No one freak out by the brutal cold that will be here in a few days

Gabler said:
Sounds about right. Mercersburg is usually about five to ten degrees cooler than here.
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I actually live outside of Mercersburg closer to mountains. How do you know about little old Mercersburg? Most people don't know about it have to say near Chambersburg
 
penumbra said:
I was thinking of this last week. I might look into it for next winter.

That is a whole lot less than I would have thought
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Japonicus said:
Precisely why us in such climates, have to ignore the posts that snow is your friend and helps
to insulate the roots and foliage and twigs and buds against damage.
For the bigger picture of the entire Winter, our trees are not insulated against the elements with snow.
Typically, our Arctic blasts are without the help of snow. Typically our drying Winter winds are not protected by snow.
It’s easy for newcomers to be mislead by the safety that snow provides in similar climates as ours.
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I don’t get all that much snow. Snow is great when I get it. I have noticed on several forums and FB groups that people think they should keep snow off their temperate zone trees

I can’t rely on it but I can welcome it and use it instead of trying to fight it when it’s around.
 
Zac said:
I actually live outside of Mercersburg closer to mountains. How do you know about little old Mercersburg? Most people don't know about it have to say near Chambersburg
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My grandfather has a place right outside Cowan's Gap State Park. I haven't been out there for a while, but we'd usually go to a butcher's shop in Mercersburg.
 
Japonicus said:
Precisely why us in such climates, have to ignore the posts that snow is your friend and helps
to insulate the roots and foliage and twigs and buds against damage.
For the bigger picture of the entire Winter, our trees are not insulated against the elements with snow.
Typically, our Arctic blasts are without the help of snow. Typically our drying Winter winds are not protected by snow.
It’s easy for newcomers to be mislead by the safety that snow provides in similar climates as ours.
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Exactly, snow has never stuck around here for us, and the weather will be 60 one day, 0 the next, predictably unpredictable, lol. It is why I always prefer the more cold hardy trees, if they aren't, I just assume I'll end up murdering it one winter. Does it stop me from working with them though? Nah.
 
Gabler said:
My grandfather has a place right outside Cowan's Gap State Park. I haven't been out there for a while, but we'd usually go to a butcher's shop in Mercersburg.
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Oh I live about 10 miles from Cowans gap state park. I go there often. My girlfriends family's last name is Cowan they are related to the guy the parks named after.
 
Here is the thread from Jan 2024 freeze in case someone wants to compare note.
namnhi

Thread 'Here comes the hard freeze for 2024'

Houston area will see the low in the low 20s on Tuesday and Wednesday mornings. Time to clean out the garage and make room for the trees. What a joy in growing trees in pots. Funny thing is we will be seeing 70s for the next couple days.
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Houston could get some winter precip on Monday or Tuesday.
@Cajunrider How are you holding up Uncle? One of your lesson learnt last year was tarp instead of plywood.
 
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Shogun610 said:
Yeah but

but you have natives too aren’t you concerned your temperature isn’t quite low enough for winter in the greenhouse. Do you let your unwired stuff get a freeze before putting in
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I only have native conifers and not really. Dormancy is triggered by daylight and lowered temperatures. Had lengthy discussions with the professional artists and collectors and the consensus is that as long as it stays below 50F(ideally below 40F) with the shorter daylight, dormancy will occur. My target has been between 34-40F for the last 3 winters with a goal of no freeze-thaw cycles and protection against the wind. There are a few raw yamadori(native conifers) in large recovery boxes that are outside(it’s in a shielded forested area) that I mulched in. Those have definitely froze and have remained frozen.
 
ShadyStump said:
No real storage areas for me to move any of my trees to, and we're not expected to get enough snow to pack them in safely before hitting the subzero mark. I'm thinking of moving a couple of the smaller ones on to the back porch and nestling them in between the wall of the house and the chest freezer: windbreaks on all sides, and the radiant heat from the house and freezer mechanism might be warmer than where the pots are all tucked together right now.
Thoughts?

My concern about doing this is that they'll either get too warm and risk waking them up, or I'll be sacrificing the known level of protection for something that might not work at all. All are extremely hardy species, but also very small/young.
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Do you think that they have enough chill hours to have the dormancy requirements met? I usually don't worry about too warm in Jan, but Feb, and March is more problematic.
 
IzzyG said:
I only have native conifers and not really. Dormancy is triggered by daylight and lowered temperatures. Had lengthy discussions with the professional artists and collectors and the consensus is that as long as it stays below 50F(ideally below 40F) with the shorter daylight, dormancy will occur. My target has been between 34-40F for the last 3 winters with a goal of no freeze-thaw cycles and protection against the wind. There are a few raw yamadori(native conifers) in large recovery boxes that are outside(it’s in a shielded forested area) that I mulched in. Those have definitely froze and have remained frozen.
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interestingly, chill hours appearently do not accumulate when frozen. This seems to be the main reasons why we here see trees waking up in late January: our frost has been reduced mostly to a few hours per night and every day after ~mid october counts as a dormancy day, and 90 dormancy days is all that is needed to wake up with regular daytime temps above the 50F.
 
JudyB said:
Do you think that they have enough chill hours to have the dormancy requirements met? I usually don't worry about too warm in Jan, but Feb, and March is more problematic.
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Likely. Mostly natives that I'm thinking of, so they're adapted to unpredictable temperatures swings. I just don't want to have to move them inside if they wake up, not this early. We routinely have winter weather through April, so it's in or out for the season.

I think I'll go for it. I'm just second guessing myself because I've suffered allot of losses over the past year, but these little guys are almost certain to die if we don't get plenty of snow before the extreme lows.
 
Never mind. Went out to dig out the trees in question, and they appear to already be frozen solid since the last storm. Not much to be done about that.

Edit: On an unrelated note, am I wrong for hoping that this knocks out the Internet so my kids are forced to do something human all weekend?
 
ShadyStump said:
Never mind. Went out to dig out the trees in question, and they appear to already be frozen solid since the last storm. Not much to be done about that.

Edit: On an unrelated note, am I wrong for hoping that this knocks out the Internet so my kids are forced to do something human all weekend?
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hahaha... they probably thinking we need to stop doing hunting and gathering activities and join them for virtual walk in the park
 
Colorado said:
Yep, this is why I’ve reduced my collection to pretty much just Rocky Mountain native species. We are supposed to get down to about -5F for a few nights in a row, but not worried at all. I don’t even bother with mulch. I just put them on the ground and shovel snow on the pots when it comes.

I have just a handful of non-natives that I bring into the garage during cold snaps. There are plenty of species that would be toast at -5F regardless of what kind of winter protection you try to give them.
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Agree! I can’t get rid of my non-natives, yet, but they can be so much extra work. I really love my Colorado spruces. No worries with cold or wind. Tough trees.
 
Dav4 said:
I did some shoveling before work today. Love the lake effect snow we get right before most cold fronts typically push through. There was only about 2 inches on my patio, but a little goes a long way :-)
View attachment 580296View attachment 580297
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The big lake is our friend, friend! You hit the nail on the head, almost always snow prior to big cold snap. Thank you Lake Michigan.
 
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