Pest management in urban landscape presents unique challenges because of the tremendous diversity of ornamental plants, each with its own complement of insect pests. A new research project has been initiated at the LSU AgCenter Hammond Research Station focusing on alternative pest monitoring approaches. One approach will be using phenology events of flowering landscape plants as indicators to predict pest activities.

Most of us home gardeners in Louisiana are always looking for alternative plants to try. We typically get accustomed to planting the same warm season bedding plants in the spring and the same cool season bedding plants in the fall. Why not reach out a little bit this fall and give bluebonnets a try.

Ornamental kale and cabbage are becoming increasingly popular as fall bedding plants for Louisiana. An alternative to garden mums and pansies, these plants have feathery leaves of robust colors that make them well suited for landscape and container plantings.

What mulch in your landscape using colors from your favorite teams. The newest mulch to debut in south Louisiana in the last couple months is Sports Mulch. This new mulch is one display at the Landscape Horticulture Research and Extension Center located at the LSU AgCenter's Hammond Research Station.

Pansies are our most popular cool season bedding plant. Here is some recommendations for home gardeners in the care of pansies and information on variety selection.

Dianthus are a popular cool-season bedding plant. Here is some variety and cultural information for home gardeners.

The LSU AgCenter's 2008 poinsettia open house is scheduled for Dec. 5, 2008 at the Burden Conference Center in Baton Rouge from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m.

Daylily is an economically important nursery crop for Louisiana growers. It was relatively disease-free before the arrival of daylily rust in 2000. Commercial growers and homeowners rely solely on fungicides for rust control, which is expensive and time consuming. Biofungicides are biological or bio-rational alternatives that control disease by different modes of action. If effective, they can reduce control cost and provide resistance management tools.

We have many trees recommended for South Louisiana landscapes. Some of these are common and known by home gardeners and green industry professionals, but there are great trees that are less known and underutilized. Here is a list.

Here is some information on weed control in home landscape beds for the fall months.