Frost Mitigation

[digitS']

The Weather Service changed their forecast after I went to bed last night. But, I was ready for 'em -- up before 3am!

Supposedly, it was going to be a 30F morning but when I checked, the forecast had been changed to a low of 27! Off I went - arriving at the garden 20 miles away, setting up the sprinkler pipe and running water by 4:40. An hour and half later, I had everything covered with 1/8" of ice :/!

Weather Underground has a volunteer about 1 mile from the garden. His thermometer showed a low of 26.8.

My theory is that if I don't break the plants, ice is better than nothing. I don't know tho' . . . for sure, it would have been better to just drive the frost off them.

There was a good deal of reflection off the ice and the light was very flat across the ground. That may explain the almost total lack of green in the photo. It wasn't quite that bad. These are snapdragons but the asters had suffered the most from the wind the last 2 days - yeah, big double whammy , gusts up to 59mph followed by frost. We'll see, the aster leaves were still alive when I left at sunrise . . .

Oh, and if you think that ground has a lot of rocks - wait until I've run that sprinkler more than 90 minutes out of the season. Then, you'll see rocks!

Steve

 

[ducks4you]

Have you tried plastic? I used clear plastic bags on my tomatoes last year, when I put them in the ground in, gulp!!, April!! We HAD some frosts, but it didn't touch the plants.

 

[2ndtimearound]

Gee Steve, I'd be terrified to try icing the plants. But I do have snapdragon seedlings ready to go into the ground, but I decided to repot them in larger containers since it is due to frost here tonight. Well, MAYBE it will frost here tonight - so far, they are saying it will get down to 37 degrees, but I have to keep checking. I was thinking of coverning plants with sheets or something. Typically, in this zone, we are supposed to wait until May 15th to be past all danger of frost, but I have all the early stuff in and it's thriving.

 

[digitS']

Well, I am a little concerned about this . . . there are 6 flats of snaps out there.

I've never had it quite this cold after I've put them out that I can remember. This year is NOT turning out to have an early spring for me.

Here's about one-half of the snaps that I've got . . . of course, this is much later in the season and after I'd been cutting on the plants for awhile. It's about 400 square feet just for those flowers and along with the asters, calendulas, and all the wind -- represents a little more than I could easily cover.

digitS'

 

[ducks4you]

Has it been pretty warm lately? As WE found out here in Illinois last week, when we had a frost, the GROUND was pretty warm and the corn that was 3-5 inches up did NOT get frosted. Higher up (like my car's windshield,) got the frost instead. I suspect, since you already have a lot of green around your crops that they'll probably do okay.
Praying for you, anyway!

 

[digitS']

Thank you, Ducks!

No warmth . . . All the unseasonably warm weather came in January and February - remember the Winter Olympics?

I started everything a little too early. We had about 2 weeks of relatively okay weather over the last 2 months. Lately, it has been more than a week of wind and clouds again. Cannot seem to get out of it even for a couple of days.

Even the cabbage & broccoli don't look as tho' they like it. Kale seems unfazed.

It could be worse: Butte, Montana had a record 15 this morning. And, Seattle, had a record amount of rain yesterday. The radar map shows the rain from Seattle spinning in from the south and the cold air from Montana spinning in from the east . . . .


digitS'

 

[2ndtimearound]

Sorry Steve,

It's not quite that bad here in Nebraska. It just broke 80 for the first time yesterday, today it's going to be 68 degrees and tomorrow 70, but this morning at 5 am it was 42 and like I said, it's supposed to get down to 38 tonight or tomorrow night, the weathermen are having a hard time deciding which.

Sorry even your cold stuff isn't too happy - the weird thing that happened here is that as soon as the several feet of snow melted, my oregano and onions were both looking like winter never happened! The butterfly bush, echinechea and asters and fennel are dong fine, but the milkweed is not getting big and thick like I'd like to see it. (Waiting for monarchs) No veggies out yet, onlly herbs and onion-like things.

I'll crossmy fingers for you also, but hang in there!! I'm sure it will get better soon.

 

[HunkieDorie23]

Wow, we had the same thing here about a week ago. The weather service missed the low temp by 15 degrees. Luckily I was up and on the computer at 4:30 am when the frost warning was issued. I just started covering with sheets because everything was in the greenhouse or on the patio.

I was tempted to put some stuff in this week but resisted the urge, and now they are calling for low 30's this weekend. I wish my frost date would get here already.

 

[obsessed]

Sorry for your cold weather but I love you snap dragons!

 

[digitS']

I think they might be okay . . . Today, after the melting of the Ice Age.

It really damaged the asters but there are more flats here at home for replacements.



Steve

ETA: Oh, and the frost "leveled" the spuds at the soil surface. But, they should be able to regrow. They were tiny things.

Funny that a couple of dahlias had already emerged and they look okay. That seems really strange.