Hmmm...the Xmas light concept is intriguing. Sounds brilliant, but I think my neighbors will think me nuts. But if it'll save my roses I'm all for it.

Someone posted on not using plastic? Please advise. Otherwise I'll be dragging out every sheet in the house not on a bed.

www.weather.gov is much more accurate than the weather channel. Its the government website and their great w/ forecasts and updated discussions.

So is putting bedroom sheets over the beds a good idea? I don't have much so thats the best I can do.

What are a list of other plants to cover?

Hostas were mentions and so were hydrangeas. What are tender perennials?

thanks!

jgpublic, Thanks for the link. I was hoping for better news but your link states it still will be 27 degrees Sat. night.

Floridian transplants are great at covering plants. I really tought with such a distinction between seasons I wouldn't have to be doing it up here. I would avoid plastic. If you put it over your head you sufficate. When the sun shines on it, it would really heat up the plant. I've used cardboard in the past. Just make sure you weigh it down. It's usually always windy when it's cold. You'll want to have lots of clothes pins to secure your sheets to the plant or fence or a stake. Nothing like waking up in the morning and having all your sheets blown off. If you use the small size Christmas lights I would plan on concentrating a few strings so they can be bunched closer together. I guess the neighbors may think I'm decorating for Easter. I can use white, yellow and green lights. Boy, this really changes gears for this week. Digging out the christmas lights. I had been spring cleaning.

I bought some landscape fabric that I was going to put under some mulch to prevent weeds. I haven't laid it down yet. Could I use that to protect the new plants that I just planted on Monday???? Do I just drape it over them and then stake it?

Imagine all the big box stores having to haul in all those dollies of tender annuals. Wonder if they're going to have a last minute sale tomorrow before the freeze?

Would watering my perennial beds today and tomorrow help the situation or hurt it? I may be thinking of the water they spray directly on the citrus in Florida, but I am grasping at straws. I found our old beach umbrella and am thinking of propping it up over part of the beds with only half of its pole. Please advise on the watering vs. not. Thank you. -amy

The farmers in Florida that water strawberry crops leave sprinklers on all night and the water forms a coating of ice over the plants. The umbrella would help but you'd have to secure it so it wouldn't blow over or away and damage plants. I think I'm going to use boxes over young plants that aren't close to the house. The citrus groves use smelting pots to keep things warm.

Went to a thrift shop today on lunch break and bought 5 tightly woven curtains, most are a burlap type fabric. I am going to cover the smaller tender stuff with the tops of cut-off water and milk jugs, the larger stuff I'll place folded up cardboard boxes over it. Definately covering my newly planted hydrangeas (3), raspberries (2) and hosta divisions. Defiantely covering all of the veggies. So, some things will just be covered with a weighed down box or cut-off water/milk jug, some will have an extra covering, a blanket if you will, in addition to this. Hope it goes well. All of my vegs are planted out and I'd HATE to lose 'em. I'd be stompin' mad!

BTW, the question about the plastic- don't let plastic touch your plants because frost occurs from top down, if you get frost on the plastic and it is touching the plants- frost on plants. That's how I have heard it in a nutshell.

I don't worry too much about established plants in the garden. This is just the weather and they (and I) just have to live with it. And nothing tender gets moved too far from the safety of the garage this early, so it's no problem bringing them back in. What I'm really dreading though, is bringing the amorphophallus back in. With all the warmth it's up and blooming, just this afternoon starting to open and waft the fragrance of rotting meat. My garage (and probably the adjoining kitchen) is going to be a horrible place for the next few days.

As far as blueberries are concerned it depends in part on what type you have. According to NCSU, highbush (Northern variety) are much more tolerant to a freeze. Southern blueberries (Rabbiteye) can suffer severe fruit damage at even a few minutes below 30 degrees. It said evidence wouldn't be visible until the fruit matured. I have rabbiteye and almost all the fruit has formed. I'll be doing my best to protect them to avoid loss. I'd sure miss the fruit this year! Good luck!

