Gardening is widely regarded as a rewarding and healthy activity, but it can be frustrating if you have questions and don't know where to turn. Good news: Experts from the University of Illinois Extension Master Gardener Helpline are available to provide you with answers and solutions.
Jeff White has been a master gardener with the Illinois Extension for 10 years. To him, the program is about providing information to his community and "helping people achieve what they want to achieve in their garden."
Gardening starts by following a reliable schedule for this gardening zone. White says April is a great time to plant lettuce, Brussels sprouts, carrots and cabbages.
He also has advice for what to plant after the last frost, which is around May 15.
"That's when we tell them they can plant crops and flowers and landscape plants that don't require heat to grow," he said. "The warm weather vegetables like tomatoes and peppers really only grow and do their best in hot weather. We usually recommend those are planted around Memorial Day."
White said most vegetable gardening questions revolve around tomatoes because "everybody grows them, everybody loves them." He added that most tomato problems are about verticillium wilt or black spots.
"Verticillium wilt," he explained, "is a wilt that comes through the air and causes the tomato to die." He said there isn't much you can do when it hits the plant.
"Black spots," he said, "are when you get black spots on the leaves of the tomato itself." He said the spots grow to about the size of a dime and that improper watering is what usually leads to the problem. "If you splash a lot of dirt and stuff up onto the low leaves of the tomatoes, they'll get the black spots on them."
White said if you are interested in planting fruit trees and have the patience to wait two or three years for fruit, consider planting apple, pear or cherry trees. He said, "If you want fruit this year, you can plant blackberries and raspberries because they grow very well in most any soil."
White recommends shopping from local nurseries. He said, "They have a good selection of plants that are meant to be grown in this area." He continued, "A lot of times if you're just buying something from the internet, you can get confused with what they're offering and you could get a plant that is really meant to grow in Florida and won't work here at all."
To reach out to a master gardener, White said to start the process by filling out a survey or by leaving a message at the University of Illinois Extension at 815-986-4357.
"We may have additional questions," he said, "but the form gets us pointed in the right direction to do research and solve their issue in the quickest possible way."
White said most questions are answered within 24 hours, for free. And if you experience a garden problem at night or on the weekend, click here. He said, the Illinois Extension has "a lot of questions and answers about everything from diseases all the way through planting." For more online resources including webinars on garden topics, fact pages on garden-related topics and more he recommended visiting this site.