"Water suckers and shoots on trees should be pruned in the spring"

I suppose this myth persists because early spring is the time most people remove water suckers growing up around the base of trees, and water shoots (epicormic shoots) growing from trunks. Not much else to tackle in April.

Stem and root suckers grow up from the ground; a stem sucker grows from just below the graph union of a grafted tree (common example, an apple tree) while a root sucker grows up from a root (common example, maples, poplars). They are unsightly, cause depletion of water and nutrients from the main tree, and if left untended can eclipse the original plant in height.

Epicormic shoots form when buds on a trunk are activated by pruning. You cut a big branch off your oak, and two years later there are fifteen small branches coming out around the pruning wound. On a fruit tree (pictured), they are the light-colored, slender new branches that leap out vertically from the trunk, and from established branches.

Now is not the time to deal with any of these culprits. Spring is when things are coming to life. Prune suckers and shoots in the spring, and all they want to do is come back right away, with a vengeance.

Live with them this summer, then prune them in November, when the trees are going dormant. Do not paint with anything after pruning; you just need to stay at 'em each fall.

"Organic produce is healthier and has more vitamins and nutrients than conventionally grown produce"

Sorry, but the falsity of this myth has been exposed at the highest government, university, and private research levels. And after wading through most of it, the facts are clear: Organic produce is not healthier than produce grown using modern synthetic chemicals.

Oh, the more expensive stuff is different. Here's one of a hundred:

In 2001, Toronto's Globe and Mail newspaper commissioned research with the University of Guelph. UG conducted 135 tests where they analyzed nutritional makeup of organic produce from a Toronto health-food outlet, and compared it to the nutritional makeup of the same kinds of fruits and vegetables from a commercial supermarket.

Conventional produce came out ahead 66 times and organic produce came out ahead 49 times. All the scientists could conclude was that the organic and conventional fruits and vegetables had drastically different amounts of vitamins and nutrients. Organic potatoes, for example, had three times more iron than conventional potatoes, but only half the calcium. An organic red pepper had 42 per cent more vitamin C than a conventional one, but 45 per cent less vitamin A.

It was hard, in other words, to compare apples to apples.

The results of this test, and dozens more, are no surprise to Dr. Phil Warman, an agronomist and professor of agricultural sciences at Nova Scotia Agricultural College. He has been growing organic and conventional crops on a test farm for 12 years, and the results are always the same.

In terms of nutritional content that could lead to a statement that organically grown produce was "healthier," Warman says, "there is virtually no difference. I know this is disappointing to the organic growers and consumers who have been led to believe that organic food is nutritionally superior."

If you want to check out studies on your own, fine, but I'll warn you: The organic industry is five times more active and aggressive than the universities, governments, or commercial growers. Check on the Web and at first you'll be convinced that eating organic produce will cure cancer, improve your memory, ease pain in joints, and reduce menopause.

But stay at it, and the marketing claims of the organic movement just don't hold up. "The truth is, there is no scientific evidence to prove that organic foods are safer or more nutritious than conventionally grown foods."
– Terri Holewinski, registered dietician, University of Michigan.

"Free trees or shrubs that I can dig and move to my yard are a good deal"

Just when I start having a tough time coming up with a new myth for this portion of the site, my e-mails come to the rescue. In the last three weeks I've had three or four comrades inquire about how to move some trees a friend has on some piece of property, free for the digging.

In nearly every case, my advice is, don't. Trees hate to be dug and moved.

Very often, trees will not survive the transplant. If you are going to dig them with a shovel, it's going to be a lot of work, the root ball is going to collapse, you are going to plant the thing and three years down the road, it'll die. You are nearly always better off going to the nursery and buying a fresh, new, potted or BB (ball and burlap) tree.

Then today on the radio I was listening to one of those garden call-in shows, and the caller described some 10' lilac bushes that were his, free for the digging. He wanted about ten of them. The garden expert on the show wisely explained the facts. A 10' lilac? The only way to dig it up is to wind up with a root ball that will weigh about 300 pounds. Digging up one mature lilac bush will take you three hours. All of a sudden, the next nine you had in mind to dig start looking a little less desirable.

You can buy a new lilac bush for thirty bucks. And get the color bloom you want, in a newer variety that is probably superior in terms of disease resistance.

