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Post by robertb on Mar 24, 2015 14:59:43 GMT -5
I've had a long winter in Birmingham, but mild by many of your standards. The temperature didn't drop more than a few degrees below zero. Walking onions and potato onions were eaten down by pigeons, this first time I've had this happen. The walking onions are fine, I'm not so sure about the potato onions. The survivors aren't growing yet, though some more I planted later are coming through. Shallots (also potato onions of course) are just coming through. Everlasting onion is fine, but rather battered, and it wouldn't do for winter green onions. Other perennial green onions stood well through the cold weather. Perennial kales were hard hit by pigeons, but are coming back strongly.
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Post by steev on Mar 24, 2015 18:48:21 GMT -5
I'm sure either onion- or kale-fed pigeon is very toothsome; got a pellet gun?
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Post by littleminnie on Mar 25, 2015 17:20:40 GMT -5
I didn't mention any perennials like rhubarb, strawberries, asparagus, horseradish.
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Post by reed on Mar 25, 2015 20:49:54 GMT -5
I spoke too soon earlier, found two more living kale plants and tiny little shoots at the base of three Brussels Sprouts. Moved them all to spots safe from this spring's tilling. Gotta learn how and when to plant these bi-annual things to get seeds.
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Post by steev on Mar 25, 2015 23:17:24 GMT -5
Planning gets easier, the longer one does it; though I'm not sure I'll ever get past the stage of "why did I plant that there, instead of over there?"
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Post by galina on Mar 26, 2015 3:55:59 GMT -5
We are in a relatively cold part of the country, on a ridge, and on wet, heavy clay. We are technically zone 8. Last winter it went down to -6C which is mild, the coldest in recent years has been -16C. All my alliums made it just fine as they always do. The very cold years I had rocket and landcress survive. Jerusalem artichockes/sunchokes survive fine every year.
This winter half of my Purple Sprouting Broccoli survived (the little bit of extra protection under netting seems to have worked, where the netting blew off I had casualties). All kales survived and also turnips under cloches. Cauliflower did not make it, even though it was supposed to be a winter variety. Carrots never make it, with our soil there is always some or other rot that sets in. Parsnips on the other hand, always make it. I had resprouts from celery (the dead old tops were acting like a shield). Leeks survive fine always (but it depends on the variety, there are autumn leeks that are less hardy). I have endive, lettuce and lamb's lettuce as well as rocket and cress in the greenhouse, where the soil is much drier and with the extra shelter. Brussel sprouts did fine until they were eaten. Some pigeon damage here too, but netting and other protection limited damage. For the first time we had significant deer damage with surviving chard eaten down to stumps and also landcress. I have tried overwintering peas and broad beans, both no good, including the 'doing well in March, but then dead by the end of April' probably also root rotting in heavy clay soil.
At 52N it isn't just temperature and soil, but also very low levels of light that put a stop to growth. I have tried surviving tomatoes in the frost-free conservatory/sun room and that has never worked, but I have limited success with peppers. I can generally overwinter ph coccineus runner bean roots, but last year hardly any and I don't know why only so few - possibly kept them too damp. Yakon shoots survive in the conservatory for replanting.
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Post by reed on Mar 26, 2015 4:29:08 GMT -5
When were the broccoli and Brussels sprouts planted, in the spring or sometime later? It sounds like the heavy clay in my garden is a big issue for overwintering. Do you ordinarily leave your runner beans in the ground or dig and store them in the green house?
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Post by galina on Mar 26, 2015 10:35:33 GMT -5
When were the broccoli and Brussels sprouts planted, in the spring or sometime later? It sounds like the heavy clay in my garden is a big issue for overwintering. Do you ordinarily leave your runner beans in the ground or dig and store them in the green house? They were planted in spring. No the runnerbean roots are dug up before the first frost and stored with a little soil in the conservatory, frost-free but quite cool. Yes dry and cold and the plants seem to cope much better, but waterlogged, not draining clay soils are more of a problem. |
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Post by littleminnie on Mar 31, 2015 19:33:55 GMT -5
Update: pretty much no biennials survived this winter. There was little snow cover. The scallions lived but look terrible. All carrots, kale and leeks died. Spinach is pretty much non existent. The good news is I am right on best case scenario planting schedule.
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Post by Joseph Lofthouse on Mar 31, 2015 20:02:51 GMT -5
littleminnie: It's good to be on schedule for planting. My season is very precocious this year. Nevertheless, I'm sticking to my tried and true schedule of planting. Somehow I already missed my date for planting carrot seeds!!! Oh well. In my garden turnips and carrots survived. Carrots often die in my fields, but the winter was very mild. Only two Swiss chard plants survived. I was able to harvest scallions essentially all winter long. Today I saw a spot in one of my fields that looks like a lawn. When I looked at it more closely it was garlic grass. Oh my heck!!! It's where I removed bulbils from the garlic plants two growing seasons ago. So then I went to visit other places that I have grown garlic in the past. Wow!!! I have a tremendous problem with garlic weeds! Leeks not so much. They tend to die out for me.
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Post by reed on Mar 31, 2015 20:38:59 GMT -5
I think I'v found every thing that lived through, aside from the regular things like garlic. Got more than a few of the garlic weeds too. I'm pleased over all that with the clay soil, cold winter and not knowing what I'm doing I found a total of about a dozen carrots, three kale, two Brussels sprouts and plenty of turnips. More that I originally thought I had but that is it as I tilled it all up earlier today. Now to see what they do. I had three Brussels sprouts but the dog stole one so I guess that qualifies as not surviving.
My chard died early last winter even before it got especially cold, I wonder what the problem was there, the clay soil maybe. The variety was Perpetual.
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Post by steev on Mar 31, 2015 21:07:38 GMT -5
My Perpetual chard has succumbed to rototilling, I think; I was never that pleased with it, anyway; the Rainbow chard has finally started re-growing decently enough that I harvested a mess last week; it's self-seeded a bit, which I appreciate. Alliums are all happy enough; artichokes and cardoons are fine, except that gopher is eating the roots off ~one a week.
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Post by mskrieger on Apr 1, 2015 9:20:56 GMT -5
My low temperature this year was -15F. Excellent drainage on sandy loam. Ground froze hard sometime in December, didn't get snow cover until January (but then boy did we ever!) Snow is finally melted now, ground thawing out.
The only things that survived this winter were scallions, winter-hardy leeks (dark blue ones, 'Bandit' purchased from Johnny Seeds), mache and garlic. The leeks look horrendous but I'm sure they'll live to set seed. The scallions looked totally dead but are resprouting from the roots. The mache looks fine. I swear that stuff would grow on an iceberg.
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Post by reed on Apr 2, 2015 4:06:30 GMT -5
Well I was wrong again. Found three more kale plants in the edge of what I tilled up. Earlier they were not even visible as dead stumps. They are coming up from roots. Kale is definitely winter hardy. Overwintering and things that take two years to seed are a serious problem for people with limited space, gotta find a way around that.
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Post by littleminnie on Apr 2, 2015 11:42:21 GMT -5
I'm actually worried about my garlic not making it through winter. I haven't found any sprouts yet.
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