Heather

What will a freeze do to the azaleas that are opening up. Should I be wrapping them up. Will a freeze put an end to the spring color that is so amazing right now?
How cold does it have to get to damage the peach crops? They are all in bloom right now.

thank you, heather q- that explains it well. unfortunately, mine are rabbiteyes and my fruit has formed, too. i recall covering them up a year or 2 ago, and it helped some. our bushes are so big it's hard to get them all covered. we'll do the best we can and cross our fingers. i noticed today my hardy kiwis have their flower buds out. they are extremely tender- even the new foliage, so unless i can protect a couple branches, i sure won't have kiwis this year. persimmons and roses are budded out and all our pears have fruit set... wail...

i've found that accuweather.com is pretty accurate and they are calling for *gasp* 24 on sun morn. it just keeps getting worse! i'll check the other site out and see what they want.

i just checked weather.gov and it wants 28, which is a lot better than 24.

while we're talking weather sites, i'd like to recommend w underground, which is wonderful when storms are coming in. it's updated every minute or so and shows the direction of the storms, the projected timeline, and the severity. very, very useful for seeing active cells near your home.

Here is a link that might be useful: weather underground radar

I spent this morning putting bamboo stakes around my plants to prepare for covering. I fortunately have a finial top fence along my shrub roses, so they are easy to cover (and they are budding already).

My lilac is totally loaded with buds as are the itea. I'm going to cover all of those.

I don't think I can reach high enough to cover the Lady Banksia, so I guess that's the end of those glorious little blooms. My Encore azaleas are still budding, not blooming, so I can cover those. My sweet bay magnolia has tight buds, but there's no way to cover it anyway.

I'll put cardboard boxes over my canna and colocasia. I've set extra flagstone scraps beside everything tender to soak up some sun. I'll put those on top of the boxes to keep them from blowing away.

Fortunately, most all of my annuals are still in trays, so those are in my garage. Unplanted perennials have been moved to my screened porch.

Something I have done for years when frost is predicted and I want to protect tender growth on prennials and shrubs is to get up at daybreak and check for frost. I look at the neighbors rooftops and if I see any frost, I grab the waterhose, set the nozzel to shower (a fan sprayer works best), turn the water on wide open and wash the frost off everything. Just "sweep" the water across everything. The "burn" occurs when the sun hits the frost on the plants. I start in front of my house since it faces northeast and gets sun first and move to the shady areas last. If frost is still falling, it usually "slides" off the wet foliage. I am in the North Charleston area and am much warmer than most of you, but we had two frosty mornings about three weeks ago and I didn't have any frost burn on my roses, azaleas, prennials, etc. This probably won't help in a hard freeze but it works every time for me to prevent frost burn. And we have a possibility for frost again this weekend. One more thing, after you are finished washing the frost off your plants, it makes a hot cup of coffee taste special. Good luck, everyone.

It is supposed to get down to 29 tonight and tomorrow night, 26 on Saturday night, 29 again on Sunday night and then up to 35 on Monday night. Dangitall!!! I JUST put my seedlings in the ground a few days ago, my roses are leafing out, hostas are leafing out, strawberries have blooms galore and my butterfly garden transplants are just now waking up. Dangit!!! I guess I will sacrifice more of my bales of hay and pull out more blankets and sheets. 26 freaking degrees tonight...grrrr. I had clipped one of my miniature horses because she was so wooly and was miserable in the heat...it is a good thing I have a heavy blanket for her!

-Amy

i just want to see what y'all say- but if you're covering with cardboard or sheets or burlap, do you leave the coverings on all day when you know it'll dip down again? i've done that in the past as long as it wasn't plastic and had good results. again, just curious.... too much to cover 3 nights running; i'm doing it once and not uncovering til it stays above freezing at night. tam

Tam, I'm with you on that, mine will stay covered for the duration. Hope we only have to do this once but it's not looking reall good the following week one night! I've been covering today with that floating row cover stuff, but will do some of it with boxes when dh gets home with them. I don't think I want to leave anything like plastic or even plastic over sheets for that long, and prolly not plastic pots for 4 days, but I'm hoping the cardboard stuff will be ok. Sheets did little to protect things from a frost last year the night before the wedding, lol. Burlap sounds interesting. I've never tried that.

