Home And Garden

Q. What's the difference between Leafgro and Compro? And is this a good time to add these materials to new flower beds I'm digging now?A. Leafgro is composted yard waste and Compro is composted sewer sludge, also known as bio-solids. Both are safe and effective. They are made from locally produced waste by the Maryland Environmental Service. Either one could be mixed into a new planting bed to improve soil structure and provide nutrients to plants.Compro has a relatively high pH (7.6 to 7.8)

When Paige Finley, a research specialist at the Johns Hopkins University's School of Medicine, moved into her rowhouse in the Medfield neighborhood in 2005, her backyard contained one shrub and her front was bare. But Finley had a vision for what she wanted. "I knew in my head I wanted it to be a little sanctuary," she says. So she set to work. "I made some drawings, and then I just made some spray paint and drew lines where I wanted the flower beds to be, and I started digging.

Joey Green, the "mad scientist of clean," and Jeff "Mole Hunter" Holper aren't the only "live" attractions at the Maryland Home and Garden Show. Here are a few others: •Among the must-sees at the show are 19 fully landscaped gardens, including one designed by European Landscapes, winner of Best-in-Show last year. Boordy Vineyards and Linganore Wine Cellars are offering free wine tastings to add to your enjoyment of the gardens. •The Maryland Spring Craft Show features more than 250 artists, including Chester Shuey's handcrafted wood furniture and Charles Adams' metal garden art. Adams' stone and metal birds are featured at the Philadelphia International Flower Show.

Sunday, June 10 Arts, crafts festival The annual Annapolis Arts and Crafts Festival takes place at Navy-Marine Corps Memorial Stadium in Annapolis. Visitors can view the works of some of the region's best artists and craftsmen, sample fine cuisine and select wine tastings, enjoy live entertainment and take a walk through history along the brick-lined streets of Colonial Annapolis. Information: 410-263-4012 or annapolisartsandcraftsfestival.com . Home and garden tour The Eastport Civic Association's seventh annual Home & Garden Tour takes place, rain or shine, from 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. It features 10 homes and gardens in a quiet, lesser-known area of the west side of the Eastport peninsula, between Boucher Avenue and Spa Creek.

Stevensville-based HouseNet Inc., a popular Web site dedicated to the home and garden, was acquired last week by Move.com Group from R.R. Donnelley & Sons Co. The terms of the transaction were not disclosed. Move.com is owned by Cendant Corp., which owns NRT Inc. - the parent company of O'Conor, Piper & Flynn ERA. It will incorporate HouseNet's editorial content and online communities into its network of Web sites. The addition will increase Move.com's network penetration to 2.3 percent of all Internet users, the company said.

I put our fall leaves and kitchen scraps in a pile to make compost. A neighbor gave me rabbit manure for the pile, too. How do I know when compost is ready to use in my gardens? This is critical when manures are used, because uncomposted manures can burn plant roots and stems. Fortunately, it's easy to tell when the ingredients are composted. Pick up a handful of your aged compost. Crumble it. It should look like dark, rich soil, consistent in texture. The original materials will be unrecognizable, except perhaps tiny twig or wood bits.

Q. I have Canada thistle growing in two of my flower beds, and I'm concerned about it spreading throughout my garden. I think I brought the seeds in on some manure I had delivered last spring. What's the best way to get rid of it without resorting to pesticides? A. Canada thistle is a tough perennial weed. It can spread vegetatively from underground stems called rhizomes or from the huge number of seeds that blow from the attractive purple flowers. Gently hand-pull young plants whenever they emerge.

Tiny red bugs are crawling on my window sill. When I wipe them up, they smush red. Now what? Clover mites often show up in spring in buildings and homes until the natural checks and balances of predator insects in a healthy landscape keep their numbers under control. This year, their numbers seem to be up generally. They do not warrant pesticides. You can tape around the window until they disappear. Ellen Nibali, horticulture consultant, works at Maryland Cooperative Extension's Home and Garden Information Center, and David Clement is the regional specialist.

In Sunday's home and garden calendar, an incorrect date was given for the Hopkins Garden Festival. The event will take place from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Friday in the Carriage House at Evergreen, 4545 N. Charles St.The Sun regrets the errors.Pub Date: 5/07/97

Next Saturday, look for The Baltimore Sun's new home and garden section, which will feature new content, including a gardening column by Susan Reimer, in addition to the popular Dream Home feature, gardening Q&A, Gardener of the Week and interior-design column by local designer Rita St. Clair.

