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Slug deterrant – use copper strapping to surround hosta plants as they emerge in the spring. We use half inch or 22 gauge copper strapping. Cut lengths that will encircle the plant base. Bend back both ends of the copper so that they will connect and hold against each other. Level the earth around the hosta so that the copper band will lay flat on the earth. Install around the plant, ensuring that there are no gaps between the earth and the copper. The copper must not be covered by earth.

Slug deterrant – mix 1 part ammonia to 10 parts water and water hostas as a slug deterrant. Very smelly, but we found it effective.

Slug deterrant – ash from wood burned in your fireplace can be used to make a small circle around your hostas and other slug targets. They do not like to go through the ash, and tend to leave your hostas alone. Re–apply after rain.

Epsom salts – many plants in your garden will benefit from an occasional drink of an epsom salts mixture. Mix 1 tablespoon or epsom salts with 1 gallon hot water, let it cool and water plants as usual.

Boston fern – if your indoor boston fern looks a little ratty after the winter, carefully trim back all of the dried-out fronds right to the base of the plant. Clear out all of the dead material, and add new soil if required. Water well. The fern usually likes this housecleaning exercise and rebounds well.

Fungicide – 2 teaspoons of baking soda to 1 gallon of water. Drench the soil and the plants.

Cedar hedges can be kept full and bushy by trimming them down a bit each year. The best way is to trim some long branches back quite a bit, and others not so much. That way, you don’t end up with a truly ugly hedge for the season. The following year, trim another group of branches.

Trim your forsythia and lilac bushes after they flower, to avoid cutting off all the blooms. These shrubs form their buds later in the year. To get a compact plant, trim only one third of the branches hard each year. Don’t trim after buds form.

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