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By Jo Ellen Meyers Sharp, The Hoosier Gardener A lot of gardeners think their worries about pests in the garden are over once winter arrives. But Mother Nature doesn’t always follow the rules and some pests may appear that could damage your plants, especially trees and shrubs.  Mouse on grain stalk (hippopx) Public Domain The garden pest forecast for this fall and winter has summer pests hanging on for a longer period in fall along with the usual four-legged animals trying to feast on your garden’s delights in winter. Fall insect pests and how to protect your garden Why will insect pests be a problem for a longer period? Warm, dry weather – which we’ve had more of this year – lengthens the stay of ants, aphids, bees, flies, mosquitoes, spiders, and other bugs. In the garden, aphids may hang around if the temperatures are warm. Slugs also may be active, feeding on the dead debris in flower beds. They shelter in fallen leaves and other plant debris. What can you do to keep these pests away from your garden? Raking the debris from your garden removes a lot of these insects, but raking also eliminates nature’s way of wintering over beneficial native insects, like bees and butterfly pupae. Four-legged winter garden pests It’s not so much insects in the garden you need to worry about as much as four-legged pests, like rabbits, squirrels, voles, and deer that will munch on plants in winter. Protecting plants from these pests in winter takes a little more effort. In winter, animals chomp on trees and shrubs. They also take bites out of perennials and stubs of vegetable crops. They usually do this when there’s little food available in nature, such as when snow covers plants. The critters eat lower branches or they gnaw on tree trunk bark. Male deer will rut their antlers and scrape away bark. Plants become deformed, injured, eaten to stubs, or even killed by wildlife feeding. How to protect your garden from four-legged pests There are two general ways to protect garden plants from these common pests, no matter where you live. Barriers Physical barriers, like fencing and other enclosures, keep animal pests out of the garden. Deer exclusion requires an 8- to 10-foot-tall fence around the area you want to protect. Or electrify a fence. Rabbit fencing has a tighter grid at the bottom so the critters can’t get through. Use hardware cloth to deter deer, rabbits, squirrels, and other small mammals from gnawing on trees. Small animals can easily crawl through regular grid fencing. If voles are a problem, bury the hardware cloth around the plant to keep them from eating roots. Barriers also are important to keep animals out of your compost pile in fall and winter. Screening is one of the best ways to accomplish this. Spring bulbs may also require protection from four-legged pests, especially deer, rabbits, and voles. When planting, some gardeners make baskets of hardware cloth to plant the bulbs in. This protects the bulbs from underground vermin, like voles. Anchoring chicken wire over new plantings of spring bulbs deters digging animals, like squirrels. Remove the wire when plants begin to emerge. Once the bulbs start to bloom, rabbits, deer, squirrels, and chipmunks take delight. This is where repellents become useful. Repellents There are many good repellents on the market and they usually are labeled for specific animals, such as rabbits or deer. Some may be labeled for more than one type of critter. These usually smell gross and may have an irritant animals don’t like, such as cayenne pepper. For best results, start applying repellents early as the season changes. You want to create an environment that deters animals before you see any damage. It’s also important to change repellent brands about every month to make sure the animals don’t get acclimated to a particular scent. Most repellents require regular applications, such as after a rain or snowfall. Repellents, such as Deer-off, PlantSkydd, or Liquid Fence, can be a granular or liquid product. Read and follow the label directions when applying repellents. They usually smell bad because they are made from animal urine or blood. Some are safe to use on food plants, but others are not. Solar-powered repellers emit sound or ultrasonic waves critters find annoying. Other solar-powered devices may startle animals with motion-sensor activated lighting or sprays of water. Wireless Deer Fence uses three, 18-inch-tall stakes armed with pheromones to repel deer. Think about psychologist and behaviorist B.F. Skinner and operant conditioning. The deer are attracted to the pheromones but when their noses touch the stake, they get a light shock. Eventually, the deer are deterred from the area. Not recommended I don’t recommend using poisons to control garden pests. Poisons have a way of moving up the animal food chains, such as when an owl eats a dead vole that was poisoned. Now the owl becomes poisoned, too. Also avoid any repellents that aren’t science-backed. There are a lot of practices, such as using EPA-regulated moth control to control animals, that contaminate the soil along with critters, which could be your dog. Act now to protect your garden in fall and winter There’s still time to protect your garden this fall and winter. Rake the debris carefully to limit insect pests doing damage. To block four-legged pests from getting at your garden, buy your barriers and repellents, so barriers are in the ground before the ground freezes and you have repellents at the ready. The advantage of a garden pest forecast is you are forewarned and can be forearmed.
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