frost and toast

Reporting in from halfway between the Berkeley flats and the hills:

TOAST:  salvia confertifolia, salvia discolor, lavendula bipinnata (it has another 
name too, but I can't remember it), cestrum, brugmansia cultivar

UNHAPPY: helichrysum petiolarus, cistus cultivar, tibouchina 
urvilliana, abutilon, Eureka lemon tree

This raises the question,  what percentage of mediterranean plants do 
you think are frost hardy (I don't mean prolonged freezing weather 
but this kind of 1-3 nights slightly below freezing)?  

Some of my medit plants seem fine--I think the pelargonium sidoides 
from the Cape in South Africa may be ok, most of my other salvias 
from the mountains of Mexico are fine (s. chamaedrys, "Cienego de 
Oro", even "Indigo Spires").  My Lavender "Goodwin Creek" seems to 
have toughed it out as well.  

I should probablu stick to the medit plants that can tolerate short 
frosts, but I don't have the self discipline to stick to that 
strategy, even though it's prudent.

Oh well, the good thing is that the frost damage has culled plants 
from my yard that I would never have had the heart to destroy and now 
I can do something new in the resulting gaps.  The salvia discolor, 
whose foliage I loved so much up close, always looked scraggly and 
unimpressive amongst the other plants. And I had trouble with the 
lavendula bipinnata succombing to root rot in the El Nino rains last 
year.  So that probably should either be treated as an annual or just 
eliminated from my garden altogether.

Hope you all have happy holidays!

Rachel from Berkeley, California
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