Home & Garden 2023

Gardening for your mind, body and spirit

Reduce your stress, lower your blood pressure, improve your mood, and save money while working on your green thumb. Research shows gardening can do all this and more.

Gardening can help you lose weight, tone your muscles, and increase flexibility. Improve your fitness. Burn calories and increase muscle tone and flexibility. The arthritis foundation encourages movement and gardening is one great way.

And don’t worry if your skills and space are limited. Everyone can increase the beauty in their environment whether just a balcony or several acres, without a big increase in their budget.

Start small. This is especially true if you’re new to gardening. It is better to build for the future than become overwhelmed and give up gardening. And seasoned gardeners can look for new ways to increase their satisfaction and fun.

Convert underutilized and overlooked areas into beautiful spaces used as small outdoor living spaces, entertainment areas, or even a quiet getaway. Container gardens, green walls, and window boxes add planting space to once unplantable

EDITORS

Melinda Myers

areas.

Brighten the indoors. Everyone, especially those with no access to the outdoors should consider windowsill gardens and planters filled with herbs, greens, and houseplants. Not only will they feed your gardening desires and add life to your décor, but they also help cleanse the air, removing harmful volatile organic compounds.

Share with a friend. Find friends and family members that share your love for or budding interest in gardening. Experienced gardeners will swap advice and plants, while new gardeners can benefit from others’ experiences and new perspectives. And with everyone’s busy schedules, it’s a great way to combine a visit with improving your landscape.

Make it an event. A plant swap, weeding round robin, or garden tour makes gardening fun and lightens everyone’s workload as you

Susan Lynn and Tim Stauffer

STORIES AND PHOTOS

Vickie Moss, Richard Luken and Susan Lynn

On the cover: Beekeeper Ron Smail.

help each other with planning, planting, and weeding. And be sure to include some light refreshments, table decorations, and recipes using your homegrown produce.

Include some herbs. Add flavor to your meals and fun to your dining experience. Have friends pluck fresh mint to flavor their iced tea or mojito. And grow some lovage. The celery flavor and hollow stems make this the perfect straw for your tomato juice or Bloody Mary.

Grow some fruits and vegetables. Not only can you save money on your grocery bill, but you can’t beat the flavor or nutritional content

of fresh-from-your-garden produce. And you control the chemicals used on your plants.

Mix it up a bit. Add flowers to your edible containers to create an attractive display. Add bulbs to your perennial plantings to increase flower power and reduce your workload. The perennial foliage will mask the unsightly fading leaves of the bulbs. And don’t hesitate to include a few annuals with your perennials. They provide continuous bloom while temporarily filling in space next to new plantings or voids in established gardens. Make it convenient. If your garden tools and gloves are

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When you grow your own vegetables you control the use of chemicals. (DREAMSTIME/TNS)

handy, you are more likely to take a few minutes to weed or deadhead your garden. Spending ten or fifteen minutes every day in your garden not only keeps it looking good, but it also improves your mood and lowers your blood pressure.

And most importantly, relax and have fun.

About the author: Melinda Myers is the author of more than 20 gardening books, including Midwest Gardener’s Handbook, 2nd Edition. She hosts The Great Courses “How to Grow Anything” instant video and DVD series and is a columnist and contributing editor for Birds & Blooms magazine.

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The tactile nature of gardening is rewarding and soothing to the soul. (TNS PHOTOS)

The buzz on beekeeping

By VICKIE MOSS The Iola Register

Ron Smail is still learning about bees, even after working with them for 40 years.

“You can never change what a bee does. You can only manipulate the circumstances to get them to do what you want,” he said.

“They are such a complex super-organism.”

A super-organism describes a group that works together and cannot survive alone.

Bees have very specific roles and responsibilities. Yet, there are so many misconceptions about them, Smail notes. That’s why he and his wife, Deb, a former teacher, enjoy educating others about the benefits bees bring to the world.

Both visit schools, conferences, clubs and organizations to talk about bees. They also have a business, Deer Creek Honey Farm. They sell honey at area farmers markets and sell

Smail

several bee hives on properties across Allen County. Each hive requires about an acre of sweet clover.

Gardens start from scratch

By SUSAN LYNN The Iola Register

Kim Bartlett is a firm believer in learning from your mistakes.

“If you’re not doing something wrong, you're not gardening,” she said. “Every plant is different. So, don’t look at killing a plant as a failure, but as a learning experience.”

She also believes in starting from scratch. In the upstairs of her home in rural LaHarpe are thousands of seedlings that she has been tenderly cultivating the last several weeks.

“They want to go outside," she said on March 31. “They’re stretching their necks to reach the sun.”

It’s not unusual for Bartlett to anthropomorphize her plants.

“But I’m holding back in case there’s a freeze still ahead. Sometimes the Kansas weather likes to throw a curve ball. According to Farmers Almanac, our average last frost date is April 15.”

“I tell them that we all have to wait for the nice weather, and so do you guys.”

She and her husband, Dusty, have 10 acres south of LaHarpe, where he has constructed eight 3 ½-foot high raised garden beds for Kim as well as a 40- by 50-foot garden plot.

THE SOIL is critical to starting

plants from seeds.

“It has to be really fine because the seeds need to be in contact with it,” she said. The soil also needs to stay

warm and moist. Bartlett has heat mats set at 80 degrees placed under the seed trays.

“And they need light to germinate,”

she said, noting rows of lamps positioned just inches above the plants.

Once the seeds germinate, she removes them from the heat mats.

Kim Bartlett tends her seedlings.

One common mistake is placing the lamps too high above the plants.

“The plants need real intense light to start growing, otherwise they start stretching out trying to reach the light.”

One seed is planted into each pod. Their success rate of germinating depends on the seeds. For every year old, it typically drops off 20%.

