This is a new situation for me. After a month of unusually warm weather about 50% of the maples have leafed out. Now for next week the forecast in my area (and all of Western Europe for that matter) is for significant night-time frosts (-4 to -6°C) with snow. In North America this situation may occur more often than in Western Europe. Will the new, tender, leaves be damaged?, should I enter all the pots? Gomero
Yes, there's a high risk of frost burn on the new leaves at least with some species (less so for hardy species like A. pseudoplatanus). It shouldn't be fatal, but will make the foliage rather ugly until they put out a fresh set from dormant buds. Anything you can get under cover, do so.
I meant to ask about Nokoribo; did it ever lose its leaves? Mine is just about to leaf out but the buds haven't burst yet. The problem is more severe for our maples in the ground. pensylvanicum, ginalla, mandshuricum (especially), Orange Dream, Higasa Yama, negundo.... Would it be wise to cover smaller plants with large plastic bags over night? I sense that might do even more damage to young leaves... -E
Probably not a good idea to have the plastic resting directly on them (tho' I think Gomero was talking more about moving specimens in pots into a greenhouse). Better to put in some poles to hold the plastic above the leaves. Sheets of bubble-wrap plastic will give even better insulation.
Hi, I don't know if you have these in your home/hardware stores, but they are bags made of floating row cover material. These are lightweight and have drawstrings at top and bottom, and are a pretty good size for a small (like 5-6' acer) tree. They are lightweight and are supposed to protect to 28 degrees f. I use them on all my acers until the danger of that kind of weather is past. Y You're right, in my area the weather you're experiencing happens every year. I don't know if it's just me, but it seems things are budding early this year. Some of the small, potted acers in my garage are close to leafing out and that means I'll have to do something with them for over a month before our weather will be safe enough to put them out. It could still get too cold here to put them out with the floating row cover bags, though. I put them out too early last year into a small poly greenhouse with a heating cable on the floor and it got into the low 20's. I had quite a bit of dieback and loss. It's heartbreaking to lose or have damaged leaves after waiting an entire winter to see them! Kay Dye
Hi I in Italy use "tessuto non tessuto"for smal citrus or small acer tes. non tes.is simple avaible in garden center in english cloth no cloth?is a white cloth ,best of pluriball plastic for me
Hi Emery, the Nokoribo kept about a third of the leaves throughout the winter, now with the push of the new ones they are falling (but still green!!). Thanks Kaydye, I have a good supply of Frostprotek covers. I empathize with you and understand your frustration with the vagaries of the weather in your area. My hunch is that the species (sieboldianum, triflorum, pensylvanicum, davidii, truncatum, etc.) do not need protection and any damage will be easily repaired (is that your experience?). On the other hand the cultivars, specially palmatum, are more tender and is better to protect them. Gomero
Gomero, do you know where Frostprotek (or an equivalent product) is available in France? Or what it's called here? I think your experience with Nokoribo shows (if it needed more showing) the enormous variation within zones. Although we are both ostensibly zone 8, in practice it is clearly much milder in the south west! :) My experience is that even many cultivars are tough enough when they are larger or well established. My problem this year is that many plants are new in the ground. Oh well, we shall see, The wind has turned to the north west, barometer has dropped 20 hP, and it is starting to get chilly. Snow and thunder storm announced for tomorrow, wind turning due north on Tuesday. If we keep the cloud cover we'll be OK. -E
Hi Gomero, all, yesterday I was at nursery Esveld, I asked about this situation and got following answer, usually the Japanese maples don't have any problem if frost is coming even if they have or start pushing new leaves, the only danger is when the buds are frozen the sun can damage the frozen buds at daytime, if you don't want to take any risk you can put a net over the plant, a kind of net like what is used to put onions in or potatoes. This will protect or break heavily sunshine which shines on the buds. I also bought some new maples like Katsuma,Seiryu and Oshakazuki. I planted the first 2 of them today in terrible wheather....got some hail, rain and there was strong wind.....but I noticed no problem for the leaves. I asked about when should I plant the new maples, they told me I could do anytime as long as the plants have not completed new leaves. I had to choose these cultivars because they can stand full or heavy sunshine. This was the only place left in my garden to put some more maples hihi. Jan M
I'm in Luxembourg and the cold is coming our way, so we're in the same boat here. I had read about the danger of late frosts - especially the May kind. So it's interesting that the Esveld crew is less worried. For Gomero and Emery, and anyone else who reads French, I have this link from Maillot: http://www.maillot-erable.com/gel.html He seems to think that the frost can damage the leaves.
