Re: Freeze protection

Ah the voice of experience and reason...!

Diann

-----Original Message-----
From: PRIMROSES [s*@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU]On Behalf Of
Claire Peplowski
Sent: Monday, April 16, 2001 7:00 PM
To: shadegardens@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU
Subject: Re: [SG] Freeze protection


In a message dated 4/16/01 6:11:17 PM Eastern Daylight Time,
naturverbunden@EMAIL.COM writes:

<< wind and not enough rocks when I need them!  Blowing pots have done
enough
 damage on their own let alone the freeze! I've been out there cursing for
 the past 2 hours and finally decided the HELL with it!  If they made it
 through the entire winter, they'll manage to survive this. AHHHHHHHH!
  >>

Poor guys, you have a worrisome problem on your hands.  We have no plants
above the ground that are not rock hardy.  We are about five days free of
snow and ice.  A hosta - what? - a hosta here ?  We do not seem to ever lose
plants to spring cold snaps.  We don't usually have any plants around to
become upset.  I did clear out the cold frames of leaves and put the covers
back today.  We have a storm warning and ours contains the announcement of
wet snow and low temperatures.

Last year we had 14 inches of snow on April 10 and the daffodils bloomed
through the snow, we did not lose one.

It may be that some plants such as the early appearing hostas should not be
grown in your area.   Sounds like zone information for the warmer zones
should be more exact.  Up here in the north pole, we simply assume
everything
with slightest tenderness will probably die so we pot it, put it in a frame
or call it an annual.  At some point a gardener does say to hell with it, if
it will not thrive in my garden, something else will.

There is a trade-off here.  You can mostly have more tender plants in the
wamer zones but you occasionally lose flower buds or entire plants.  We have
no problem with early cold spells as most of the spring here has been a cold
spell.  The tradeoff is you have a much longer growing season and many times
I would like to have that.

Claire Peplowski
NYS z4
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