The James Bay area of Greater Victoria is great for gardening even though it is expensive. Photo: A tiny area is used for exotics that can fit in tighter areas. The mild Pacific air allows local residents in Victoria to have broadleaf evergreens in winter. It is nice to see subtropical trees grow in part of Canada. Here is a link that might be useful: Subtropical flora in Greater Victoria

Thanks everyone. The pictures of it recovering are in this photo album. It has another two fans I saw coming out of the crown today. It had zero protection just to clarify. http://www.flickr.com/photos/23840945@N05/ Don555, I live near Whitemud Crossing and from my monitoring I have noticed its almost identical to city centre readings. Far south Edmonton is the coldest area in the whole city. I've found even Leduc has warmer extreme lows (-37c this year). Its weird that the international airport is so much colder than anywhere within 50 miles of the city consistently every year (-46c this year) and anything close to the south henday is the worst in the city. -35C is the coldest I've seen in many years where I live and thats one degree off zone4a so I basically consider my area zone 4a. I've had many years that don't break -30 sitting in zone 5a.

Here's what I will toss out. I did some research in Alamogordo and there was a cold snap as you can see in the first picture. The airport is maybe 5 miles from most of Alamogordo. If you go to www.wunderground.com you can view archived weather history on "view calendar forecast" on the local station's page, e.g. type in Alamogordo it allows you to see weather history. I just wanted to point out -13 F was recorded at the Alamogordo airport in early Feb. 2011 and lots of palms made it through that winter. Several days of negative degree nights and not a whole heck of a lot of recovery during the day. Most that died were Washington Robusta (Mexican fan palms) as they were seen dead all over Alamogordo, Las Cruces and El Paso. Mexican fan palms aren't a good choice in this area unless they're a Cali/Mex hybrid because the snaps in New Mexico are just too cold for them. You would be lucky if you got 20 years before they succumb to the cold. I would bet any Washington Robusta in Albuquerque would probably be toast in a few years. A better choice might be the Washington Filfera which is the California fan palm. They have been seen to survive -20 F and pretty sure they would be able to survive anything Albuquerque could throw at it. The Washington Filfera rarely get leaf full leaf burn until it drops below 13 F Very few canary island date palms seemed to have died down in southern NM which was interesting. They are proving to be almost as hardy as the California fan palms. In 1962 there was a -7 snap in El Paso and there are many date palms that are 60+ years old many planted before the snap and are still alive today. However it looks like the few Canary Island dates planted in Alamogordo made it through the winter there in a south facing exposed location in temps as low as -13 which if this is true this might be a new cold hardiness record for these palms which shows how remarkable they are. There's not a lot of information about them in this area because they haven't really caught on in popularity until recently. Most of the newer neighborhoods are stocking the canary island date palms in Las Cruces and they seem to be doing fine. The trick might be that you need to grow them from seed put them in a pot and leave them outside until about 10F then bring them into the garage on nights any colder than that, put them outside in the day when young. After they outgrow the pot in a couple of years plant them outside and your tree will be adapted and used to the cold. I think that's why some of these palms are doing ok even despite the incredibly cold snaps. Even the exposed palms seemed to have made it down in southern NM. Anyways if you check out the image of Alamogordo street view if you look carefully in the top left corner of the street view picture shows a date of 2013 which is after the big 2011 freeze. They look a little ratty as some single digit nights were recorded in 2013 as well. These palms were there before the freeze as well and I'm guessing they're almost 30 years old so they've probably seen some incredibly cold nights over the years. I wouldn't be completely sure a date palm would make it in Albuquerque long term because the snaps in Albuquerque tend to have slightly colder day time recovery, maybe with some mild winter protection like with Christmas lights (non LED type, but the incandescent type) you could have a small one tucked up against your warmest south facing wall with some black gravel rocks beneath it (which absorb heat) and a few large black rocks positioned near the palm to re-radiate heat at night to the tree in the winter you could get one to survive at least until a big freeze maybe 20 years or so. I would imagine it might just survive the cold snaps Albuquerque based on the cold snap data from Alamogordo in a good sheltered location and maybe with a small amount of protection could make it. If a crazy cold winter came up you might need to do some bagging or have a fold out greenhouse to put over it just to be safe. There is a rule of thumb in areas that are on a slope but not too high in elevation but maybe a few hundred feet above the bottom of the valley floor you might see 3-4 degrees in warmer temps on the coldest nights which is going to give you an advantage. In southern New Mexico all the palms in sheltered locations like against a south facing wall seem to get very little leaf burn during the winter despite the very cold nights at times where as the ones out in the open seem to be totally burnt which is telling me that the sheltered location makes all the difference. There are many nights that fall into the single digits every couple of years in Las Cruces and that you're possibly looking at +5-10 F degree micro-climate increase. As far as palms go in Albuquerque I would give it a go and maybe if you are aware of a super unbelievably cold night bust out a small radiator or parabola heater to direct heat at it or get some heat tap to wrap the bud and top of the tree to raise the air a couple of degrees which would likely be just enough to make it through the cold nights or another trick is depending on how your house is built put it near a south facing bathroom exhaust vent. If the vents are on the side of the house then at night just turn on your bathroom vent that blows toward the palm and that would probably help too although not as much as heat tape. This is a good video for showing the freeze damage in palms in Las Cruces which recorded a -5 night. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=81fxNatT2lQ

Finally February is done, average temp came in at 8 F. Yikes.. Anyhow my Basjoo patch has 3 feet plus of mixed mulch on it and quite a distance out from the corms...so I anticipate no problems...I will open it up to the elements in mid April as always. I probably won't save more than a foot or so of P-stem even though some of them I left with four to five feet intact. Here's a picture from just before they went to sleep last November. The dozen or so other bananas and palms are indoors waiting this out...won't be long now in the low 40s today with heavy melting...long way to go yet though with an eighteen inch snowpack with 4 foot drifts in the main gardens by the house...lol.