Glossary of Terms
GARDENING WORDS YOU SHOULD KNOW
Gardeners have a vocabulary all their own. Would anyone else besides a gardener understand what "dress with dried blood to accelerate" means? It's not a line from a teenage horror flick - just a suggestion of how to make a peony grow faster, taken from an old gardening book.
As an aid to better gardening communication, here is a list of gardening words you might hear - plus a sentence in which you can use it. (Thanks to Pike Nursery for allowing the use of this list.)
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- scalp
- To mow off the top inch of dormant Bermuda grass in order to accelerate green-up
"I'll scalp my lawn when average daytime temperatures approach fifty degrees Fahrenheit."
- slow release fertilizer
- a fertilizer whose granules have been manufactured to release nutrients over several weeks rather that all at once
"Those little white balls on top of the soil under a potted azalea aren't insect eggs - they're just granules of slow release fertilizer."
- soil test
- a chemical test that measures the nutrients in your soil and its acidity level
"I need to have a soil test done by the Extension service so I'll know how much lime to spread on my lawn."
- soil test
- a chemical test that measures the nutrients in your soil and its acidity level
"I need to have a soil test done by the Extension service so I'll know how much 10-10-10 to give my roses."
- Soilless mix
- A mixture of peat moss and other materials which does not include mineral soil
"Why in the world do they call it potting soil when it is not soil and has no soil in it?"
- stolon
- a thin aboveground plant part that grows from the main plant to adjoining areas
"If my neighbor's Bermuda grass stolons didn't grow into my fescue, it might look pretty nice in the winter."
- sucker
- a small sprout that emerges at the base of vigorously growing trees
"Those suckers I pruned off my crape myrtle made excellent stakes to prop up my peonies!"
- systemic pesticide
- a chemical that is absorbed by roots or leaves and then travels throughout the plant
"Lots of rose growers use a systemic insecticide on their plants to control aphids."
No glossary terms found.
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