I hope everyone was able to get out this weekend and see all the damage and recovery occuring in our gardens. The picture to the left is a perfect example of Dogwood leaves with frost damage. I believe we will see alot of these symptoms throughout the rest of the year. I have also heard a few good reports that hostas are beginning to push up new healthy leaves through the damaged leaves. Keep an eye on woody trees and shrubs. We should see new growth on those in the next week or so, I hope. You should be able to scratch the bark to see that the cambium layer is still green and these trees are still alive. Wait another week until you start to prune the dead tissue.
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From Gilbert Wild
The Cold has really hit our garden hard. We are getting more calls on "what do I do about the frozen plants?" than any other, so we want to address this for your garden. The frost damage should now be obvious on your plants. Each plant variety is a little different, so we will address each differently.
The Daylilies - The evergreen and the semi evergreen varieties were hit the hardest. The top foliage appears almost white on many of our plants, but the crown is green. We recommend that you cut back the foliage to the green tissue. Remove all dead and decayed plant material. Fertilize an additional application using a 10-10-10, a couple teaspoons around each plant. The blooms might be a bit later and smaller, but the plants should survive and look great again next year.
The Hosta - The top foliage appears almost white and looks like frozen lettuce, but the crown is green. We recommend that you cut back the foliage to the green tissue. Remove all dead and decayed plant material. Fertilize an additional application using a 10-10-10, a couple teaspoons around each plant. The plants should sprout up new green foliage in 1-2 weeks.
The Peony and Lilies - we do not have much damage to the plants, if you do cut back the foliage to the green tissue. Remove all dead and decayed plant material. Fertilize an additional application using a 10-10-10, a couple teaspoons around each plant. We feel that many of the early bloomers will lose bud set and bloom, the midseason and late should have full bloom and no impact. We also recommend that you start spraying with a general fungicide to prevent any infections.
The Iris - We were in bloom on some of the early iris varieties, and that took a lot of damage. The tops have drooped, the flowers frozen. We recommend that you cut back the foliage to the green tissue. (Remember on iris to cut the foliage at an angle so that water cannot penetrate the leaf.) Remove all dead and decayed plant material. Fertilize an additional application using a 10-10-10, a couple teaspoons around each plant.
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