Bartlett is concentrating on cut flowers this year, including dahlias, sunflowers, marigolds, celosia, gomphrena, ornamental grasses such as bunny tail, salvia and sunflowers.

“The gomphrena do really well in dried arrangements,” she said. “I’ll start moving those outside in the next couple of weeks.”

"I've always loved having a cut flower arrangement on my table in the summertime,” she said. “My grandmother always had daylilies on her table.”

Like any good hobby, growing flowers from seed is therapeutic.

“I like witnessing the potential of a plant coming from a tiny seed. I nerd out about it.”

Bartlett “caught the bug” from her experience working at TLC Garden Center in LaHarpe.

“Almost all of their vegetables and several of their flowers are grown by seed,” she said. “It’s a great thing to be able to tell your customers that you know from the very beginning a plant’s history, including that it hasn’t been stressed out by being transported.”

Bartlett plans to first cover the tilled garden with a landscape fabric in hopes of keeping the weeds to a minimum.

Bartlett saves the raised beds for vegetables, including peppers, tomatoes, garlic, onions, okra, lettuce, cabbage, zucchini and herbs, all of which she is also growing from seed.

Peas and beans grow on decorative arches. Along the south side of the house are strawberries. Daylilies, peonies, and hyacinth are along a fence line.

The most important thing about

raising vegetables and flowers is to keep them watered.

“As long as they have water, most plants that can grow in Kansas will be OK,” she said. “Sometimes that means watering twice a day, so they don’t crisp up. The root system is the most important part.”

Now that spring is here, Bartlett

“During the winter, plants go dormant and don’t need as much water,” she said, noting she’s increased watering from once a week to as often as two or three times a week.

“The humidity inside is not as much as outside, so they dry out.”

if growing plants from seed saves money.

“Again, it’s a hobby.”

“Maybe in the long run there’s a savings. But that’s not what it’s about for me. It’s about enjoying life.”

Kim stands beside the raised beds in which she’ll plant vegetables.

Family makes her house a home

By SUSAN LYNN The Iola Register

Welcome to Addy Prather’s home.

It’s small but airy and bright. Old but in most ways brand new. A family home but perfect for a single, young woman with a promising career.

At age 22, Addy is the proud homeowner of what was a dilapidated mess that she and her parents, John and Tammy Prather, are renovating into a modern-day delight.

It’s not what any of the Prathers had in mind when Addy accepted a position at Iola Elementary School to teach music.

Longing to be on her own, Addy searched for a suitable place to rent, “but the prices were ridiculous,” she said, noting most area landlords demand $600 to $800 a month for apartments and small houses.

“That’s a good chunk of my paycheck,” she said.

The market for houses was also out of reach for her income.

“Everything was selling for between $165,000 and $225,000, and still needed a new kitchen and bath,” she said.

The ideal rent or mortgage/income ratio is that it consumes no more than 30 percent of your income, according to the Department of Housing and Urban Development.

Aided by a can-do family with home renovation experience, Addy and her parents

began to scout the town for abandoned fixer-uppers.

“We’d drive around at night and take note of the homes with their lights off,” said Tammy, which is how they discovered the home at 508 S. Walnut, last occupied in 1979.

It wasn’t love at first sight, but there were hints of a relationship.

“Sometimes you must look beyond the obvious, to see the possibilities,” said

Addy Prather, age 22, is the proud owner of this fixer-upper. She and her mother, Tammy Prather, at right, take a break on the new front porch.

Tammy.

Eight-foot doors. Crown moldings. A bay window. Fireplaces. Ten-foot, fourinch ceilings. Windows of varying sizes. A spacious attic.

Addy purchased the home for $8,000 in spring of 2022 and by June had secured a home construction loan.

With Addy and her parents, as well as in-laws, siblings, and friends willing to devote their spare time to renovate the home, “we figured we’d be done in a year,” said John.

Then came the surprises.

First, the foundation was rotted through.

“We probably would have been better off starting from scratch,” said John. He’s still kicking himself for failing to request a termite inspection. “We were told it was sound,” he said bitterly. “It should have been bulldozed.”

With that off his chest, John gathers himself and reconsiders.

“Nah, it’s better this way. We’re bringing this old house back to life. Now it’ll be good for another 100 years.”

The additional work put the family behind schedule.

“I thought I’d be settled in by now,” said Addy, standing amid little more than a shell of a home.

Other setbacks included the cost of supplies and labor. Whereas John initially may have considered asking a contractor to do the foundation work to expedite the project, today’s costs made that unfeasible.

“We put a new foundation around our house in 1991 for about $9,500. We were told this would cost $50,000,” said John.

John works at Russell Stover Chocolates where he is a utility operator. Before that, he worked at Haldex Brake for 21 years “before I lost my job to Mexico,” in 2010 when the local plant closed.

Tammy works at Iola Elementary School as a media library specialist.

FOR THE better part of the summer, John worked under the house digging holes, mixing cement, ramming rebar and stacking cement blocks.

“We didn’t have a choice,” said John. “I couldn’t say, ‘Well kid, you’re just going to live with a crumbling foundation.”

John estimates he installed 30 piers. The original piers consisted of brick stacks.

“At first, I made the holes

The Prather family, from left, John, Addy and Tammy, are in the spacious attic. The house was built in 1904.

Remodel: A family affair

Continued from 7

too big, 20 x 20. It took 16 bags of concrete for two holes,” he laughed.

Repeatedly, John would purposefully walk through the 1,700-square-foot house looking for weak spots in the floor so he could shore them up underneath.

Because the area is still experiencing a slowdown in supplies along with a shortage of skilled labor, it wasn’t until July that the roof was replaced.

The roof was taken down to the rafters, which involved removing two layers of shake shingles covered by three layers of asphalt shingles.

