cold damaged greens

[Deleted]

I planted some Chinese Thick-Stem Mustard from Southern Exposure Seeds that is supposed to be able to handle winters down to 6'F. It popped up September 7th and had grown without any problems until Jan 2. However, we had 2 inches of snow a couple nights ago. The temperatures dropped down to 16'F the first night with snow cover, but it melted the next day, and temps dropped to 16'F again. Fast forward 2 days, and the mustard looks really pitiful: the leaves are frost-bitten and dried out, and many of the stems have snapped. The ground is well-draining and heavily mulched, so I don't think the roots would be damaged too badly. Is there any way the plants could possibly resprout from the base in the spring? (The strange thing is, the Purple Lacinato kale planted right next to it hasn't been hurt much at all.) I'll upload some photos in a bit if I can.

[ottawagardener]

I have some Lancinato mixes - purplish - from Wild Garden Seed and they have survived very cold temperatures. I didn't expect them to. Sorry about your mustards. Many of my brassicas show the tendency to resprout from low stem nodes, maybe the roots even asian greens. Good luck!

[throwback]

If you can stand it, wait out the winter, your mustard just may surprise you and sprout again. I have to second Ottawagardener, Wild Garden Seed kales all survive our winters even with snow and ice breakage and deer damage. Mustards not so much, except I have some hybrid Joi Choi that is plugging away, from a September planting. We've only been down to 19F though, but I'm happy with the greens as long as we can get them

[steev]

That mustard is a lot less structurally sturdy than kale, which is why it's so good lightly cooked.

[ottawagardener]

I agree about mustard versus kale leaves but the surprise for me was that I've never thought of lacinato as being particularly hardy compared to the russian kales, for example.

[Deleted]

Well, I've given the mustard a few days, and it looks like even though the large leaves were severely damaged, the smallest ones are untouched (whew). A quick question here: how would one overwinter greens in a cold-winter area with natural materials? (No plastic, please.) I've heard of people planting them late and then covering the tiny plants with straw or something until late winter / early spring arrives.

[ottawagardener]

I've heard of people using loosely packed leaves or straw - see post by Extreme Gardener: theextremegardener.com/?p=21. I use evergreen branches carefully placed overtop to offer some protection but mostly to help accumulate and retain snow atop of things which would mean they are not available in mid winter. A commentator in Mother earth news mentions filling bags (you could use paper leaf collection bags) full of leaves and then laying them on top of roots. I suppose you could place them around a small frame or build a straw bale wall around the plants that can be easily covered with a board or another bale of straw as a lid when cold weather threatens.

Your best defence is probably doing what you're doing by winter tolerant good varieties. Of course, careful choice of planting space (not in a frost pocket etc...) would help too. I sprout a lot of roots inside

[Joseph Lofthouse]

I pretty sure that the seed company wasn't advertising that the plant would look good at 6F, only that it would survive, to grow again after temperatures warm back up.

My best guess is that it will do fine in the spring. If you replant the seeds of the survivors, then you may prod the population into becoming more cold hardy in your garden with each generation.