- Hi, thanks for joining us for the Family Plot Gardening in the Mid-South.

I'm Chris Cooper.

Winter can be hard on plants.

Today we're going to   take a look at a few ways   to protect them.

Also, wildlife   can be a nuisance.

Today we're going to talk   about how to keep deer, geese   and armadillos   out of the garden.

That's just ahead   on the Family Plot:   Gardening in the Mid-South.

- (female announcer)   Production funding for   the Family Plot:   Gardening in the Mid-South   is provided by   the WKNO Production Fund,   the WKNO Endowment Fund,   and by viewers   like you, thank you.

[upbeat country music] - Welcome to the Family Plot, I'm Chris Cooper.

Joining me today is Dr. Lelia Kelly.

Dr. Kelly is a retired Mississippi State Extension horticulture specialist.

And Mr. D will be joining me later.

All right Doc, it's always good to have you here.

- Yeah, great to be here.

It's been a little while now.

- It's been a little while.

- Yeah.

- Now it's cold.

- Yeah.

- So now we have to talk about what protecting our plants in the winter landscape.

- Putting the garden to bed.

- Putting the garden to bed.

- Well, the thing about this time of year going into the winter is you have to watch the weatherman to bring in your tender plants.

You've got all these things growing out in your yard and you want to protect them and bring them in, if you got the tender things like a house plants, having the weatherman on or watching on your phone, checking your weather app to see what the lows are at night, and then to look for the predictions of frost and freezes.

I did a little reading, Chris, on the difference in frost and freeze, because that's always kind of confused me.

A frost is just apparently according to the meteorology guys, it's just, when there's visible frost.

Well see that didn't explain a lot.

So I'm thinking, okay.

And it's, you can have a freeze and not a frost.

Did you know that?

- I did not know that.

No freeze, no frost.

- Yeah, yeah.

But it all depends apparently on the water vapor in the air.

- Okay.

- Check the weatherman.

And you know, if it says frost or freeze, take precautions.

Obviously a freeze is something that the air is below freezing.

So it's going to do damage to plants that cannot stand freezing temperatures.

A lot of things we have can withstand a frost.

Some things like our vegetables even tastes better.

with a frost.

- Those cool-season vegetables.

- Like turnips and radishes and carrots and the cabbage and the broccoli and all these cool-season vegetables.

And I got thinking more now, why is that?

Why do these things taste better?

And you know what I found out?

That in some plants that when cold weather comes, it triggers, in these plants to store and produce more sugar.

So that's why your turnips are always sweeter, as my grandmama said, after a good lot of cold weather.

- Good to know that, okay.

- So yeah.

So it's putting all that sugar in there and getting ready for winter because if you know, something's got a lot of sugar, the freezing point for it's lower.

- Okay, got so that makes sense.

Yeah, okay got it.

- So plant tenderness, you have to look at that and figure out what's needed to be protected and what doesn't and some plants that are hardy, even in your zone, supposedly can be damaged by quickly falling temperatures of long duration.

They haven't had time to acclimate to a gradual cold.

And if it just bop, we get, what do they call those Arctic?

Whatever it's called.

- Blast.

- Yeah , Arctic blast comes in that can damage.

So pay attention again to the weatherman and see, because he'll tell you if there's an Arctic whatever coming in and to protect your dogs and you know, all your animals and all that stuff.

But there's all kinds of types of protection.

- Okay, yeah.

Let's get into that.

- Yeah, that we can use.

And if you just want to cover the plant, with the protective covering, plastic is not the best.

A lot of people just throw a garbage bag over something that don't offer a whole lot of protection.

Especially if the plastic touches the plant because the cool from the plastic and you can get damaged.

So things that are more insulated like blankets or I've used old sleeping bags that I go to the thrift stores and buy the old blankets, the old sleeping bags.

You can use styrofoam coolers, work good.

Old styrofoam coolers.

You can use buckets, you can use what those are called cloches, right?

The fancy name is something that you turn over on top of the plant that's got a shape to it.

It kind of holds it up, off of it, so like a milk jug.

I know you've seen people   protect their tomatoes   with a cut up bottom of a milk   jug or two liter Coke bottle   or something like that.

And I've even used my old tomat   cages to put around plants that I want to protect, that I know could get some damage from suddenly dropping temperatures.

And I used my tomato cage and then wrap the blanket   around that and   then cover the top   because the soil holds heat.

Particularly if it's a wet soil and that heat radiates up out of the ground overnight.

