Category Archives: Gardener’s Checklist

Gardener's Checklist, October

Gardener’s Checklist

October 2021

Garden Maintenance

  • Text: Leaves are not litter. They're food and shelter for butterflies, beetles, bees, moths, and more. Tell friends and neighbors to just #LEAVETHELEAVESProtect overwintering butterflies, beetles, bees, moths and more beneficial insects by leaving the leaves!
  • Make more plants!

Webinar: Make More Plants! Fall Propagation of Native Perennials – CCE Tompkins County

  • Dig up tender bulbs and tubers (i.e. cannas, dahlias, elephant ears, caladiums, etc.) and store them for the winter in a cool dry place.

Storing Tender “Bulbs” for Winter – University of Wisconsin-Madison Extension

  • A pile of tulip bulbs
    Tulip bulbs

    Plant spring-flowering bulbs.

VIDEO: Planting spring bulbs is easy! – University of Minnesota Extension

Pest Watch

  • Cluster of several spotted lanterfly adults near an egg mass laid on the trunk of a tree
    Spotted lanternfly adults and eggs

    Learn more about the Spotted Lanternfly.

VIDEO: Spotted Lanternfly: A New Invasive Pest – NYS IPM

  • Help keep spotted lanternfly from spreading! This invasive insect can lay its eggs in any surface, so make sure you check your car and any items that have been outside when traveling, especially in areas of know infestation like NJ and PA.

Confirmed Spotted Lanternfly Locations – NYS IPM

Checklist for Residents – Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture

  • Info-graphic: Live in Tick County? Do a daily tick check!Report any sightings of Spotted Lanternfly in New York.

Spotted Lanternfly Public Report

  • Do a daily tick check whenever you spend any time outside!

VIDEO: Keeping Pests Out of Your Home this Fall -NYS IPM

Vegetable Gardening

  • Garden bed covered with row cover
    Row cover

    Remove and dispose any diseased plants.  Do NOT put them in you compost pile.

Webinar: Winterize your Veggie Garden – Cornell Cooperative Extension Tompkins County

  • Take some time to learn more about your soil and then get it ready for spring planting.

Webinar: Understanding and Preparing Your Garden Soil – CCE Tompkins County

Happy Gardening!

Wheel Bug - Large Insect with what looks like have of a gear on its back
The wheel bug (Arilus cristatus), a predatory bug that is commonly seen in the fall.
August, Gardener's Checklist

Gardener’s Checklist

August 2021

Garden Maintenance

  • Deadhead annuals and perennials regularly too encourage new blooms.
  • Consider adding some herbs to you perennial flower garden.

    Japanese Knotwwed in full bloom
    Invasive Japanese Knotweed

Webinar: Gardening with Herbs – Cornell Cooperative Extension Chemung County

Pest Watch

A silken fall webworm nest at the end of a branch full of caterpillars.
Fall Webworm Nest
  • Keep pests out of your home this fall!

Webinar: Keeping Pests Out of Your Home this Fall: From Stink Bugs to Mice – NYS IPM

  • Scout your lawn for grubs⁠—before you treat!!

VIDEO: Using IPM to Assess Your Lawn for White Grubs – NYS IPM

  • Dump out any standing water from containers in your yard to prevent mosquito breeding.
A very holey head of cabbage a result of feeding by the imported cabbageworm
Imported cabbageworm damage on cabbage.

How to Manage Mosquitoes in the Landscape – New York State Integrated Pest Management

  • Scout often for pest in your vegetable garden.

What Kind of Insect is Destroying my Plants?– Gardening in Orange County New York Blog

Vegetable Gardening

  • Rejuvenate your soil by planting a fall cover crop such as barley or clover.
Light purple clover flower against a background of green leaves
Clover makes a great fall cover crop.

Webinar: Cover Crops for the Home Garden – Cornell Cooperative Extension Tompkins County

  • Continue to remove weeds, as they compete with your garden plants for water, sunlight, and space.
Bottom of basil eaf covered with downy mildew spores
Basil Downy Mildew
  • Preserve your bounty.

Webinars: Food Preservation – Cornell Cooperative Extension Tompkins County

Happy Gardening!

