Now that the weather is consistently below 90 degrees F, you can start to fertilize your roses again, if necessary. Don't fertilize just to fertilize. Get your soil tested (if you haven't already) to find out if you need any additional minerals to make the ingredients in your fertilizer available to the root systems of your plant. If your soil test shows your soil is adequate, no need to fertilize. 

If you do need to fertilize, make sure your roses are thoroughly watered the day before applying any fertilizer.  Especially if you use a non-organic fertilizer, as it will burn the plant. After applying the fertilizer, water again. 

You can alternate your fertilizer with fish emulsion if you wish. Use a fertilizer that has a greater percentage of (P) phosphate in relation to (N) nitrogen and (K) potassium. This will help to create stronger root systems and resistance to stress. 

If you grow roses in pots (like me!) use half the recommended dose of fertilizer but apply it every two weeks. You can alternate between liquid fertilizer and dry fertilizer until 30 days before the "first frost date." Normally, for Fresno, that is  right around Dec. 1. In our mountain areas of the county, that is (usually) about the middle of November. 

You can go ahead and lightly prune your roses once the high temps are consistently below 90 degree F. This is not the "big prune" that you will do in a couple of months. Deadhead any spent blooms down to about the third leaflet below the bloom. A leaflet is where those 5 or 7 leaves come away from the cane. If you can, prune to an outfacing bud. Cut about one-quarter inch above the bud. Make sure you wipe your pruners with a alcohol wipe. That will help to stop the spread of diseases. You can take off any dead leaves but again, be careful to not expose the canes to too much sun. The sun can still burn your plants this time of year. 

Keep inspecting your irrigation system to make sure it is functioning properly. Your plants in pots will need to be watered more frequently than the ones in the ground. Make sure you have mulched your roses to help them retain moisture.  Three to four inches of mulch is recommended around the drip line of the plant. 

Check your roses for spider mites and thrips. They love the type of weather conditions we are having. A good blast from the hose (especially under the leaves) will help to get rid of them. I am still getting some minor damage from grasshoppers on my roses. They have been prolific this year. I have found all sorts of baby ones! They love to chew on certain varieties that I grow. If you can get over the ick factor, hand pick them off the rose bush when you see them.  Again, if you can get over the ick factor, you can cut them in half with your clippers. It also seems that since I have some California native plants next to my roses, the baby grasshoppers seem to have a preference for them over my roses. California native plants bring all sorts of beneficial insects to your garden, so I highly recommend planting them. 

New roses and Rose of the Year

Now is the time to start to think if you want to add any new roses into your garden. Soon the catalogs and mail order nurseries will have the new varieties for 2024. If you decide to add, order early! 

Look at which roses are just not doing well in your garden or ones that you may not like. Sometime roses are prettier in the catalog than in the real-life growing conditions of your garden. I generally give a rose three years to perform well in my garden. If it doesn't, then out it goes. Yes, this is difficult. You can give the rose away to someone who will love it or put it in the compost heap. A rose should make you happy and thankful that you have it in your garden. If not, there are literally 18,000 other roses out there that you might enjoy. Don't be afraid to check them out at your local nursery, a rose catalog, on-line rose nursery, etc. You can always look up a rose on Help Me Find Roses to see the reviews, pictures and how it might do in your yard. You can use the search engine on Help Me Find to look up antique roses, climbers, purple roses, etc. 

The American Rose Society has announced their 2023 Rose of the Year. The members of the American Rose Society throughout the country (me included!), rate roses each year as to how well they do in their garden. Are they drought tolerant, have little to no diseases, attract a lot of pests, grow well in their garden conditions, etc.  This year the awards went to the following roses: Celestial Night, Sweet Spirit and Petite Peach. 

The color of Celestial Night is considered mauve. It is a floribunda rose developed by Weeks Roses (located in the central valley!). It was hybridized by Christian Bedard and introduced in 2019.  It received an overall garden rating of 8.7 out of 10.  

