Planting Summer Color Plants and Landscape and Lawn Water Savings Tips

Learn what  you can do to keep your garden beds blooming throughout the heat of the summer, how to attract butterflies and humming birds and how to prepare your landscape for summer heat. Presented by David Rodriguez, Extension Horticulturist for TexasA&M AgriLIFE Extension Service. David will answer your specific questions about your gardening issues. Bring a notebook.

Texas SuperStar™ are plants that are highly recommended by Texas A&M AgriLife for South can add dramatic color to your late summer landscape.

Summer is here, and throughout South Central Texas gardeners and homeowners are experiencing low rainfall and high temperatures. While many plants and flowers seem to be fainting away, there are others that sing merrily along through the mid-summer heat. Our growing area offers many choices for tough-as-nails flowering plants that will provide the color you want, while tolerating the most intolerable summer heat. The solution to successful summer color lies in the varieties that you choose: the yellow blaze of esperanza; the delicate and varied colors of purslane and moss roses; the red flourishes of firebush and firespike as well as the shade tolerant favorite penta . . . colorful plants that  will keep your South Texas landscape lively thought out the dry months.

Earth-Kind combines organic and traditional principles that help homeowners create lush yet environmentally safe gardens and landscapes. They are research-proven techniques that are successful and preserve and protect the environment. Techniques include using composting to improve existing soil conditions, proper mowing, effective irrigation methods that conserve water and using plant materials that are less susceptible to insects and diseases, Perez said. Topics include an Earth-Kind overview, Earth-Kind roses, improving existing soils, Earth-Kind turf management, selecting plants for South Texas, disease and insect management, and a question and answer session.