So you want to capture that.

- Right, you don't want to lose it.

- You don't want to lose that, that radiant heat from the earth.

So covering that up, keeps that heat in there.

So let's see what else.

I had some other things, oh, baskets, like bushel baskets.

I mean, just whatever you got that you can use that's around the house or you can order fancy things online, like the water towers and stuff, that you fill up with water and goes 'round your tomatoes and stuff.

But there are a lot of things in the catalogs   that have, row covers.

White row covers.

- Yeah, okay.

- That will hold temperature   a couple of degrees.

- Okay.

So let me ask you this, should you remove the covering?

- Oh yeah.

You definitely need to remove whatever you got if it's a sunny, bright day, because it'll be just like the greenhouse effect.

It's going to rapidly build up the temperature in that little enclosed space.

And you're going to wind up killing the thing regardless of your good efforts.

- All right, good good.

- So whatever you cover 'em with, there's a couple of things to remember, it needs to make ground contact because of the heat coming from the earth.

You can put it down if it's a blanket and you need to kind of stake things up.

If you're using a blanket or a sleeping bag or an old quilt or something like that, or space blankets.

You can use the space blankets that they have that campers use and stuff.

Put the aluminide side down though, because that radiates heat straight back to the...

The heat that comes up from the ground it radiates right back.

So put it down on the ground, contact, put like a bricks or pieces of board, or just, use pin downs.

You know, I cut up a wire coat hangers and make my own pins.

- That's smart.

- Recycle and use those to hold everything down, so that no air and the heat can't get out from under there.

So, yeah.

Oh, and don't cinch.

If you've got a plant that you're wanting to completely cover, don't cinch it around the trunk.

- Okay, got it.

- You know, because that, what are you doing?

You're losing the heat coming from the earth.

- Got it.

- So and I know up north, sometimes if they've got a bad snow storm and with cold winter winds, you can get that wind burn from stuff   and they'll wrap like   burlap or whatever around   their evergreens so you   don't get that tip burn.

But down here in the south,   we don't have to worry   about that so much.

- No we don't have to worry about that too much.

- Let's see of course taking it off be sure and do that.

And then there's other things besides covering, the plant to add the protection, we can mulch.

We were talking about that earlier about... And don't cover the crown, that's important.

If it's a perennial, you don't want to mound up everything on top of it because it holds the moisture in and you get the crown all wet and rotten.

And you wonder why the thing don't come up next spring, because you were so careful, putting the mulch.

'Cause mulch does a lot of good things obviously.

- Sure, sure.

- It insulates the soil and keeps the temperatures from fluctuating up and down.

It's kinda like a buffer, or an insulation for that.

And you can also group pots together, make a big cluster of them if you've got a bunch of them.

- I've seen that, like in the nurseries.

- Yeah, cluster them together.

And then they all throw mulch on top of all that, especially woodies, the woody plants.

And just make a mound of it and that'll work really well, like old sawdust or you can get from an old saw mill or just whatever, some kind of mulch.

And you can also, with young trees, there's a cold damage that you get if you've got a young sapling, a fruit tree or something, it can get sun scald on the trunks.

In the winter, in the south or southwest, when the sun hits it, and it's been really cold and that tissue falls and they burst, you know the cells burst.

You get that bark splitting or trunk splitting.

- Yeah I've seen that.

- So there's things you can do to prevent that.

You can wrap an old blanket around it for the winter, and you can buy these tree collars or whatever they call them, that protect the trunk.

And you can also, this is what I've done with little saplings that are, about an inch maybe in diameter, no bigger.

- Okay.

- Like a pipe, like your conduit and stuff you use for pipe insulation.

[laughing] You know these foam tube things.

- I know what you're talking about it.

- They are slit down the side, slap that thing on the trunk.

- You're telling us some good stuff.

- Yeah and that works great.

Or you can use those old, what's those things called a pool noodle.

That's it well see they got a hole in them.

So you just cut through that, you can get several out of that thing and they're cheap.

- How 'bout that huh?

- So yeah, that works too.

So that kind of insulates to keep you from having sun scald on your young trunks.

And another thing that you might not think of but you know what I said while ago that saturated soil holds more heat.

So always if it's dry and there's a cold wave coming, water the plants well.

- Okay.

- Because you're going to retain more heat in the soil so make sure that your plants are watered well before that real cold freezing weather comes through.

- Yeah, I don't think people think about that.