I tend to believe those who do grow their maples themselves and this is not the case for Maillot. I have about 50 maples (1-2-3 year old grafts) in plastic pots outside and they all were solid frozen for two weeks this winter (lows in the -6°C, Emery you would be surprised how cold it gets here), none suffered any kind of damage, they are all leafing out happily. So if Cor says that young leaves can take light frost (thanks for the info Jan, I also was there two weeks ago), then I sort of believe him. I am surprised not to hear more about this from our North American friends. : Voile d'hivernage, it can be found at any Garden Center Gomero
Re: Frosted leaves & wool socks A thin wool blanket works a lot better I find mine at second hand stores and tag sales. I also use raw wool gathered from the fields of my local sheep farms, I have used it as a mulch, but not around maples of course. This stuff works, many of my geraniums never went dormant and it went down to 9 degrees F or -12 C this winter, the ones that died back did bounce back was very quickly with new leaves. I also have use up to a half inch of humate, this is the very best mulch bar none, it is the Cadillac of mulches and throw in some raw wool for winter, man that is one pampered plant.
We frequently have early spring freezes after Japanese maples start leafing out in North Carolina, USA. Mine have never suffered any damage other than minor leaf burn. My math is a little rusty, so I forget the Centigrade to Fahrenheit conversion, but we often have temperatures in the mid to upper 20s this time of year. A few of my Japanese maples are starting to leaf out and they weren't bothered by lows around 28 degrees over the past few nights.
today in sud Italy wind and rain no frost ,in this period normal is -5/6°C but this year +16/17 similar 1997 when I have tomato red in dicember!!
We had snow and very heavy hail all day today. As luck would have it, I was visiting a friend this morning early, who had cloth over a number of plants in her garden. She gave me a bunch of the fabric, and I did protect a few plants. But I think the Frostprotek product, with the drawstrings, sounds good; I had a hard time fixing the stuff effectively, and was concerned about the increase of wind cross section. We're in for 100 kph tomorrow apparently. For now it's calm, snowing and about -3C. Not too bad! Alex, we didn't have tomatoes, but we did have roses on the table into January this year! Keeping fingers crossed... -E
lucky you Emery that see the roses on the table in january, is incredible this year ,ah Emery I read one news in web about the wood of violino(you old thread)Stradivari use acer of Romania but if no avaible use acer campestre,(Italy I suppose) or again pseudoplatanus; the cause of flame is many frost in winter ; that reduce the grow of trees .(you ask if is true to your liutaio!!) I read about the temperature of this week :no problem trees have the reserve bud!!For this event . However tomorow start spring I listen Antonio Vivaldi "4 seasons" is the best sound for imagine the spring ....Regards
I have used this material as well and it seems to work however if it does drop to -2 it does not stay there very long, usually not long enought to do any real damage.
My hunch is that the species (sieboldianum, triflorum, pensylvanicum, davidii, truncatum, etc.) do not need protection and any damage will be easily repaired (is that your experience?). On the other hand the cultivars, specially palmatum, are more tender and is better to protect them. Gomero[/QUOTE] Of my maples the sieboldianum has been around the longest and has withstood the most. I planted three new cultivars last year and wrapped two of them in the row cover stuff more because of fear of deer damamge than cold. The triflorum are never wrapped and do fine. I had quite a bit of dieback on the one snakebark (don't remember which one it is at the moment), but after doing some research, I think it was due to dryness rather than cold. I am moving it this spring to a moister area. I have one experiment I tried that has worked pretty well for those in pots that decide to start budding too early. I put everything I had in pots in the back of my pickup truck and parked my truck in a shaded area. Then if the temps get too cold, I drive my truck into the garage until it warms up. It works like a dream. I know you've had strange weather in Europe, too, our temps this spring are going to be very (record setting) warm next week. It's a worry. A hot dry summer is so devastating. Kay Dye
Gomero, How did your plants fare with the cold temps? We are in for about 4 days of winds gusting 40-50 mph and temps in the low 20's F. (-6. to -4. C.). I had to take my bags off the maples because they were leafing out. Spring was about 2 weeks early, but now winter has returned. Did you have a lot of damage, or is it too soon to tell? Kay
Kaydye, Since you ask... The temperatures were not as low as forecasted, we had several nights in the mid-upper 20's and, as dawgie said, I did not notice any damage at all. I just entered in the cold greenhouse the one-year grafts but all the other potted maples did stay outdoors. About 80% of the palmatum cultivars have now leafed out. The Japonicums and Shirasawanums are still in buds. Wind+frost sound like a lot of stress for them, I hope the best for you. Gomero
