Now that everything is in full swing with the recent warm weather, I've been taking an inventory of my winter damage. This winter was colder than any of the recent past winters (-9F, previous low was -4F).
Salavatski pom- completely dead- I give up on in-ground poms and will try something else there.
Tam Kam and Izu persimmons- maybe they are just very late leafing out, but I fear that they are both dead. I tried to protect the Tam Kam, but it doesn't look like it was enough.
Ichi Ki Kei Jiro persimmon- died back to the snow line and then some- even though the snow was deeper, it looks like everything over a foot is dead.
The 2nd IKKJ, died back last year and regrew from close to the graft union. Before I wasn't sure if it was rootstock or IKKJ, but now I know it was rootstock, as it survived fine and has a different (narrower) leaf shape. I'll be grafting slightly hardier persimmons to this- regrettably none are non-astringent.
I had a few other die-backs which I wasn't expecting:
Blackberries- Triple Crown, Ouachita, and Prime Jan (died to snowline)
Gratitude grapes- My vine died back to close to the ground- maybe 12". The Jupiter and Faith nearby are fine and covered with mini-grape flowers. I guess that this is the "occasional winter injury to vines" from the UoA write-up.
Issai hardy kiwi- This one really surprised me. All my other kiwi's are well leafed out and getting bushy. The Issai has some sporadic growth, but there is still a lot of bare wood. Maybe the big crop it produced last fall sapped some of it's hardiness. It should be hardy to zone 5 and -9F is still within the 6A range. I think I'll still get some from it, but my current guess is that it will be only about half. But I am looking forward to a more substantial crop from my other kiwi which have lots of flowers ready to open, including a couple which haven't yet produced fruit.
