Um ... why do you not want the trees to bud out?

I'm facing the same problem. April was sunny and mild but even with cooler first week of May, things continued opening up, some have already been hit with 30df last night with minimal damage.

Next week could be 28d for a couple of nights.

IME: depending on how calm the weather becomes determines how the cold affects the plants. If the weather is unsettled during the cold period, things seem to go with little damage. But anything can happen I guess.

We're a little warmer than you guys, but most things seem to have stopped in mid-April when the temperatures dropped. Most of the big trees around here haven't fully leafed out yet, and even our native Fringe Tree, which is more of an overgrown shrub, has barely opened leaf buds. We had a couple of freezing night and a fair amount of damage, as so many plants had grown so fast in March and early April. This has got to be the strangest spring for this gardener, at least.

Me too, Will. I am further ahead of you, but I have already lost the first set of buds on a seedling chinkapin oak I planted last fall, among others. New buds have formed and are starting to open. Friday night low is forecast to be 28 degrees. Sigh. How many times will a very young tree push buds, anyway? I don’t want to find out.

I hear you...same story here in central Indiana, freezing temps expected Friday night. My worry is I have 4 trees just planted in September last year, 2 Redpointe Maples and 2 Golden Globe Ginkgos. My Ginkgo leaves opened early in April (surprised me for a ginkgo), then got killed off by a freeze the second week of April. The maples just opened about 2 weeks ago. Which brings me to a question...as my 2 ginkgos sit there with brown buds already....can I expect a tree just planted last fall to have plenty of energy to put out the second set of buds this summer?

I'm having the same anxiety looking at the forecast for the weekend. My landscape is just barely recovering from 24 degrees in mid-April when everything was further out than normal. Half the baby leaves died off on my tulip poplar trees and new leaves still haven't replaced the dead ones. My Dawn Redwood still looks terrible, with most of the new growth killed and now only sparse foliage showing. Hostas turned to gelatin and just starting to recover. Interestingly my Freeman maples were about half way out and did not suffer any damage whatsoever.

We'll see what 30 degrees brings this weekend now that everything else is pretty fully leafed out. Not much you can do except let nature take its course and remain hopeful for a rapid recovery when the warm weather returns.

Let’s all hope for the best! Looks like the cold is dipping south quite a bit.

It is looking more likely that 100 year freeze is going to take place thIs Friday. Low is 3° off the lowest temperature ever recorded in May. Only a few other times has it been in this mid 20s range.

They bounced Friday up 1° but Sunday dropped 4°. 💩

Anything above 28° honestly does not make me nervous. Under 28° is where things get dicey.

I left these maples outside the other night by mistake and the low temperature was 29° only a little damage in which you can’t really see.

See you guys this summer!

whaas, being in a frost hollow, I feel your pain. Wish a number of my trees wouldn't bud out so early & then get fried. 29.5 F (-1 C for you limeys) last nite, prb'ly even colder nites coming. Hillsides up above me were prb'ly fine as that's where the cold air drains off of. Farmers near me "know" & don't plant their frost-sensitive crops until mid-May.

So sick of this cold April/May.

Looks like a real roller coaster here until next Wednesday. One or two nights is bad enough but this? Dad used to always say: 'Don't put anything out that's sensitive until after Memorial day'. And that was down in the twin cities when MD was the last day of May. :-)

Have you guys been getting any rain? Its super dry here as well. 40-50mph gusts several times this month already with a very high fire risk.

Then 40min south of me has flood watches for crying out loud.

April - mid May rain totals = 0.9"

April - mid May average = 5.46

I'm at a higher elevation than all surrounding areas and I'm forecasted to go lower then immediate areas to N, S, W and E. Not sure how that works when I thought valleys are supposed to get colder.

They're calling for 26 tonight and 27 (SW Ontario) on Tuesday morning. Of course most of my stone fruits are blooming. I'm going to mist them several times overnight, hopefully the ice accretion will suffice. I'm also considering hitting the dawn redwood as well.

