Shame we didn’t get this weather in february. Our trees would all be sleeping.
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All things considered, things have worked out fairly well in Virginia; although, it would still be nice if my trees weren’t 6 weeks ahead of schedule. Our nighttime lows should not break 22 degrees.
Speak for yourself! (you just did).
My part of VA is looking at lows of 17, 16, and 16 for Wed, Thur and Fri. I’m desperately trying to convince myself that lots of my peach buds are still in the red calyx stage!
Almost all of my friends live in NOVA and I feel as if we often luck out (or miss out?) on snow and cold snaps. We’re just far enough south to miss the really bad weather. Although, I feel as if we both have to deal with an equal amount of brutal humidity.
My orchard is at 1550 feet so we get a bit of a break on the humidity end, but the temps are often a few degrees cooler than forecast which is making me very nervous for this upcoming cold spell. Oh well.
You probably don’t have an adequate greenhouse. The idea is to wait for the ground to be warm and then put in healthy plants (mine are often in quart containers) that are really good sized and already forming peppers. It is excessively cool soil that stunts peppers and tomatoes, but yield is based on maturity and the longer mature plants are in warm soil the longer and larger your harvest. You also need to use productive varieties, such as the best of them all, IMO, Carmine. Gypsy is another fantastic producer, but the peppers aren’t as sweet. All I grow them for is sweet red peppers.
I’ve never seen your garden, but I see lots of them here and my peppers are probably 4 times as productive as those at other gardens I observe. I’ve seen pictures of CA gardens with pepper plants that look as productive- their season is much longer than mine so that is to be expected. I’m from CA and am trying to get as much out of our shorter season here as I did there.
Actually, I think that is what I’m seeing, for the most part. I’m still optimistic about everything but cots and J. plums- the peaches just look as swollen as they did last year in February- and it took about -12 to do them in. I no longer fear an early spring, so up here in NY there is still hope!
I’m going to have to check out this Carmine!
I’ll give Alan some props. I planted Carmine after all of his high praise for it over the years. It was easily my earliest and most productive pepper of last summer’s garden. Pretty tasty too.
My plants are very productive. I usually harvest around 500 peppers a year mostly grown in containers, some years 800. No I don’t have a greenhouse. And using cold frames and such is too much work. I always started them early, then one year someone asked me to grow some seed out and it was late, I did, and those plants out produced my early plants. The reason is the early plants were stunted by the cold, and didn’t produce, were slow to restart, Any advantage was lost. Some years I can manage it, but I’m often not here in the spring. If I’m here to protect them, I can. When I do, yes it’s a better production. Production is decent, I’m happy. So if it’s not broke…
My peppers do OK, here is one branch of a bell pepper plant
I’m far from the best pepper grower. The Podpiper grows so many in Michigan he has his own line of pepper powders. I bet he starts them early too, he is set up for it for sure! And others here have posted some amazing photos of peppers. Yours too Alan, you do a great job, and I never doubted that, just saying it don’t work for me in my situation.
I would get my figs going early too if I had some kind of greenhouse. Maybe in my next lifetime? I’m threading water in this one!
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Is that “Carmine” hot peppers or “Carmen” sweet peppers?
I think I’m feeling about the same. Some buds are waking a bit on some other trees (Asian pears, etc), but there are still plenty of dormant ones. We may even get a few JPlums, though I bet I won’t need to thin any. It got down pretty low again last night: 7F, after several days in the 10-11F range.
Now, we are forecast to get 1-2 feet of snow tonight and tomorrow. That should help keep things cold for a while. Hopefully not too long though- I have nursery orders coming in around the end of the month and don’t want to dig through the snow.
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Just move enough snow to set them against the ground, add some mouse bait stations, set the boxes of trees against the ground, cover with a tarp and cover the tarp with snow. The trees will wait in refrigeration for up to a month. Even without snow, I’ve kept trees in the shade, still wrapped in their shipping box and wrappings for almost that long by just covering them with a tarp. You can add leaves for extra insulation.
I’m sure your peppers do great, but commercial growers- especially green market growers, need to use a lot of tricks to extend their season and have products to sell as soon as possible. They often size up plants in greenhouses and plant into soil made warmer with black plastic to accelerate harvest. I don’t like the black plastic, but I do use a glorified cold frame (the only heat is heat mats and fabric over the plants,within an uninsulated plastic structure) and a large southern window in my house where I keep the plants until April.
In some ways you are better starting off late. By the time harvest season is over I’m completely burned out, partially from the energy required to deal with the harvest- but also from the mental strain of always having to remember to water my starts and move them to larger pots before finally putting them in the ground. I feel almost like I’m on vacation from Nov until Feb. when all I have to worry about is my home orchard business (planting and pruning during those months).
Thanks, that’s a good idea. I think I have a suitable place for that as well (on patio, against north wall of house). I’d still prefer if I can plant them right away, but that sounds like a better place to keep them than my garage (45-55F), if it is a long wait.
Our forecast got pulled back a bit from 12-24" to 4-14" + ice. I’m just going to look at it as insulation now. 
Glad you mentioned Gypsy. That is one of the best here in Texas for sure. Pretty plants too. It sizes down for summer time but still produces. I have not tried Carmine I’ll have to look for it.
I think i’d take the snow over the ice…but you can’t chose 
That snow should insulate the ground so it might be plenty workable if you move the snow away? Although if you were 7F i’m guessing things froze up good again.
My ground is frozen again. It was frozen for only a week or two at the the beginning of January. Otherwise, it has been too muddy to do anything. That is highly unusual for winter in my area.
I’m glad my Juliet bushes came when the ground was thawed. It’s frozen solid now. The inland lakes on my road froze back over! It was brutal working three stories up in the wind today on a 14/12 pitch roof. Real feel was below zero, but I really couldn’t feel a thing with my numb fingers.
Update time: Hope is edging despair by a nose. Green tissue of most species seems intact, although maybe a bit dull in J.plums and some pears- but no clear signs of full brown ovaries like last year. The recent bouts of very cold temps and a couple feet of snow seems to have made the trees pull back and the odds look good of a normal timed bud-break. Long term forecast doesn’t even include normal frosts, but days stay pretty cool- for whatever that is worth.
About 40 miles north of me a client had completely lifeless J. plum flower buds- all brown and dried out. It’s amazing how much difference a few miles can make.
Since I posted the photos with my Jefferson Plum buds showing green, we’ve had 12 days with overnight lows in the teens and 5 or 6 days in a row where the temp didn’t get above freezing. I checked the buds yesterday, and the large majority look fried, but a fair amount are showing some green growth/swelling. I didn’t cut them open to look inside, but I’m happy to see some signs of hope. Most of my cherry and peach trees and other euro plums were hopefully dormant enough to be ok,