Black Swallowtail on Lupine ‘Tutti Fruitti’
Gardener's Checklist, July

Gardener’s Checklist

July 2021

Garden Maintenance

  • Purple petunia bloomKeep weeding and mulching.
  • Pinch back petunias to encourage bushy growth.
  • Deadhead annuals and perennials regularly.
  • Keep lawn mower blades sharp.  Mow lawn high (2½ to 3 inches).

Pest Watch

  • Slug on a green leafCheck your garden for slugs and slug damage.
  • Dump out any standing water from containers in your yard to prevent mosquito breeding.

How to Manage Mosquitoes in the Landscape – New York State Integrated Pest Management

  • Colorado potato beetle larvae sitting on a decimated potato leaf
    Colorado potato beetle larvae

    Scout often for pest in your vegetable garden.

What Kind of Insect is Destroying my Plants?– Gardening in Orange County New York Blog

Vegetable Gardening

  • Cluster of Brussels sprouts on plant
    Brussels sprouts

    Keep tucking your indeterminate tomato vines inside the cages.

  • Sow cool season crops.

Virtual Workshop: Summer Planting for an Autumn Harvest – Cornell Cooperative Extension Tompkins County

Brown bullseye lesions on a yellowing tomato leaf
Early blight on tomato
  • Continue to remove weeds, as they compete with your garden plants for water, sunlight, and space.
  • Remove diseased or yellow leaves from tomato plant.

Got Blight? Which One? – NYS Integrated Pest Management

Go pollinators go!

Bumble bee on the petals of an echinacea bloom

Gardener's Checklist, June

Gardener’s Check List

June 2021

Garden Maintenance

  • Oscillating Sprinkler watering a gardenWater in the morning, allowing plants to dry before nightfall.
  • Continue to divide spring-flowering perennials.
  • Remove emerging weeds before they take over your garden.

Virtual Workshop: Gardening for Beneficial Insects: Bees, Butterflies, and Natural Enemies – Cornell Cooperative Extension Tompkins County

Pest Watch

Get your ticks tested for free! – Upstate Medical University

Spotted Lanternfly Look-alikes – Virginia Cooperative Extension

  • Close-up of a blood filled mosquitoDump out any standing water from containers in your yard to prevent mosquito breeding.

How to Manage Mosquitoes in the Landscape – New York State Integrated Pest Management

  • Scout your plants often for pests.

What Kind of Insect is Destroying my Plants?– Gardening in Orange County Blog

Vegetable Gardening

  • Seed green beans, radishes, and heat-tolerant greens every two weeks.

Vegetable Planing Guide – Cornell Cooperative Extension

  • Continue to remove weeds, as they compete with your garden plants for water, sunlight, and space.

Get outside and enjoy nature!

White spider camoflagued on a white daisy nabbing a fly

Gardener's Checklist, May

Gardener’s Check List

May 2021

Garden Maintenance

  • Remove dead leaves from flower and vegetable beds.

When can I clean up my garden…and still protect beneficial insects? – Biocontrol Bytes, NYSIPM

  • Divide perennials so they have more space to grow.  Give extras to family and friends.
  • Light purple lilac blooms
    Lilacs

    Remove flowerheads after lilac bloom.

  • Plant a cutting garden to create beautiful flower arrangements all summer long.

WORKSHOP: Growing and Selecting Flowers for Floral Arrangements –  Cornell Cooperative Extension Orange County

  • Remove emerging weeds before they take over your garden.
  • A short wooden tub set next to a tree overflowing with plants: a tall grass with red leaves, a bright green plant with white viens and a dark pruple plant spilling over the edge.Consider using container gardening to beautify your home, create a privacy screen and/or grow vegetables and herbs.

WORKSHOP: Creating Beautiful Container Gardens – Cornell Cooperative Extension Orange County

Pest Watch

Get your ticks tested for free! – Upstate Medical University

  • Watch out for snails and slugs in the garden.

Spotted Lanternfly Look-alikes – Virginia Cooperative Extension

  • Scout your stone fruit trees(i.e. cherry, peach, plum, etc.) for black knot.