“We couldn’t do anything until the roof was replaced because it was completely shot,” Tammy said.

It took two months for the family to take the house down to the studs, removing the lath and plaster walls, the lowered ceiling tiles, fluorescent lights, carpeting, foil wallpaper, and everything that water, gas, or electricity coursed through.

It’s only recently that the utilities have all been connected. John will install the outlets, hang the fixtures and connect the appliances.

The Prathers are outsourcing jobs beyond their ken, such as hanging the Sheetrock. On the exterior, concrete siding will replace the old wood.

THE WORK has taken a physical toll on the family.

“At times, we thought the house was trying to kill us,” said Tammy, only half joking.

John has made multiple trips to a chiropractor for an injured hip caused by repairing the foundation.

Tammy’s stepdad, Larry “Popsy” Walsh, dropped a 5 x 8 piece of Sheetrock that “nearly took his ear off,” she said.

Tammy injured the tendons and ligaments around her thumb after tripping down the front steps while carrying a 5-gallon bucket full of bricks. “I couldn’t write for two months.”

And the most recent, and severe, injury was to her mother, Marty “Granny” Walsh, age 71, who fell off a ladder when the rotted floor gave way. Marty landed on tools and Sheetrock, which left her with scrapes, bruises, and a bum knee, and now requires physical therapy.

ONCE SCHOOL is out, Addy and Tammy plan to devote their waking hours to completing the inside of the house.

“It’s a labor of love,” Tammy said, which will turn that house into a home.

Below, the Prathers have started replacing the intricate woodwork surrounding the attic window. The house consists of eight rooms and 1.5 baths.

Tammy, left, and Addy Prather talk about remodel efforts in the kitchen that included new cabinets, flooring and appliances.

John Prather, in back, and friend Scott Moore, remove the plaster and lath in a bathroom. Moore also helped remove wood moldings throughout the house before the demolition work began.

Wheat carves time for home renovation

By RICHARD LUKEN The Iola Register

With the patience of Job, and a DaVinci-like eye for detail, Tom Wheat is nothing, if not meticulous.

For the past few weeks, Wheat has kept busy chipping away bits of mortar from a pile of bricks that had formed a wall wrapping around the front porch of his parents’ old house at 420 S. Washington Ave.

The brick work wasn’t always in the plans for the home’s renovation, Wheat explained.

But because crews had removed lead-tainted soil last year, and were hoping to eventually put “clean” dirt up to the home’s foundation, Wheat felt the prudent move was to get the short brick wall that wrapped around the house’s front porch out of the way.

In a perfect world, the wall could have been moved intact.

But this is hardly a perfect world.

“As we laid it down, it broke into three pieces,” Wheat said. “We figured we had a 1 in 5 chance of it staying together.”

The bricks will be reused and the wall will be rebuilt, much like it was beforehand.

But that requires a hammer, chisel and loads of time.

“There’s lots to do,” Wheat said one recent afternoon, as he gently tapped away chunks of mortar, and then neatly stacked the newly cleaned bricks.

Renovating the home is something of a labor of love for Wheat.

His parents, the late TD and Naomi Wheat, lived there for more than 30 years, until such tasks as climbing stairs became too difficult in their golden years. The couple then moved to a single-story house on North Walnut, and then to a local nursing home.

T.D. Wheat, a long-time Iola High School counselor and Iola Municipal Band -

leader, died in 2005. Naomi Wheat died in 2012.

In the years since, the home sat vacant, used primarily for storage, until it officially came into Tom’s possession about two years ago.

Tom, who lived in the house through high school and then his first year of college, has slowly begun the renovation process.

“There were and are a lot of family responsibilities, estate responsibilities, personal responsibilities I had to tend to,” Wheat said, calling the ongoing renovation a “return-to” project.

As in he returns to it in his spare time.

Wheat, 74, has carved out three days a week from his schedule to focus on fixing the home, “which will have pretty much new everything” when it’s complete.

“We don’t work when it’s cold or miserable,” he said. “We don’t work in the slop. Once we get inside, it’ll speed up a lot.”

See WHEAT | Page 16

Tom Wheat chips away at bricks.

How to get noxious weeds under control

By VICKIE MOSS The Iola Register

Most weeds are obnoxious.

Some are just noxious.

Counties have an entire department to deal with the second group.

“I use dandelions as an example. Some people like dandelions. Some people see them as a weed and they don’t want them in their yard. They’re obnoxious,” Kevin Turner, director of Allen County’s Noxious Weed Department, explained.

“A noxious weed is a plant that takes away the nutrients and cropland from other de-

sirable plant life for our cattle and other animals.”

Noxious weeds are invasive and disruptive. They absorb water and nutrients so the plants around them die, then they spread to those areas.

“They’ll just take over an area,” Turner said.

The role of the Noxious Weed Department is to control the spread of those harmful weeds.

To that end, Turner and his crew regulate, control and enforce noxious weed populations in the county as required under state law. They spray county-owned lands and rights-of-way. They sell

chemicals so property owners can control the noxious weeds on their lands.

Turner conducts surveys and files an annual report

with the state to indicate where and how much noxious weeds may be in the county.

The goal is to control, not

eradicate.

“They’re very hard to completely eradicate,” Turner said. “As long as you’re controlling or maintaining and not allowing them to spread, that’s what the state expects me to enforce.”

Most property owners understand their responsibility to control noxious weeds — farmers and ranchers don’t want those harmful plants around either, Turner points out — but those who ignore the problem can face financial penalties and even criminal prosecution.

That’s why education is so important, Turner said.

“I want to build a bridge

Kevin Turner, center, leads the Allen County Noxious Weeds Department, part of Public Works. He is assisted by Earl Valentine, left, and Chara Moss.

between us and the public. I’d like to be able to do more education about noxious weeds,” Turner said. “I’ve learned so much since I took over this position.”

