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What is a Cane Borer? There are several species of insect that are considered cane borers. These include the raspberry cane borer (Oberea perspicillata), the red-necked cane borer (Agrilus ruficollis) and the bronze cane borer (Agrilus rubicola). Both the red-necked and bronze varieties are types of flat-headed borers. Raspberry Cane Borer Info Raspberry cane borers are beetles that live their entire life cycle on cane plants. They are laid as eggs just below the tip of the plant....

What is a Peanut Cactus? Peanut cactus is a plant native to Argentina with the Latin name Echinopsis chamaecereus. It is sometimes called chamaecereus cactus. It is a clustering, or mat-forming, cactus with shallow roots. The stems are plentiful and shaped like fingers, or long peanuts. They can grow up to about six inches (15 cm.) tall and 12 inches (30 cm.) wide. In the late spring and early summer, peanut cactus produces gorgeous, large, reddish-orange blooms that cover much of the cactus clump....

What’s Wrong with My Bromeliad? Bromeliads are extremely resilient plants. Their cultural requirements are very simple, few pests bother them, and they thrive in indoor light. Bromeliad plant problems usually start with water. Too much or too little can affect the health of the plant and promote disease. We’ll go over the three most common bromeliad plant issues. Water Related Problems Watering is a very important part of bromeliad care. Too little and the plant dries out, too much and they are prone to stem rot....

Division allows each repotted part to grow and fill another container. Plants grow more quickly during their growing season. Some succulents are spring and summer growers, but many, like aeoniums, are winter growers. Check for each plant. Read on to learn more about dividing a succulent plant. When Can I Divide Succulents? While repotting and dividing a succulent is best done in spring, you can do it any time of year....

When Can You Transplant Honeysuckle? Can you transplant honeysuckles vines and bushes? Yes, you can. Just be sure you act at the right time. Despite its vining habit, honeysuckle is a woody shrub. In cool to moderate climates, it’s a deciduous plant that goes dormant in autumn. This is an ideal time to transplant. If you happen to live in a very warm climate where honeysuckles don’t go dormant, you have more choice in timing....

White Mulberry Info White mulberry trees (Morus alba) are native to China. They were originally brought to North America for silk production. White mulberry trees are the preferred food source of silkworms, so these trees were thought to be essential in producing silk outside of China. However, the bottom fell out of the silk industry in the United States before it even started. Startup costs proved much too high, and the few fields of these mulberry trees were abandoned....

About Kiwi Vines in Zone 9 Kiwi (Actinidia deliciosa) is a fast-growing deciduous vine that can grow 30 feet (9 m.) or more. The leaves of the vine are rounded with reddish hairs on the leaf veins and petiole. The vine blooms creamy white blossoms in midspring on one year old wood. Kiwi is dioecious, meaning plants are either male or female. This means that in order to set fruit, you need both a male and female kiwi in close proximity for most cultivars....

Chinaberry Bead Tree Information Native to Asia, chinaberry was introduced to North America as an ornamental tree in the late 1700’s. Since that time, it has naturalized across much of the south in the U.S. An attractive tree with brownish red bark and a rounded canopy of lacy foliage, chinaberry reaches heights of 30 to 40 feet (9-12 m.) at maturity. Loose clusters of small purple blooms appear in spring. Hanging bunches of wrinkly, yellow-brown fruit ripens in autumn and provide feed for birds throughout the winter months....

What is Bone Meal? Bone meal fertilizer is essentially what it says it is. It is a meal or powder made from ground up animal bones, normally beef bones, but they can be the bones of any animal commonly slaughtered. The bone meal is steamed to increase its availability for plants. Because bone meal is made from mostly beef bones, some people wonder if it is possible to get Bovine spongiform encephalopathy, or BSE (also known as Mad Cow Disease), from handling bone meal....

What is Boxwood Decline? If your boxwood shrubs are suffering from stress – like improper pruning, inadequate drainage, or cold injury – they may contract boxwood decline. This disorder can discolor and damage your mature plants. It can be caused by the fungus Macrophoma, which causes the oldest foliage to turn yellow. If you look closely, you can see small black dots on the dead leaves. These are the fruiting structures....

