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

I'm Chris Cooper.

Hydrangeas can produce large summer blooms.

Today we're going to plant some.

Also, a Japanese maple is a go od focal point for 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 Joellen Dimond.

Joellen is Director of Landscape at the University of Memphis.

And Carol Reese will be joining me later.

Hi Joellen.

- Hi.

How are you doing?

- Doing fine.

- Good.

So we're here.

Yeah, your place, right?

- Yeah.

University of Memphis.

- The University of Memphis.

- What are we gonna be doing today?

- We're gonna plant a hydrangea.

- How about that?

Okay.

- Now this particular hydrangea is a Hydrangea paniculata.

- Okay.

- For the cultivar, Bobo.

- Bobo.

- Which means it's gonna be from two to three feet tall, and just be a small hydrangea that's gonna be covered in white blooms.

- Nice.

Nice.

- In the summertime.

So as you can see, it is deciduous.

So we're planting it in early spring here.

I mean late winter, so that you see it doesn't have any leaves on it.

We've got them placed.

We've already planted a few.

We're gonna take this out of the pot.

- Got it.

- And look at the root system.

- Look at that.

- And see that it's not circling the container.

There's nice healthy roots in here, so we don't have to do any cutting, so we will dig a hole here.

- Okay.

And what we want, we don't wanna go any deeper.

In fact, we wanna stay out of the ground just a little bit on this, 'cause when we put mulch over it, then the mulch will cover the root ball.

- Okay.

- 'Cause we want it to be well drained, but we want to dig it a little bit wider than it is deep.

- Wider than deep.

- Wider than deep, because when these roots start to establish and come out, they're going to come out this way.

- Okay.

- And radiate around the plant.

And you want it nice and loose for those roots to anchor the plant.

- So it's always best to plant high if you can, right?

- Plant high if you can.

- Okay.

Well drained.

- All right.

I'm gonna give this a shot.

See how this works.

- This particular hydrangea, the paniculatas, like zones three through eight, so that's a large part of the country that they can be in.

And the paniculatas like sun to partly shady areas, so, and of course well drained soils, but it will bloom for many years, and they will bloom and the blooms will stay on them for a very long time.

In fact, they'll usually start out kind of a chartreuse and then they'll turn their white, and then as they age, they'll turn a little bit of pink.

And then of course they get dried on in the fall.

So, I mean, they have quite a few weeks, sometimes six, eight weeks of bloom time or more.

- All right.

What do you think so far?

- It looks good.

It needs to be just a little bit deeper.

- Deeper.

Okay.

See if I can get in there.

- Yeah.

Like most homes, this is not the greatest soil up against your house.

It has some kind of construction rocks and debris in it.

But as long as the soils are good and it's well drained, it'll be fine.

- It'll be fine.

And we can try this, and another way you can do this is you can take your shovel.

- Okay.

- And you can measure your container with your shovel, and then put it down in the hole.

- Look at that.

- And say, "Hmm, it's a little high.

"It might need to come down just a little bit more."

- All right.

- Of all the hydrangeas, the paniculatas are probably the toughest of all of the hydrangeas, because they do take sun and partly shady areas very, very well.

In the further south you go, it should be have some afternoon shades.

They are tough.

They do have diseases and pests, ju st like the other hydrangeas, but they don't seem to get them, because they are in sun and they usually are very well, got a lot of airflow around them, so they don't have so much disease problems.

- I think that'll do it.

- Okay.

And we wanna make sure it's as wide, so we need about that wide, - About that wide.

- at the bottom.

Hey.

Hey.

- Maybe just a little - Just a little bit, yep.

to the side here.

Just so it sits nice and flat.

- Okay.

- Towards the bottom of the hole.

I also like to make it, dig it and put some slashes in the side.

- Okay.

- So that if a root hits it, they will hit some of this other rough edges and follow it into the side of the soil and not circle that container.

- Okay.

Like a container.

- I think we got it.

- Then we'll place it in this hole, make sure it faces the way we want, and then we can backfill.

You notice it's a wider than it is deep.

Nice area for the roots to come in.

- Can we just break it up a little bit?

- Break up the clods as you put it back in.

And you'll notice it's up out of the ground just a little bit.

It's just the way we like it.

- Yeah.

Oops, rock needs to go.

And then down when we mulch it, it will fill over the top of it, but it will be a well drained shrub.

- That looks good.

- Yeah.

How about that?

All right.

- It looks nice and comfortable.

Better than outside in the container.

- All right, just the right height.

How about that?

