Winter,again @#%&*!

[Axel]

It was only december 2022 when large parts of the UK experienced winter temps that damaged many palms and other plants. Generally, only coastal areas and London escaped the cold.

The south UK coastal areas have widespread frost now and in the coming days

actual UK evening temps, this time it’s coldest in the middle of the UK, even colder than parts of Schotland. Amsterdam around 0C tonight.

[Meangreen94z]

It was only december 2022 when large parts of the UK experienced winter temps that damaged many palms and other plants. Generally, only coastal areas and London escaped the cold.

The south UK coastal areas have widespread frost now and in the coming days

actual UK evening temps, this time it’s coldest in the middle of the UK, even colder than parts of Schotland. Amsterdam around 0C tonight.

I’ve been hearing about that on a couple other forums. We dropped to 14-16°F (-10°to -8.8°C)on 3 consecutive nights but it was completely dry. Im hoping for minimal damage, although I covered a decent amount in tarps anyway .

[mickthecactus]

Cold this morning, -6c. Hope the outside stuff is ok.

[Stan]

At least Texas isnt without power unlike the other big freeze. Somebody learned.

[Meangreen94z]

At least Texas isnt without power unlike the other big freeze. Somebody learned.

They have made improvements but it wasn’t as cold or as long of a duration as 2021. I think the recorded low for the state was -1°F(-18.3°C) in several towns in the northern panhandle , where as in 2021 some of those towns saw -15°F(-26.1°C). We only dropped to 14°F, December 2022 saw 12°F, and 3°F in February 2021. There was also less precipitation/ice involved, mostly isolated to the far eastern portion of the state and on one day.

We had a brief warm up yesterday but then it cooled back down today, the low is
21°F(-6.1°C) tonight but then rain comes Sunday with the warmer weather predicted for much of the country.

[mickthecactus]

The cold weather has gone and we are in a run of mild days for a while. Today the sun is out and it’s quite pleasant if a bit breezy.
I took the opportunity to clean the greenhouse glass outside.

[Stan]

The bay area is soggy with mild nights. It's called an atmospheric river but to me seems like plain old fashioned rains. Nothing driving or beating on the roof type rains.
Friday starts a streak of as much as 10f above average temps. 49ers vs Lions should be 70f and sunny in Santa Clara.

[nsp88]

Finally uncovering and/or moving back indoors after all the cold. We are around 60 in the day with lots of rain.


The hoop tunnel and moving blankets over some potted plants and over my raised bed (with insulated walls) did really well, thankfully. Even had a few survivors I wasn't expecting:
-Sedum spectabile (always dies in winter and comes back every spring)
-Tiny turks cap (does same as above^)
-Delosperma (sp?) - these have had a rough couple months. They came with mealy bugs apparently so I ripped a bunch of dead growth back and sprayed. Bugs weren't all killed so a month later I stripped them back further, cut a bunch off, bare root and washed, sprayed again and repotted. Threw them outside and if they died, oh well. They were still alive when the cold front came so I buried their pots in a planter, threw a Walmart bag and towels over them, and left them. They actually made it through. If they stay bug free I will put them in a better spot.
-Aptenia - I saw mixed info online on cold tolerance, but most said it couldn't handle these temps. Pleasantly surprised to see it did.
-2/3 of my small A vilmoriniana survived. One was in the raised bed and had no damage. Two were in pots. The one in the smaller pot with holes in the sides died. The one that was slightly larger (both plant and pot) survived but lost some leaves. I was impressed by the two surviving.

Top leaves on left are good. None on right plant are okay.

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Made it through perfectly

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My tomato plant didn't make it. I read online where someone left their cherry tomato plants all winter and a little over half of them survived. Decided to leave my roma plant out to see if it could make it. I covered it with blanket and trash bag, but it all died. Not unexpected, but I was hoping.

Edit to add, we got down to 12f (-11c) on the coldest night and a couple of other nights in the teens and another night or two in the low 20s.

[Meangreen94z]

Finally uncovering and/or moving back indoors after all the cold. We are around 60 in the day with lots of rain.


