Posted on 12/26/2008 4:35:30 PM PST by hsmomx3
Okay, I need some professional opinions here.
We are going to have below freezing temps. in North Phoenix tonight and since it is so windy, are there any alternatives to covering plants/shrubs?
Putting a cover over these items is useless since the wind is a factor.
Any suggestions would be most helpful.
Here in SC the farms sray the peach trees with water. The ice that deveops creates insulation for the peach blossoms. Don't know if this would apply to you, but maybe. The wind would be a factor and might keep the ice from forming -- somebody else might know better. Covering them somehow is the best insurance.
Pining a few friends that might be able to help!
The wind itself will help stave off freezing some. Depends on the temp and the plant.
water the ground
Shop for new plants in the spring.
Unless you’re talking a hard freeze, the concern would be frost, I’d think. And, the wind should prevent frost.
If you’re still worried, those lawn and leaf bags with pull ties should stay on most landscape plants.
It will be in the 20’s where I live.
PING for some gardening advice!
Many thanks to Red_Devil 232 for resurrecting an older version of the garden ping list —— My apologies to all I have missed.
Watering the soil might help.
Can you cover & secure with rocks or rope?
Hopefully it won’t hard freeze here.....my geraniums are looking so pretty!
Well, what sort of plantings do you have, are they tropical varieties, or are you talking southwestern desert, what do you guys call it, xeriscaping or something like that?
I can only speak for the southeast, as far as preventing or limiting frost damage. The poster above who mentioned spraying to create a thin coating of ice is correct. In the orange groves, sometimes they use “smudgepots,” to put out a little heat and smoke to limit the frost.
If you’re only talking one night, and don’t want to trust that the wind will prevent frost from settling, get garbage bags or lawn and leaf bags with the built-in pull ties, put them over the plants and then pull the tie down reasonably tight and tie it off, but not tight enough to potentially damage the plants. If this unusual cold is going to settle in for a while, you might want to insulate the roots and lower portions of the plants; we in the southeast would typically mound mulch or pine needles around sensitive plants.
Does this help?
Dang typo!
I meant “pinging”
Where’s me glasses?
LOL
I am talking about a ficus tree and our jacaranda tree got damaged two years ago and it is finally growing back.
I would cover them but the wind just knocks the covering off.
I guess if I spray them before I go to bed that should be sufficient?
The soil is quite moist as we got a good soaking about midnight lastnight and it has been raining on and off all week.
Bust up a hay bale and get some ground cover down if you don’t have any plastic to cover the ground.
LOL—wish I had some but I don’t!
In order for the spraying to be effective, you’d more or less need to turn a sprinkler on it, hitting all the foliage, and leave it on to create a coating of ice. So, you’d not want to hit it too hard with water/ice, which could end up damaging the plant due to the weight of the ice. Is this a large tree? Six feet, eight, ten? Too large to cover and tie it around the trunk(s)?
LOL.....we’re pretty soupy here too.
Here in Scottsdale/ N Phoenix where I work, we have Fichus trees as well as many other species of plant/trees. We lost some trees a few years back (Couldn’t wait for them to come back, although they probably would have) They had been wetted down with a mister.
I think we’ll just take our chances this time, and a previous poster is correct, the soil is saturated from recent rains. I guess we’ll see.
The Jacaranda is about 6 feet tall and the other, the Ficus, was damaged two years ago but is growing back nicely and looks like a shrub but the trunk is so short and there is no way to tie something down around it.
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