This hose is easy to handle and easy to store.

A soaker hose is a great way to be water wise. By slowly soaking only the areas you need, plants grow strong and lush with minimal runoff. These Flat Soaker Hoses are easier to use than standard hoses which are hard to bend and even harder to store without kinking. The flat design rolls or folds up tight to store in a small space and is available in three lengths; 25, 50 and 75 feet.

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Effortlessly hydrate your young and newly-planted trees.

The ArborRain Tower Tree and Plant Hydrator features an innovative, industry-recognized design that will keep your young trees hydrated and help boost survival rates. Engineered tall and slim (at just 18" wide when filled), the ArborRain Tower is ideal for both sloped-surface landscapes and the nursery. It’s also effective for irrigating smaller containerized trees.

A single bag holds 20 gallons of water and fits trees up to 4 inches in diameter. The locking zipper allows you connect several bags for larger-diameter trees. Leonard ArborRain Towers are constructed using a durable, reinforced polyethylene material. These green bags feature a black plastic interior and a sealed bottom. Each ArborRain includes two triple-stitched handles. ArborRain Towers keep your young trees hydrated and dramatically increase their survivability. Professionals place their trust in the innovative design of these towers. They are ideal for both sloped landscapes and nurseries. ArborRain Towers deliver water directly to the roots of your plants. Strategically-placed drain holes prevent soil blocks and provide a 5 to 8-hour drip time. You can also use them to hydrate smaller container-based trees. Three critical features set Leonard ArborRain Towers apart from the competition: its black interior, its zipper, and its sealed bottom. Sunlight encourages the accumulation of mold. This mold clogs other bags in as little as 2 to 3 months, significantly reducing their effectiveness. ArborRains black interior blocks this sunlight and prevents the growth of mold. We designed the ArborRain zipper to provide the most secure hold possible. This secure hold allows the tower to withstand the extra water weight, especially when connecting several bags. The sealed bottom of the ArborRain tower is its final critical feature. Other hydration bags feature inferior stitched bottom edges. These stitched edges deliver water too quickly for the plants roots to draw in, often leading to excessive runoff. The sealed bottom of the ArborRain Tower perfectly hydrates your young trees, preventing water runoff.

Backed by Leonard’s 5-year warranty, the durable ArborRain Tower will hold up and irrigate your most valued young trees.

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The submission deadline for proposals is June 1.

The Horticultural Research Institute, the AmericanHort foundation, is actively seeking research proposals for projects that will produce new knowledge and lead to applied advice for the green industry.

Researchers are encouraged to submit proposals for research in the areas of horticultural marketing and consumer purchasing practices, benefits of plants, pest and disease management and control, and sustainable production and environmental resource management. Additional guidelines and information can be found on the Horticultural Research Institute website.

HRI is funded by horticultural businesses, organizations, and individuals that make their living in, or in service to, horticulture. Over the last three years alone, HRI has directed over $1 million to research covering the full range of production, environmental and business issues critical to ongoing industry success.

For more information, contact the HRI team:

Jill Calabro - JillC@AmericanHort.org, 202-789-0683

Jennifer Gray - JenniferG@AmericanHort.org, 614-884-1155 

With this acquisition, LiveTrends will form The Urban Jungle Group and add 20 acres of indoor houseplant production space.

LiveTrends Design Group has announced that it completed the acquisition of Plant Marketing Florida.

With this acquisition, LiveTrends will add 20 acres of indoor houseplant production space and a team of 60 people. However, this new entity will operate completely autonomously from LiveTrends and under a new name – The Urban Jungle Group

The Urban Jungle Group will honor all contracts with existing customers and will start adding new plant varieties in time. The new company will continue to operate without any changes. It will include the same management team, but it will receive marketing and infrastructure help from LiveTrends.

“The main reasons why we chose to partner with Plant Marketing are the quality of their growing operations, and most importantly, the quality of their management team. We believe that this addition to the LiveTrends family will deliver exceptional synergy between both companies and it will be very beneficial to our supply chain,” Bisser Georgiev, founder and CEO of LiveTrends said.

The Urban Jungle Group will continue to grow tropical foliage plants, and some designer foliage upgrades will be sold under the LiveTrends brand umbrella. This is done with the goal of preserving the high design standards of the LiveTrends brand, and at the same time, maintaining the competitive price nature of the Urban Jungle basic plants.

The three-year project will develop biological control agents for spotted lanternfly in California.

The California Department of Food and Agriculture has awarded funding for one project in the initial funding cycle for the Proactive Integrated Pest Management (IPM) Solutions grant program. The project, titled “Proactive Biological Control of Spotted Lantern Fly, Lycorma delicatula (Hemiptera: Fulgoridae)” was awarded $543,936.

The three-year project will develop biological control agents for spotted lanternfly, an invasive pest that has not yet arrived in California but is spreading rapidly across the eastern US. This pest has the potential to affect many high-value California crops including grapes, walnuts, avocados, and pistachios. The project will piggyback on work that is already being conducted on the pest in the eastern US and abroad. Project leads are Dr. Mark Hoddle (UC Riverside) and Dr. Kent Daane (UC Berkeley). The biological control agent is a small (3 mm) stingless wasp, native to China, that parasitizes the eggs of the spotted lanternfly.

The goal of the Proactive IPM Solutions grant program is to anticipate which exotic pests are likely to arrive in California and to identify and test IPM strategies that can be rapidly implemented if the pests become established in California. CDFA is responsible for preventing and mitigating invasive pests in California. Techniques resulting from the Proactive IPM Solutions Program will allow for rapid deployment of future management plans.

Detailed information on this program, including the application process and application requirements, is available at: www.cdfa.ca.gov/oefi/opca/proactive-ipm.html

CDFA’s Office of Pesticide Consultation and Analysis (OPCA) received an annual appropriation of $544,000 for this research program as part of the 2018-2019 budget. OPCA provides consultation to the California Department of Pesticide Regulation on pesticide regulatory matters. The offices’ consultative activities focus on potential pesticide regulatory impacts and pest management alternatives that may mitigate or prevent such impacts on production agriculture. OPCA staff are also involved in other projects relating to pesticide use and alternatives.

Information on the Office of Pesticide Consultation and Analysis is available at: www.cdfa.ca.gov/oefi/opca/