We had unexpected frost last night! ARGGHH!
Mother Nature had lulled us into a false sense of security with the relatively warm days and above zero nights. Weather forecast was for +2C... no hint of frost at all, so of course we had not covered any of the plants. Jack Frost sneaked in and did his dastardly deeds by the light of the moon as we lay sleeping, obliviously in our warm beds... He randomly picked plants here and there at whim, freezing one little captive tomato plant and skipping over the next one. Zap! Zap! A pardon for you today; Zap and zap for you two!
My 3 beautiful carefully nurtured dahlia plants are all black! Two look really bad, one still has a healthy looking bottom half... It might make it with a huge trimming...
My gorgeous regal geraniums had all the top blossoms hanging limp and frozen... But Jack kindly spared my 3 little tuberous begonias which I had started from scratch and planted in the green tub across the driveway, except for the proud little yellow blossom bravely up sticking above the rest. And the German ivy in the same tub was also overlooked.
The Big Kiss Yellow Stripe gazanias which I had planted yesterday at the top of my rock garden were also ignored (Yay!)
First the deer invasion, now this! Oh, I haven't mentioned the visit by a deer the night before this. The culprit left incriminating footprints behind in the soft soil of my new flower bed. It ate the blossoms right off the new rudbeckia, but luckily ignored the fuzzy leaves of the rest of the plant so it lives to grow another day... Then the deer (or its compatriots) meandered over to my wild bed and proceeded to have a midnight snack of the newly transplanted Delphinium there; and then went on to the two other little delphiniums that were barely out of the ground.... The plant books say that delphiniums are "deer resistant". Hah, right! Tell that to the deer!
Okay, I admit, I didn't plantskydd any of the above tortured plants. They were unhappily overlooked in my journey through the yard with my trusty squirt bottle... So I gave hem each a squirt after the fact, hoping to deter further nocturnal visits. The good news is, though, that the plants that I DID squirt with Plantskyyd were left alone!
Tonight we have a similar weather forecast as last night +2C, (fine print: feels like -1C), so I travelled my garden beds, trailing sheets, pillowcases, old towels and t-shirts, covering the most vulnerable plants as well as I could. Then I proceeded to carry and drag every pot and container of flowers, vegetation and greenery from off the open deck up close to the house, under the covered deck in the hopes that they would be safe this night.
Fingers Crossed! X
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