Avocado Tree Grafting Avocado growers get most of their fruit from grafted avocado trees. Grafting avocado trees is considered necessary in order to obtain a large crop of top quality fruit. Avocado tree grafting isn’t technically necessary to get fruit to grow. However, grafting can speed up the process of fruit bearing. If you grow an avocado tree from an avocado seed, you’ll have to sit with the seedling for six years before you see any fruit....

Ceanothus Bush Info Despite the differences between Ceanothus varieties, you will be able to recognize these plants by their distinctive leaves and flowers. Look for oval leaves with toothed edges. Each leaf has three veins running parallel from the leaf base to the outer leaf tips. Ceanothus bush leaves are glossy green on top, between ½ and 3 inches (1 and 7.6 cm.) long, and often spiny like holly leaves. In fact, the name Ceanothus comes from the Greek word “keanothos,” meaning spiny plant....

Symptoms of Cherries with Brown Rot The first symptoms of cherries with brown rot are browning of blossoms and small brown spots on ripening fruit, followed by death of small twigs. Infected blossoms often drop off the tree and gummy cankers appear on twigs between healthy and diseased areas. Fruit remaining on the tree may become mummified. The spores spread in damp weather, when you may see clumps powdery, brownish-gray spores on infected flowers and fruit....

Chionodoxa Glory of the Snow Glory of the snow bulbs are native to Turkey. They produce a mass of lovely star-shaped flowers with deep green strappy leaves. Each bulb bears five to ten blooms on thick short brown stems. The blooms are up to ¾ inch (2 cm.) across and face upward, showing creamy white throats. The most common glory of the snow bulbs produce blue flowers, but they also come in white and pink cultivars....

If you have one of these fruit trees in your home orchard, you’ll definitely want to understand the clementine growing season and when and how to harvest these sweet citrus fruit. Mandarins, Clementines, and Tangerines Let’s start out with the botany: what Americans call tangerines are actually mandarins — they are called mandarins everywhere else around the globe. The term “tangerine” appears to have been a marketing ploy for reddish-orange varieties of mandarins....

Growing Tomatoes in Containers It’s easy to grow tomato plants in pots. To get the most from container-grown tomatoes, you need to match the eventual size of your plant tomato plants to the overall size of your tomato planter box. For instance, smaller varieties are well suited to hanging baskets or window boxes, whereas you might want to choose a sturdier planter or 5-gallon (18.9 L) bucket for larger types. Make certain the pot is deep enough to accommodate the plant’s root system....

How to Use Verbena for Groundcover While some verbena varieties grow as bushes that can reach 4 to 5 feet (1-1.5 m.) in height, there are plenty of other varieties that stay low to the ground. Some are trailing plants that spread along the ground. They put out creeping stems that root themselves easily in the ground and establish new plants. Others are just low-growing, upright plants that top out at about 1 foot (30....

While robust, there are some issues that may cause these plants to struggle in the garden. Daylily leaf streak, for instance, can cause distress for both growers and daylily plants. What is Daylily Leaf Streak? When daylily leaf streak presents itself, the fungus Aureobasidium microstictum has infected the plant. Daylilies with leaf streak may initially show very few signs of infection. However, upon closer inspection, growers may first begin to notice some yellowing of the plant’s leaves along the midrib....

Bumps on Zucchini Although there may be an open-pollinated zucchini variety with bumpy skin, bumps on zucchini are not typical. Usually, bumps are considered a sign of one of the more serious zucchini problems, caused by one of many incurable plant viruses. Cucumber mosaic virus, watermelon mosaic virus, papaya ringspot virus, squash mosaic virus, and zucchini yellow mosaic virus can all cause these bumpy, deformed fruits. Symptoms of the many viruses in zucchini may bear close resemblance to one another, with common symptoms like scattered yellow patches on young or maturing leaves, leaf deformation, and irregular bumps or yellow spots on zucchini fruits....

Types of Sugarcane If you want to grow sugarcane and start to investigate how to go about it, you’ll find there are a lot of different sugarcane plants. It can be confusing, especially if you are reading information for farmers and commercial growing of sugarcane. To help narrow down your options, there are a few basic types of sugarcane: Chewing canes. These are sugarcane varieties that have a soft, fibrous center which is good for chewing....