You may find this copy/paste job of some interest. If you still have questions, please ask. I've seen general cold hardiness limits published for various perennials (trees & shrubs) in some of the texts I have on plant production methodology, but nothing I recall on the net. Commonly, each species of plant has a general range of cold-hardiness. Within species and cultivar, cold-hardiness is genetically determined. That is to say that a plant that is propagated from cuttings or tissue culture will have the same ability to resist cold as the parent plant. Plants cannot "develop" a greater degree of cold-hardiness by repeated or prolonged exposure to cold, even after 100 years (trees). If we pick any plant at random, it may or may not be able to withstand freezing temperatures. The determining factor is the plants ability to prevent freezing of bound water. Bound water is the water inside of cells. There are actually three kinds of water to consider when we discuss "freezing". The water held in soil - When this water freezes, and it can freeze the soil mass solid, it doesn't necessarily kill the plant or tissues. Then there is free or unbound water, also called inter-cellular water. This is water that is found in plant tissues, but is outside of living cells cells. This water can also freeze solid and not kill the plant. The final type of water is bound water or intra-cellular water. If temperatures drop low enough to freeze this water, the cell/tissue/plant dies. This is the freeze damage that kills plants. Fortunately, nature has an antifreeze. Even though temperatures drop well below freezing, all plants don't die. In hardy plants, physiological changes occur as temperatures drop. The plant moves solutes (sugars, salts, starches) into cells and moves water out of cells to inter-cellular spaces in tissues. These solutes act as antifreeze, allowing water in cells to remain liquid to sometimes extremely low temperatures. The above is a description of super-cooling in plants. Some plants even take advantage of another process to withstand very low temps called intra-cellular dehydration. The roots of your trees can stay frozen for extended periods or go through multiple freeze/thaw cycles w/o damage, so long as the temperature does not fall below that required to freeze intra-cellular water. If roots remain frozen, but temperatures remain above killing lows, dessication is the primary concern. If the tree is able to take up water, but temperatures are too low for the tree to grow and make food, stored energy becomes the critical issue. Dormant and quiescent trees are still using energy from their reserves (like a drain on a battery). If those reserves are depleted before the tree can produce photosynthesizing mass, the organism dies. There are a number of factors that have some affect on the cold-hardiness of individual plants, some of which are length of exposure to seasonal cold, water availability (drought stressed plants are more cold tolerant), how recently planted/repotted, etc No one can give a definitive answer that even comes close to accurately assessing the temperature at which bound water will freeze that covers the whole species. Unbound water is of little concern & will usually freeze somewhere around 28*. Some material will be able to withstand little cold & roots could freeze/die at (actual) root temperatures as warm as 25-27*. Other plants may tolerate much colder actual root temperatures - as low as 10*. There's just no way of knowing unless you have a feeling for how cold-tolerant the genetic material the plant was derived from might be, and finding out is expensive (from the plant's perspective). ;o) Another example of this genetic variance is that trees found growing and fruiting well closer to the equator need no chill time, while other trees, derived of genetic stock from a more northerly provenance may need a period of chill to grow with optimum vitality in the subsequent growth period/cycle. It's wise to remember that root death isn't instantaneous at one particular temperature. Roots succumb to cold over a range of chill with cultural conditions affecting the process. The finest roots will die first, and the slightly thicker and more lignified roots will follow, with the last of the roots to succumb being the more perennial and thickest roots. Since any root death is a setback from an energy allocation perspective, and root regeneration takes valuable time, it's probably best to keep actual root temperatures in the 25-40* range as long as we can when the tree is resting, even though the organism as a whole could tolerate much lower temperatures. Even well established trees become very much like cuttings if all but the roots essential to keep the tree viable are lost to cold. Regeneration of roots is an expensive energy outlay and causes the trees to leaf out later than they normally would and shortens the natural growth period and reduces the potential increase in biomass for the next growth cycle and perhaps beyond. Al