Vegetable Gardening

  • Install supports for climbing vegetables such as peas and beans before planting seeds
  • Seed or transplant hardy vegetables such as kale, beets, peas, radishes, chard and carrots.

Vegetable Planing Guide – Cornell Cooperative Extension

  • Transplant warm weather vegetables and tender annuals after the last frost.

Patience is a Virtue in Planting Outdoors – Times Herald-Record

Play out in the rain!

A small child in yellow rain boots jumping in a puddle

April, Gardener's Checklist

Gardener’s Checklist

April 2021

Garden Maintenance

  • Evergreen tree with a large section of yellow needles
    Winter burn

    Examine evergreens for winter burn.  Prune out damage after new growth appears.

  • Carefully remove winter mulch from planting beds.
  • Fertilize roses as new growth appears.
  • Clump of white daffodils with bright orange centers and yellow daffodils
    Daffodils

    Get you soil tested before any major planting.

  • Cut flower stalks on daffodils, hyacinths, and other spring flowering bulbs as the flowers fade.  Do not cut foliage until it dies back naturally.
  • Divide and transplant fall blooming perennials.
  • Learn more about how to attract pollinators to your garden.

Creating a Pollinator Garden Workshop – Cornell Cooperative Extension Orange County

Pest Watch

Spotted Lanternfly Look-alikes – Virginia Cooperative Extension

Vegetable Gardening

  • Plant cold season crops early in the month  (i.e. onion sets, lettuce, radishes, spinach, turnips, leeks, etc.).

Vegetable Planing Guide – Cornell Cooperative Extension

Vegetable Gardening Workshop – Cornell Cooperative Extension Orange County

Stop and smell the daffodils!

Small child squatting in a patch of daffodils leaning over to smell one of the blooms

Gardener's Checklist, March

Gardener’s Checklist

March 2021

Garden Maintenance

  • Clean-up beds containing spring-blooming perennials and bubs.
  • Full Wooden Compost BinTurn your compost pile once it has completely thawed.
  • Learn how to trouble shoot your compost pile throughout the year from our Orange County Master Garden Volunteers.

Composting Workshop – Cornell Cooperative Extension Orange County

  • Wait to prune spring-flowering trees and shrubs until right after bloom.

Someone using a pair of pruners to remove a small branch (close-up)Pruning Ornamental Trees and Shrubs – Purdue Extension

  • Prune summer and fall blooming trees and shrubs.
  • Learn more about pruning from our Orange County Master Garden Volunteers.

Pruning Workshop – Cornell Cooperative Extension Orange County

HouseplantsHouseplants

  • Start feeding houseplants again and water more frequently.
  • Continue to monitor your plants for infestations and disease.

Houseplant Problems : Diagnostic Chart – University of Maryland Extension

Vegetable Gardening

  • Clos-up of a sugar snap pea pod growing on the plantPlant peas outdoors as soon as the soil can be worked.
  • Plant cold season crops at the end of the month (onion sets, lettuce, radishes, spinach, turnips, leeks, etc.).

Vegetable Planing Guide – Cornell Cooperative Extension

  • Wicker basket full of lettuce, tomaotes, peppers, beets, turnips,onions and a sprig of mintStart growing seeds indoors for warm-season vegetables.  Start tomatoes later in the month to avoid leggy plants in May.
  • Whether you are a beginner or an experienced vegetable gardener there is always more to learn. Sign-up for a vegetable gardening class.

Vegetable Gardening Classes – Cornell Cooperative Extensions

The ground is still covered with snow, but by the end of the month we should start seeing the first blooms of spring!

Floweres of a pink and white varigated Hellebore
Hellebore
February, Gardener's Checklist

Gardener’s Checklist

February 2021

Birds

  • Cedar waxwing bird eatting red beeries out of a treeRemember to check your bird feeders and keep them filled throughout the winter.

The Great Backyard Bird Count – Cornell Lab of Ornithology

  • As you think about the coming growing season, consider planting bird friendly plants in your garden

Recommended Plantings for Migratory Songbird Habitat Management – University of Rhode Island

Garden MaintenanceClose-up of snow on the needles of a spruce tree

  • Gently remove snow and ice from the branches of evergreen trees to prevent damage.