Turner was named director of the Noxious Weeds Department in August. The department is part of the county’s Public Works department; Turner reports to Mitch Garner.

Turner has worked for the county for two years; he started at the landfill and also helped at the county’s rock quarry. Before that, he worked for 12 years for the Kansas Department of Transportation. During that time, he sprayed weeds along the highway.

“It was vastly different. What we do here is way more detailed,” he said. “The chemicals we use are pretty much all the same, but there’s so much more to this job that I didn’t realize until I was in it. And I’m still continuously learning.”

Turner spent much of the winter learning about his new role, which included filing reports and preparing for the spraying season. He also helped other areas of the Public Works department as needed.

In March, he completed a training event for county noxious weeds directors, hosted by the Kansas Department of Agriculture and led by Scott Marsh, state weed specialist. The training was very helpful, he said.

“It was a lot of good information,” Turner said.

He also turns to the K-State Research and Extension Office for advice.

“The Extension Office is great at educating people about noxious weeds. They’ve helped me and they’ll

provide information for free to anyone who needs help.”

A common question, for example, is help to identify what is a noxious weed and what isn’t.

Kansas has identified 12 noxious weeds. Ten are not native to Kansas. Counties also can declare additional weeds as noxious, but Allen has not done so.

Noxious weeds in Kansas are:

• Hoary cress

• Leafy spurge

• Quackgrass

• Russian knapweed

• Kudzu

• Pignut

• Canada thistle

• Field bindweed

• Musk thistle

• Sericea lespedeza

• Johnsongrass

• Bur ragweed

THE Noxious Weed Law was established in 1937 to protect landowners from the encroachment of noxious weeds from neighboring lands. The Kansas Department of Agriculture regulates noxious weeds at the state level.

Each of the weeds on the list have unique qualities that make it a threat. Leafy spurge, for example, is toxic to cattle but has not been identified in Allen County, according to a report compiled by Marsh, the state weeds specialist.

Three noxious weeds are the most common in Allen County: Johnsongrass, Sericea lespedeza and bindweed.

“Those are the main three I treat in this county. They’re the most trouble,” Turner said. “And the growing season is different for all of them, so it’s im-

portant to know when the peak season is.”

Musk thistle is another common problem. The same chemicals that treat Sericea and bindweed also work on musk thistle.

It’s crucial to treat noxious weeds before they go to seed. That happens in June and July for Johnsongrass; Sericea is later, perhaps late August or even early September. Musk thistle, though, has a two-year cycle. And then there’s bindweed, which doesn’t pollinate like the others.

“The roots can just creep along and then they’ll decide, oh, that’s a good spot and just pop out. Most noxious weeds have more than one way to reproduce. That’s what also makes them a problem,” Tuner said.

“Time is a little bit of an enemy. What’s important is to treat as many of them as you can before they go to seed. So it’s important to know what the peak season is for each of them.”

Even if you miss that window and the noxious weed has advanced past the flowering stage, it’s still important to treat them.

Timing is just one factor. There’s always the weather to consider and, because this is Kansas, that can be one of the biggest variables of all.

When spraying for noxious weeds, it’s best to avoid times of wind and rain, or when it’s too cold.

“Rain is not only going to wash everything away, but it’s going to wash it somewhere I don’t want it to go. And for a whole year, nothing is going to grow there. We don’t want that to happen to someone’s yard or pasture,” Turner said.

The same thing can happen with wind. Additives can be added to chem-

icals to make them heavier so they are more likely to “stick” to the spot where they are sprayed.

“We have to be constantly vigilant for those kinds of things,” Turner said.

Noxious weed department crews started spraying earlier this year, in March, but have been limited because of weather conditions.

Turner also recommends property owners try to control weeds by using more than one method. Controlled burns help with weed control.

Turner will survey parts of the county each year and estimate how much noxious weeds are found. He then sends a report to the state.

The county sells chemicals at a discounted rate to encourage property owners to control noxious weeds. Most of their customers are farmers and ranchers who understand the importance.

Sometimes, Turner receives complaints about owners who haven't been controlling noxious weeds. For example, perhaps a farmer who does a good job spraying for Johnsongrass has a neighbor who isn’t as thorough. The farmer wants Turner to get involved before Johnsongrass spreads to his land.

In those situations, Turner said, it’s important to keep communication open. He will try to talk to the property owner and encourage them to spray. If they don’t, he can escalate the level of communication through legal notices. If the owner still ignores those notices, he can turn the case over to the county prosecutor.

“I don’t want to be the bad guy. I’d much rather educate people so they understand why this is so important,” Turner said.

Johnsongrass

Sericea lespedeza

Field bindweed

Musk thistle

Bees: Hive is a complex system with very specific roles

Continued from A1

“nuclear” bee hives (also called nucs or nukes) with a small colony of bees and a queen with all the essentials to get started. They also collect swarms for people who find a hive in an undesirable place.

EVEN AS A CHILD, Ron enjoyed learning about insects.

“I like anything that creeps and crawls,” he said. “I put my mom through heck with it. I had glass jars and aquariums full of everything you can imagine.”

A friend introduced him to bees in his late 20s.

“It kind of tripped my trigger.”

He worked with a commercial beekeeper to learn the basics, but put the hobby aside to raise a family. As retirement approached, his interest in bees began to emerge again.

It happened when his daughter called and asked if he still had any of those old bee boxes. She’d caught a swarm.

“My wife kind of bowed her head and said, ‘Oh, crap.’”

“That’s what he wanted to do in retirement but it’s not a cheap hobby,” Deb added. “It’s very expensive and it takes a lot of equipment and time. It’s not simple.”

