Here's what happened with this weekend's freeze. Friday night had 9 hours below freezing with a low of 24; Saturday night had 5 hours below freezing with a low of 29. Lettuce-uncovered mature Romaine is mush; covered the first night , but not the second (the forecast was for only 33 and I trusted the NWS)-looks OK. I harvested enough to last a couple of weeks in green bags beforehand. Beets-the tops are mush and the roots are about two weeks or so away from harvest; we'll see if we can make pickles or not. Turnips-50% or so top damage. I had already harvested the Tokyo Market and we're about through eating them. I will harvest the Scarlet Ohno as soon as the ground dries (I watered before the freeze)and the roots are fine. Carrots (Little Finger)-no damage to the tops and they look great. Harvest should begin in a couple of weeks. Kale and Collards-this is the big surprise. The late planted (late Aug-early Sept), small plants look as if they might die; certainly no production from them is expected. The early planted (late July) big plants had heavy damage to the upper leaves. Fortunately, I harvested two big messes of leaves before the freeze and I expect them to recover enough to resume harvesting in two or three weeks. Beets, Carrots, Turnips, Kale and Collards were all uncovered. Everything was well watered before the freeze. Newly emerged seedling Onions and Spinach in the open and Lettuce in an uncovered cold frame were undamaged. Every year is different, but I was surprised by the extent of the damage from this freeze. All of the warm weather vegetables had been killed or damaged beyond recovery by a five hour, 30 degree freeze on the morning of Oct. 8.

I'd wait until all chances of further freezes are past, and then cut the plants back to the ground, if the damage merits it. Best to have all new growth emerge from the crown. If the damage is minor, you can simply cut off the offending leaves.

Solutes in Solvents can lower the freezing point of pure water. Different substances have different freezing points and lower the ability for water molecules to move as fast or in the case of freezing...slow down as quickly. You can take pure water and throw some dirt in it and it will lower the freezing point to a degree because it has different ionic concentrations and varied molecules that prevent it from freezing uniformly. Granted, I have no knowledge on the matter, but in the case of roses, my guess is that the tender new growth and buds are formed with a higher concentration of water to other particles in solution...especially with new buds as you can squeeze them and they just turn to mush. As the bud matures and forms, it probably has chemicals(added molecules other than water) that give the rose it's petals and color pigmentation and thereby makes it more resistant to the cold. Some of my roses still have smaller buds on them and it's supposed to get down to 34 tonight, but I'm not really concerned. I believe Karl said in another post that new growth(presumably buds as well) have a lot of sugars in them(makes sense for growth) and the addition of sugars acts a little bit as "antifreeze".

The last time you posted it,wasn't it surrounded by lawn and across from the Australian tree fern? I have seen photos of them in Bakersfield with some serious deep scars,but they kept going. And the owners added the burden of not much water. I would just plant some undergrowth to cover the scars as the top growth of fresh green fronds is what you really want to see anyways.