Bill, you look at the wunderground 10-day forecast just like I do. As mentioned, some accumulating snow forecast for NY state & other areas coming up. Even some rain/snow mix for far west MD & WV mountains. Plenty of precip here at least for the year so far.

28f last night but very little damage from what I can see. Stayed breezy all night so that might've help.

They've downgraded our forecast to lows in the low 20's for the next few nights, I hope they're wrong. :-(

Last night I put insulated containers on my peonies and Annabelle. We'll see if they work in the low 20's.

whaas,

We've had a couple rains of tenth of an inch or less and the ground is moist from the the snow melt. More forecast next week.

I'm the one causing a stir but I've told folks to remain calm if temps will be in the 28-32 range for a few hours. It just doesn't cause any damage to wood plants along with many perennials.

It was 29 last night and it didn't phase a single plant. If you can imagine I have many specialty plants. The buckeyes looked a little sad but bounced back once the sun came out.

Tonight is a brutal freeze though. Highs in the mid to upper 30s today will create very little residual warmth. Then the freezing temps will last between 8-12 hours. If it goes to 24 that will kill the majority of the emerging buds on most plants.

As someone mentioned above I find Freeman Maple, Oak, Sargent Cherry and handful of others to make it throught. Others like Asian Maples, Katsura, Dawn Redwood (see a trend here) will get blasted.

It was snowing a bit ago but the sun just came back out.

Flurries here, atm.

Mid to high 40's f forecast for the next several days.

Rain tomorrow. (0.3")

Possible snow amounts for NE:

Just when you think it's safe to go back in the water. :-?

The late frosts aren't unusual here, it's the early April bud break of everything.

Looks like we'll be in the clear again after Tuesday.

So is there really a risk for normal trees? I'm a bit concerned about fruit flowers, since losing those would mean no fruit, but I figured most everything would be fine except that the tomatoes are becoming a bit of a jungle indoors.

Olana Skycam

A lot of the local historic sites are doing new things because of the lockdown. Olana State Historic Site, home of Frederic Church, has put a camera feed from the house tower online. It is about 15 miles north of me, so if we get snow, everybody can see it.

The last time we had a drop to the low 20s in May, Japanese maples were one of the few things with leaf damage. Local fruit production took a serious hit, but wasn't totally wiped out. Occasionally that summer, I ran into plants with odd growth or damage. It always took me a while to remember that it might be the result of that freeze.

For my location it's a little like "deja vu all over again" - it was exactly 3 years ago on May 8/9 2017 that a freeze damaged the new growth on a variety of trees/shrubs in and around my yard: tuliptree (see pic), walnuts (English and black), ash, sumacs (pic), His Majesty corktree, spicebushes, Winter Red holly, taxus (and probably a few others I'm forgetting). This year, however, things aren't quite as far along, so hopefully this year's damage won't be as widespread.

Dave, do you remember the low temp and roughly the duration of freezing temps?

Unfortunately, I didn't keep a note of the low temp, but per a Google search there was a freeze warning in effect for all of southeast MI from midnight to 8:00 am the night of 5/8. As I recall it was clear and calm and I'm guessing around 27-28F (possibly a degree or two colder) at my location for at least several hours. I remember the fruit growers in southwest MI suffered notable damage the night before.

That’s right around that temp you start to see damag

Its not looking good for WI and MI tonight.

I‘m at 29 degrees already - one of the lowest temps in the United States. 12 hour freeze is not good for the thin barked trees flowing sap right now.

Wow. Lots of you are seeing Wyoming-like May (June, too) freak cold. I know how you all feel. sucks

Yeah it's going to be a sad night for a lot of gardens. Temps as of 6:22 EDT. Freezing as far south as the NC/VA border and southern Kentucky.

Notice the patterns seen in the above; even very far north, being close to water saves the day.