Before long, he had 10 hives. Now, he has about 100, spread over several locations throughout the county.

He typically keeps about one hive for each acre of sweet clover. In Kansas, not many farmers have clover.

“We’re at the southern edge of sweet clover. It used to be farmers always planted

it, but they went to rotating their crops and using chemicals to build up nitrogen so they don’t plant as much clover anymore,” he said.

That could be one of many factors that led to declining bee populations in recent years. The “hive collapse syndrome,” as it came to be known, was partly attributed to mites brought in from another country as well as a variety of factors. Even now, Ron said it’s not clear exactly what caused the problem. Bees are rebounding, but only slightly.

“So much of our food would disappear from the shelves without bees,” Ron said.

“There are thousands of bee pollinators. But the honey bee pollinates 20 times more than all of the others combined.

“An average hive has

40,000 bees that are going out and visiting 150 flowers apiece. They make the equivalent of 2½ trips around the earth to produce a pint of honey.”

HONEY is the purest food on the planet, Deb noted.

“We have no idea what the expiration date is. They pulled honey out of the pyramids that was 3,000 years old, added water to it and said it was edible.”

She’s heard of people who throw away honey because it has crystalized. There’s no need to do that. Just warm the jar slowly and it will turn back into honey.

There’s a big difference between raw and pasteurized honey. Most of the honey on store shelves has been pasteurized, which means it was heated in a process that kills the yeast and enzymes,

They’ve even heard stories that honey collected from hives near orange or cherry trees will have a slightly orange or cherry flavor. The taste of honey can vary depending on location. Each season, Ron leaves enough honey in the hive to feed the bees. The goal is to create circumstances so the bees continue to make a surplus of honey without leaving the hive.

DESPITE WHAT most people think, the “queen bee” isn’t a leader. She’s just a breeder.

and then run through a filter to turn it into a sweet liquid.

“Raw honey is a lot better for you,” Ron said. “Raw honey is as the bees eat it. There’s pollen in there and all the good stuff.”

Many of his customers — and even his wife — swear by honey to help with seasonal allergies. But that only works with fall honey, Ron cautioned.

Yes, there’s a difference between spring honey and fall honey.

Spring honey has a lighter look and taste, as it comes from the first flowers that bloom in the season.

You’ll notice most of those flowers have a lighter color: white, pink, lavender and pale yellow.

Fall honey is darker and has a more intense flavor.

Ron prefers spring honey; Deb likes the fall flavors.

Her only purpose in life is to mate and lay eggs. She doesn’t make decisions or give orders. In fact, she doesn’t do much of anything. Nurse bees feed her and take care of her.

“She mates once in her lifetime. She flies out and the drones start chasing her. Then she flies straight into the air and gets mated with one of them. He falls to the ground. She does this 12 or 15 times and then she comes home and she’ll never be mated with again,” Ron explained.

“But that’s not reproduction in the bee. That’s only the queen being bred. The reproduction is the swarms that you see in a tree. They’ve got a queen. They’ve got drones. They’ve got workers. They’ve got everything they need to go off and start a new hive.

“As the beekeeper, I manipulate the circumstances so that they don’t swarm. Because when they swarm, there goes your honey crop.”

Drones, the only males in

Smoke will mask the enzymes produced by guard bees when they sense danger, allowing the beekeeper to work with the bees without risk of being stung.

the hive, also have a limited but essential role. They’re also taken care of by other bees until it’s time to mate. After that, they die. They won’t live through the winter.

“My wife likes that part,” Ron joked. In fact, he and Deb said, the story of a drone’s life tends to be a favorite when they talk to students.

“The drones have it easy. They hang out in their man cave all summer long. They’re just waiting for that queen to come by and do their thing. Then after fall, the girls kick them all out,” Deb explained.

Worker bees are all females, but their jobs vary as they grow.

After they hatch, female

hive. Then, she takes on a role as a nurse, taking care of the new bees, the queen and

od of time, they produce wax to build up the hive. Eventually, the worker bee will take flight to spend the

last few weeks of her life collecting pollen.

“Each step is a promotion,” Ron said.

“They go through a series of jobs within the hive to keep that organism working.”

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Ron Smail shows bees swarming inside a hive. The queen bee, at right, looks different from the worker bees.

Wheat: Patience and persistence key to home’s renovation

Continued from page 9

He chuckles at the notion that he’s moving too slowly. Sure, he could bring on additional hired hands, but with those workers, he’d also have to find other jobs to bring in the needed revenue to pay his crews.

So Wheat is content to take it a day at a time.

WITH A solid foundation, and a new roof and plumbing, getting the rest of the home back in shape is only a matter of time.

“It will be a complete modernization, while maintaining the rustic style,” he explained. “I’ll replace plaster with plaster, instead of Sheetrock.”

He’s uncertain whether he’ll eventually sell or rent out the home, or keep it for himself.

“‘I figure, it will take inside of two years” to complete, Wheat said. “People around here want all these projects done within a year. I’ve built over 100 structures, and I’ve rebuilt structures on a substantial scale. I’m not gonna ‘piein-the-sky’ it. So it might take me a while. If things go nicely, I’d rather come home earlier than I expected and not later.”

ON TOP of serving as a former technical director at the Bowlus Fine Arts Center, and later running a coffee distribution company out of Venezuela, Wheat also is a skilled carpenter. Or, perhaps a better description, a skilled craftsman.

“I’ve been a contractor or an employee, or a de

signer, or a consultant, or a walk-on for every different scale, every different size,” Wheat said. “Big jobs, little jobs, I’ve done them all.”

