From various sources I found that: Both Camellia japonica and Camellia sasanqua survive low temperatures down into -17.8 to -12.2 degrees Celsius range but other sources say japonicas can be slightly more hardy than sasanquas but not by much (say 10 degrees F). Camellia reticulata does best where temperatures don't drop below -9C for very long. And Camellia oleifera is resilient and tolerates up to -10C degrees.

Unfortunately, as you point out, temperatures below freezing will force the plant to go dormant to protect itself & the blooms. And theeeen there goes the bloomage. Blooms brown out, some flower buds could drop and the rest of the flower buds will go to sleep.

Temps below freezing -especially extended periods- begins to cause cell tissues to rupture and dessicate. And bloom hardiness varies greatly within all sasanquas or within all japonicas. A good way to tell if the bloom is unaffected is if it remains open and lasts its "normal" timeframe open.

The ones I have here are not a good choice as the plants stop blooming and restart much later, sometimes months. But that is what happens when the weather here girates up and down so much. Yesterday we had a high of 79F. Today I woke up to 36 and the high was 42, now back down to 31. Sigh...

I hope others with suggestions will chime in with what has worked for them.

davidrt28 it all depends on the variety, the location and the condition of the plant as to how much cold a plant can tolerate without damage. Plants that do well in zone 8 may not do well in zone 7 or 6. There are some varieties that have excellent cold tolerance, but severe freezes, dry plants, wind exposure, etc, even on these cold tolerant plants, can cause damage. So nothing is written in stone. If you live farther north than zone 8, protection is the best choice you may have. Planting under an evergreen tree, against a wall or other wind blocking plants, can help. Hydration, covering etc can help improve chances.

Not sure of what this Camellia is (may not even be a japonica as I am not a Camellia expert), but I took this shot this morning. It will bloom intermittently in a 'normal' winter (which averages a daily range of 40-26 in mid-Winter). Last winter was different and it lost a lot of flowers buds, resulting in fewer March into April blooms this past season (which seems to be its peak). Currently, it is loaded loaded with buds. As Savannah says, location IS really important. I have some definite Camellia japonicas on the other side of the house that have failed to take off. (One in the picture is about six feet tall.)

Oooo, nice. It is all quiet on the camellia front over here. Flower buds galore. No flowers yet. I need to add earlier bloomers but I did not find anything that caught my attention this Fall.

Anyone know whether my plant posted above is a japonica or a sasanqua?

The time when they bloom is the really big difference between the two. Sasanquas tend to bloom earlier, sometimes as early as Septemberish. But that is not written in stone and things get murky when one finds some late blooming sasanquas or very early blooming japonicas like yours in late December.

Could be a japonica but you might be able to tell better by measuring the length of the leaves. Japonica leaves are -generally speaking- as much as 3-4", maybe 5" in some while sasanquas are much smaller. Sasanqua leaves can handle more sun exposure than japonica leaves but this is a test that may not be practical for you. Someone once told me or maybe I read somewhere that sasanqua blooms -when spent- fall petal by petal while japonica blooms drop the whole bloom instead; unfortunately, it was word of mouth and I have never tried to see if that's true by looking at my japonicas and sasanquas.

I am not good at identifying camellias by name so let's see if others chime in. But give them time as many are probably logged off due to the holidays.

Thanks njoasis. That's kind of what I'm looking for. Just need a Camellia expert to ID it.

To clarify, I wasn't talking about foliar hardiness, an issue largely settled at least with respect to knowing which varieties to buy. I was talking about a demonstrable ability of the petals to withstand freezing.

Camellia Spring Promise looks like the pink one in your picture.

David, for the Mid-Atlantic, I would HIGHLY recommend Camellia x 'Spring's Promise', which is very likely the one pictured above by njoasis.

It is a hybrid I believe, so, not a pure japonica. Although I can't seem to find the mix at this time.

It has very hardy unopened buds, which can survive into the single digits. I lost most of my buds last winter with the extended cold -- first time since I've had the plant! But a few under the snow still survived and bloomed in March.

But yes, during warms spells here in zone 7 I can expect blooms on 'Spring's Promise' from December thru March.

Spring's Promise's open flowers, in my open NE location, seem to tolerate around 28 degrees or so for short duration without turning brown. It's just about the hardiest bloom I have found yet. I have about 20 varieties in my garden.

If you grow it under a tree canopy, you can probably get blooms to survive a degree or two more!

Like most of you, we had a colder than usual winter here during 2013/14, and most camellias just shut down the blooming process altogether, or at least put their flowers on pause for a long time. Locally, the best variety in terms of getting back to the business of blooming quickly was 'Professor Sargent'.

