I was finally able to take my hoop plastic off after 8 nights and seven days of my beds being covered. It has been a long long time since we had that many nights below freezing and many well below. The plants look like they have survived better than I had hoped after that long under the plastic. Time will tell how many of my broccoli, cabbage and cauliflower heads froze. I know for a fact that one large head of broccoli was ruined by freezing and will know in a few days or weeks if any others got that cold. My lettuce was very young and seemed to do very well despite the long long nights well below freezing. Any leaves on the plants that were touching the plastic are definitely goners and on the north side of the hoops the cold really seemed to penetrate more than on the other side. I guess from the constant cold north winds.
I am hoping that this good cold spell which was more hours below freezing in just one week than we had the last two whole years here; will get rid of some of the whiteflies that brought up the TYLCV that destroyed my fall tomatoes. I have some more broccoli plants ready to set out for spring and it looks like I will definitely need the hoops with this kind of cold so early in the winter.
My rutabagas and other greens did not fare so well. My larger mustard and turnip plants will have to be turned under but I think my rutabagas will recover. Luckily I picked a huge batch of rutabagas just before the freeze hit and I have been eating the other greens for month.
Despite my loses I am happy to see a real winter down here for a change and hope it will bring a real spring this year so that the fruit on the less heat tolerant tomatoes have a chance to develop some good size before ripening. Most importantly I hope it will lower the volume of pests we have to deal with each year. At least for a month or two.
Bill
|