Do I have to worry about -20 temperatures before wind chill, or is that -20 with wind chill? I’m really worried about my trees this winter. They’re in a very open spot prone to heavy wind.
I live in Florida so my knowledge on the subject is limited, but my understanding is that it’s the cold wind that can do a lot of damage…I’m sure others with more experience will chime in,
Yesterday was much ado about nothing, it actually cleared up pretty nicely in the afternoon and got sunny. Then around 4 temps started dropping and last night we got pretty close to a hard freeze. This morning it was bitter…For the first time in recent memory the locks on my car doors were frozen up, but we’ll warm up to about 50 by this afternoon…I truly feel for some of you northerners who have to deal with this every year…
When you know it’s coming and you know it always has, you also know how to prepare.
A friend who lives close to the Ohio River was freaking out that the pipes might freeze in her house if it got below 0. Because it never had. Here, I shrug off 0 because we always get it and know the pipes will survive to at least -25
If it was to hit -50, I’d be the one freaking out because we’ve never had that and I wouldn’t know if I was prepared
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Total whiteout conditions here in Newport. The ‘Bomb Cyclone’ is here now! Winds are picking up too. Pretty scary!
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I’m with Jeremy in that I don’t know a lot about which is more damaging- cold ambient temps or cold wind chill. My guess is a colder air temp is worse but the wind can be pretty bad as well, as it acts like a dessicant. I found these articles on the Mich St site, which might help.
Others on here say that it’s not necessarily the very cold temps that are the issues, it’s the big swings of temps that can do a lot of damage. Like going from say, 40 down to -10 for a few days, then back up to 40 or higher. If the cold’s more constant, that’s better.
That’s just my opinion, though. Folks like @alan, @Olpea, and others have more hands-on experience with fruit trees and plants. So, I’d defer to them for questions like this.
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its funny how the media gives crazy names to normal weather phenomena just to get ratings! its a big nor’easter that we’ve had many times in the past and not the end of times like the news is propagating. here in Maine its business as usual. my buddy on the coast, where it will be the worst, is smoking a deer roast on his deck right now! he’s a scallop fisherman. remember the polar vortex? last month was one of the coldest dec. ever in a lot of the country but you didn’t hear them calling it a polar vortex as its old news and wouldn’t get the coverage like it did before. it just makes me laugh when i see these younger ones freak out over this when i remember many times it was way worst in the past and was barely even mentioned in the news.
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Wind chill ordinarily doesn’t affect fruit trees. If it did there would be dead trees all over the place. I’ve seen -30 to -40 wind chills in Amarillo Texas. That didn’t bother peach trees in the least. Same thing in many locations every yr and during this cold spell.
Now that can have an effect because it can affect several processes in the tree. Constant cold is much better than up and down as long as the constant cold isn’t too cold. In fact constant cold in the zero to 30F range increases the cold hardiness of fruit trees like peaches. At those temperatures the plants tissues increase in hardiness by about 1F per day until the plant reaches a maximum hardiness. Just one warming spell above freezing and the plant losses all the increase in hardiness. Water tied up in ice returns to water form. Drier tissues are hardier just like having more antifreeze in your radiator.
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correct. and I don’t think we are (yet) in trouble in most parts of the Midwest. peach trees fail below -20. It has been and continues to be cold and windy for an extended period of time, but nowhere near the conditions of 4 years ago.
Wind chill has a very real affect on warm bodied animals because our bodies are stiff and dead at well above outside winter temperatures. Peach trees aren’t affected by 0F and 60mph wind because the peach is fine at 0F. The wind won’t cool it any colder than 0F no matter how fast it blows. My body would be very stiff and very dead at 70F much less 32 or zero. After a night at 0F and 60mph wind with no clothes on and I’d be dead. The peach I’m lying under would be, like what’s your issue?
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I believe wind chill is not a factor for trees as far as cold goes, but I think a strong wind can be, insofar as it dessicates (removes water) from the tree.
That’s not a big deal if the tree can replace the water, but if not, lacking water is a big stressor to the tree, assuming it doesn’t get bad enough for it to die. A tree under stress can make it more vulnerable to other things.
This dessication effect can become exacerbated in the winter, because in many areas the winter is a drier season, so not as much moisture in the soil. Also, the processes in the plant are greatly slowed due to dormancy, so it’s theoretically possible the wind could be taking water out of the tree faster than its roots can replace it even if there is adequate soil moisture.
I’m not an expert, this is just what my gardening podcast said when they dealt with the topic. It made sense to me, so I figured I would pass it on.
It’s a snow-person relief! The Greeks were fond of this art form. Creative daughter, 
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Cold thru Sat and then a nice warm up is in the cards next week…mildness returns… GFS hints at some 40Fs after mid month… No snow around these parts until late next week…maybe.
Subdood,
I really don’t have much to add to the good articles you posted and your comments. I might add I’ve read that once temps get above freezing and trees de-harden (as Fruitnut mentioned) they harden back about 2 degrees F per day for every day they remain below freezing, until they reach maximum hardiness (as long as they are still in endodormancy).
As I recall most peaches are really only hardy to 0F (for fruit buds) at it’s minimum dormant hardiness. However, for each day below freezing, the tree will gain 2F more in hardiness until it reaches max. hardiness (i.e. after 5 days of constant below freezing the tree would be hardy to -10F).
I’m pulling this from memory, and of course there are other factors which affect hardiness, so that’s just a rule of thumb.
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Over a foot of snow. Hope it slows down soon!
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So do you think your peach fruit buds got fried by the sudden very cold temps?
Did you lose any trees back in the winters of '14 and '15?
The orchard we frequent lost a lot of their peach trees due to -20F temps three years ago. They planted a bunch of new ones that year, but late frosts have kept them from getting any fruit off them the last couple years.
There is probably something to this idea. But I’ve lived for about 45 yrs in west Texas. Some winters we have no rain or snow and we average about 0.5 inch per month Nov-March. Temperatures go from 70 to 15-20 almost every week. I’ve never that I know of lost a plant from drying out. The only plant that regularly dies back is figs. On those the south side can be more damaged than the north. That seems more like a sun dried issue. But at any rate figs just aren’t very hardy. They often die back in winter even near the gulf coast where average winter lows are 40F. I think it’s more the rapidly fluctuating temps that kill fig tops. They always grow back. Even when heavily covered with leaves and carpet mine have died back.
Plants without leaves loss almost no water thru the wood. Compared to summer with leaves the water use is maybe 1/10 of one percent. Maybe frozen wood could dry out. If frozen the wood might not move any water.
I’m not too worried about the cold spell a few days ago. We had a good period of cold weather leading up to it, and it only got down to -9F. Of course a lot of winter and spring to go yet, so no celebrating so far here.
Last winter it also got to -9F and there was considerable loss of fruit buds, but that event happened without much cold weather at all. It was very sudden.
I’ve mentioned it on the forum before, but for the last few years, I’ve been moving toward trees which are hardier and bloom later, so I’ve already gotten rid of a lot of trees which are questionable in marginal weather.
I’ve only lost peach trees when I’ve pruned them too hard too close to winter (and mainly young trees). It’s not been cold enough here to kill peach trees outright unless they are under a lot of stress which slows dormancy. But in the last 20 years or so, it really hasn’t gotten that cold here. I think around -12ish is the coldest it’s gotten during for the last couple decades.
In 1991 it got down to around -22F for the all time low record for Kansas City. I remember that cold snap. It was close to Christmas. My guess is that it pretty much iced all the peach trees in the state. Cold snaps like that will come again. Records are made to be broken, but I hope it’s a long time away.
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