“Doing this isn’t really a silo kind of skill set,” Wheat said. “When it comes to the really fussy, and beautiful things, I know who to call. As a contractor, the great est thing I have to offer is my Rolodex.”

site, Wheat continues to assist with tech support during productions at the Lied Center at the Univer sity of Kansas.

ally ramp production back up for coffee distribution out of Venezuela.

Mission, Inc., in the 1990s, had dealt primarily with single-family coffee farmers out of Venezuela, selling those products to coffeehouses in the Lawrence area.

But that coffee business has ground to a halt — no pun intended — because of American trade policies with the Venezuelan government.

Much like his home renovation, Wheat is persistent and patient.

“It took me three years to get the first coffee here,” he said “I’m just wading through all of the requirements. There are ways to

Allen

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Opening day: May 2 Cofachique Park, Iola • 1-3 p.m.

Thursday

Opening day: May 4

Southeast corner of Iola’s square 5:30-7 p.m.

Saturday: TWO LOCATIONS

Opening day: May 6

Northwest corner of Humboldt’s square 8-11 a.m.

Southeast corner of US Highways 54 and 59 in Moran • 8-11 a.m.

Questions? Email info.allencountyfarmersmarket@gmail.com or call 620-228-3482

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Tom Wheat is renovating his parents’ old house at 420 S. Washington Ave. He expects the process to take about two years.

Advice for first-time homebuyers

By ILYCE GLINK and SAMUEL TAMKIN Tribune Content Agency

Q: My daughter is thinking of buying her first home. Can you give her some pointers?

A: It’s terrific that in this day of elevated interest rates, first-time home-buyers are eager to get out there and claim their share of the American dream.

Here are the two most important most important for your daughter to consider:

1. Should you rent or should you buy?

Just because you can afford to buy a home, that doesn’t mean you should. One of the big mistakes home buyers often make is buying when they should be renting.

How do you know if you should rent? Consider whether you’re happy in your job and can envision yourself staying put for the next five to seven years, or at least staying in the same general location.

First-time homebuyers often make the mistake of buying a property that’s too small for their growing lifestyle. So, aim to buy at least a two-bedroom, two-bath condo or single family house. That way, you’ll be able to accommodate a partner and perhaps even a child down the road.

Of course, the biggest issue is whether you can afford to buy. In to-

day’s interest rate envi ronment, you’ll need to have a substantial down payment and afford the monthly payments with a higher interest rate.

2. How much should you spend and how will your credit affect what you can spend?

How much you can afford to spend on a house may change depending on interest rates. Where your credit score is at any point in time will also directly affect how big a loan your lender will approve.

The higher your credit score, the lower the interest rate you’ll pay on your loan. You’ll also get a better deal in terms of points (a point is 1% of the loan amount) and other fees.

Right now, the average credit score is around 700, which means the interest rate you carry on your mortgage could be close to 7%. Depending on how much cash you have for your down payment, you might be able to spend two to three and a half times your gross annual income on the value of the house. You can spend up to 28% of your gross monthly income (GMI) on your mortgage payment, real estate taxes and insurance premium, and up to 36% of your GMI on your total debt payments. So, if you don’t have any additional debt, a conventional lender would allow you to spend up to 36% on your mortgage,

taxes and insurance.

If you are buying a condo, or if you have a large amount of debt, the lender will subtract the monthly payments on those condo assessments and debt service payments from the total amount you can spend on the property. It gets pretty complex, and your daughter should work with a trusted mortgage lender to figure out exactly how much she can afford to buy before she starts looking.

Because of course, another of the biggest mistakes first-time buyers make is falling in love with homes that are way outside their price range. For some reason, they also often believe that the houses they buy should look exactly like featured homes on cable TV.

The best thing you can do is help your daughter understand the realities of what she can’t afford, what types of properties her neighborhood of choice offers, and how she can make the most of her hard-earned dollars.

Moles on the move: Traps are most effective

MANHATTAN, Kan. — Considering they spend most of their time underground, it may seem surprising the damage that moles do above ground.

As they forage for food, moles are known to make travel lanes that cause meandering paths of upheaved soil in home lawns and farmsteads. Moles do not feed on plant matter, but they can still cause damage by disturbing roots and uprooting small plants.

Some tunnels may be abandoned soon after they’re built, while others are used for a period of time.

Kansas State University horticulture expert Ward Upham said homeowners have come up with many remedies — chewing gum, noisemakers, broken glass, bleaches, windmills and human hair among them — but none have provided consistent or reliable control.

“Poison baits also fail to work because moles feed on earthworms and grubs, not vegetable matter,” Upham said. “Even grub control products are ineffective because they

do not control earthworms,” which are the primary food source for moles.

Grim as it may sound, traps are the best control method for moles, according to Upham.

“There are three types of traps: harpoon, choker and scissor-jawed,” he said. “Each can be effective but may take some time to master.”

He offered the following advice:

Because moles use some tunnels more than others, use a broomstick or similar item to poke holes in a number of runs. Check a day later to see which runs have been repaired. These are the active runs.

Place a trap in an active run by excavating soil, placing the trap and then replacing loose soil. Secure the trap so that the recoil will not lift the trap out of the ground. Make sure the triggering mechanism is not in the center of the run.

Push down two holes, one on each side of the trap. Moles should be caught when they try to repair the tunnel. Move the traps if no moles are caught within three days.

Traps are the best control method for moles, according to K-State horticulture expert Ward Upham.

When considering the pros and cons of buying a home, the neighborhood is just as important as affordability. UNSPLASH/ RAVI KAYDEN

Who’s dining in my garden?

By MELINDA MYERS Special to The Iola Register

You take a walk through the garden and find branches trimmed, flowers missing or bark damaged. Of course, the culprit is nowhere to be seen. You may have suspects in mind but a close look at the damage and surroundings can help you identify who is dining on your plants. Knowing this can help you reduce the risk in the future.