- No, they don't think about watering in the winter and going into the fall.

Yeah, they don't, yeah.

- That's all some good stuff.

I appreciate that.

- Sure, I've killed a lot of plants.

So I know some tricks.

- Yeah, this is definitely gonna help protect our plants, in the winter landscapes.

Thank you so much for that.

[upbeat country music] - All the annuals here are begonias, but as you can see, they don't look even.

And one of the reasons is all annuals in the nursery are given growth retardants to help branch and keep the plant compact and environmental factors are what caused them to grow or be stunted, like this.

Begonia here, nice and compact and blooming, but not filled in like it should have.

And then you have other problems here of stem rot that has killed these first two begonias.

And I'm standing here and there's water standing on top of the ground and I'm squishing.

There is something wrong with the irrigation system that's not evenly distributing water to all of these plants.

And some are way too wet and others have been getting just the right amount of water to be nice and even.

[upbeat country music] - All right, Mr. D, nuisance wildlife, you want to start with geese.

[laughing] - Let's start with geese, let's start with geese.

It's one of the few that I don't have a problem with at my house, but geese can be a problem, especially if you have a pond or are close to a pond.

And in the last several years, we've had resident populations of geese, especially around golf courses and things like that.

- Yes.

- And my personal opinion, if they're residents, they're not migratory.

And I don't personally think they ought to be covered under migratory bird laws, but my local game warden doesn't agree with me.

So I'm not going to argue the point, but anyway, there are several things that you can do that might help.

I know one thing that I've seen in my career, one time the population of, and it was actually ducks got so high in one of the neighborhoods here in Memphis, that they developed a disease and it was just a massive die out.

There was dead ducks everywhere.

And it was, I think, a form of cholera or something like that, that it was a type of disease that affected the ducks because the population got so high.

So that could possibly happen if you would get really, really high populations.

But these geese are, are vegetarians, of course.

And they can damage wheat populations and things because they'll pull the plants up by the roots.

They don't just bite a little neat piece off of the leaf.

They'll pull up small plants.

They've been used in gardens before, if you get the garden plants of a pretty good size, they've actually used them for weed control in gardens.

'Cause they'll go in and they'll eat the small weeds in the gardens.

That's one good thing about them.

And they're also very tasty on the Thanksgiving table.

[laughing] You know, that's another good thing about geese.

So if any of them happened to meet their demise, you can kind of keep that in mind.

But damaged and I went to "Prevention and Control of Wildlife Damage".

This is an old publication and you can get, - We'll make sure we get that link up there.

- You can get this the same publication, but modify the habitat.

If you have ponds and it's your pond, you can make the sides more vertical, bring in a trusty track hoe and, And instead of having gentle slopes going into the pond, make it more vertical.

Eliminate nesting areas around the pond.

If you've got a little island out in the middle of the pond, like some people do, that's perfect for the geese to nest out there and the predators, it's not as easy for the predators to get out there.

So you don't want that kind of thing.

You can use fences, install fences around ponds, gardens in and yards.

Install, I don't know how practical this is, overhead grids or netting on pond reservoirs and fish raceways.

Change some of the cultural methods, change the timing of planting and harvesting of vulnerable crops.

Produce winter grains instead of spring grains.

Use less preferred plant species in parks, cemeteries and lawns.

- Oh my goodness.

[laughing] - I don't know what those species are.

Frightening is something that you can do.

And there's a lot of things here that frightened them.

And personally I think the last one is the best, - I bet I know what that is.

- Flags, Mylar tape, balloons, scarecrows, water spray devices, automatic exploders, pyrotechnics, recorded distress calls and dogs.

- Oh, a dog.

- A retriever even, anything that's used to hunting.

Dogs are really, really good at keeping geese away.

So that's a really good for frightening.

Live capture, there's a time during a goose's life that he can't fly, he or she can't fly, when they're molting.

And you can herd them up like cattle.

And that's during the summertime, I think maybe late summer or mid to late summer they're molting.

And you can herd them up like cattle and put them in a cattle trailer and haul them off and take them to your neighbors.

You need to check with your local game warden before you do that and make sure that, because it is illegal to transport wild game without... Those are some things.

The best thing, shooting, 12 year old with 20 gauge shotgun.

That is the best thing that you can do, where it's legal.

And it says it here, hunting is preferred method.

Shoot 'em, shoot 'em.

- All right.

So what about deer?

- Deer?

Twelve year old with a twenty gauge shotgun also on deer.

