Each year, thousands of Arizona residents email or call Rosie Romero’s radio show with questions about everything from preventing fires in their chimneys to getting rid of tree roots invading their sewer system. His goal is to provide answers that suit the specific lifestyle wherever someone lives in Arizona.
Q: I shut off the reverse osmosis water treatment system in my kitchen about two years ago, but now I want to use it again. How do I reactivate it?
A: You need to have a technician come out to hook it up again and sanitize all the parts in the system. You also need to install new filters and membranes.
Q: If there is a frost warning, do I have to cover the baby palm trees in front of my house?
A: It depends on the type of palm tree it is. If they’re baby Mexican fan palms they’re probably going to be all right without frost cloth protection. But if they’re pygmy palms they particularly need covering, especially at night in Pima and Pinal counties.
Q: If I have exposed copper pipes running up the outside wall of my house and then running through my attic, do I have to cover them in case of a frost warning?
A: You don’t have to worry about the pipes in the attic, but any copper pipes on the outside of the house definitely need to be wrapped in winter to protect them from freezing on cold nights.
Q: I have a mature pink grapefruit tree in my yard that may be as much as 60 years old. It wasn’t doing too well recently, so I ran all the water from the purge pump for my evaporative cooler into the area of the tree. Since I started that, the grapefruit has lost half of its leaves. Was that a mistake?
A: It is a problem because the water from the cooler would be way too salty for watering a tree. You can’t use the overflow from the cooler that way. You might still be able to revive the tree, however. Buy some gypsum and soil sulfur and work those materials into the soil around the base of the tree. Then let water trickle onto the area for two or three days. Finally, try fertilizing the tree in February. However, it’s possible that the tree is on a downward slide because of its age. Sixty years is getting up there for a grapefruit tree.
Q: Property managers for our area had a tree cut down, but they left the stump sitting there. Now shoots are coming out of it, and we’re wondering how to get rid of the stump.
A: You need to make a fresh cut on the top of the stump and then drill holes into it. Then apply glyphosate, a chemical used to kill plants, or some other herbicide to the stump. If you need it removed quickly, call a company that can grind it up.
Q: I have a very large Aleppo pine in my yard and it seems to be dying back. There are a lot of branches with no needles. Other trees in the area have gotten that way, and my neighbors have been cutting off the dead branches. Should I be doing that, too?
A: Probably due to recent dry conditions, many of these trees have been experiencing die-back over the past few years. It might be worthwhile, though, to have an arborist look at your tree . As you probably realize, it could cost thousands of dollars to cut down a mature tree and any new tree you plant will take years to grow.
