- Howdy, I'm John Hart Asher.

This week on Central Texas Gardener, it's tree planting time.

Ben Gillilan from Grizzly's Hidden Falls Nursery & Landscape helps us pick the right ones.

Designer Paige Oliverio shows how to control runoff with rain gardens that feature beautiful, pollinator-friendly native, and adapted plants.

Daphne Richards highlights your garden photos, and herbalist Corey Gusnowski plants winter herbs.

So, let's let growing, right here, right now!

- [Announcer 1] Central Texas Gardeners' 30th season is made possible by Lisa and Desi Rhoden; supporting a love of gardening and nature for all communities.

- [Announcer 2] Wanna know what happens to your recycled plastic?

Since 2004, HEB has turned 58 million pounds of recycled plastic into things like composite decking, and Field and Future by HEB trash bags.

You can learn more at ourtexasourfuture.com.

(bright upbeat music) - Designer Paige Oliverio Controls runoff with rain gardens that feature beautiful, pollinator-friendly native, and adapted plants.

One of the important things about the Rain Catcher program, goes beyond just catching rain, and that is a focus on neighborhood resilience, and climate resilience, and response to climate change.

My name is Paige Oliverio, I'm with the Rain Catcher Austin pilot program, and we've been working on this pilot program in a small area of Austin for a little over five years.

The area that was chosen to first pilot this program is connected to Waller Creek, so we chose to use the watershed boundaries to pilot this program with 1500 residences in Austin.

The Rain Catcher Pilot program is designed to educate neighbors about rainwater catchment, creek health, and also neighborhood resilience when you're connecting people to each other.

- My name's Larry Morse.

- I'm Jessica Morse, and I have a lifetime love of gardening, and planting, and birds, and all the insects.

And so 20 years ago or more, I actually put in a complete zeroscape with native plants in the front yard.

And as we were having more difficulty with flooding, I heard about this program, and I thought it would help me have water for all my native plants, and it would also help with rain mitigation, flood mitigation for me and for the neighborhood.

- In Central Texas, the rain patterns all come, rain all at one time, maybe one, two, three inches at a time, and then no rain for several months.

So when we're capturing that optimal window of rain from anywhere from like one inch of rain, to three inches of rain, that's gonna give us enough rain in storage tanks to last for several months to support trees throughout a drought, and to keep the soil healthy and rich.

Systems in Central Austin are sized for the amount of impervious cover, the amount of hard surfaces that you have on your property, like roofs, and sidewalks, decks, driveways.

For the typical, the average house in Central Austin, that kind of square footage would dictate usually between catching 1500 to 3000 gallons of water in some way on your property, holding it, and letting it soak in.

We do that with a combination of rain tanks, and rain gardens.

- So this is a very interesting grand experiment we did in the front yard.

We have three cisterns, a large one in the front yard, and when it overflows there are pipes running underground under our path that lead to this basin in the front yard.

And so every so often, if we get, I think it's two or three inches of rain or more, it will overflow, and we'll have for about 24 hours water in that basin.

When there's not rain, and there's not water in the basin, there are lovely plants.

And those plants are selected so that they can withstand that temporary flooding.

- Quite often if it's possible on a property, we encourage people to plant new trees that help shade the street, they help mitigate heat island, and they add beauty to the walking areas and the public areas of the neighborhoods.

With the kind of weather that we get in Central Texas, it's really hard to offset the flash flooding that's typical to this region.

And programs like this would not be able to address flooding in that way.

What we can do with this program is address water quality that does end up in the creeks.

And so a program like this keeps rain from just sheeting off of the hard surfaces, and even sheeting across the typical lawn that might have fertilizer, that'll keep those contaminants from leaving the property, going into the stormwater system, and going into the creek.

A lot of people know what a rain tank is, but a rain garden is a little bit of a mystery for some folks.

It can be as simple as a depression in the ground, a rain garden, that has grasses growing in it.

You can have rain gardens that have a gentle slope so that you can mow your grasses, but typically rain gardens are gonna be vibrant basins shaped into the ground that'll hold a little bit of water for a couple of days, and support beautiful perennial plants, tall grasses that have deep roots that help water soak into the soil.

And lots of, usually lots of perennial plants that come back each year, have lots of flowers, support bees, butterflies, hummingbirds.

