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 live in a home that has electric heat and an electric water heater. But I found out that because I have a natural gas line for my stove I can put in a gas water heater. So which is better: a gas water heater or an electric water heater? I’m thinking of making the switch and I don’t know what to do.
A: That’s a tough question to answer. An electric water heater uses fewer BTUs than gas; on the other hand gas is generally cheaper to buy than electricity. However, there are new issues involved now. All new water heaters sold in the United States must now conform to higher energy standards, and some heating and air conditioning experts say a new gas-powered unit will become a better choice. So you might want to investigate further what’s going on in the industry; it might be a good idea to make the change.
Q: My girlfriend has a sliding glass door on the back of her house that’s always stuck. It seems as if it would take two men and a boy to open it up even a crack to let in some fresh air. What’s wrong with it?
A: You need to get a friend or maybe your girlfriend to help you lift the glass door up and remove it from the track. It needs to have new wheels installed on the bottom of the slider. You can find these wheels for sale at most hardware stores. If you don’t think you handle this job yourself, you should have a window repair company install the wheels.
Q: We seem to be having problems around the house with little flying bugs or gnats. They particularly hang around in the kitchen near the sink. How do we get rid of them?
A: It may be because of problems with your garbage disposal. You may not be running it long enough and using enough water to get rid of all the food debris that goes down the drain. Try running the disposal a few times while putting some water mixed with bleach down the drain. You might also want to try some household insect control spray. All our moisture this summer has certainly created a large hatch of bugs of all kinds everywhere.
Q: We have a passion vine growing in a pot on our patio. Every year, caterpillars come along and strip it bare, eating all the vegetation. How can I stop that from happening so the vine will bear some flowers?
A: Many people who grow the passion vine do so because they love butterflies and want to attract them to their yard. Those caterpillars you want to get rid of will eventually build cocoons that hatch and produce butterflies. On the other hand, the passion vine does get beautiful flowers. If you want to control the caterpillars, use some safe, non-toxic biologic spray on the plant.
Q: I have some four-year-old pecan trees in my backyard. They’re growing great, but the taste of the nuts that they bear is very bitter. How can I improve the taste?
A: The bitter taste may be because the trees are not being fertilized enough. Pecan trees need zinc fertilizer as well as abundant water — about 40 gallons of water per week for a four-year-old tree. In addition, be aware that most pecan farms don’t harvest pecans from trees that are less than seven years old.