On a more detailed level you see the same patterns with this screencap of wundergroup wundermap (TM). Also, because this is an advective freeze, elevation matters in the layman's expected sense of 'higher=colder'. The pine barrens of New Jersey are notoriously freeze prone during radiation freezes, but escaped tonight. Likewise, the reason the coldest reading showing up for Fairfax County is Tysons Corner is that, at 520', it's the highest point in the county. Even though it's highly urbanized now. (and in fact the reason I 'discovered' Sugarloaf Mountain, Maryland in the 1990s was I was cresting the central hill in Tyson's on a unusually clear day, looked off in the distance and said to myself...what the hell is that tiny mountain doing out there on the horizon LOL)

My garden not immediately adjacent to water but not far from it, went to 34F. I left a Justicia whose flowers were expendable outside to as as a sentinel for the formation of frost, it's fine as are apparently all other flowers.

It was too windy last night with snow squalls off of Huron to bother staying up all night and hand misting everything. 27F at dawn, there will be some damage for sure, hopefully not much.

23 degrees just 2 degrees from tieing May’s record low. Not even bothering with pics as some are already brown.

Interesting that with a touch, sedum‘s foliage falls apart.

Hoping the trees early in bud phase aren’t effected just so I have something to look at other than green grass over the next couple weeks.

Hopefully things stayed warmer for others.

Note the balmy high of 25

Saved by wind last nite (29.5 F low), but the real hit comes tomorrow (Sunday) morning when the wind calms and my hollow becomes a frost-pocket. Goodbye Manchurian fir shoots among others.

Snowing here now, was predicted 2.5" rain, now 3-5" snow? Only got to 28f for about an hour last night before the front moved in. 30d for tomorrow AM. Still saying low twenties Mon-Tue AM but not calm weather with winds 5 mph.

beng: nephrolepis or holophylla?

Hola!

Forecasts for 70's by next weekend. :-)

Well, at least we don't have a white landscape here today, but a lot of the new growth on my Emerald City Tuliptree was damaged this am. Overnight low was 27F.

Bill -- Abies holophylla. Pic below -- shows excellent growth from last year after a rare spring without a May frost. Needles on it are viciously sharp. Snow-showers, strong winds and 35 F here now @ 2pm. Uggghh.

Looks good beng!

Z5 hardy and such small sprouts, I wouldn't think barely freezing for a short time would hurt it that much. Lets hope anyways.

Dave,

My sugar maple has just begun to unfurl leaves so they may make it!

Nice Abies beng. Where did you get it, Forestfarm?

It was a hair above freezing here so no damage although I was worried enough to cover a few things.

Nice wet snow and barely froze here last night for an hour but still predicting clearing and 22f and 23 Monday and Tuesday AM.

I'll try covering the Red charm peonies flower buds for the wife but that's pretty cold to protect imo.

Everything else here is just the beginning of tree leaves so not too worried as everything is zone hardy here (pretty much).

Yes davidrt, Forestfarm. 25 F Sunday morning in my frost hollow, EVERY bit of new growth on the fir is completely fried. Quite a bit of damage to many trees (but not to pine candles). Strangely, no weeds/grasses seem to be bothered by late frosts.

Too bad but at least it's big and established enough that it should recover.

Sorry to hear about your Abies n. beng.

Yes it should sprout again.

Contrary to predictions.

It was only 28f last night for about an hour. No damage, even what I didn't cover looked good.

Tonight is supposed to be 22f and wind @ 0 mph for an hour or two, that could be bad.

I see my balsam fir is showing green sprout tips. The spruce and pine are barely breaking bud but deciduous trees and perennials are unfurling fast.

24F for about an hour last night and very calm. Below freezing total for about 4 hours.

Except for some blackened leaf tips on the still barely unfurling sugar maple and possibly lilac flower buds being killed, I think we made it! :-)

Down here by the cities, it seems very localized the damage (frost pockets). What I have seen damage too is Smoketree, Red Oak, American linden, Korean/Japanese maples and their hybrids. Thats all that's obvious at moment. I think those coldest spots got 26-28 degrees Saturday morning and 28-30 degrees this morning.

Shrub perennial damage seems more widespread in those same spots. The first couple of feet above the ground must have gotten quite cold. There are shrubs toasted around the base but fine on top.

I've always noticed that the sub-arctic cold air seems to flow like water and will follow ditches and low areas as it moves in from the north.

And cold damage is accumulative where one night of marginal cold doesn't hurt but the next does significant damage.