With trees, people inquire about hiring a professional tree spade contractor to come in and do the work. Sometimes e-mailers want to know if that's a good way to move a tree they like from one part of their yard to another.

A tree spade rig tears the heck out of your yard. It's expensive. There is no guarantee the tree will live. Often, for the same amount of money, you can buy a new tree, perhaps smaller, but it will grow so much quicker than a mature tree that's been uprooted, that in five years it will be a better looking specimen than the tree you moved. Had it lived.

"Deadheading lilacs increases next year's bloom"

Not a bad idea, not a waste of time, but then, not a shred of truth to the statement, either.

No one can find evidence that deadheading lilacs increases bloom for next year. Still, you read it in magazine articles and in a few detail-oriented gardening books.

Oh, it helps the plant, particularly when young, because deadheading the bloom circumvents the seed-production process. The plant will move into root-growing mode a few months early, never a bad thing in the north. But increase blooming the following year? The University of Minnesota can find no proof.

Continue to deadhead lilacs if you like the way it cleans them up in June. But when it gets to the point where you need to get the stepladder out and spend an hour or two on one bush, your time is probably better spent doing the gutters.

"Water newly planted container trees and shrubs once a week"

Yes, but will it stay this green after it's out of the container and in the ground?

Running into more and more research and evidence that the old once-a-week theory is myth. It used to be every two weeks, also myth. Water your newly planted container (and BB) shrubs and trees every five days, for the first month they are in the ground.

Makes sense. Container trees and shrubs are watered every day at the wholesaler, and at the retail nursery. The soil in the container is usually very well drained. The plants grow to depend on that constant moisture. If you water only once a week (or every two weeks) after planting, it leads to violent transplant shock.

This is for the first month. After 30 days, water shrubs and trees once a week, for the entire first season, and once a week the next season, if the specimens were planted in later fall.

"Always plant a tree at the same depth it was in the pot"

Meaning that if the tree was mistakenly planted too deep in the pot, you're planting your tree too deep in the ground.

Big news rolled out of the University of Minnesota two years back. After checking over 500 potted trees randomly selected from wholesale and retail nursery yards, University researchers discovered a great many that were potted too deep, with, on average, six to eight inches of soil packed above the first set of lateral roots (or "shoulder" roots). The same situation has been found in trees dug and sold with the root ball wrapped in burlap.

If homeowners plant a tree at the same level as the soil in the pot, but don't check to see if excess dirt has been packed over the top of the shoulder roots when the tree was dug and prepared for sale, they could be planting the tree too deep. Planting a tree even six inches too deep can cause root girdling, as the roots, sensing they're too far below the surface, tend to grow up, then in, circling the trunk. The tree dies in five years, or goes down in a storm in twenty, or lives a long, sickly, bitter life.

At the nursery, scrape away the soil around the trunks of trees sold in containers, and be certain you find the start of the shoulder roots immediately. Bring along a straight piece of coat hanger wire when choosing ball-and-burlap trees. Plunge the wire through the burlap next to and parallel with the trunk of the plant. If you don't hit shoulder roots immediately, the plant was not dug and wrapped properly. If you wind up purchasing a tree with excess soil packed over the shoulder roots, remove all of it, then plant the tree so that the shoulder roots are just barely beneath the surface.

It all came back to me. Four years ago, we were shooting one of those insufferable HGTV segments on planting a tree, and the potted tree the production crew brought for me to plant, a ten-foot Maple, had exactly six inches of excess dirt on top of the lateral roots. I had to remove it all before taping the episode. I thought, man, that's odd, but it turns out that it's fairly standard practice.

How widespread is this problem? Assume that it's nationwide, and assume it's been going on for years. The State of Minnesota runs a pretty tight ship when it comes to nursery industry knowledge and professionalism, Department of Agriculture supervision, University of Minnesota testing, research, and the like. So if it can happen here it could well be a problem in your state or country. Some of the trees found at fault in the study were Minnesota-raised and some were from out of state. If you find a tree improperly potted, don't read the riot act to your local retail nursery, as most often it was dug and potted improperly at the wholesale level.

But do tell them what you've found, explain to them why it's serious, and go check out a different tree.