It's pretty good.

I think I can get the hang of that.

I think I can do that.

- We got a few more to do.

- Okay.

All right.

I guess I better get my practice in.

- That's right.

- All right.

Thank you, Joellen.

I appreciate that.

- You're welcome.

- Good.

[upbeat country music] When you buy a plant from the nursery, it comes with a tag.

The tag serves its purpose, it's put on the plant as soon as it's potted up.

That way people in the nursery, and when you go to buy it, know exactly what plant that it is, and it keeps track of it.

But it does need to come off the plant, because it can stay on and girdle the plant.

Plus it leaves plastic in the ground.

You don't really want that.

So whatever you do, either cut it off or you can untangle it and take it off.

And then you can plant your plant.

Now it'd be good to keep this, because it's got a lot of information about the plant on it.

And if you, the plant should not survive, you would have the tag of what exactly what it was, so you can replace it.

[upbeat country music] - All right, Ms. Carol, let's talk a little bit about Japanese maples.

We love Japanese maples, don't we?

- We do.

They don't always love us.

- Right.

- And you better love 'em, because sometimes they can cost a pretty penny.

- They sure can.

- Although they have come down in the last few years.

I think there's more people producing them, and sometimes the price is less than I expect it to be when I pull up that tag.

And let's talk about why they're that expensive.

You know, to grow them, you have to have a grafted plant.

You can take seeds off a Japanese maple and plant them and grow a little maple, and sometimes they're quite beautiful, a seed-grown maple.

There's a lot of variability, but most often you're gonna get a small green tree with great fall color.

And I love them, and they're often more heat tolerant and sun tolerant, which can be a real issue with Japanese maples.

So actually a few of my Japanese maples in my yard are seedlings and they look quite good.

But to get the weeping form that so many people want, or the lace-leaf form, which, by the way, I think a red weeping lace leaf form has become so common, let's talk about some of the others being more desirable.

But if you want one like that, let's say Tamukeyama, which is a very good form for the South, you would have to grow the seedling up for a couple of years and get a piece of scion wood off of that Tamukeyama, and then graft it onto that root stock.

Usually it's a side veneer graft, and then once it's well rooted, or well healed in there, they'll cut the green part off, and then the weeping plant has to develop.

But that takes a while.

It takes a good bit of time for that to grow into a sizable enough plant to go into the retail market.

- Wow.

So if you're the producer, you've had to invest in either plants that were already grafted, or grow the seedlings, then pay a skilled laborer to graft them, then you have a lot of time invested.

- Right.

- How much time it spends in the nursery before it gets to the market is actually a big determiner of how much it cost.

Big determinant.

- Ah, okay.

So, 'cause if you could have turned that space in your nursery over very quickly with something, but instead it took you a lot of years to get it to market.

Tamukeyama, we mentioned being a good one, a good red lace leaf weeping form.

And it's sort of become the standard to replace the old Crimson Queen was the most common red lace leaf weeping that did well in the South, because the South, because of our heat, we have to be real careful.

And there're literally probably thousands of Japanese maple cultivars now.

The history of 'em goes way back, of course.

Japanese maple, Asian.

- Yeah.

And they've been selecting, there's a lot of genetic variability in the seedling root stock, so they've been selecting for thousands of years and perpetuating those clones by grafting.

So some of these go all the way back and have very complicated, hard to pronounce Japanese names.

So do not trust my pronunciation.

I'm from Mississippi, right?

So, you probably wanna research whether I'm saying them properly or not.

Would you agree with Tamukeyama, anybody?

- I would.

- I would agree.

I would agree with that, yeah.

- And Crimson Queen, we can say.

- We can say that, right.

- Okay, we can say that one.

The old standard for an upright red would be Bloodgood.

Bloodgood was always the one that did well in the South.

But even it would often turn kind of greenish as the summer goes on.

It loses the good, rich red tones that we like so much.

So more have been coming on that are upright big reds.

I like one called Hefner's Red, which stays very dark and a good deep burgundy through the summer.

Emperor I would be another one, if you like the upright red forms.

But there's a variety of them, and there's a whole books devoted to them that you could research.

I'm really fond of the green forms.

I love a green Japanese maple, and to me the green ones seem to be a more tolerant, which makes sense if you think about it.

The dark leaf is gonna absorb more heat.

- Heat, right.

- So the green leaves are gonna survive our hot sun a little better.

And just as far as that goes, most Japanese maples are gonna prefer at least afternoon shade.

They like some sunlight, or they won't keep the rich colors.