The choice for the Fragrance Award went to Sweet Spirit. Sweet Spirit is a red blend grandiflora from Meilland (in France but you can get the rose here). It also has an overall garden rating of 8.5. 

There is also a "no spray" division of roses as well. The 2024 winner is Petite Peach discovered by Teresa Byington.  It is quite disease resistant.  It is a orange-pink to apricot miniature rose and a sport of the rose Petite Pink. It is very floriferous and will be introduced through High Country Roses. It is rated as an excellent garden rose. 

Until next time . . . "As delicate as flower, as tender as rose petals, choosing to be tender and kind in a harsh environment is not weakness, it's courage."  Luffina Lourduraj

The look of neighborhood yards has changed radically these last years. Landscape designs that feature highly-manicured, constantly trimmed, raked, and groomed lawns and planting beds are disappearing, by necessity. Traditional formal plantings (visualize rose beds inside boxwood hedges) are being replaced by drought and heat-tolerant California native and pollinator-friendly plants and trees better suited to our Central Valley climate and better able to survive extreme heat spikes as well as the high winds and heavy rainfall that come with atmospheric river 'bombs.'

Mulches are always recommended as covers for bare soil in the landscape for water conservation, soil temperature moderation and weed prevention, but the thinking on mulches is changing. Wood chip, straw and cedar shaving mulches are expensive and they release minor amounts of nutrients into the soil as they decompose. Leaf mulches from your own well-established trees or your neighbors' trees contain 50 to 80 percent of the nutrients the tree extracts from the air in a season.

 

The rapid composting method is one easy way to create leaf compost, but leaves that have not yet been composted can also be used as mulches. Leaves that fall from some deciduous large landscape trees (Japanese maples, liquid ambars, Chinese pistache) can actually be left intact to use as mulch underneath the trees. Lighter-weight leaves will break down fairly quickly during the fall and winter months.

Rake or spread the leaves to maintain an even depth of about two inches. Thicker layers of whole leaves can block water and oxygen as the leaves break down and become compacted. You can add more leaves as the leaf layer breaks down.

Leaves from evergreen broadleaf trees like Southern magnolia and California bay take longer to break down and should be shredded before being used as mulches. A three- to six-inch layer of shredded leaves is optimum underneath the trees' canopies.

Use a mulching mower to shred the leaves or a shredder. Shredders are now smaller, lighter and less expensive. The one-time cost of a shredder or mulching mower will soon recoup the repeated expense of buying mulches every planting season.

Shredded leaves can be used as a one-inch deep mulch layer on lawns. Spread the leaves thinly so that the grass blades show through. Add a two- to three-inch layer of shredded leaf mulch to cover your planting beds in winter, keeping the mulch a good four inches away from stems and trunks to prevent rot.

By spring the leaf mulch will have turned to nutrient-rich leaf mold that can be dug in as a soil amendment. Uncomposted leaf mulch will be host to many insects, insect eggs and pupae including butterflies, moths, spiders, ants and beetle species. Remember to leave some areas of bare unmulched soil in your garden to provide habitats for ground-nesting bees.

Leaves from trees that have had fungal problems (anthracnose, fireblight) or pest insect infestations (whiteflies, scale, aphids) should not be used as mulch. The wintertime decomposition process will not create enough heat to destroy fungal spores or pest insects and their eggs.

Sources:

www.familyhandyman.com/article/leaf-mulch

https://xerces.org/blog/midwinter-tasks-for-pollinator-gardening 

Pick a bouquet of herbs in the early morning to retain flavor. Keep them in a vase and use them all week.

Tasks

• Monitor soil moisture after rain and water if needed, especially for trees and shrubs.
• Renovate cool-season lawns – remove thatch and aerate.
• Hand pick snails and slugs in the early morning or use bait. Avoid baits that contain metaldehyde as they are toxic to all vertebrates.
• Monitor drainage after watering container plants to be sure plant roots are not standing
  in water.

Pruning

• Sharpen your pruning tools in preparation for fall pruning.
  