Rabbits can be found yearround in the landscape. They have sharp teeth, making a 45-degree clean cut much like your bypass pruners. Their damage usually occurs within their 3-foot reach.

They eat a variety of flowers and vegetables throughout the spring and summer. As these plants fade in fall, they begin dining on trees and shrubs. You may find bark gnawed and branches, stems, and buds clipped off the plants.

Deer tear vegetation, leaving a ragged tip on browsed plants. You may find damage on a variety of flowers, vegetables, trees, shrubs, and plants pulled out of the ground with the distasteful ones left behind. In fall, the bucks rub trunks of young trees damaging the tender tissue below that transports water and nutrients between the roots and leaves. Deer usually feed at dusk but as they become comfortable around people they can often be seen dining during the day.

Squirrels are fun to watch; that is until they eat all the birdseed and damage your

plants. They dig bulbs and uproot other plants, eat and bury nuts in the lawn and garden, and take a bite out of multiple tomatoes, strawberries, and more. They damage trees by ripping off the bark and clipping off branches. If that wasn’t enough, they may gnaw on structures and furnishings. Treating the damaged area and a 12” radius around it with a repellent can help discourage more damage.

Chipmunks are active from spring through fall. They don’t hibernate but are

inactive in winter depending upon their food stash to survive. You will find them

Damage to a tomato plant after being visited by a hungry critter. PHOTO COURTESY OF MELINDAMYERS.COM

digging in potted plants, hanging baskets, and rock walls. They eat grains, nuts, berries, seeds, insects, mushrooms, carrion, young birds, and bird eggs.

Their tunnels can be 20 to 30 feet long and are well hidden. The openings are only 2” in diameter with no surrounding mounds of soil.

Commercial and homemade scare tactics are an option. Unfortunately, most of these critters have become accustomed to people and are not deterred. Motion-activated ones are a bit more effective but make sure they are not annoying to you and your neighbors.

Fencing tight to the ground with a secure gate and at least 3 feet — preferably 4 feet — high is effective for preventing rabbit damage. Deer on the other hand need a much taller fence. Although they can jump 7 feet or higher, a 5-6’ fence is often enough to keep them out of smaller gardens. Sink fencing 4 to 6” into the ground to protect plants from voles.

Repellents labeled for controlling the critter that is causing the damage are another option. Organic Plantskydd (plantskydd. com) is labeled for repelling, not harming, all of these critters so you only need one product. Since it is rain and snow resistant, you won’t need to apply it as often. Always read and follow label directions for the most effective control.

A bit of defensive action goes a long way in protecting your gardens and landscape from hungry critters this season.

MANHATTAN, Kan. — Noticed by their reddish color and long front legs, clover mites are harmless to humans but can be a nuisance.

Kansas State University horticulture expert Ward Upham said they can easily invade homes through small openings around windows and doors because they are so small.

“Mites can be removed from inside the home with a vacuum cleaner. Bags should be removed and sealed after use to prevent mites from escaping,” Upham said.

Upham recommends pre-

“Mites do not readily cross loose, clean, cultivated soil, so a band about 1824 inches wide all around the house, kept free of grass, will help deter potential invaders,” Upham said.

Applying talcum powder, corn starch or baking soda around entry points can also prevent clover mites.

“Even double sticky tape placed on window sills will catch the small mites when they try to pass. Replace the tape when it fills. Do not crush clover mites as they will leave a rusty stain,” Upham said.

Using miticides is also

home.

“Spray outside walls and foundations with lambda cyhalothrin (Spectracide Triazicide, Scimitar) or bifenthrin (Hi Yield Bug Blast-

er Bifenthrin, Hi Yield Bug Blaster II, Talstar),” Upham said. “The house should be sprayed from the lower window sill down to the ground.”

Here’s how some communities save rural grocery stores

By AARON BONDERSON Harvest Public Media

For about five years, Emerson, Nebraska, had no grocery store, leaving residents to drive at least 20 miles for a full-service grocery.

Then last year the community came together to support a new co-op, and Post 60 Market moved into the old American Legion building.

Manager Brian Horak said the village of 824 people invested nearly $160,000 in the store.

“With being a co-op and so many people bought in – it’s like you got multiple owners who have just as much commitment to see this thing succeed,” Horak said.

Investors receive discounts and dividends and elect a board of directors each year to oversee large financial decisions.

Yet in many small towns, a grocery store is a thing of the past.

According to the most recent data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, 76 counties nationwide are without a single grocery store, and 34 of those counties are in the Midwest and Great Plains.

Rural communities have been losing population for decades making it harder for businesses to stay afloat, said Rial Carver, program leader for the Rural Grocery Initiative at Kansas State University.

“So as small towns get smaller, that means fewer sales coming in the door for our grocery store,” Carver said.

Big box stores and grocery

Students help run the Circle C Market in rural Cody, Nebraska, as part of classwork. As rural areas struggle to keep traditional grocery stores, some communities are finding other solutions. Store owners have found that friendliness and cleanliness keep customers coming back. NEBRASKA PUBLIC MEDIA

consolidation have added even more pressure on local grocers. A recent USDA report shows the percentage of grocery sales from the nation’s top 20 retailers more than doubled from 1990 to 2020, while the consolidation was more pronounced in rural areas.

The Rural Grocery Initiative was created in 2006 to help establish and sustain grocery stores in rural communities throughout Kansas.

Rial Carver is program leader for the Rural Grocery Initiative at Kansas State University.

Carver said innovation can help keep stores in small towns.

“We’ve seen success with

communities kind of becoming engaged through cooperatives, through public-private partnerships,” Carver said. “We’ve even seen nonprofits and schoolrun grocery stores, as well as municipally-run stores in communities.”

The Circle C Market is a good example.

