How cold is a "hard freeze" in your area? It was cold enough here last night that the water in my birdbath froze, but all the roses in bloom still looked more than half way decent today. Roses can take quite a bit of cold--into the high 20s, like 27-28 degrees. If I were worried, I might grab a couple handfuls of oak leaves (blown in from my neighbors' yards) and put them around the base of the rose bush. In fact, with 15 Austins all only a few weeks in the ground, I think I'd do that to all of them for sure. Good luck. Kate

Hello ! So I am in the simcoe county area in Wasaga Beach ontario. I have 17 beautiful now 3 year old emerald cedars at 7 ft now. I back onto forest and get crazy wind from the bay. I COVER MY CEDARS and in 3 moves in 8 years with this being my 3rd hedge I’ll tell you why ...... WIND + animals. All the cedars in my area are brown, bare in the bottom or bare throughout. Rabbits go after the base, deer everything else. The wind here almost gives the cedars a wind burn. I never believed in tightly burlaping anything. I string up the cedars incase of freezing rain or in the case of this year lots of heavy snow, I then stake a wall front and back, then burlap the wall. I use a steel gaged fence tied to the post and burlap over too. Yes it’s excessive but I see the damage of uncovered, half eaten cedars. When I lived closer to Toronto I only saw damage from cedars out in the open exposed to our winter winds. At this point with how full and tall my cedars are I’m not about to start swapping out ones that die. Not to mention my neighbour who works at 4am (I still live in a subdivision) see’s deer stalking my cedar ‘Berlin wall’ a few times a week. It’s not attractive, neighbours don’t mind one bit and come spring I have no issues. My other neighbours had issues and did the same after replacing 6/9. You can use other materials other then steel gaged fence it is pricer I did it because the winter winds here are nuts and COLD the burlap without the support just caves in, I do it come November and no touch ups or issues until End of March / early April I take it down then reuse the same materials come fall. At this point the steel fence costs less then having to replace each tree. I also in the fall but those fertilizer spikes you hammer into the ground and put one for each tree/shrub it seems to do wonders. I water up until end of October. They are established but like anything else hot days - dry streaks I do my best and water everything. In our area the nurseries all agreed to cover the area around the trees but not cover completely allowing them to adjust to the temperature and as well snow won’t hurt them one bit just keep them twined incase of freezing rain etc

Thanks Tom! I'm guessing that the flowers are gone for this season and while that's a disappointment, it's only one year. What I would regret is if I've killed this little tree, because it was a very nicely grown specimen. I'll keep an eye on it, and if/when the secondary buds start swelling then I'll try to protect if from frosts. But for now (tomorrow night!), even with more temps in the mid-20's I don't think I need to take any action because the remaining buds are not breaking at all yet. Does that sound right?

The safest would definitely be the sunroom at night. You probably don't want the first growth to emerge in the sunroom where it will not be accustomed to the full intensity of the sun, so it would be best to put it outside by day. Then again, if you are really going to plant it that soon, it probably does not matter all that much. Just FYI: you probably should not count on or even allow fruit to develop on this young tree the first year (or first few months really) in the ground.