  

Fertilizing

• Do not feed citrus and other frost-tender plants.
  
  

Planting

Fall planting continues

• Annuals: stock (Matthiola incan), forget-me-not (Myosotis), Iceland poppy (Papaver nudicaule), pansy, violet.
• Fruits and vegetable: Swiss chard, turnips, snow peas, plant from seed
• Perennials: Lupine (Lupinus), plant from seed.
• Trees, shrubs, vines: sago palm (Cycas), Ceanothus maritimus ‘Valley Violet', magnolia,
  myrtle (Myrtus), flowering cherry (Prunus), oak (Quercus).
  
  

Enjoy now

• Annuals and perennials: dianthus, aster (fall-blooming), Mexican blue sage (Salvia
  leucantha), pansy (Viola).
• Bulbs, corms, tubers: spider lily (Lycoris), Sternbergia lutea.
• Trees, shrubs, vines: Texas ranger (Leucophyllum), sweet orange (Osmanthus), cape plumbago, snowberry (Symphoricarpos).
• Fruits and vegetables: apples, bok choy, cantaloupe, persimmon, snap peas, tomatoes.
• Fall color: goldenrain tree (Koelreuteria).

Things to ponder

• Use organic mulch around permanent plants, and add organic matter into soil to prepare beds for spring planting.
• Spray hedges and shrubs with water to clean and keep them free of dust to discourage spider mites.

In 2020, when libraries were shuttered due to COVID-19 and the public, sequestered at home, began developing greater interest in gardening, an idea took form in the mind of Clovis Library assistant Amy Johnson. She wanted to capitalize on the library's community reach to create a space for swapping vegetable and flower seeds and keep people gardening.

With buy-in from her supervisors, support from the Clovis Friends of the Library, and help from library aide Angel Hernandez, a seed library was launched in March 2023 housed in a vintage card catalog cabinet in the foyer of the Clovis Library (1155 Fifth St., Clovis).

“Our seed library is pretty simple,” Johnson said. “We take donated seeds, package them into single-serving envelopes intended for small garden use, and then we let the public take what they want. We don't require a library card, there's no check-out, no due dates. The idea was to keep it simple and easy to use.”

Even with a second seed library at the West Fresno Library branch, 188 E. California Ave., the concept is ripe for duplication in mini libraries, churches, community centers and among groups of friends and neighbors.

The materials needed to start a seed library are minimal: seeds, packets or envelopes and a storage container. Other materials may include labels, a catalog and participation log sheet. Keep the cost low by reusing an old shoebox to store the seed packets or invest in a sorted storage cabinet.

What are the benefits of a seed library?

Variety and genetic diversity. Seed libraries promote the use of more types of plants, unusual varieties and greater genetic diversity than seeds found in commercial settings.

Lower cost. Seeds can be expensive. The seeds in a seed library are free.

Disease resistance. Compared to transplants, growing from seed reduces the risk of introducing diseases into your garden.

How to save seeds for a seed library

There are a variety of ways to harvest seeds, but it is important to always collect seeds from healthy plants and healthy produce. When choosing what to grow for seed saving, consider growing open-pollinated varieties. It is also important to note which plants self-pollinate and which cross-pollinate.

Let seeds mature on the plant before collecting. Clean and dry seeds, then store in a cool and dry environment. Label and date seed packets, keeping note of color, season, sun/shade preferences and other available growing information.

For detailed seed-saving instructions, see Seed saving: Connection to the past and a link to the future by Margaret O'Neill, UC Master Gardener coordinator for UC Cooperative Extension San Bernardino County.

The Clovis Library will host a Crop Swap from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. Oct. 14, to give gardeners a chance to meet for trading seeds, sharing information and building community around a common interest.

“We're always on the lookout for opportunities to partner with other community organizations to bring new classes and programs to the library,” Johnson said.

Read more:

Saving seeds: Select, collect, store, sow, UC Master Gardeners in Marin County

Why Save Seeds?, UC Master Gardeners in Marin County