They can get kind of wimpy and wispy and not get good rich colors if they're in full, deep shade.

So ideally, morning sun, a few hours of morning sun, and then some afternoon shade will be your best siting for color and growth and not getting sunscald.

- Yes, this is common.

Because we start getting calls, don't we?

- Yes.

Yes.

- Especially late in the summer when it gets really hot, and if they get a little bit drought stressed.

So if you think about the fact that this is, in its native setting, a woodland maple, one of the things you can do to help avoid the sunscald and the drought stress is to really take care of that root zone.

They're sort of like a dogwood in that they want to have a lot of good air exchange.

They wanna be planted a little bit high, good organic soil with a lot of porous, what I call the leafy duff, the woodland kind of thing that goes on, is gonna help a whole lot.

And be sure that you adequately water those things, especially when getting established.

That's crucial.

Planting a little bit high, we were talking about the problems when you plant them a little bit deep, and you get that soil that stays wet all the time.

They're not gonna like that, so if your drainage is a little iffy, I would recommend, you know, put 'em up on a mound to help, and be sure that you mulch well over that root zone to keep those roots cool as well.

It's gonna help you out a lot.

- Okay.

Any other diseases or insect pests?

- There are, in fact.

The borers really like to attack the Japanese maples.

The flatheaded borer is common, and luckily that is one that's easily treated with the systemics that you can put around the root zones.

And the flatheaded borer is gonna have the D shaped hole as it exits.

And the bark looks like it's sort of flaking off.

And if you pull back, you'll see some engraving, then that one is more easily treated.

But the ambrosia beetles are a whole 'nother story.

- Oh, they're tough.

- And they really love any thin-skinned tree, and the Japanese maples certainly qualify, the thin-skinned bark trees.

And that's gonna be a small hole about the size of a pin head, a little bit larger than that.

Early, a lot of times when they're feeding, you'll see the toothpick-like frass extruding, but if it's windy or it rains, you'll see the sawdust or frass.

We call it the caterpillar poop [Chris laughs] has fallen down around the base of that tree.

And that's a good clue that it's gonna be the ambrosia beetles, and that's a very difficult thing to treat.

Usually you're not gonna have success.

It's not actually the beetle that kills, it's the fungus - Right.

that the beetle introduces into the tree.

So sometimes they'll make it, but often not.

The best thing to do is to spray preventatively.

The other issue that they get, and this is one that I just can't find any solution for, and that is canker.

They'll just up and get canker.

- Yeah.

Cankers are tough.

- Cankers are.

Usually stressed trees are more prone to canker.

If you keep that tree happy and healthy and vigorous, and it's got the perfect siting, and you don't let it get drought stressed, you're gonna be more resistant to the canker.

And the canker doesn't always kill it.

Sometimes it'll kill a whole limb.

Sometimes the tree acts like it wants to die and it doesn't.

I had a Seiryu, which is an upright lace leaf form, a green leaf form that's very heat tolerant, beautiful fall colors.

We had 'em all over Mississippi State campus, and it got a huge case of canker, and I thought it was gonna die.

And I got tired of looking at the ugly thing, and threw it out in the edge of the woodland, pulled it up and threw it out.

And the joker the next year sprouted out.

- How about that?

- I dug a new hole and put it back in there, and it's like, "Yep, I'm gonna live."

- And it lived.

- That's right.

- So also, since they are grafted plants, be sure you monitor below the graft union, and rub off any of the growth that comes out from below that graft union is another thing you need to know.

- Yeah.

You mentioned that.

- Okay.

Wow.

So Japanese maples are nice trees.

- There are, and some good places to see them, the Memphis Botanic Garden has got a good collection.

And then we have some local people, if they want to get in touch with you, who allow tours sometimes.

- Okay.

We can do that.

Thanks for that information.

That was good.

- Sure.

- All right.

[upbeat country music] - Let's do a little bit of germination testing for some of our seeds.

This packet was packed for five years ago, but we have some very straightforward and easy ways that we can test and see what the viability of these seed packets are.

So I'm simply going to lay out a few seeds.

Ten is nice, because the mathematics are easy when we do some germination testing.

So now we have 10 seeds simply laid out on a piece of paper towel.

Then we'll fold it gently, so they'll stay in place, and then wet it down.

[water sprays] Again, slip this wettened packet into a small plastic bag, leave it in a nice warm place.

Cucumbers would like at least 70, 75, even up to 80 degrees for good germination.

And then we can come back in a few days and test it.