Deer are a worsening problem, more of a problem.

And Tennessee Wildlife Federation has changed all the counties of West Tennessee are now unit L counties.

And that means a hunter can kill three does a day.

And up until a few years ago, Shelby, Tipton, some of the counties right around Memphis were not unit L counties.

But now because of that high deer populations, they are.

Unfortunately fewer and fewer people are hunting.

We need more people out there shooting deer.

We need more hunters.

It's a very tasty, nutritious product.

Venison is an outstanding food product.

And if we had more people, that is one of the best ways to get the numbers down.

- But can you shoot those in the city?

- Can you shoot them in the city?

No, no, you can't shoot them in the city, legally.

Now there are exceptions, I know President's Island has a shooting season for bow hunters.

Of course it's highly regulated.

I would encourage, we could put pressure on legislators to have that happen in other areas.

My opinion, Shelby Farms is someplace we might want to consider doing some kind of bow season there because it is really a problem.

There are a lot of deer out there and we have a lot of deer automobile collisions on Walnut Grove Road.

- By the AgriCenter.

- It's kinda dangerous.

- Okay.

- But I'm also afraid that we're going to reach the population where they do the same thing, that chronic wasting disease or some diseases that occur.

And you'll start finding dead deer everywhere, when that happens.

And it actually adversely affects the population.

So if you manage them with predators, that is a good thing.

And it actually makes the deer population more healthy.

But exclusion, fences, electric fences, tall fences.

That's a good way to... You can get pretty good... And I personally have had some success with that, doing that out at AgriCenter.

But frightening, gas exploders, pyrotechnics, gunfire, or tethered dogs.

- Tethered dogs.

- Again, your dog is a good deer excluder but that's about it.

You know, we need to hunt more.

- All right, so what about armadillos?

- Armadillos.

- They're all over the place, - They're kind of a little different critter, they're out there digging around in your yard, looking for grub worms.

- I have had them in my yard recently.

- Yeah, so I guess you could consider them a beneficial critter because they eat grub worms.

About 90% of their diet are insects, they do eat a few earthworms too, but they, they're eating grub worms.

And those kinds of May beetle and June beetle larvae and Japanese beetle larvae and things like that, they eat a lot of that.

They're a real interesting critter.

Every year the female has given birth to quadruplets, identical quadruplets.

They're one egg is fertilized by, you know...

They're identical twins.

So if you've got one armadillo out there, there's three more somewhere, probably unless it got hit by car.

And when you scare one, if you walk up behind the armadillo and clap your hands, he's gonna jump up.

They jump like three feet off the ground.

And unfortunately that doesn't work well when you have an 18-wheeler barreling down towards you.

And if just lay there kind of crouching down a little bit they'd be all right.

But, they don't know, they jump up and it gets them.

- Oh, man.

- But shooting, 12 year old with a 20 gauge shotgun.

- There you go.

- The most commonly used methods.

Again, inside of city limits, you need to check with local authorities.

Shoot only where it's legal.

- Sure, sure.

- But clear brush and other cover to reduce their habitat.

You can trap them.

They're pretty easy to trap in a live trap.

They're not real smart.

And if you put some   1 by 6s, 10 or 8 foot,   one by six's create wings   and kind of guide them into   your trap.

As they're digging   around, they just kind of,   and then you put some...   - Do you have to bait to trap?

- You do need to bait the trap,   over-ripe or spoiled fruit is a good bait.

Other suggested baits are rotten meat, fetid meat and mealworms.

- Mealworms?

- Yeah.

But again, Wildlife Damage Control.

It's the University of Nebraska, Lincoln.

That's got this kind of information on about every critter that you can think of.

- Oh, that's good stuff.

- Good luck with the armadillos.

- Good luck.

All right, thanks Mr. D, good stuff, man.

[gentle country music] - Well, this happens to be a cherry tree, but it is a thin-barked tree, and many thin bark trees get sun scald.

And you can see this sun scald here has tried to heal and is doing okay.

Sun scald happens in the wintertime when the temperatures outside heat up during the day and the sun is beating on the thin skin bark of the tree.

And then at night, when temperatures fall, the tree bark cracks, and that's what causes sun scald.

This one is trying to heal, but unfortunately this one over here, is a worst case scenario.

It can't heal.

And since there was no nutrients flowing on this side, this particular branch failed.

And now we've got a real big problem and this tree has serious issues with its health.

[gentle country music] - All right, here's our Q and A segment.