The hoop tunnel and moving blankets over some potted plants and over my raised bed (with insulated walls) did really well, thankfully. Even had a few survivors I wasn't expecting:
-Sedum spectabile (always dies in winter and comes back every spring)
-Tiny turks cap (does same as above^)
-Delosperma (sp?) - these have had a rough couple months. They came with mealy bugs apparently so I ripped a bunch of dead growth back and sprayed. Bugs weren't all killed so a month later I stripped them back further, cut a bunch off, bare root and washed, sprayed again and repotted. Threw them outside and if they died, oh well. They were still alive when the cold front came so I buried their pots in a planter, threw a Walmart bag and towels over them, and left them. They actually made it through. If they stay bug free I will put them in a better spot.
-Aptenia - I saw mixed info online on cold tolerance, but most said it couldn't handle these temps. Pleasantly surprised to see it did.
-2/3 of my small A vilmoriniana survived. One was in the raised bed and had no damage. Two were in pots. The one in the smaller pot with holes in the sides died. The one that was slightly larger (both plant and pot) survived but lost some leaves. I was impressed by the two surviving.


Screenshot_20240123-172402~2.png

Screenshot_20240123-172645.png


My tomato plant didn't make it. I read online where someone left their cherry tomato plants all winter and a little over half of them survived. Decided to leave my roma plant out to see if it could make it. I covered it with blanket and trash bag, but it all died. Not unexpected, but I was hoping.

Edit to add, we got down to 12f (-11c) on the coldest night and a couple of other nights in the teens and another night or two in the low 20s.

The vilmoriniana specimen in the raised bed had no protection? Craig Jackson, formerly of John Fairey Garden told me they drug their two potted specimen (standard and variegated) into a greenhouse for the 2021 freeze. Aside from the walls they had no added protection from 6°F. He was shocked to find they weren’t killed, he said the green specimen took little damage. Maybe because of the tropical appearance no one has ever tested them. Let me know if yours show more damage/death later. I have two specimen to test out.

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[nsp88]

The vilmoriniana specimen in the raised bed had no protection? Craig Jackson, formerly of John Fairey Garden told me they drug their two potted specimen (standard and variegated) into a greenhouse for the 2021 freeze. Aside from the walls they had no added protection from 6°F. He was shocked to find they weren’t killed, he said the green specimen took little damage. Maybe because of the tropical appearance no one has ever tested them. Let me know if yours show more damage/death later. I have two specimen to test out.IMG_4467.jpeg

Sorry I probably typed it up in a confusing way. I had thick moving blankets and hoop tunnel over the raised bed and the pots together beside the raised bed. Here is an highly detailed drawing:

Yellow is hoop tunnel. Blue is moving blanket.

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One was in the raised bed and it made it through perfectly.
One was in a small plastic pot beside the raised bed and it lost lower leaves.
One was in an even smaller orchid pot with side holes and it died.

Oh wow, that is good to know! I might leave my large one out next year and just put it in the raised bed instead of a pot. I have been impressed with it this winter. It was out in high 20s with no damage prior to this storm. I was too much of a coward to leave it out during this recent bad storm though. I put it inside.

When you say you have two to test out, does that mean in the future or that you already did some testing during this past storm?

[mickthecactus]

A noisy storm went through last night and no trains running locally because of overhead line damage.
Not cold though.

[Paul S]

Wrong type of wind!

[Stan]

The bay area is entering a short false spring with temps running from 65-to low 70's today to Tuesday.
I ran through my internet plant sites. Only A-ville still had new posts. The dead of winter for ya.

[Meangreen94z]

The bay area is entering a short false spring with temps running from 65-to low 70's today to Tuesday.
I ran through my internet plant sites. Only A-ville still had new posts. The dead of winter for ya.

Yeah it’s definitely that time of year. It’s nice that it has stayed interesting on here .

[mickthecactus]

Yesterday was such a lovely clear sunny day that we drove to the coast with the dog, walked him along the seafront and sat outside a beach front cafe with a coffee. About 9c.

A rare day for January.

[jam]

I ran through my internet plant sites. Only A-ville still had new posts. The dead of winter for ya.

It's interesting, innit? You'd think the pattern would be more time in your garden during the season and more time on the net during long winter nights

The other thing is a lot of discussion has moved from classic fora to social netwok channels and unfortunately this trend is not going to change. Classic fora offer you a knowledge base which is logically structured and is moderated and also give you a sense of community belonging. OTOH social networks groups may contain valueable info which you may come accross rather ramdomly (or in line with algorithms) by scrolling through comments but also a lot of BS. Plus they are less about community and more about anonymous interactions.

