It's all too easy to send potted plants to the Big Nursery in the Sky, but what if you have a plant growing in your garden that you know is a major mistake? How do you kill it?
"Clearly, this is the last resort," says Mark Takemoto of the Urban Garden Center, "but it's a question we get. The first thing I tell people is that it has to be their plant. When somebody says, 'I want to kill a tree,' I'm pretty sure that it's growing next door.
"If it's in your garden and you've got the wrong plant in the wrong place, and you are sure you want to kill it, this is what you do. Cut it low and immediately apply full strength 41 percent Round Up to the freshly cut surface with a paint brush. You must do this right away - even 10 minutes later is too late.
"Or you can drill holes one-third the diameter of the stem with a power drill and pour full strength Round Up into the holes. For smaller plants, any brush killer from the garden shop should do the trick.
"To remove bamboo, cut it to the ground, fertilize it and water it until it is about 1 foot tall. Then spray Round Up on the stems and leaves."
But how to kill plants is not what most gardeners want to know. They want to make the best of what they have. The following pieces of advice have been gathered from a variety of sources, usually from successful gardeners.
Lawns, more than any other part of your garden, need water. To reduce the time spent watering - and your water bill, replace some of your lawn with native ground covers that are naturally not as thirsty as most grasses. Group plants according to their water requirements, planting the thirstiest ones closest to a faucet and hose. This means you can water these groups without saturating the entire landscape.
Pineapple plants are an interesting addition to the garden, and they should produce fruit after about 18 months. To initiate flowering, place a cherry tomato snugly in the center of the plant. The ripening tomato releases ethylene, a gas that causes pineapple to flower. Flowers should show up in about two months, with the pineapple ripening two to three months later.
Jade plants should bloom in the cooler areas of Oahu after seven or eight years. To produce the beautiful little star-shaped white flowers, the plant needs long nights, a cool temperature and minimal watering. Protect the plant from any light after the sun goes down, and it should flower.
Seaweed is an excellent compost activator and adding it to your compost pile will noticeably speed up the process of decomposition. Chop the seaweed and soak it overnight in hot water. Then pour the entire mix over the compost pile.
To grow crotons from cuttings, cut five- to six-inch pieces from the new growth and remove the leaves from the bottom three inches of the stem. Poke the clean stems of the cuttings into moist potting soil and place the pot in partial shade. Keep the soil moist and the cuttings should root in about four weeks.
Other than cactus, there aren't a lot of plants that will grow on an apartment lanai with strong sunlight all day. The sun will burn the foliage and heat the soil in the containers to the point that the roots die. To keep the roots cool use wooden containers or double pot plants, using a layer of mulch between the two containers. Plants that will grow in full sun include croton, lantana, bougainvillea and dwarf citrus. Herbs such as rosemary, sage and oregano grow well in strawberry jars on sunny lanais.
Spider mites are a chronic problem with houseplants. Since they hate getting wet, the easiest way to prevent them is to mist the plant's foliage, and don't miss the undersides of the leaves. When you add a new plant to your collection, place it away from the other plants until you are sure that it doesn't have any insects or fungi on it. Pests sometimes appear on houseplants because they were introduced on new plants.
Several slices off a dog's flea and tick collar tucked under the leaves and around the crown of low-growing container plants will repel aphids and other garden pests.
Gardenias will grow as houseplants, but it isn't easy. Keep the soil somewhat dry, avoid temperature fluctuations and drafts and never move the plant when it is in bud. Feed the plants with an acid fertilizer every three weeks and hope for the best.
Beer really does eliminate most snails and slugs. Pour small portions of beer into bottle caps and place the caps among the plants that are being attacked. The snails and slugs will consume the beer and go somewhere else to sleep it off. Other gardeners recommend raw potatoes cut in half and placed where the culprits congregate.
If the lower fronds and the new growth on your Boston fern are looking unwell, they may be stricken with a fungus that flourishes in warm and humid weather, and the fronds stay wet for a long time. Keep the crown of the fern dry, and water only in the morning, and infrequently, so the fronds dry during the day. Ferns will naturally die out in the middle if they are pot-bound, so divide and repot the fern when necessary.
And remember-Old gardeners never die, they just lose their bloomers.