This is my 1st time using the row cover stuff and I love it. I guess this will be a good test for it. With the peonies I'm just tying the corners of it to the cages.

I'm wondering if the bleeding hearts should be covered? One native type is still pretty small, just coming up but not leafed out, I think it'll be ok? Another is leafed out but no blooms yet, it always blooms later. My largest one, with the bigger leaves, is leafed out and full of gorgeous blooms... I'm not sure about it. How tuff are the larger leaved bh's? Also does anyone know how the cranesbill/geranium will take freezes? What about the summer phloxes? Mine are knee high or better. Will ferns be ok?

EE's will get more mulch since they're coming up. Columbine they're tuff, lamium laughs at the cold, toadlilies will get bit but they'll keep coming, same with amaryllis and other bulbs. Hardy begonia is still small enough that I just pulled some extra pine needles up over top of them.

I have hydrangeas, wisteria and hostas covered. The peonies that were already leafed out and budded were covered. The ones that are just coming up I'll leave alone. I've seen them come thru frost, snow and ice and make it. The other ones that are starting to leaf out but no buds, I think I'll put a box over.

Plants that I figure have one chance of blooming I've covered, but those that will regrow and throw new blooms I've left to fend for themselves.

All containers went back in last night except the ones that were under the house and they're going back in tonight. Whew, now what am I forgetting?

I know from other years, that the new leaves of the toad lily are quite delicate and will get frosted quite easily. Since they bloom in the fall, the Spring frost/freeze is not so bad for them. They just have a slower start.
I worry about my hydrangeas.
Also, my EE will go back under it's leaf mulch.
It looks like tonight, Thursday, will be bad and then Sat, really bad.

Just another challenge in the garden. Nancy

Capping over some tender plants I noticed the HotLips salvia (which never lost its foliage) is starting to bloom.
Think I ought to throw a blanket over it?

37 degrees last night..maybe this will be a warning to the plants of more cold to come.

It was 34.1 when I got us this am. Ho hum.

H.

The next 3 nights look like they are supposed to be the worst. Last night I mulched the newly planted perrenials, hydrangeas, raspberries. Covered with boxes and doubled up sheets and curtains the veggies- I'll uncover ant check once it is above freezing today. Really glad I didn't plant out my 3 new blueberry plants yet! The hydrangeas and raspberries are staying permanently covered until this is all over. This is my first year of real serious gardening, I hope I am doing the right things and won't lose too much!

I don't know if I'd leave the plants covered until the cold snap is over. Lack of light will stress them out and suddenly exposing them to full light will stress them more.
I'm taking off my covers this morning. It's about 43 now.
Any sun warmth of the soil today will help overnight.
It's a nuisance to have to do this for 4 days but worth it.

as a lot of what we were covering trees and foliage high up, it's more than a nuisance, and it's staying on. it took about 3 hours for 3 of us working yesterday just to cover. we can uncover them halfway through the day on monday so they only get a half day of light if necessary. the things covered with sheets will probably get some light anyhow. our yard is a pitiful sight- it looks like a dryer exploded. oh well- the neighbors already know we're a little nuts- now everyone driving by knows, too. heh heh

our temp gauge said 32 this morn, so i'm happy we escaped one freeze. now, if it only stays 2-3 degrees above what they want the other nights we should be in good shape.

dottie, my hot lips never went dormant all winter. i'll bet yours will be ok. the buds might get frosted out, but the plant will be fine and probably just set more buds in short order. i took a ton of cuttings from trimming mine for our swap, and they began blooming just 2-3 weeks after i stuck them. i can't get over how fast they struck roots. i didn't notice buds on them when i was sticking them, either.

I covered the all roses w cardboard boxes and the newly planted hydrangeas with large pots and wrapped material around stakes around the bananna tree and climbing rose. I uncovered them this morning and everything looks good except the bananna has some leaf darkening. Gonna have to look for a larger box for that and I think then it should be fine.At 6am it was about 32, so it was lower than that over night... The 100s of daffs that I got on sale at Wal-mart and put in late are everywhere and in bud, they seem to be fine too. The bleeding hearts are next to the house in bloom and I didn't cover them in any way and they look so- so. Maybe I'll put stakes in today and cover them tonight too, as they are from 'up norths garden', and have sentimental value. Thanks to everyone for their input, I had lots of questions , but I just kept reading what everyone had to say and hopefully everything will make it through this cold snap. The caterpillers are on all the roses now though, did I create a warm place for them? Can I spray them with something or should I try to hand pick them? They seem like they are eating an alfull lot of leaf !