In this rain garden we three types of salvias, all of them are in the purple family.

We have Mexican Honeysuckle.

There are several sedges at the edge, in the basin, where they're gonna get more water.

There's Woolly Stemodia and Lindheimer Muhly.

There's a Cenizo bush and a yellow bells.

There's also Mexican mint marigold, which is edible.

And rain gardens can be really good for some edible herbs as well.

Sometimes we'll plant rosemary on the high berms, and then we'll plant things like mint and other things that like water down in the basin.

You can get really creative with the types of plants that you have in a rain garden.

Here, we usually try to stick with plants that are pretty easy to care for.

A lot of times we have first time gardeners who haven't had something like this to tend to, so we suggest plants that are native to the area and that are common at nurseries so that people can make a garden that they can really tend to if they've never tended gardens before.

Lots of mulch weeds, we use lots of mulch in the basin after it's shaped.

A rain garden is basically a depression in the ground that's planted and mulched, instead of a flat yard surface.

When we remove some of the square footage of just lawn, we are doing a lot to help revitalize the soil in that space.

Healthy soil is gonna hold a lot more water instead of it just running right off into the street.

What happens too is we end up with a cooling effect.

In the summer, we have some data from a heat camera that we've been able to zap the space of a rain garden and get a temperature reading for that area.

And then the space right next to it that might still be lawn, and get a temperature reading for that area, and there's been a temperature difference.

So rain gardens have a cooling effect.

- We thought it would take over a year for the plants to come in.

and I think it was like eight months.

And it's kind of fun when the pond does fill up, then there's a whole nother ecosystem that comes in, and you get bugs, and you know, tadpoles and things like that, it's fun to watch.

- We have designed cities to flush water away, away quickly from our homes and our properties.

What happens when we do that is we lose the soil system that's here, that's healthy, that keeps our trees strong and beautiful, keeps our neighborhoods cool, draws people outside, because it's nice and it's beautiful, and people connecting to each other.

- We created another little pocket over here for us to sit in two chairs, so we can just sit and watch our garden, even if there's no water in it there, the grasses are blowing in the breeze, and we're next to the street, and we have people come up and ask us about this unusual garden we have in our front yard.

- Hey folks, you know that fall and winter are the best time to plant trees.

So today we're thrilled to talk trees with Ben Gillilan, owner of Grizzly's Hidden Falls Nursery and Landscape in Nolanville.

How are you doing sir?

- I'm doing fantastic.

- Wonderful, well thank you for coming, how did you get started with your nursery?

- It fell in my lap, really, okay?

I started in landscaping when I retired from the army in August of '03, and did that for quite a few years before they were getting ready to shut down the nursery in our town.

I said we can't have that, so I jumped in with both feet and wow.

It was close to drowning but we pulled it through, and now it's doing fantastic.

- Well thank you for your service, we always appreciate that.

You're in Nolanville.

- Yep.

- Where exactly is that for those of us who don't know, and what type of soils, and what's the environment like there?

- Well, Nolanville is about an hour north of us, off of I-35, close to Belton.

And the soils up there are horrendous, like most of Central Texas, kelechi, straight limestone.

We get a few fingers of the blackland prairies up there, so it's hit or miss in how you're planting, but we deal with it.

- Okay.

What all do you have at your nursery?

We've got all kinds of trees, I mean from sizes from five to 30, to 45 gallon.

For plantings, we've got all the natives.

We just love our natives, and that's what we specialize in.

And then we've got a lot of the herbs, we've got a lot of the veggies, we've got all the annuals that people wanna dress things up with.

Multitude of shrubs, multitude of flowering shrubs.

It's a full service nursery with everything you can dream of.

- Okay, and y'all act and y'all install as well?

- Yeah, we do install, we'll do design, we do everything.

- Okay, one stop shop.

- Yeah, pretty much.

- Okay, so we've mentioned that fall winter is the best time to plant trees, what would you say specifically those months might be when y'all are looking to get trees in?

- Well, I push people to start planting really hard when the trees start going dormant.

So we'll start in November, in fact, we do these, a huge push in November to get folks going because they don't think, because the trees are going dormant, they're not pretty.

So I push them all through winter and even up into February, March.

And then after that you can still plant, but the best time is the fall/winter periods.

- I guess it's good that Arbor Day is around November 7th, right?

So, maybe you start to think about if you're gonna do, especially larger trees, smaller trees, you might be able to push out a little bit more from the fall and winter, but, larger trees, it just takes a lot more resources to get those established.

Yeah, you might want an instant tree, but maybe sometimes it's good to go a little bit smaller, 'cause it'll get there.

- Oh it will.

And you know, one of my favorites like that is a cottonwood, people wanna start as a big cottonwood, I said don't.

- Yeah.

- Start with a five gallon, or a 15 gallon and watch that thing grow.

You'll be amazed.

- Okay, well a lot of people think of just shade trees, but not a lot of folks have huge yards.

So we're gonna go through some of the trees that you've got, and some that you feel are really good performers for those who don't have 400 acres to grow a grove on, so to speak.

So for color and seasonal plants that really might flower a lot or attract pollinators, what about the Texas redbud or the redbud in general?

- Redbuds are amazing.

It's my favorite springtime tree, it's one of the first to bloom in the spring.

I absolutely love the Mexican redbud.

Doesn't get quite as tall, but it's just, to me it's more, even more harder than Texas redbud.

So when we push fall color, I don't talk about redbuds.

We push spring color, I talk about redbuds.

- And that's an understory tree usually too, right?

It's not necessarily... I've see a lot of folks, or I've seen in the highway them put it out in the blazing sun, and sometimes they can look a little rough, it's not that they won't survive.

- That's true, yeah, the leaves will yellow, they'll suffer a little bit from the heat, but they'll do all right, you just gotta baby them a little bit, but understory is amazing with them like that.

- Right.

Okay, what about the Mexican buckeye?

It's one of my favorite for a shady area.

- They are a fun tree.

If you run across those in the wild, and you see it, they're in the woods.

So it's a fun tree to plant, people don't think of them, so I push them on them on.

A lot of them don't like them 'cause of the seeds, they make a little bit of a mess with the seeds, but it's not that big of a deal.

- They're pretty cool.

- Yeah, it's cool, and it's they have a long bloom period, but when it does bloom it's a showstopper that's beautiful absolutely.

- And I've noticed them too on rocky cliff sides as well, like they're pretty hardy.

What about the mountain laurel?

- Mount Laurel's a fun tree.

You have to be very, very, very patient.

I've got one in my backyard that's 12 feet tall, and it's 15 years old.

I don't give it any extra love.

I enjoy that tree when it blooms, it's amazing.

So this past spring, mine didn't have any blooms.

And a lot of people in my area didn't have any blooms on them, I don't know if it's 'cause we had a drier winter or what, but it's a fun tree, a beautiful evergreen tree, but be prepared to to wait.

- To wait.

Yes.

And as a 80s kid, I have to say that the bloom smelled like the scented grape markers, that might be really weird.

- I always called it great bubblegum.

- So let's talk about some shade and larval host plants.

We're gonna talk about a couple of oaks.

I know Doug Tallamy is a big supporter of oaks, 'cause it's a keystone species.

What about Chinkapin oaks?

- Chinkapin oak is a fun tree.

I've got one in my own yard, it's probably 20 feet tall now, and I transplanted it of somebody else's yard, he didn't want it, it did grow fast enough for them, but they didn't care for it enough.

I stuck it back there thinking it wouldn't survive, and now I've got it for 10 years in my yard, and it's doing wonderful.

So it's got a great growth habit, upright, it'll branch out after several years to start getting some good shade.

Acorns aren't huge, so they're not that bad, so it's a good tree.

- Yeah, and those, that's in the white oak family, is that correct?

- Yes.

- And I've noticed the white oaks tend to be, for those people are worried about oak wilt, that the white oaks tend to be a little bit more resistant if you've got that in the area, versus red oaks, which are highly susceptible, and then live oaks, I mean they can all be affected, but it's a really hearty tree.

- Very hearty, very hearty.

That's one of the reasons I recommend those.

So what about the Monterey?

So that's technically it's range into Texas, I think it's Southern Texas, but it performs great here, right?

- Oh yeah, performs wonderful here.

The largest one I've seen in somebody's yard was about 40 feet tall.

- Okay.

- So it's a large tree, but it takes a while to get there, even though they're considered a moderate to fast grower for an oak, and they're semi evergreen, so that's what people go for.

- What about the, what you're calling the cottonless cottonwood?

So we're talking about cottonwoods earlier, tell us about this wonderful tree.

- The cottonless cottonwood, it doesn't make a mess.

So it's very appealing to folks that don't like all the cotton.

I discovered those, didn't discover, but, I learned so much about them going to Bigbend, we go down there annually, and we camp out in the backwoods, and they grow all over the spring areas.

Even when there's nothing visible, these trees have reached down and grabbed hold of that water, and they just thrive in our region.

And they grow five to six feet a year.

- Yeah, they get huge.

I mean if they've got a water supply, they can get real tall.

- Yeah.

- And we love to see them, up to your point on springs, or we see them by rivers a lot, they're really important tree.

And, I don't know, I like the cotton, I think it's kind of like fall or something.

You know, you get to go around with all the fluff going on.

So I don't know, I'm pro cotton.

Okay, well let's talk about some accent plants, and these are great for support for pollinators as well.

What about Possumhaw?

- Possumhaw is amazing.

It's my favorite one for the wintertime, because it's a big showstopper along the sides of the roads, the red or orange berries that they get right, draws the wildlife in.

So it's one of my favorites, and I push them for folks, but they get afraid of the berries.

Growing more trees, don't worry about it, just right, give us some life for the wildlife.

- Well, I would say, you don't have to worry about berries that much, 'cause inevitably you're gonna get cedar wax wings that are gonna get highly inebriated on the fermented berries, so they'll take care of that for you nonstop.

Okay, what about desert willow?

That's a hardy tree.

- That is an amazing tree.

It will survive with no water whatsoever.

They have the wonderful blooms when it's just brutally hot outside and you're just ignoring them.

The bubba is the one we sell down there, and they're relatively fast growing tree.

It's a fun tree, a beautiful tree that people just... It's a willow, no, it's not a willow, it's just what they call it.

- Right, right, right.

Okay, well let's talk really quickly about some common issues you see when people are planting trees.

So they're really excited, they've got this new tree, and then what are some of the problems you see?

- In my experience, it is almost always water.

So they'll dig a hole just as big as the root ball, and they'll plop the tree in there, and it's just, it's gonna grow in big circles.

So it just doesn't work, and we'll come out, we'll diagnose the problem, we'll make adjustments for them.

If they plant it themselves, I don't try to unplant it, 'cause that could be certain death if they've waited too long.

But we'll adjust their watering.

If they say they're watering every day and I check it and it's wet an inch down, then they're not watering right every day.

- We've said this a number of times on the show, but plant an ugly hole too, to your point about the girdling roots, is if you just do a thing that looks beautiful and you plop it in there, those roots are just gonna keep circling.

Really quickly too, something I've definitely seen is the mulch volcano, the dreaded mulch volcano.

Why shouldn't people do that?

- It inhibits growth of the tree, it'll cause disease.

It's just a horrible way to plant your tree to start with.

It will kill your tree eventually.

Well Ben, thank you so much for coming in and talk about trees.

Now let's check in with Daphne Richards, who joined Central Texas Gardener on September 21st, 2009.

(soft music) - Every time I step outside, I discover bees, birds, butterflies, and lots of lizards.

So we love it when viewers send us their own wildlife captures.

Amanda Millwee shared this fun video.

One day, her husband, Matt Nall, spotted this Cooper's hawk in their backyard, and happened to catch it as it took a little rest stop break.

Monte S. zeroes in on tiny discoveries like this snail, looking comfy on a cactus pad.

Another morning, he spotted a lit tiny link spider on his deep red celosia.

Thomas Arellano from Dickinson sent in a picture of this flowering elephant ear plant, which although it looks rather cold sensitive, is actually hardy to zone eight.

Fall's a great time for planting to attract wildlife, but there are some things we should wait to plant until after the last frost date next spring.

Cold sensitive perennials like Lantana respond better to spring planting, giving them almost a year to adjust before they see their first frosty night.

While most deciduous trees and shrubs are better off planted in fall, which provides extra time before they see their first sun blasting a hundred degree day.

No matter when you plant, be sure to check for pot bound, or circling roots.

Loosening and even cutting smaller roots will encourage them to branch and grow.

And if the root ball's dry, soak it in a basin of water for a few hours prior to removing it from the container.

Dig the planting hole twice as wide, but no deeper than the root ball, and backfill only with the native soil from the planting hole, if at all possible.

Be sure to firm up the soil around the plant to decrease large air pockets.

A plant that's firmed in nicely will be well supported and shouldn't need to be staked.

Water the planting area immediately and often.

New plants need more frequent watering for the first year, so pay close attention to temperature and sunlight as your plant becomes accustomed to its new home.

Mulching over the planting area will also help to insulate the roots as they grow, and will increase the soil's moisture holding capacity.

Just be sure not to pile mulch right against the base of the plant, which could cause rot.

We often hear from gardeners who need to move a plant, perhaps a special rose or perennial, or even a strub, or small tree.

Cool weather's the best time to move most plants, because cooler temperatures are much less stressful, and more conducive to growing new roots.

We'd love to hear from you.

Visit centraltexasgardener.org to send us your questions, pictures, and videos.

- One of Central Texas Gardener's early garden and studio guests was Ellen Zimmerman, founder of EZ Herbs.

And in 2017, she hooked up with Tricia Shirley about medicinal native plants.

- If Americans called it snake root, so you can even use it for snake bites, which- - I heard that.

- Which when she sold EZ herbs in 2020, Corey Gusnowski carried on the mission.

Today, Corey takes us into winter with healthy herbs.

(soft music) - Hi, I am Corey Gusnowski, owner of EZ Herbs Apothecary based here in Austin, Texas.

And I'm here today to talk about a handful of herbs that are growing and thriving, and are fall gardens here in Central Texas.

And the ways that we can utilize those herbs to support our bodies through these colder winter months.

The first herb I'm going to talk about today is Cenizo, is also known as Purple Sage, Texas Sage, and Barometer Bush.

The Texas Sage is helpful to soothe a sore throat, or to support respiratory symptoms; congestion, coughs.

Next we are going to look at Chile pequins.

Chile pequins are about five times hotter than jalapenos, and are really helpful for moving things within the body.

So think about whenever you eat something really spicy and your nose starts to drip.

This is gonna help with moving excess mucus out of our respiratory systems, and it's gonna help to increase circulation.

They also contain vitamins that are really helpful to support our immune system.

The next herb that we're gonna talk about is this beautiful Rosemary.

A rosemary we're all very familiar with, we've used it in body care, and it's known for helping to increase concentration and memory.

But the way that we're gonna talk about using it during the winter is for again, warming.

The next herb we're gonna talk about is thyme.

Both thyme and oregano contain chemical compounds called carvacrol and thymol.

These are very potent antibacterial and antifungal compounds.

Thyme in particular, has an affinity towards supporting the respiratory system.

The last herb that we're gonna touch on is oregano.

Oregano, as we all know, is quite spicy.

It has a very potent flavor that lends itself to, again, increasing the circulation and warming our system.

A lot of times we will find oregano in health food stores in the form of oil of oregano and capsules, that can be really harsh on our systems.

Utilizing dried or fresh oregano, especially straight out of your garden, is going to be a wonderful way to include it in your recipes and really get the benefits that it has to offer your circulation, as well as those antibacterial properties.

It's going to be mutually beneficial to do a little harvest now.

We can go ahead and start drying these herbs.

They can all be used very nicely in teas, they can be added to broths, or you can dry them and grind them into a powder to use as seasonings for roasted veggies, roasted chickens, roasted turkey, this time of year.

These can all be also used fresh in fire cider.

It's a great way to infuse them.

They can also be infused into honey.

It's a great way to use it during the winter seasons, you can add the honey to warm tea, warm water, and then you get the benefits of both the soothing honey, and the herbs.

For Backyard Basics, I am Corey Gusnowski, with EZ Herbs Apothecary, it's a pleasure to be here talking to you today.

- Hey, check out centraltexasgarner.org for tips, resources, and watch online.

Until next time, adopt the pace of nature, her secret is patience.

(soft music) (soft music continues) - [Announcer 1] Central Texas Gardener's 30th season is made possible by Lisa and Desi Rhoden.

Supporting a love of gardening and nature for all communities.

- [Announcer 2] Wanna know what happens to your recycled plastic?

Since 2004, HEB has turned 58 million pounds of recycled plastic into things like composite decking, and Fields and Future by HEB trash bags.

You can learn more at ourtexasouruture.com.