Frost Mitigation

[2ndtimearound]

Well, my plants survived the "frost" that turned out to be very light where I am, thank goodness!
Only one of my asters plants seemed to have had any effect. That particular plant was very late starting to poke up through the ground. It is one of two that I planted last fall and the other one is about 5 inches high already, but this little guy is maybe 1 inch tall, if that! So he looks a lilttle wilty with that cold snap, but I hope he'll make it eventually.

I'm glad everything went well with your cold weather, and hopefully that magical no-more-frost date will come soon for all of us. I think I'm 6 days away from mine!


:rose row :rose :tools :rose :watering

 

[journey11]

We are back under frost advisory tonight too. Our last frost date was May 1st... :/ I don't have much out yet to worry about, other than a few melons and pumpkins I got out Friday that I started indoors for an early jump. I'm glad now I didn't hurry to plant the tomatoes. They and everything else are still in flats and can be brought in. What wierd weather we've had this spring! I'm wondering if it will ever warm up?

Steve, those snapdragons are gorgeous!

 

[lesa]

Forget frost, we had a couple inches of snow!!! It is so windy, if you didn't have a calendar you would think it was March!! Ugh! Every week that goes by, I try to say, well next week will be spring- I am wondering along with journey- will it ever warm up and stay warm???

 

[hoodat]

Looks as though you may have sqeaked by. I certainly hope so after all the effort you put in to save them.

 

[Whitewater]

My brother's vines (cukes, pumpkins) died totally because like lesa, we had snow too! Well, when I say 'we' I really mean most of the city, except us. Hubby and I received no precip but it was very cold!

My tomatoes survived thanks to them being small enough to put under gallon-sized plastic water jugs. They were under there for two nights and the better part of three days!

The weather later this week ought to be good enough to start planting the warm weather stuff, which is good, the tomatoes in the basement are ALREADY starting to get lots of roots in the bottoms of those plastic cups. . .

And I just can't wait for the first pattypan squash

Here's hoping it wasn't too cold to kill the lettuce seeds I've already sowed, now on their 15th day.


Whitewater

 

[hoodat]

Aw shucks. I forgot to plant patty pans this year and I have so much other squash (Winter and Summer types) the I don't think I can find room for them. My Mexican zukes are showing the first female blossoms and that's encouraging anyway.

 

[digitS']

Light frosts the last 2 mornings and we are going to replant in the beds of China asters. The old saying, "what don't kill you, makes you stronger," isn't really true in most situations.

I can ignore a light frost on most of the hardier plants and have successfully used sprinklers to mitigate damage to plants when the temperatures drop down around 30F. It doesn't work so well much lower. The large field sprinklers do a worse job than a hose and lawn sprinklers.

I think that even in 4" pipe, the water cools quite a bit traveling out of the ground 100 yards away. I suppose that any water coming from 3' under the soil surface is about 50 or above. 50 water has to be better than 30 air. Besides the long run of pipes, the sprinkler is slow so the water cools as the sprinkler turns in its big circle . . . can't win for losing.

At least, they were in the ground rather than sitting in little plastic containers in my overcrowded yard. That's about the only upside to this experience of such a hard freeze after I thought it safe to get snaps, asters, brassicas, and onions into the open garden. The weather service has all the mornings at above 40 for this week with some sunny days, however. I'm optimistic !

Steve

 

[digitS']

About 20% of the asters were pulled and replaced. A few of them were dead, dead, dead . . . but most were just badly burned with more than a leaf or 2 were gone, they were pulled and replaced.

Only about a dozen snapdragons were yanked. I still have plenty of plants of each that I could move out there.

That heavy frost even killed a fair number of sweet onions! They were beyond the sprinkler. Since they were set very close together, the event shouldn't make much of difference in harvesting the bulbs. Cuts down on scallions, tho'.

The warm-season plants are raring to go! Shouldn't they get a chance for their run for the glory soon?

Steve