Part of my daily routine is to pack up the hound dawg and head to the nearby park for a twice a day march over the river and through the woods for exercise. The road I drive takes me right by Tamelask's house. I can attest to the sight. It appears that every available shred of fabric has been employed as frost covering for all the bushes in the yard. How are they keeping warm at night? the family I mean, not the garden?? I'm almost compelled to drop off a sleeping bag or two but wonder if I would just see THEM draped around the orchard too.

So, the thread count on those nice pale green sheets...

Tonite here in Charlotte is not forecasted for a freeze but Saturday night is. Sunday should be cold but not frosty either. Whew!

ROTFLMAO!!!! i wondered how long it would take for john to say something about our house. hmmmm- hadn't considered the sleeping bags.... we have a lot of spare sheets- no worries- we are warm!! and you leave those loverly light green sheets alone- those are from our bed and i love them! i was hesitant to use them, but they needed washed anyhow, lol.
most of the rest are spares i keep for company or covering plants. my mom gave me a buttload the last time we were up. isn't the dishwasher box over the pomegranate nice?! i have to say, my favorite is the multicolored beach towels. i thought those were an inspiration in sight and hopefully in the job they'll do. nice thing about the towels seems to be that they are heavy enough they don't need weighted down. once i take everything off i'll be doing laundry for a week!
we may be getting new next-door neighbors this weekend and i can only imagine what they are going to think. oh well- after this they won't be surprised by anything, right? still LOL

they are calling for snow tonight up here in South Boston!!!! Aaaackkk! Then tomorrow night--23 degrees! This is BONKERS!

It was 26 degrees here at 7:00am this morning!

We had friends and family here for dinner last night, so we had lots of help covering the plants! Roses look fine. The blooming Dutch irises are fine and we didn't cover those. Everything is fine except the loropetulum.

I'll start posting my freeze casualties as they happen.

thursday night friday morning:
1. Gerber daisy (came back up from last year)

**on a side note my clematis "elsa spath" just opened its first bloom

:bangs head on wall:

No complete losses here yet, but several of my Hostas that were well leafed out look like they've got plenty of damage. Snow predicted here tonight too. My fences are covered in sheets too Tamelask- you're not alone. I can't walk in my garden room at this point, but it sure looks pretty full of hydrangeas and my roses in pots. My cats think they've finally found the jungle.

I'm so sad for my roses at this point. :-( This just bites.

Nancy

Every sheet I own except the ones on the bed are now covering my roses. Used sheets of "early start" plastic to cover the azaleas. Boxes over the newly planted roses. What I'm most worried about losing are the siberian irises that are in full bloom.

And I'm doing the same thing as tamelask. They'll stay covered for the duration. Too much work.

Might be a good idea to leave it all covered. When I uncovered today the new top growth on my roses looked bent over and awful already. Now it's raining here, and the map in motion shows scattered snow moving my way. I need a glass of wine to go with my whine.

nberg I hear you. Also raining here. I'll join you in pouring some wine to go with my whine. Based on the forecast this will turn to snow later tonight.

Whatever will be will be..que sera, sera. Singing is about our only option left.

And now I have lots of wet sheets out there.

Someone on here suggested watering if frost in the nmorning. I did, now I have icicles! Oh no! Should I keep spraying? I DO NOT WANT TO LOSE THESE PLANTS! I just put them in a week and a half ago. A lot of time and money spent! Help!