[Meangreen94z]

I ran through my internet plant sites. Only A-ville still had new posts. The dead of winter for ya.

It's interesting, innit? You'd think the pattern would be more time in your garden during the season and more time on the net during long winter nights

The other thing is a lot of discussion has moved from classic fora to social netwok channels and unfortunately this trend is not going to change. Classic fora offer you a knowledge base which is logically structured and is moderated and also give you a sense of community belonging. OTOH social networks groups may contain valueable info which you may come accross rather ramdomly (or in line with algorithms) by scrolling through comments but also a lot of BS. Plus they are less about community and more about anonymous interactions.

Yeah, I still post on FB groups but expect the “Why would you do it that way? you’re an idiot.” responses. There are a number of highly knowledgeable people on there that watch and respond to posts all day, yet never have the time to join classic internet forums like this one. So I monitor both.

[Gafoto]

The bay area is entering a short false spring with temps running from 65-to low 70's today to Tuesday.
I ran through my internet plant sites. Only A-ville still had new posts. The dead of winter for ya.

Yeah it’s definitely that time of year. It’s nice that it has stayed interesting on here .

This is somewhat the season of ‘nervously checking the weather to see if the arctic is going to unload on us again’ but also the season of starting seeds. I find I have the time to baby plants along under lights in the winter and they enjoy the consistent conditions for the first few months of life. Things grow well inside but it’s a layover. Most of them want to be outside in the ground under the sun.

[nsp88]

Classic fora offer you a knowledge base which is logically structured and is moderated and also give you a sense of community belonging. OTOH social networks groups may contain valueable info which you may come accross rather ramdomly (or in line with algorithms) by scrolling through comments but also a lot of BS. Plus they are less about community and more about anonymous interactions.

I have been a part of a small number of different subreddits and Facebook groups that bucked that trend. Really great moderators on the subreddit and then local plant groups on the Facebook pages. All really great groups to be a part of.

But yeah, most are much more anonymous and as you describe. I do love that you can join so many groups from one account though. If you have a small number of favorite subreddits that are small it isn't bad to just visit each one and see what posts there are that day. If you join too many or they are too large and it just becomes too much to fully keep up. And facebook's algorithms are just always insanely horrible.

This is the first forum I ever joined. At first it kind of drove me crazy trying to figure out what the heck was going on with how things were organized and all, but I really like it now. I like how you can bring up old threads and continue on with new information and updates and then that opens up new input from others too. On reddit if you comment on old posts, no one but you and the original poster see it so the only real way to get more discussion on it is to make a brand new post. And then you lose all historical convos on the topic

[Stan]

Might as well post that bay area records are falling with temps in the low to mid 70's the last two days. Ends with another atmospheric river by Wednesday night. Its a different winter with record warm alternating with plenty of rains.
It used to be only warm winter records were set in the drought years of 76 and 77,now it's no drought and still making warm records.

[Stan]

Oh,how it's been pouring rain in the bay area and in socal as you've seen on the news much flooding. It's only Friday and periods of heavy rains until Tuesday to go.

[Meangreen94z]

Sprinkling today but sunny and mild this weekend. It feels like spring. Hopefully it will hold.

[mickthecactus]

Yeah, today had a hint of spring here too.

[nsp88]

...Let me know if yours show more damage/death later...

I think it is safe to say the smaller one in smaller pot is gone and the next size up is okay.

Right after I posted that last photo I cut off lower dead leaves of each. That left the smallest one with only one or two small brand new leaves, but even they looked mushy. The next size up just needed a few lower ones cut off.

Tonight I inspected them. The smaller one in clear smaller pot is just a shriveled blob. The other one in the black pot closer to the camera is looking good.

And the one is the raised bed is good, too. Don't have a photo of it right now, but no changes to it really.

[Azuleja]

This is somewhat the season of ‘nervously checking the weather to see if the arctic is going to unload on us again’ but also the season of starting seeds. I find I have the time to baby plants along under lights in the winter and they enjoy the consistent conditions for the first few months of life. Things grow well inside but it’s a layover. Most of them want to be outside in the ground under the sun.

I enjoy caring for seedlings in winter. It's a nice thing to do inside and they seem to do well.

Aloe seedlings

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