It's been a week.

Let's come back and see what our germination test was on our cucumber seeds from 2013.

We'll gently open the package, and peel back our paper towel to be able to make a count.

We have 1, 2, 3 seeds that haven't germinated.

So that's about 70% germination, which would be what we'd expect from seeds that we're a few years old.

We're now free to plant the rest of that packet, seed just a little bit heavier than we normally would, and if we're careful, we might even be able to use these that are just germinated right here on this paper towel.

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

You ready?

- I'm ready.

- Ah, these are great questions.

I like this first one.

All right, here's our first viewer email.

"I have five big catalpa trees along my driveway, "and each year two of them are covered with catalpa worms.

"How do I prevent catalpa worms?

"I can't pick that many, and going fishing every day."

Right?

So this is Jim from Colcord, Oklahoma.

- Wow.

- So I know a little bit about catalpa worms, 'cause my grandfather had catalpa trees.

And he used to love to pick th ose worms to go fishing with.

- Yeah.

- All right.

- So how about that?

But he wants to prevent catalpa worms.

How do we do that?

- Well, and it's just on a couple of them.

- Right, just a couple.

- It's in- - Two outta the five.

There's a publication from Penn State University Extension about the catalpa worms.

- Good.

And it talked about those trees that are affected, tilling underneath them.

- I think that's interesting.

- And it will get the larvae on the top of the ground, and break up the larvae, so not, the population will be lower.

- Okay.

- For them.

- He can try that.

Also, when you first start, if you're scouting, first see the little nymphs come up, then he needs to spray them with Bt, 'cause Bt, Bacillus thuringiensis, will easily control the catalpa worm.

- It will control it, right?

You just read and follow the label on that.

Yeah, I wonder the size of the trees though.

It's gonna be, you know, a lot of spraying for that.

The Bt, which is to safe product, but it's just, if the trees are too tall, it might be an issue, you know, to get the spray up there.

But yeah, so knowing the life cycle, of course you want to target the catalpa worms when they're a little small larva.

- Yeah.

- You know, know they're easy to control that way.

But yeah, read and follow the label, Mr. Jim.

Or you just might have to get some more fishing buddies.

- Yeah.

- Right?

- And just pick out some more worms, how about that?

- Yeah.

And then it, the publication, went on to say, if you have a really problem with them, you might wanna, there might be some environmental factor that is causing those two, that particular trigger, those two trees to get the worms moreso than the others.

- Wow.

- And so they suggested maybe replacing them with some other catalpas that may not be as sensitive to the worms.

- That's interesting.

So some some kind of stress, right?

- Some kind of stress on those.

- Yes, bringing the moths in to lay those eggs.

- Yeah.

Yeah.

- On the leaves.

How about that?

- Yeah.

So I don't know.

We got no picture, so I don't know what's, what conditions the other two that get 'em are in.

- Okay.

- But yeah, I think tilling underneath the trees and trying to get rid of the population might help.

- Right.

Yeah.

Destroying those pupae.

- Yeah, and maybe a little Bt here and there.

Just gotta, but you're gonna have to scout.

- Yeah.

You definitely gotta scout.

- Often to make sure when they're starting to infect the tree, and get them early.

- No, you're definitely right about that.

And then, yeah, we don't know how tall those trees are either.

- No, we don't.

- You know, so that's something that you have to consider too, Mr. Jim, or find some fishing buddies, and yeah, grab a lot of those and go fishing with those buddies.

- All right, so thank you, Mr. Jim for the question.

We appreciate that.

Here's our next viewer email.

"I keep my Bonsai trees outside in the warm weather.

"Is there anything I can do to protect my Bonsai trees "from the spotted lantern fly?

"How can I control the eggs and the nymphs without damaging my trees?"

And this is Mike from Northern New Jersey.

Ah, how about that?

- Yeah.

- So spotted lantern fly, which is a problem on the East coast.

- It is.

- That's why, of course they're, they have piercing sucking mouth parts.

We know that they're what, taking up sap.

They do excrete honeydew.

But yeah, the eggs, you know, they pretty much lay eggs on outdoor, you know, furniture, equipment, and things like that.

So scouting is something you definitely have to do there.

If you do see those eggs, the nymphs, target the nymphs, right?

- Yeah.

So you can target the nymphs with oils, right?

Neem oil, horticultural oil is gonna be something you can use or insecticidal soap.

- Insecticidal soap.

- That's something as well.

But how else do you think you can protect the bonsai tree though?