I've heard that 'Prof Sargent', 'Mrs Charles Cobb', 'Berenice Boddy', 'Dr Tinsley' and 'Gov Mouton' are all old japonica varieties that will keep blooming (or only pause for a short while) during cold snaps.

Perhaps those single japonicas that look like the species- like the one blooming in NJ pictured above- tend to bloom better than varieties whose flowers have more petals because it's easier to open a few petals than a dozen or more petals?

And I agree that location in the garden is very important- most of us have 'zones' where there's more protection from wind and/or warmer temperatures. It makes sense to plant camellias in those spots because they're often the only plants blooming- or trying to bloom- during the colder parts of the year...

Virginia

Virginia, thank you. Your input is very helpful. When I was at the NCSU arboretum after the freeze (and Camellia Forest for that matter!) I should have made a note of whether any camellias were blooming, but was so distracted by other plants it didn't occur to me to look for them.
I had a Dr. Tinsley when I was a teenager, in my first garden. It was a nice variety and I wonder why Cam Forest has not offered it in recent years. It is a parent of some of their April series and perhaps they believe those plants are superior. I have 'April Remembered' but it seems a shy bloomer to me...of course the gardens and soils were very different so that might not mean anything. I will try fertilizing it a bit this year with bone meal to see if I can get better bud set. (the soil here is so acidic, the slight alkalinity of bone meal will not be a problem)

FWIW, my 'Survivor' got cut off earlier this year than it ever has, yet continued to bloom during mild spells until just about now. Most years, it is able to finish blooming before freezes so I haven't been able to know if it would keep blooming afterwards. So that implies its buds are hardy to 20F at least.
(In fact some years it has set seed, and it has a couple seedlings under it but I'm not sure if selfed Survivors are worth keeping so I haven't dug them up, they might have been eaten by something now)

Another interesting fairly hardy winter bloomer is 'Winter's Fire'. I don't think open flowers are quite as hardy as Spring's Promise though. Mine starts in December. Normally the blooms are variegated.

I have other camellias, but this one is the only one in current bloom.

Cool, what kind of peafowl are those?

I thought they were Wild Turkey. But if you think they are something else, let me know. (This is NJ Zone 7.)

LOL ok I should have realized that. I didn't look closely and assumed they were some kind of fancier bird. Turkeys are related to peafowl of course. I too had a colony of turkeys (or whatever it is called) a few years ago but they all mysterious disappeared rather quickly. Someone or something hunted them down, I doubt they just move on.

Actually the name I should have used is guineafowl. I believe some people have these as pets:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helmeted_guineafowl

These are blooming now in DC near where I work. This is C. sas. 'Kanjiro'.

Have no idea what japonica this is. But in full bloom.

At my home Spring's Promise has just started up.

David, my turkeys ALSO DO appear and disappear rather suddenly, no one hunts here. We just started seeing them last year when a flock of 7 wandered around for a few days..., on Thanksgiving. Now, they can be seen crossing busy streets and as people gaze in amazement as they have become much more prolific in suburbia! These two above were around last weekend, then gone.

Dave, the Camellias are gorgeous..., especially like the ones in the second picture. Gotta get me some sasanquas as well. How do they rate w.r. to japonica w.r. to hardiness.

P.S., Regarding wild life, my biggest surprise is that the deer NEVER TOUCH'EM, but I don't recall seeing them on deer resistant lists.

'Gotta get me some sasanquas as well. How do they rate w.r. to japonica w.r. to hardiness.'

Generally I would put sasanquas about 1/4 zone less hardy than japonicas, but really they are all over the place. It all depends on which particular varieties you are talking about.

In New Jersey zone 7, for fall bloomers, go with any of the Ackerman hardy hybrids. So that would be his Winter Series or Ashton Series such as Winter's Waterlily, Winter's Snowman, Ashton's Ballet, Ashton's Supreme, Snow Flurry, etc, etc.

For Japonicas, I'd consider some of the Park's April series hybrids. April Remembered, April Tryst, April Kiss, etc.

There are many more.

Does anyone know how the Sansaqua's rate vs Japonicas in the heat? I was thinking the reverse hardiness was true. I'm in zone 8b. I may be dreaming but can ammend the soil even water with rainwater. I worked on a job with a huge camelia on it locally but of course I never ID'd that one. So apparently they CAN tolerate some heat here in Central Texas Hill Country region.

I am located in the Dallas/Fort Worth Area and camellia japonicas, reticulatas, sinensis and some hybrids require shade by 10-11am during the summer months. An hour left or right of 12pm in the summer is not good. They should receive afternoon AND evening shade. Camellia sasanquas will withstand full sun if they are provided mulch and sufficient soil moisture. However, I give them morning sun only although a restaurant near me has them in large planters getting afternoon sun. Both can take full sun in winter or when temperatures recede starting in September. Avoid planting them in the ground if you have caliche soil; use pots instead.