Y'all ready?

- Ready.

- These are great questions.

Here's our first viewer email.

"Each spring, I have to   buy a new butterfly bush   "because they never   survive the winter.

"I do not mulch it because I   have watched several care video   "that say not to mulch it   because they don't like moistur   "in the winter.

"What should I do to   help it make it through   this upcoming winter?"

Mrs. Cara from   Natchez, Mississippi.

So how about that?

So butterfly bush, but it never survives the winter.

And we're talking about Natchez, Mississippi.

What do you think about that?

- Well, I wasn't familiar with the zones, the plant hardiness zones of a butterfly bush.

And I was a little surprised   that from what I read,   it's hardy all the way to   zone five, which is cold.

And Natchez...   All the way from five to nine.

Okay and Natchez is   8B I think I looked up.

And so it's not a matter   of cold that kills it because it should be fine.

It could be that it's on the southern range and it could be the heat and overwatering, maybe she has it in a low wet place and she's right about it not being wet.

They don't like wet feet.

Like most plants, unless they're a plant that's made for that.

But I don't know.

I would suggest maybe she moved it to another place and try that.

- Okay.

What about you Mr. D?

- I agree.

I can't figure it out.

It oughta come back out in the springtime.

Hopefully she's waiting long enough, giving it time to come out in the springtime-- - Because they are slow to leaf out, but then you know, in Natchez, it might not even lose its leaves, totally.

- Yeah, totally, right.

- So I don't know.

Maybe she's just needs to move the thing.

Or if it's dead, go get another one.

[laughing] - Get another one in that case.

And the thing about the mulch is this, of course I would still mulch.

I know she said she watched the videos, but I'd still, you know.

- Yeah, if she gets it in the right place it wouldn't hurt to mulch because mulch is always good as long as you don't like cake it up around the trunk and crown of things.

- Especially for the winter.

It's a blanket for the roots.

- Moderates the temperature changes.

- That's for sure.

- All right Cara, hope that helps you out there.

Here's our next viewer email, "I'm going to plant two tomato plants next year "and I'm preparing the soil now.

"I'm using banana peels, coffee grounds, and corn meal, "hoping to attract earth worms.

"I'm concerned that I could add too much.

"Is it possible to add   too many soil amendments?

Please offer some advice,   thank you," and this is Darrell So Darrell is going to plant two tomato plants, right.

But he's trying to prepare the soil right because he wants to attract earthworms.

So what do y'all think about that?

- Yeah well, to answer his question, about can you add too many amendments, yes.

Yes, you can.

And I would suggest that Darrell have his soil tested.

And just see what it needs.

- Don't guess, soil test.

- Don't guess, you know.

And it's two tomatoes, it might be not very big area he's talking about so I'd have it tested.

- If he's got a whole lot of soil amendments, maybe he needs to plant more than two tomatoes.

That way he could spread it out over a larger area.

- Just two?

- Yeah.

- I mean, were just using his, know five, but yeah get your soil tested, right?

- Yeah, that's what I'd say first thing.

- Organic material, humus, all that good stuff.

- What about the coffee grounds, is there.. [indistinct chatting] - And a lot of people that use in the community gardens and such.

- Yeah, put them in the compost.

- Yeah, put it into compost.

- And blend them all in with everything else.

- I think that'll work, yeah.

- But corn meal now that will attract earthworms.

We used to do that when we were trying to attract earthworms for fishing worms.

- I want to know what kind of soil he's got.

Like you said, he needs the Soil Web, doesn't he?

- He needs the Soil Web, check it out.

See what you're sitting on.

- Check it out, yeah.

You may not need any of this stuff.

- But yeah, to answer your question, yeah, you can add too many.

- Oh yeah.

- You can definitely do that.

So thank you for that question Darrell.

We appreciate that.

All right, Dr. Kelly, Mr. D, that was fun.

Thank you much, thank you much.

Remember we love   to hear from you   send us an email or letter.

The email address is   familyplot@wkno.org   and the mailing   address is Family Plot,   7151 Cherry Farms Road   Cordova, Tennessee 38016,   or you can go online to   FamilyPlotGarden.com.

That's all we have time for today.

Thanks for watching.

If you want to learn more about protecting your plants this winter, or keeping critters out of your garden, go to FamilyPlatGarden.com.

Be sure to join us next week for the Family Plot: Gardening in the Mid-South.

Be safe.

[upbeat music] [acoustic guitar chords]