- The, you know, the first, when I'm, first of all this question, the first thing I thought of was to make little screen square tents to go around them.

- Okay.

- Because, you know, Bonsai plants aren't very big, and that would keep them off of them, but I mean, that probably would be unsightly to look at.

- Right.

- But yeah, I mean, if, the things that, if, he needs to look at them often, which are hopefully as a Bonsai plant that he would.

- Okay.

- Because if you start seeing the small nymph stages before they get to be the adults, then you can use these insecticidal soaps and neem oil to get rid of them.

And my question is too, you know, the spotted lantern fly likes certain types of plants-- - That's right.

So, what kind of Bonsai plants does he have?

Because one of the, on the list of things that they like are maple trees.

So, and I know people do Bonsai a lot of maple trees sometimes.

So if that's what he is worried about, then he's just gonna have to scout often, and just make sure that he catches everything when it's young, and if he does see egg sacks near it, then you can just scrape them off, and put them into some alcohol, and that it usually gets rid of them.

- Yeah, that'd be good.

No, I didn't know that about the maples, but I do know, of course, the host plant for the spotted lantern fly, tree of heaven.

- Yeah.

- Yeah.

So if you have anything of that in your yard, you want, might wanna get rid of it.

- Yeah.

All right, there you are, Mr. Mike.

Thank you for that question.

Yeah.

Scout.

Be on the lookout, okay?

Here's our next viewer email.

"I have vegetable raised beds.

"The vegetable seedlings grow midway, "then they will die.

"The leaves sometimes curl, "the plants will stop growing, turn brown, and die.

"When pulling out what is left, "I have found this.

"When moving the soil, I will see these white specks.

"Is this killing my plants?

Thank you for your help."

And this is Regina from Hawaii.

So what do we think that might be?

- Yeah, that is a stem rot.

- Okay.

And yes, the roots and stuff that is the rot, the little, the fungus that causes all of that.

And yes, that, but of all of that is because it's too wet.

- Yeah.

All the pictures look like there's, the soil is just too wet.

- Too wet.

Need to improve the drainage.

Yeah, so that fungus would be a white mold.

I mean, that's what it looks like, you know, to me.

And of course the symptoms, you know, they start wilting, and they, you know, they die off.

Stem rot is something that you mentioned.

That's what I think the problem is.

So for that, you have to practice good sanitation, right?

I wouldn't use a fungicide.

I would look for resistant varieties the next time that you go looking for your plant material.

- True.

- So those are the things I would do, Ms. Regina.

So wouldn't you agree?

- Yeah.

Oh yeah, I totally agree.

But, yeah, and resistant varieties would be the best thing to look at too.

But I think the soil's too wet.

- Yeah.

Yeah, so culturally, yeah, improve the drainage.

- It's just don't water it too much.

- Yeah, yeah.

Yeah, just loving it a little bit too much, right?

- A little bit too much.

- A little bit too much.

So thank you for that question, Ms. Regina.

We appreciate that.

All right, cultural practices, okay?

Here's our next viewer email.

"I have seven fruit trees and one in a pot.

"I would prefer to buy one of those big bags of fertilizers.

"Are nurseries the best place to buy bulk fertilizer?

"I looked at some online sites, an d it was very expensive.

Thank you."

This is Nemo on YouTube.

So what do you think about that?

- Yeah.

- Yes.

- Of course it is.

Yeah.

- Yeah, they, nurseries, you know, garden centers, all of them have bulk fertilizers that you can buy.

- Right.

- I just don't, you know, of course, I don't know, seven fruit trees.

Have they ever took a pH test?

- Hey, that's what I was thinking.

Look at you!

Yeah.

I was thinking, "Soil test."

- I mean, they may not need anything but nitrogen.

You don't know, because you haven't done a soil test to see.

- Right, right.

So I would do a soil test, Nemo.

That'd be the first thing I would do before I run out and buy that bulk supply.

- Bulk supply, yeah.

- Bulk supply of fertilizer.

So get that soil tested.

Let's see if you need that for your fruit trees.

Yeah, you might need some, but yeah.

But use those according to, of course, getting the soil tested, right?

So, and you'll be just fine, Nemo, okay?

Get that soil tested.

All right, Joellen.

Thank you much.

That was fun.

- It was.

Appreciate that, all right?

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.

Today we planted a hydrangea.

If you want to learn more about planting roses, blueberries, trees, or vegetables, we have lots of how-to videos at FamilyPlotGarden.com.

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

Be safe.

[upbeat country music] [acoustic guitar chords]