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Published on 10/20/01

Controlling Fall Weeds on 'Gardening'


UGA CAES File Photo

Walter Reeves

On this week's "Gardening in Georgia," host Walter Reeves shows how to control annual and perennial fall weeds. The show will air at 7:30 p.m. on Wednesday, Oct. 24, on Georgia Public Television. It will be rebroadcast at noon Saturday, Oct. 27.

Fall weeds can be grouped into perennials, which sprout from their roots every year, and annuals, which come up from seed. Reeves points out some annual weeds, which can be controlled with a preemergent herbicide that keeps seeds from sprouting.

Perennial weeds like nut sedge and wild violets are harder to control. Often the best technique is to dig up the plant, roots and all. Reeves uses his handy Water Weeder, Product No. AL829 from Lee Valley Tools, to unearth the roots of perennial weeds.

Wasted Space Below

A deck above usually means wasted space below. Ginger Burgess shows co-host Tara Dillard how to tackle that space below her deck. Sealing her upper deck created a dry ceiling for a lower deck.

It's surprising just how functional her new potting space is. Adding chairs and tables, with a ceiling fan to come, has turned an unused area into a usable patio room/potting shed.

Reeves is angry! He's discovered Asian ambrosia beetles in his prized flowering cherry tree. The beetles bore into the trunks of susceptible trees and deposit a fungus that clogs the trees' water transport tubes. Half of his tree is already dead.

Asian Ambrosia Beetle Trap

Plotting revenge, Reeves shows how to build a monitoring trap. He fills a plastic film cannister with denatured ethyl alcohol and inserts a cotton wick in the top. He puts the cannister in the bottom of a large plastic cup with large holes in the sides and water in the bottom.

Beetles attracted to the scent of alcohol fall into the water and drown, indicating that it's time to renew the insecticidal protection on nearby trees.

"Gardening in Georgia" airs every Wednesday at 7:30 p.m. It's rebroadcast every Saturday at noon. A Web site provides further information. The show is produced especially for Georgia gardeners by the UGA College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences and GPTV.

Dan Rahn is a news editor with the University of Georgia College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences.