Land-Grant Colleges
Eric comments that extension has been around for a long time. It's part of the mission of the LAND-GRANT COLLEGES in the US. Talk to us about the scope and what extension does and their role with the universities. The extension service is a part of the land-grant universities and there are three pillars of the land-grant universities. There's one in every state, or, more correctly, at least one in every state.
Extension Services
Eric thinks there's so much that the extension offers, and a lot of people are not aware of the many SERVICES that they have right at their fingertips. They just need to reach out. Let's talk about that. James agrees, extension and the services offered by your local extension office are really going to be tailored towards the needs of the local community. As an extension agent, they are tasked with doing a needs assessment. They look at the communities that they serve and really bring programming, offer services that meet the needs of that population.
Master Gardeners-Volunteers For Extension
Eric knows one program that's under the umbrella of extension that many of our viewers know and have taken part in is the MASTER GARDENERS program. James agrees, Master Gardeners are volunteers for extension. Some of these people were Master Gardeners in their own right, they came to the program because they were very interested in gardening. But other people have come to the program really wanting to learn how to garden. So their gardening journey coincides with their Master Gardener training. The program's really set up to try and support extension agents in delivering information to residents.
Why Soil Analysis
Eric thinks one of the many tangible services that extension offers people is SOIL ANALYSIS. Why is it important that we know what's in our soil? James comments that unhealthy plants are more susceptible to disease, insects and weeds. So any problem might go back to the soil. Having a soil test lets you start from the ground up, helping you solve your problem. What that plant needs comes from the soil. What we're trying to grow also matters. If you're growing blueberries, that requires a different soil than if you're growing Hostas, in all likelihood.
Soil Analysis-What Are You Looking For
With a typical soil analysis, WHAT ARE YOU LOOKING FOR? The main parameters or one of the biggest parameters that they're going to look at is pH, below seven being acidic, above seven being alkaline. We know that the leaves are aiding photosynthesis and that feeds the plant. In addition, the roots bring in the water and are also bringing in the nutrients that a plant needs. Macro nutrients whenever we fertilize, are going to be N, P and K; nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium. These are the three numbers given on a fertilizer. And those nutrients can be added through a fertilizer or through organic methods, but those nutrients are only going to be available if they're not bound too tightly to the soil particles.
Taking A Soil Sample
Eric wants to go through the process of TAKING A SOIL SAMPLE and have James talk to us about what we should be doing when we're pulling our samples and the best way to get the best results. James shows us a bag from the University of Georgia that they will send to the lab in Athens. We need only about a cup and a half of soil, we really don't need that much soil to do a test, the representativeness of a sample is important. You're asking a question of your environment. What does this soil need? We need to think about how to get a representative sample. How to lay out this experiment in the right way.
Interpretation Of The Results
The other thing we want to look at is the recommendations and the INTERPRETATION OF THE RESULTS. What are you trying to grow? Another thing is dependent on what you're trying to grow, thus the depth at which you're getting the soil. We're going to use a spade today, which is a great tool to use. We really don't need to go that deep. For turf, we're looking at about four inches, if you're looking to get the soil right for your lawn, the relevant soil depth is about four inches. For a vegetable garden like we're going to do in this raised bed, it's going to be about six inches down in the soil. So we want to go down about six inches. James is using a bucket, you could use anything to collect the soil.
Common Questions
Eric is sure there's never a dull moment in James' line of work and gets to see so many different things. Every day is like a new day and solving a new problem. Eric would like for James to walk our viewers through some of the COMMON QUESTIONS he gets and some of the common problems he's solving and then what are some of the wildest things that he has heard? James agrees, there is never dull day, they’re never the same. This is not an office job. This is education, but not in a classroom for sure. They get a lot of questions around this time of year when grasses, lawns are greening up again and people get back out in their yards. They're starting to think about, what is this weed? One of the biggest things they do is identify weeds for folks.
Insect Questions
Eric is sure they also see a lot of questions about INSECTS too. Correct. Anytime an invasive species, especially an insect, makes it into the news, they get a lot of calls. "I think I have this." James had one fun site visit. Somebody was sure he had a hornet he had not seen before so James went out and visited. It was in a dead pine tree right next to the driveway. So they set up to try and get pictures. They were buzzing in and out. They were really patrolling, but James was trying to get a good photo of it so that he could investigate it or maybe give it to an entomologist at the university.
About 80% of American households participate in gardening and the ranks of younger gardeners is on the rise. The big favorites among this emerging generation of new gardeners are bold, colorful containers and vegetables. But, developing your green thumb is a lifelong endeavor. There are many amazing books that we can rely on to advance our knowledge of certain topics and there are shows like GardenSMART that seek to educate and inspire enthusiasts. In this episode GardenSMART taps into one of the greatest resources each gardener has right at their fingertips to increase their gardening productivity.
There are experts right in your area whose sole job is to research better ways to succeed with plants and educate the community. This multifaceted individual is your local county extension agent. From soil testing to diagnosing all kinds of problems, they're an incredible resource that many gardeners never utilize. Eric would like to introduce the GardenSMART audience to his local extension agent, James Herrin. James has worked for years helping gardeners in his community get the most out of every season. James, welcome to the show. Thanks so much for joining us. James thanks Eric and GardenSMART for including him in the show.
Eric has the warmest memories of extension, going back to when he was a child. His dad had an acre vegetable garden, and remembers the extension agent coming out and talking to him providing ideas like, "Okay, why don't you try this? We're going to put newspapers down in the aisles and put wood chips on top of them.” But a lot of it was new to him, and Eric remembers how impactful that experience was. So it's great to meet an extension agent again, it's been a minute since we've interacted. Eric wants James to tell us what his journey was, what was his path to finding extension?
James feels like he was recruited for extension early on also. In the fifth grade he was enticed by a video that showed a youth camp going to Rock Eagle, and he wanted to do whatever it took to be able to go down that water slide. But they said, "You have to give a presentation. You have to speak publicly on any topic.” So he won first place at the county level, and was able to go to summer camp. That was all the way back in fifth grade. Fast-forward to his junior year of high school trying to figure out what to do. His trigonometry teacher gave an assignment. It was the PERT formula, P-E-R-T. She gave us a catalog of all the classes and majors that you could have at public universities in Georgia. He was flipping through it and mistakenly read Fisheries and Aquaculture as fishing and said, "Well, that's the one I probably need to investigate. It was at the University of Georgia, Warnell School of Forestry and Natural Resources where he received a bachelor's degree and then a master's degree in Fisheries. His research focus was on nuisance aquatic species.
Eric wonders, do you work mostly with gardening and plants, or does your work cover a broad range of topics? As an extension agent, it's going to vary widely depending on what is going on in your county. James works in Fulton County which is a large county, a diverse county. They do a lot with homeowners. A lot of people have home vegetable gardens, but as well lawns or ornamentals. But they also have farmers. A lot of our farms are more diversified than larger operations. So James spends a lot of time trying to figure out how to meet the needs of this diverse clientele.
Eric comments that extension has been around for a long time. It's part of the mission of the LAND-GRANT COLLEGES in the US. Talk to us about the scope and what extension does and their role with the universities. The extension service is a part of the land-grant universities and there are three pillars of the land-grant universities. There's one in every state, or, more correctly, at least one in every state. They are public institutions dedicated to teaching, research and extension. Extension is bringing the research, the results of research to the people, to the folks in the state, the residents that are funding these public institutions. Extension is really the public education arm of that. Within extension they cover three main program areas. One being agriculture, which more people are familiar with. The other is family and consumer science, nutrition, healthy living choices, even financial awareness. And then youth development. That's another one that James thinks a lot of people know about, the four-leaf clover, 4 H. The role of extension changes based on where you are so it really is designed to meet the needs of the communities within a state. As populations change, economic drivers change. When extension started, most of our economy was agricultural. That was how people made money. That's where the families were, on the farms growing the food, and extension agents were bringing that research information to those farmers. The extension agents at that time were more like - "Hey, here's what we're finding, maybe you want to change or this could be a more sustainable practice, this could be more successful, resulting in an increased yield.” Extension continues that today based on where people are located and what they're doing in the counties.
Eric thinks there's so much that the extension offers, and a lot of people are not aware of the many SERVICES that they have right at their fingertips. They just need to reach out. Let's talk about that. James agrees, extension and the services offered by your local extension office are really going to be tailored towards the needs of the local community. As an extension agent, they are tasked with doing a needs assessment. They look at the communities that they serve and really bring programming, offer services that meet the needs of that population. And it's driven a lot by the questions they get. One of the most common things and ways that extension helps people is just responding to their questions. "I'm having this issue with my plants or with my lawn, I saw this insect. Can you help me figure out what it is?" And then they respond to those questions, that's really reactive programming. So extension can say, "Hey, we're getting a lot of people asking us about lawn and disease. Let's do some programming around that.” And that programming could be as simple as social media posts that are going to direct people to publications from University of Georgia faculty that are specifically written. They're not directing the public to scientific publications, they're directing them to extension publications. And these are written for a general audience, really applicable. I'm seeing this issue, what can I do with it? We're trying to help people diagnose and then address the issues that they're observing. Beyond that, they may do some proactive programming. Since COVID, they do a lot more virtually so it might be a webinar that you could log onto. They may show you how to calibrate a rotary sprayer in ones yard? The public may say I’m putting it out there. I've read the rates. How do I know I'm putting it out there correctly? Extension can provide those types of programming as well.
Eric knows one program that's under the umbrella of extension that many of our viewers know and have taken part in is the MASTER GARDENERS program. James agrees, Master Gardeners are volunteers for extension. Some of these people were Master Gardeners in their own right, they came to the program because they were very interested in gardening. But other people have come to the program really wanting to learn how to garden. So their gardening journey coincides with their Master Gardener training. The program's really set up to try and support extension agents in delivering information to residents. Consumer horticulture is a big focus, they go through what is essentially Horticulture 101. It's a college level course. Some of the courses are actually taught by extension agents, others by university faculty. The intent is to educate them, try to provide everybody with a base level knowledge on botany and plant physiology, and then expose them to different ways to garden. For example, vegetable gardening, lawns, designing a landscape, diagnosing and troubleshooting issues. Once they complete their training they become the extension of the extension office. The Master Gardeners in Fulton County, all three groups did festivals. So they're selling plants, but also responding to people's questions. Master Gardeners provide feedback from the community and provide the way extension agents are able to assess needs. There's a really good example that occurred recently in Georgia. A homeowner saw a very large flying insect and said, "I don't know what this is," and brought it to their local extension office in Chatham County. Master Gardeners actually identified it as a non-native. The Master Gardeners said, "We don't think this is one of our native or known exotic species." It was identified as a yellow-legged hornet, which was a species of concern potentially for beekeepers. And the Georgia Department of Agriculture deployed crews out there to try to eradicate this pest, and it's still being monitored. But that started because a resident reached out, “I’ve never seen this before. Can extension help me find out what it is.” Statewide resources, were then marshaled, alerted to the problem, and the problem was ultimately resolved.
Eric thinks one of the many tangible services that extension offers people is SOIL ANALYSIS. Why is it important that we know what's in our soil? James comments that unhealthy plants are more susceptible to disease, insects and weeds. So any problem might go back to the soil. Having a soil test lets you start from the ground up, helping you solve your problem. What that plant needs comes from the soil. What we're trying to grow also matters. If you're growing blueberries, that requires a different soil than if you're growing Hostas, in all likelihood. What are we trying to do? With the soil analysis, we can determine what we have? Getting the soil right addresses many, many problems. A happy plant is going to be a healthy plant. Things they talk about in extension a lot when talking with people is ... And sometimes they're coming to you after it's been done... They've not done the soil test and they've put the plant in, they've not considered the soil. But, importantly, put the right plant in the right place and do away with guessing, by getting a soil test.
With a typical soil analysis, WHAT ARE YOU LOOKING FOR? The main parameters or one of the biggest parameters that they're going to look at is pH, below seven being acidic, above seven being alkaline. We know that the leaves are aiding photosynthesis and that feeds the plant. In addition, the roots bring in the water and are also bringing in the nutrients that a plant needs. Macro nutrients whenever we fertilize, are going to be N, P and K; nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium. These are the three numbers given on a fertilizer. And those nutrients can be added through a fertilizer or through organic methods, but those nutrients are only going to be available if they're not bound too tightly to the soil particles. And that's really where pH can come into play. Does that plant have the ability to pull the nutrients in that it needs? Even if we get micro nutrients out of whack, if your calcium levels are way too high, for example, that's going to bump off magnesium because they're both plus two. And so without getting into all of the soil and water chemistry, a basic bit of analysis will help you understand, are we in a good ballpark? Are plants most likely going to be happy here? What direction do we need to go to get those plants happy? A lot of plants want to be just below that neutral 5.5 to 6.5 range, but for some we want to be a little bit lower. A bit more acidic.
Eric wants to go through the process of TAKING A SOIL SAMPLE and have James talk to us about what we should be doing when we're pulling our samples and the best way to get the best results. James shows us a bag from the University of Georgia that they will send to the lab in Athens. We need only about a cup and a half of soil, we really don't need that much soil to do a test, the representativeness of a sample is important. You're asking a question of your environment. What does this soil need? We need to think about how to get a representative sample. How to lay out this experiment in the right way. And one of those questions is going to be where you collect the sample. We're collecting a sample today in this bed, and we're thinking about how do I manage this bed? I'm not going to divide it in half and do one part. I'm going to treat the whole bed the same. This could be different in your yard though. You may have areas that are flower beds, you may have lawn, you may have a vegetable garden. So all these are going to be managed differently and you want to take that into consideration. Consider taking multiple samples when you're going to be managing your landscape in different ways. A vegetable garden is different from a lawn, is different from a flower bed.
The other thing we want to look at is the recommendations and the INTERPRETATION OF THE RESULTS. What are you trying to grow? Another thing is dependent on what you're trying to grow, thus the depth at which you're getting the soil. We're going to use a spade today, which is a great tool to use. We really don't need to go that deep. For turf, we're looking at about four inches, if you're looking to get the soil right for your lawn, the relevant soil depth is about four inches. For a vegetable garden like we're going to do in this raised bed, it's going to be about six inches down in the soil. So we want to go down about six inches. James is using a bucket, you could use anything to collect the soil. We'll do about three or four places in this bed, thus we're sub sampling that way. The results are representative of the entire bed, the whole environment. From that, we'll just mix it up and then pour it into the bag.
Eric wants to know what typical results look like. We just sent this off, what do we get back? James has some examples, some soil samples that he did for his yard last year. He collected samples in his front yard and in his backyard. It's not a large lot and a lot of it is under trees. But even in that small space he wanted to know - does he need to do something different? Is he working with two different soils? And in fact, he was, especially related to pH. Comparing the pH in his backyard relative to the pH in his front yard he found out he did need to add lime. While we're looking at these results, something to keep in mind, it's on a log scale, which means that a small change is a big difference. His backyard was 5.2, his front yard 6.2. That's only a one - five and six. What's the difference? It's 10 x difference. There's 10 times more acidity in the backyard. So he is going to need to add lime. The other things that we're looking at on any result from an extension lab, you'll be given phosphorus, potassium, and then some other micronutrients, magnesium, and zinc. Well, what about the nitrogen? How do I know how much nitrogen to add? Nitrogen is very mobile in our soils. It’s volatile. So the nitrogen cycle includes atmospheric stages as well as those in the ground and water. And in addition, it's being carried off. So the nitrogen that is there today, is not likely to be there by the time you get your results back. It's different. Nitrogen recommendations are based on what you're trying to grow and its needs. Is it a heavy feeder or a light feeder? The meat of the results is really the recommendations part. What should I be doing? I need to add limestone at 70 pounds per 1,000 square feet in my backyard. Eric feels this is a great resource and nothing's more important to the success of a garden than the health of the soil. Thus we recommend that every gardener take advantage of this service.
Eric is sure there's never a dull moment in James' line of work and gets to see so many different things. Every day is like a new day and solving a new problem. Eric would like for James to walk our viewers through some of the COMMON QUESTIONS he gets and some of the common problems he's solving and then what are some of the wildest things that he has heard? James agrees, there is never dull day, they’re never the same. This is not an office job. This is education, but not in a classroom for sure. They get a lot of questions around this time of year when grasses, lawns are greening up again and people get back out in their yards. They're starting to think about, what is this weed? One of the biggest things they do is identify weeds for folks. Sometimes we get calls, more and more though it's emails with photos saying, "Hey, can you help me identify this weed?” They need good, in-focus pictures. Another thing that they tell people is to provide a couple of perspectives. With a landscape, even if it's a weed, he wants to know what else is going on around the area. You're focused on this one problem, but regardless of what it is, let me know what's going on in the landscape. That can often be helpful whenever they’re trying to give a recommendation. But identification is key for giving recommendations. Often the question is, "Well, what can I spray to kill this? Or what can I use that will get rid of this weed?" A lot of weeds that we see right now in our lawns are winter annual weeds. These are weeds that germinated back in October, November. Stayed low near the ground and then just started to grow big as temperatures warmed up. So these weeds are going to die out anyway in the summertime. They talk about pre-emergent and post-emergent herbicides. Pre-emergent is going to prevent a plant from germinating from its seeds. So if you know that it's a winter annual, then you should be putting down pre-emergence in late August, September here in Georgia. It's going to vary depending on where you are in the country. But that can give you a management strategy, what you should be doing. Even if you're using a lawn care service, are they telling you they're doing the right things at the right time? It can really help you make sure that you're not wasting time and money. So in addition to weeds, another common question with ornamentals, is going to be - what is this black spot? Or why have I got stunted growth? What am I not doing? This plant's been doing well, and so again, photos can be really key. Or if you're close enough to the office, they will come out and do a site visit, walk the site with you. But in a lot of cases with fungus on leaves, it's transmitted, spread by water, so the spores are carried by water. One thing you can do to prevent that is not necessarily spraying anything but watering close to the ground. Leaves don't need water. They are wilting, but they need that water in the soil so it can get to their roots. One thing that a lot of people can do is just consider eliminating overhead watering.
Eric is sure they also see a lot of questions about INSECTS too. Correct. Anytime an invasive species, especially an insect, makes it into the news, they get a lot of calls. "I think I have this." James had one fun site visit. Somebody was sure he had a hornet he had not seen before so James went out and visited. It was in a dead pine tree right next to the driveway. So they set up to try and get pictures. They were buzzing in and out. They were really patrolling, but James was trying to get a good photo of it so that he could investigate it or maybe give it to an entomologist at the university. They determined it was a European hornet and he reached back out to him and said, "Well, I made an identification. It's not the yellow-legged hornet. It is an invasive species, but one that we've had for quite a while. One of the things that we recommend is that you not shine lights on it." Before he called me, he did go out one night to try to look at it. These wasps are more active at night and they respond quite aggressively to bright lights at night. So he got stung a couple times.
Eric compliments James, we've learned so much from you today. Thank you for the stories and thank you for the information. And I think one thing that we want all of our viewers to know is view the extension service as this amazingly valuable resource. There's so much knowledge there and there's so much help that's available for gardeners all throughout the U.S. Thank you so much for today. Eric has learned so much from James today. Next time you need a bit of assistance with your garden, I hope you reach out to your helpful extension agent.
In a world dominated by technology and fast-paced living there is something soothing about connecting with nature through crafts.
Click here for an interesting article that highlights some crafts we can make using dried flowers, herbs, and vegetables along with simple instructions on how to dry and prepare them.
Click here to sign up for our monthly NEWSLETTER packed with great articles and helpful tips for your home, garden and pets!
