them all winter long.

- Cindy, y'all have an annual plant sale.

- We do.

- And it's every April. And you sell how many?

- 10,000 plants.

- Wow.

- It's really, the event that allows the Herb Society to sustain itself. And I think that the reason that is important is that we also have a grant branch of our Herb Society. This year we awarded $8,900 to 11 community agencies that are in food, that really serve food challenged communities to teach 'em how to raise the herbs to help them really begin to be more self-sustaining. And we think that community service is really important. We support this garden entirely, we have another garden that we support in Centennial Art Center. So we provide a great service, we think, to the community.

- I believe it.

- And that plant sale is a sustaining feature that allows us to continue our operations. We'll have some new stuff, fun stuff. And the history of all these herbs. Herbs are really the gift that really keeps on giving. 'Cause all of these, generally, all of them can be dried and used all winter long. So they're truly a gift to our soul and our palettes.

- And you know what, Cindy, you are a gift to us and our viewers. So thank you so much for this.

- Well, you're very welcome.

- And your knowledge of this. And we love what you're doing. Thank you for the Herb Society and for helping us today.

- Well thanks for letting us talk about it.

- Great.

- If you love roses and you grow 'em, you really need to know about some common problems. And today we'll talk about, we're gonna look at two common problems that you can fix and one that you can't. First we're gonna talk about if you've ever gone out and noticed in the spring that your rose leaves are just being decimated, little holes chewed through, usually from the bottom, and it's making a lace like pattern out of your leaves. And just your whole plant looks ratty. That's rose sawfly. And it's easy to control. with a chemical called spinosad or spinosad, people pronounce it differently. This is actually an organic solution. You just mix this concentrate up with water, spray it, and it's a bacterial extract fermented that the little worm eats and it kills it. It doesn't hurt anything else. So this is a, well, it can hurt bees and stuff, but be careful how you spray. Don't spray it on open flowers. All you have to do is spray the foliage. And this will take care of the problem. The other thing of course is black spot. And even knockouts will get black spot. They just don't, they resist it. So they'll get a few on lower leaves or interior leaves, and then you don't see it much. But other kinds of roses get super kinds of black spot. This is what I use, triferine. There are other things, you can use NEEM, which you have to be careful. It can burn the foliage in the hot weather. Super organic growers have done a thing where they use baking soda and water in a spray, and it gets some results for black spot with that. Those are the two things you can cure. Here's the disease that's relatively new on the scene. In the last 15 years it's shown up. This is incurable. This is called rose rosette disease. And this is a Coral Drift. You can see part of the plant is normal. Part of the plant is this distorted, congested, twisted, obviously something's very wrong with it. Distorted foliage, it's often thread-like. The new growth is often very red. Although that doesn't necessarily mean rose rosette disease, because knockouts, for example, have new red foliage naturally, as do some other types. But these, this kind of dense, almost witch's broom-like growth. There's a ton of little tiny, a forest of little spines that's diagnostic of rose rosette. This disease is fatal. It's basically a virus-like disease that is born in the plasma of the plant. It's in the tissues of the plant. And because it's fatal and because it is communicable, you have to get rid of it. If you see a plant that's starting to get these, get rid of it. And you have to dig it entirely out of the dirt. If it's aN own root, like a knockout, just dig it out. Don't worry about getting every last scrap of root out. Just get rid of it. and don't throw it in the trash. You're best off burning it actually, if you can. but completely get rid of the rose. Bundle it up in a plastic bag or something. Don't combine it, don't put it in the compost or whatever. If it's a grafted rose, be ardent about getting all of the root mass out. because any part of that root stalk that can live and send up a sprout is still diseased and can reinfect other roses nearby. Now, how does this disease spread? There's a little bitty teeny tiny mite. This mite is so small that it can drift on the wind. It can hitch a ride on a bee's back basically. It's so little. And that's how it gets from plant to plant. Wind borne is a big problem. And this mite spreads in usually in the warm weather, usually spreads this disease this way. It can also be spread by gardeners. You never, ever, when you see this kind of thing on your plant, don't think I'll save the plant. Part of it's good, I'll just cut off this bad stuff. Every cut you're infecting your clippers. And if you don't disinfect your clippers between every cut, you're gonna spread it. The next time you cut another rose with those clippers, you've infected it. Don't do it, just get rid of the plant. Bite the bullet, ditch it. So the good news is you can have roses. Even with the prevalence of rose rosette disease, you can control it in your garden. You just can't control it in an individual shrub. Just get rid of it, yank it out, and operate cleanly, and you can have wonderful roses, and good luck with them.

- [Narrator] For inspiring garden tours, growing tips and garden projects, visit our website at volunteergardener.org and find us on these platforms.