Japonicas may want to bloom at times when our temps are warm and then fluctuating heavily up and down.... and down may not be good if sap is very actively flowing and they are flowering. Sometimes, that will halt flower buds from opening until temperatures warm up enough. Other times, it can cause flower bud browning and dropping. I even lost one plant outright this February when it bloomed just as temperatures crashed to -2°F. But not bad a track record as it is the only one ever to do that in 40+ years.

Keep them well mulched with 2-4" of organic mulch (no rocks), water deeply before temps plummet from warm to below freezing and your last application of a slow release fertilizer should be about three months before your average date of first frost. You can try to use burlap to protect from ice and incandescent light bulbs if it gets too cold.

Thank you! These will be in deeply filtered light all day, pretty nice soil...most of it brought in by me, but no caliche. Native Soil is actually pretty nice here however this IS Texas. Granite Gravel indigenous. Do you know varieties in the containers? I'd love to see picture of that! Do you think planting at this time of year is advisable? They will be on a protected south wall, but one will be in a container. These are sansaqua, Alabama Beauty, and they are beautiful!

Yes, all bets are off if we get another winter like last year. We went -2 here as well. No fun!

FWIW I learned a lot since that post.

Seems like most camellia flowers have a slight resistance to freezing if they are in a protected spot; maybe the most outer petals burn a bit but they are quickly replaced. Here is an Ackerman camellia today...

After temps of 25f only a few nights ago.

After heavy-duty cold, the quickest to rebloom are the species C. yuhsienensis or hybrids thereof like 'Yume' or 'Dream Angel'.

That is STUNNINGLY beautiful!! Do you know it's name? So Ackerman was developed to be more cold hardy than either Sansaqua or Japonica from what I just read. I wonder how they would take the heat, even out of the sun. BTW...Where are you located?

Lucky for you I had to open my plant database and click thru all the camellias to find the name of the camellia I mention in this post: https://www.houzz.com/discussions/6208093/recommend-a-hardy-formal-double-for-me-please

The one in the picture above is 'Ashton's Pride'

And, as revealed in that thread, I am in the northeastern corner of Maryland, aka, Cecil County.

Sorry, I was skimming most of the posts...so didn't catch your mention of location. I being in the pretty far south am more concerned with heat, but that may not be anything you would have to know about. Lucky you! Your photo looked like a double from here, but i see that's not the case for the Ashton's Pride.

This is the camelia sansaqua in question. I love the doubles!

I think the info luis_pr provided was more than I could about camellia heat tolerance.

All I can add may not even be related, but I have a former coworker who grows tropical fruits in the outer suburbs of Houston. He and his wife told me they are aware of the spring blooming camellias but didn't recall ever seeing the fall blooming ones. Just not noticing, or are they genuinely less common? I have been in SE VA and NC much in the fall, but I feel like sasanquas seem less common in those areas, too. Which is a shame:

Sasanquas have a reputation of being more sun tolerant up here, too, and for example...at the 'Chesapeake House' I-95 rest stop, there used to be Camellia sasanquas in full sun near the entrances that were sometimes blooming as late as Christmas. A sign to northern travelers that you'd entered the geographic south, if not quite the political south. ;-) Alas, they were all torn out and replaced with hideous "eco" landscaping a few years ago when the MD I-95 rest stops were rebuilt. Natives only, decidedly uninteresting ones, too, and even planted in a way that just made them just look like weeds!

They always seem to come on the market in the late fall...which is why I always think of them as winter bloomers. Too much competition with other things more adapted to want the spring blooming variety for me. I never even heard of a Spring bloomer until reading this thead.

David, is that a photo of the white camelia in the treetops the containerized one you mentioned? Or what? What a beautiful array of colors there!

Maybe you mixed up a comment of mine with one from Dave? I might have recently posted a pic or two of a camellia in a container, but none of mine are intended to be permanently in containers. I mail order them, and keep them in pots for 1 to 3 years until they get about 3/8" caliper, then I plant them out.

The white, fall blooming camellia surrounded by fall colors has been planted out since roughly 2012.

I think you are right. You are obviously in the right place for camelias. I am thinking of trying one in a pot and two in the ground, aware they will need to be thinned and transplanted later. I keep an estate so it's in their budget to have the look of the moment and I'd like to do a triad in a corner to fill an area on a blank wall as some little Gem Magnolias fill in.

"You are obviously in the right place for camelias."

At least until another winter like 1994!