So far, it's been around 2 - 4 degrees warmer at our house than the official reading at the airport, so we've been lucky so far. No damage yet. But tonight is really the night I've been concerned about anyway. I don't know how we can escape damage when they're calling for a low of 26.
Dana

I'm going to take a last look at everything that's blooming today before bidding it syanora. My big Florida azalea that's in full bloom, the piedmont azaleas that are flowering more than they ever have, the bapisitias, wisteria, peony, iris with buds on it.... I'm going to bring in as cut flowers what I can, cover the peony (although with temps in the 20's covering often doesn't help), and everything else is on its own. I am just hoping that the temps don't go down quite as low as forecast. We usually are a good bit colder than readings at the airport.

i wonder if the rain helped keep the temp just a little higher somehow? anyone know? i'm happy we got rain, regardless of its effect on the freeze. with this wind, the sheets will dry out today quickly. in fact, we'll have to recover some things the wind took off already. so far, a lot of it is staying on, though. haven't been out to see what, if anything is showing damage yet. don't worry about things being bowed over from covering; they recover pretty quickly from that unless the stems snap (or freeze).

thanks to several posters for making me feel like i'm not the only one crazy enough to cover everything i can with all i got. i laugh, but i do feel silly. at the same time i really don't want to lose this year's fruit crop! the flowers i'd be sad, but the fruit, i'm really bummed about.

last night got to 30 here, so that forecast was right on. the range i'm seeing forecast on reliable sources is 24- 27 for tonight. i sure hope it's on the 27 end.

Wow, the wind was so strong at our house I had to keep recovering everything. I did not cover my Crape myrtles and today the leaves are dried up and dead.
I put my landscape lights under my hydrangeas and covered them with blankets and they look good this morning. I am dreading tonight as it will be colder still.

Tamelask yes the rain, but more so the cloud cover proves to keep the temperatures up a few degrees. The reason is the cloudcover serves as a blanket that traps any warm air that radiates up from the ground that was stored during the day. Might I add that it SNOWED here last night. Just a little, but it did snow!!

I'm sure my yard will be a total loss.

Casualties Friday Night-Saturday Morning:

Leaves on new deciduous magnolia are turning dark green/brown. Not good :(

Here in Clemmons the temps Friday night were below freezing. Our fig trees are showing some damage (they have tiny figs forming already), our snowball bushes also have been hurt...the dogwoods, Japanese maples also showing tinges of leaf damage....just to scared to look at some of the other beds. Lots of hard work being damaged and still two more nights to go. DON'T FOOL WITH MOTHER NATURE....she usually comes out the winner.

Most of my veggies seem to be fairing well, I covered them right off with cardboard and blankets. My newly planted perrenials and hardy annuals from seed aren't fairing as well. Got frost burnt. Shouldn't have screwed around- should have covered them to begin with. ***SIGH***. Time to resow seeds starting tonight. Should I take the blankets off tomorrow to allow for sun or only do so if I notice posiible signs of distress? What would those signs be?

Well - we just got done covering all the azaleas that we could - put pots over some nastursiums that I had planted out last weekend. What I am most concerned about are my clematis - I have 5 that are in full bud ***uugghhh***. They are on arbors and obelisks and are hard to cover. I am sure they will put out new buds but man I hate to loose these. I put the covers back on all of my wintersown trays, containers, ect and moved a few things back into the garage. Those 80 degree days really lulled us into a sense of security and a 'bring on summmer' attitude. Guess ole' Mom nature had a trick up her sleeve......

Lynne

lynne,
My nasties seem to be pretty hardy so far. They were wintersown and planted in the ground about a week or two ago. I have been covering with light blankets at night but that's it for the nasties.
Tonya

As noted above by jgpublic, cloud cover DOES do something to keep things from freezing/frosting. I've noticed clear nites do more damage. Even my radishes look bad after a couple of nites of clear. It's like the clouds insulate somehow.

My row of ligustrums (planted for 2 yrs.) were just starting to fill out and look really good. The leaves turned dark green and every leaf on 18 plants fell off within a week of the Eastern Freeze. Also, a lot of leaves fell off of my needlepoint hollies,too. My ligustrums are totally bare!!! Will they fill out this year??

yes, ligustrums would probably recover from a nuclear blast- have no fear. i've actively tried to kill many of the seedling privet (kissing cousin to what's normally called ligustrum) on my property (they are invasive) and they have to be sprayed with roundup and/or whacked back to the ground repeatedly before they give up.