'Moonlight and Magnolias' Comedy about the writing of the movie script for "Gone with the Wind" runs June 8-30 at the Colonial Players, 108 East St. in Annapolis. Performances are at 8 p.m. Thursdays-Saturdays and 2 p.m. Sundays, with a 7:30 p.m. performance on June 17. Tickets are $20 and $15 and can be purchased at thecolonialplayers.org or by calling 410-268-7373. Book sale Thousands of books, videotapes, and miscellaneous items will be on sale Saturday-Sunday, June 2-3, at 1718 Urby Drive in Crofton.

Someone once told me that home design and improvement projects should be fun. But if you've ever built a new house, tried to renovate a bathroom, landscaped the front yard or selected a paint color for the hallway, you know that projects around the house can be stressful. They shouldn't be. After spending much of my free time over the past 21/2 years fixing up my old house, I need to remind myself of that on a regular basis. So one of my New Year's resolutions is to keep the projects I am working on around the house fun. Sure, the wood floors underneath the wall-to-wall carpet I just had removed on the second floor look like someone splattered them with driveway tar, tried to ice-skate on them and then scorched random boards with a handheld torch, but I know it could be much, much worse.

Coming out of the snowiest Maryland winter on record, thousands of Marylanders got a jump-start on spring at the Maryland Home & Garden Show where tulips, daffodils and pansies were in full bloom. Last month's blizzard inspired McCarroll Nole of Baltimore to attend the annual show on Sunday for the first time. "We are tired of the white stuff. We want to see some green. We want to see something come out of the ground," said Nole, who brought a camera with him to record ideas for sprucing up his flower garden.

Joey Green, the "mad scientist of clean," and Jeff "Mole Hunter" Holper aren't the only "live" attractions at the Maryland Home and Garden Show. Here are a few others: •Among the must-sees at the show are 19 fully landscaped gardens, including one designed by European Landscapes, winner of Best-in-Show last year. Boordy Vineyards and Linganore Wine Cellars are offering free wine tastings to add to your enjoyment of the gardens. •The Maryland Spring Craft Show features more than 250 artists, including Chester Shuey's handcrafted wood furniture and Charles Adams' metal garden art. Adams' stone and metal birds are featured at the Philadelphia International Flower Show.

If gardeners are ever truly green, it is probably with envy, an emotion that commonly overtakes them when they see someone else's garden. That's never more true than on garden tours, when you pay for a ticket to see gardens that are nicer than yours. Home and garden tours clutter the calendar in late May and early June, when the weather might still be mild and the gardens are at their peak of color and freshness. Saturday and Sunday in Reservoir Hill, Charles Village and Annapolis' Murray Hill neighborhood, many "little gems" will be on display on self-guided walking tours.

Can I transplant my dogwood while it is blooming? I planted it too close to the house two years ago, but it is flourishing. Dogwoods are forest understory trees, so choose a new location that is at least part shade. Spring is the time to transplant your dogwood, but wait until the soil is workable, i.e. dry enough that a ball of soil squeezed in your hand will crumble when you bounce it. Working with soggy soil that contains a high percentage of clay could turn it into cement. When you transplant your dogwood, prepare the transplant hole ahead of time.

You don't need a rambling estate or even a quarter-acre plot to be a successful gardener. Jim and Sue Hudson tend to a lush garden on the patio of their Abingdon apartment. You can read about it and see more photos tomorrow at baltimoresun.com/gardener. To read a complete calendar of the home and garden events for this month, go to baltimoresun.com/homeandgarden

A week ago, Bill Snell and Lew Shipp were awaiting what they hoped to be the last blast of winter, hunkered down in their Columbia homes, unable to pursue their respective outdoor passions - gardening and golf. "I was laying in supplies," Snell recalled yesterday with a hearty laugh. "I made sure I had toilet paper, bread, milk and everything." The toilet paper might not be gone, but the snow - nearly a foot in some places around the state - is. With temperatures in the area reaching a balmy 76 degrees, according to the National Weather Service, Snell and Shipp and thousands of others in the region were able to participate in activities they hadn't experienced in months.