Good news, I’ve finally got a new weather station up. I purchased a weather station (off Amazon) that has temperature, humidity, rain, wind, wind direction, and barometric pressure. The nice thing is this one has a sealed temperature gauge so it can go outside and doesn’t need its own separate housing that I don’t have. It was a bit more expensive, but I like it. The old one has a temperature gauge, but I had no place to put it but on the back patio. That isn’t ideal as its placed close to the house and doesn’t get an accurate temperature. The new weather station, a single larger unit with everything attached to one main unit, is out on a post in the yard.
One problem with the smaller unit is that the wind gauge is in a pot on the deck. The rain gauge is a separate unit that had to be removed when the deck was put in. But because those were close to the house before, they were both affected by wind, which can be blocked by either the house, pots, or a grill. Consequently even now I realize how different the temperature and wind are between the two places, close to the house, and farther out in the yard.
Its hard to imagine that just a month ago we were dealing with snow. But now we are warm, today was in the 70’s and we are due to reach the 80’s in a few days. We haven’t had much in the way of rain, much needed rain. So I would have to say we have definitely left the cold behind us.
As much as people felt we lost a lot of plants in the cold most, by a very large degree, are coming back. For example:
roses, have some dead branches but new growth is already leafing out
blackberries, new leaves already out
swiss chard, ends are freeze burned and dead (it was covered) but it is coming back with a vengence
strawberries, not covered and acting as if nothing happened – they are growing
tomatoes did die
asparagus, already coming up
blueberries, not covered and leafing out now
carrots, still fine, covered loosely and acting as if nothing happened
lettuce, like the swiss chard covered and any place the planket touched is burned and dead, but the rest is growing
grapes, covered with a pot and growing again with new leaves already unfurled
sorrel, did lose some leaves initially but now looks better than before
fig tree, has new growth.
The citrus trees took the hardest hits. They were all covered, two of the groups had Christmas lights around them for warmth. But all took a hard hit with the cold and snow. But nobody seems to be dead. They do have dead leaves but when I bend the branches, they bend they don’t break. When I’ve cut some of the branches it is obvious they are alive, not dead.
As for my succulents, that is where I seemed to lose the most. Some look like they may survive, but they have a large amount of lost leaves and frozen stems. Those may be a total loss. That is where I need to wait and see what might survive.
Today I took a Home Depot run. They had a lot of new products – lots of plants, vegetables, trees, flowering annuals, pots, etc. I picked up some of their veggies, not something I usually do. But they had some veggie basics, for example the tomato was labeled salsa tomato. No other information given, no idea what variety. But they also had heirlooms and other plants. So I picked up tomatoes, jalapeno peppers, and some squash plants. After losing the seeds I had started I felt it was worth it.
After bring the new plants home I immediately put the into their new homes, pots. Some of the little pots I bought have more than one seeding, so I actually gave some of the spare seedlings to a friend.
I believe in sharing the plant love.