I have a room in my house that is very drafty and if I let it stay cold it keeps the rest of the house cold. I brought this heater from Target last year, I keep it on 24/7 on a low temp and after about a day running it has kept the room comfortable although not real warm. If I turn it up it will be smokey hot in there which I did not want to do. It has solved the problem. I checked my light bull and it did not change significantly over the year. I am wondering if this might be a solution for you? You are in zone 7 like I am and I have had no need for supplemental heat outside yet and my birds seem to be doing fine. Their whole pen is made of wire mesh with a box for them to go in at night. The temp has gotten pretty low and when it did the chickens stayed in their box huddled together for a while but for the most part they were business as usual. I did close their box on really cold nights though to keep out the drafts. HTH Here is a link that might be useful: heater

I wish you would've come to where I work!! Sorry...but every molecule of that Silicone has got to go. * There are some SILICONE caulk removers out there. Check at hardware stores, etc. * They MAY cost more than the initial caulk did, so prepare yourself! * It takes time to break-down silicone too. Cut out what you can so that "breakdown" process goes quick. * Lastly, use rubbing-alcohol to get all remaining residues off, and dried-out. FINALLY....ready to use paintable caulking!! * I like Polyseam-seal. * Allow enough cure-time before painting over.... * I caulk all vertical inside corners too. It just makes corners look more finished...especially if your corners aren't that great. * I often caulk horizontally along ceiling-line too, on top of baseboards, and along vertical wood door-trim. MUCH nicer detail look when ya do that!! Faron

Re: cooktop on the island: I know you are starting to move away from this concept, but I want to emphasize how important I think it is NOT to have the cooktop on the island. This is from my experience, and I know everyone is different, but there is no way I would have the cooktop on the island simply from a safety standpoint. When my kids were younger, they sat at the island to do homework. They would have never felt comfortable sitting there if I was cooking. My mother had her cooktop on the island for 37 years, and she loved it, but the island was essentially a gigantic cooktop. She didn't do her prep there, and no one sat at the island while she cooked. Think of the times you are cooking and your oil spits. All it takes is one time...and your kids will never sit at the island again. And I wouldn't want them sitting there. Do you want your precious sweeties injured? No. Re: prep sink in the island even though you are not far from you main sink. My cutting board is in the island, and even though it is a mere 3-4 ft. from the garbage disposal, I remember the first time I used it thinking,"How do I get this crap over to the sink without making a mess on the floor?" Our house is 27 years old, and prep sinks weren't the thing in our area at the time it was built. There are times when I wish I had it, but if I would redo the kitchen, I wouldn't put one in, and here's why: our island is the perfect party magnet. Guests and family just love to hang out at the island when someone is cooking or just to socialize. When we have a large party, we use the island as a buffet table. I think I would just view the prep sink as being in the way in a situation like that. But that's me. Because we don't have a prep sink, the floor between the island and the sink can get dirtier than the rest of the kitchen. I joke that it's amazing how dirty the kitchen can get when you use it! But isn't that what kitchens are for? My mother washed her kitchen floor almost daily. But she made everything from scratch, plus she canned and froze her own vegetables and fruit. So if I have to wash that section of the floor more frequently than the rest, so be it. Another thing I would consider is the clean-up triangle. One plan had the clean-up area include the sink, DW, and table. But the refrigerator is a huge part of clean-up. There's a lot of 'stuff" you have to put away. Also think about your landing area for putting leftovers into containers. We use our, yes, you guessed it, island for this. We keep out containers in a cabinet in the island. I'm glad you are keeping an open mind about your plan. There are so many good ideas here. No kitchen plan is perfect. You're doing the right think by being more aware of your habits this week, so you can determine what your needs are. Oh, and one more thing. There are many things in our gorgeous, upscale kitchen, that are wrong, mostly due to placement. But after living her for 22 years, we have gotten so accustomed to it, that we would never spend the money to "make it right". Now that we are retired, we would rather use that money for travel. Just food for thought, no pun intended.