It’s run by the Cody-Kilgore school district in Cody, Nebraska, a town of just 167.

“We are vital to the community,” said teacher and store manager Liz Ravenscroft. “The next closest grocery store is 40 miles to the east, and the other closest grocery store is an hour to the west.”

The store got started in 2008 with the help of sev-

ket in Paullina, Iowa, eight years ago. Like many businesses in the town of 952, they struggled at first. Then they adjusted their hours, staying open on nights and weekends to cater to their customers, who often commute long distances.

Laura Palmer likes the look and feel of Trader Joe’s, a national grocery chain, and she tried to emulate their style when she and her husband, Don, opened the Prairie Market in Paullina, Iowa.

“They appreciate the hours — that they can actually get here and on Sundays,” Palmer said. “They’re like, ‘What did we do before you were open on Sundays?’”

eral national organizations and a grant from the USDA. The Village of Cody owns the building, while the school district and a local non-profit, Cowboy Grit, helped finance the store.

Each semester about eight students help at the Circle C Market as part of a class, learning important skills from Ravenscroft.

“I teach them how to do the different orders, like pop orders and chip orders,” she said. “I also have students that I teach how to do billing.”

For small stores, meeting the needs of an individual community is critical to remain in business.

Laura and Don Palmer first started Prairie Mar-

Palmer said focusing on the fresh food helps them stand out from nearby discount stores. They also work to appeal to current tastes. Palmer painted the store’s facade teal as a nod to a wellknown chain.

“My favorite store was Trader Joe’s and that’s kind of what we have tried to replicate the store after,” Palmer said. “People come in the store, especially young people, they want to come in and they want it to be vibrant and clean and organized.”

In Emerson, Post 60 Market manager Brian Horak said two things create success for rural grocers.

“Friendliness and cleanliness. That’s the two key things,” Horak said. “I mean you get the Walmarts and Hyvees and stuff like that, but they’re not gonna know you by name. We’re gonna know you by name. We’re gonna know what you want.”

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IOLA CITY-WIDE SATURDAY, JUNE 3

The Iola Area Chamber of Commerce & Tourism is coordinating the Iola City-Wide Garage sale just in time for your spring cleaning!

The event will take place on Saturday, June 3rd. Physical maps of the sellers will be available in The Iola Register paper and distributed to the sellers for people to pick up. Digital maps will also be available on the Chamber website and Facebook page.

To register as a seller, visit iolachamber.org or stop by our o ce at 10 W. Jackson. MondayThursday 9 a.m. - 3 p.m. There's a $10 registration fee. Cash or check only. Cash, check or Venmo accepted.

Bird safety: How to reduce window collisions

MANHATTAN, Kan. — Homeowners who plan to make shiny windows part of spring cleaning chores may want to re-think how that’s done.

That is, at least, if they also enjoy the variety of backyard birds that populate many urban, suburban and even rural areas. Kansas State University wildlife specialist Drew Ricketts said an estimated 1 billion birds die each year as a result of impact with windows.

“There are two types of bird strikes,” Ricketts said. “One is where the bird doesn’t know the window is there and just runs into it. The other is when birds see their reflection in the window and sort of beat their beak on it because they’re trying to get at a competitor.”

Ricketts cited a study in which researchers tested window films to determine the best way to ward off danger for homeowner’s fine-feathered friends.

“A lot of times when I’m helping homeowners, I will

suggest films that have a character of an animal or some sort of picture that allows the bird to see that the surface is not open,” he said. “Or, sometimes we think of putting newspaper or other object, but a lot of people don’t want to obstruct their windows.”

A pair of industrial products could be a better solu-

tion, he said. A bird shield is a film that has a pinstripe design that is barely visible to humans, but more easily seen by birds. Another product, a bird shade, is a film that uses a wavelength of light that humans can’t see, but birds can.

“If you want your window to look clear, these sorts of films could be very effec-

tive,” Ricketts said. “They’re generally made for industrial applications, but you could purchase them for a house.”

Researchers also report that where you place the films matters.

When the films were applied to the outside of the window, “the bird shades increased window avoidance by about 50% and the bird shield increased avoidance by about 40%,” Ricketts said.

“Fifty percent may not sound like all that much, but when you think that half a billion birds could avoid dying, then that’s a lot.”

When films are applied to the inside of windows, “researchers saw a drastic reduction in effectiveness,” Ricketts said.

“And so even though it may not be convenient when we’re thinking about applying something to a window to keep a bird from hitting it, it’s going to be important to apply that to the outside — rather than the inside — of the window.”

Advantages of vertical vegetable gardens

MANHATTAN, Kan. — Kansas State University horticulture instructor Cynthia Domenghini says home gardeners can expand garden space by taking it to the next level…literally.

Domenghini said many crops can be grown vertically, including the more traditional tomatoes, pole beans, and peas as well as vining crops such as cucumbers,

melons, squash and gourds.

“Elevating plants off the ground increases the air flow which can help prevent disease,” Domenghini said. “Bringing the height of the produce up also makes harvesting easier.”

Domenghini recommends edible-pod and snow peas because those crops have longer vines and are therefore more appropriate

for growing vertically than English (shelling) peas.

Bush-type vining crops produce short vines and are consequently less suitable for vertical growth. “Be mindful of crops that grow large fruit as they could damage the vine if grown vertically,” Domenghini said.

Supporting your vertical garden with a study struc-

ture is also important. Domenghini suggests bamboo poles.

“Create a pup tent or A-frame structure by leaning two cattle panels or pallets together and securing them at the top. Alternatively, a single panel can be tied upright to T-posts for support. Plant vining crops at the base and train them to grow upward,” she said.

Homeowners are encouraged to take steps to prevent bird collisions with outdoor windows.