Winter Damage to Trees and Shrubs – Penn State Extension

  • Once the snow has melted, check your cold-hardy perennials for frost heaving.  Frost heaving is when your plants rise up out of the ground as a result of repeated freezing and thawing.  Carefully tamp your plants back into the ground a place soil around the base of the plant to cover any exposed roots.

Frost Heaving – Missouri Botanical Garden

  • Loppers cutting a branchThe best time to prune most trees and shrub species is will they are dormant. Remove suckers as well as dead and diseased limbs and prune for shape and airflow.
  • Wait to prune spring-flowering trees and shrubs until right after bloom.

Pruning Ornamental Trees and Shrubs – Purdue Extension

  • Learn how to properly prune your trees and shrubs.

Pruning Workshop – Cornell Cooperative Extension Orange County

HouseplantsHouseplants

  • The sun’s angle is changing.  Move your houseplants to ensure the receive proper light.
  • Prune overgrowth and remove dead leaves.
  • Continue to monitor your plants for infestations and disease.

Houseplant Problems : Diagnostic Chart – University of Maryland Extension

  • Transplant root-bound plants into larger containers.

Vegetable Gardening

  • Tray of cabbage seedlings inWant to get a head start on your vegetable garden, but don’t have space inside, consider winter sowing.

Successful Winter Seed Sowing – Penn State Extension

  • If you are planning on growing onions or leeks from seed this year, it is time to start those seeds.

Vegetable Planing Guide – Cornell Cooperative Extension

  • Assortment of Vegetables and Flowers - tomatoes, pumpkins, greens and flowersWhether you are a beginner or an experienced vegetable gardener there is always more to learn.  Sign-up for a vegetable gardening class.

Vegetable Gardening Classes – Cornell Cooperative Extensions

We are off to a snowy start to February and if Punxsutawney Phil is to be believed we are in for another six more weeks of winter!
Groundhog standing up straight on its hind legs looking out over the grass

Gardener's Checklist, January

Gardener’s Checklist

January 2021

Garden MaintenanceSnow covered house and landscape plants

    • Avoid using salt based de-icers near susceptible plants.

Salt Damage in Landscape Plants – Purdue Extension

  • Consider using an anti-desiccants to protect your evergreens.

Protecting Evergreens in the Winter  – University of Massachusetts Extension

  • Three deer standing is a snowy fieldReapply deer repellent on vulnerable shrubs as needed.

Using Commercial Deer Repellents – University of Maryland Extension

  • Do a daily tick check!  That’s right, ticks are active in the winter too!!

Winter Tick Activity – University of Rhode Island

African violets with pink flowersHouseplants

  • Make sure to check you plants at least once a week for signs of pest and other issues.

Houseplant Problems : Diagnostic Chart – University of Maryland Extension

  • Learn more about houseplant care.

Webinar Series: Houseplant Master Class – Penn State Extension

Sketch of several garden tools (i.e. rake, shovel, gloves, watering can, etc.)Tools

  • Sort out your hand tools. Repair and clean as needed paying attention to ones that you have not used.  Consider giving these away!  Choose a good location to store them and perhaps a container to organize them.

Maintaining Lawn and Garden Tools – University of Wisconsin-Madison Extension

  • Learn more about how to care for your garden tools.

Webinar: Care of Garden Tools – Penn State Extension

Vegetable Gardening

  • Pumpkin seedsSpring may seem to be far off, but it will be here before you know it, so it  is time to plan you garden!
  • Do a germination test to see which of your seeds are still viable and which ones will need to be replaced.

Home Germination Test – Cornell Cooperative Extension

  • Looking to change this up this year, check out what vegetable varieties other people like.

Bowl of tomatoes of all shapes, colors and sizesVegetable Varieties for Gardeners – Cornell University

  • If you had any disease issue last year, consider looking for varieties that have disease resistance.getting varieties

Selected List of Vegetable Varieties for Gardeners in New York State – Cornell University

Wishing you all a Healthy, Hopeful and Happy New Year!
Pumpkin covered with succulents surrounded by pine branches and lights