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Letter to the editor

Be ready for the big chill

If winter pays our area a visit, the way you prepared your garden for it may decide if you and your plants are left out in the cold.

By Pam Brown and Carol Suggs, Special to the Times
Published December 29, 2007

January is one of the coldest months in our part of Florida. Here's how to prepare for a sudden frost or freeze.

- Watering the root zone before a frost or freeze is helpful, but make sure your sprinkler system is not on automatic during freezing weather. A lot of damage can be done to landscape plants when sprinklers come on in the early morning hours and ice forms on the plants. The buildup of ice can split or break branches.

- Healthy plants can withstand cold temperatures much better than neglected ones. Water regularly, in line with restrictions in your area. Mulching tender plants protects their stems and roots.

- When frost is predicted, cover plants with sheets, blankets, newspapers, cardboard boxes, plastic buckets or garbage pails (hold these down with a rock or brick on top), or other suitable materials. (Look around the house and stockpile these so you're ready when the weather turns cold.)

- Don't leave the coverings on for longer than two or three days, even if you have to re-cover them later. They need sunlight to photosynthesize, or they'll start to yellow.

- If you shield your plants with plastic sheeting, don't let it touch the plants. The material conducts the cold directly to them. Instead, build a frame and tack the plastic to the frame. Remove the plastic before the sun comes out the next day or it will function as a "cooker" and steam your plants.

- In case of a light frost, hose the leaves of tender plants after the temperature rises above freezing but before the sun hits the foliage. The water removes the frost, which, if left in place, can act as a prism and cause the sun to burn the plant.

- If we get a freeze, you can do little to protect tropical plants from being damaged or killed. Covering protects only against frost.

- Potted plants can be moved indoors, to a garage or shed or onto a sheltered lanai for temporary protection. After you move potted plants back outdoors, check the soil for dryness. Wind and cold are very drying, and foliage may lose water vapor on a sunny day.

- After a cold snap you may be tempted to prune damaged or wilted plants. Don't. Give them a chance to recover on their own. What looks dead now may miraculously restore itself.

Pruning encourages new growth, and tender new shoots will be very vulnerable if subsequent frosts and freezes occur. Wait until later in the spring, when all danger of frost has passed.

When it is time to prune, cold-injured wood can be identified by scraping a small section of bark and examining the cambium layer beneath the bark. Dead wood will have a brown or black discoloration while healthy wood will be green. Prune damaged branches back to a green area. Herbaceous plants that tend to rot after a freeze can be cut back to try and save the root system.

Compiled by Pam Brown and Carol Suggs of the Pinellas County Extension Center/Florida Botanical Gardens. Questions? Call them at (727) 582-2100.

[Last modified December 28, 2007, 16:50:49]