Devastation Last Night

[Matt W]

Here is what I found this morning. P. aureosulcata Aureocaulis and Spectabilis and Bissetii seemed to take the hardest hits. Thankfully the Nigras were shorter and don't show as much damage as of now. Even the Yellow Groove took it badly.


More disgusting photos here. http://mattsbamboo.shutterfly.com/292

Matt

[David]

Hey Matt,

Arrgh! I know it's disheartening, but it looks like some of the culms survived. Some of the lower portions of culms will probably survive also. I had the same thing happen about 5 years ago and the plants sent up new shoots.

Do you know how cold it got. We got down to 30 for about 3 hours. Some damage here also, but not as severe as yours. Such is April in Tennessee.

[tallgrass]

Matt, I feel your pain. Lost all my Moso shoots last week......AGAIN

[Jeff: Igor's Apprentice]

Matt, I'm so sorry. Your bamboo was coming along so nicely, too.

We were braced for a freeze here, but this morning there is no signs of damage to tender new plant growth anywhere, so I guess we didn't suffer the low temps that we might have.

[Matt W]

Thanks for the condolences guys. David I don't know exactly how cold it got last night. A recording thermometer would have been nice. Most of the ones that looked like they might make it in this morning's photos have now (2:30) flopped. I'm wondering about the Nigra that I thought was OK. It maybe that they are killed too, just short and fat enough they haven't fallen over yet. I guess a few days will tell. I had covered a few with leaves, just in case, so maybe a few will be saved. It was cool, that puny looking plant had about 5 weak culms from last year and I had counted around 60 nice fat shoots (almost 1" avg) so far, and you know how I like Nigra! I will probably cut most of the damaged ones to the ground, just don't like the look of topped bamboo.

Arrgh! Is right, but it hasn't been all bad today. I found over $100, on the highway coming back home from lunch today!

Matt

[stevelau1911]

A couple weeks ago I lost a few tree peony seedlings due to freezing temperatures getting down to 25F, but not nearly as widespread as what you have. I know it really sucks, but there are ways to minimize the damage.

Whenever I see extreme lows in the forecast, I usually cover up my tender plants with frost cloth which is light enough not to break anything, but they do seem to offer a few degrees of protection which can make the difference between being unscathed and flopping over.

It was a very warm start to spring, but for the past 3 weeks we've had below average temperatures so shoots on most bamboos are staying dormant around here regardless of the warm winter, but I have taken extra precaution and added 2ft of compost/ tree leaves to ensure that the soil temperature takes longer to heat up around the shoot buds because it is better for them to emerge well after the last frost date, than risk wasting a good up-size.

[Alan_L]

Matt -- don't be too hasty with cutting damaged culms. If you're interested in faster size-up, keep as many leaves and culms as possible. What sucks worse than losing your new shoots/culms is having next year's shoots be fewer and/or smaller than what you saw this year.

[foxd]

Weather report calls for patchy frost tonight. *sigh*

I'm not sure yet, but I suspect it actually got colder last night than it did the night before. I base this on the amount of frost I had on the windshield this morning.

I'm cringing a bit about what I might find when I get home this evening.

[Matt W]

Steve, Thanks, Good things to know for the future.

Alan, As I took a survey late today, it looks most are killed below the lowest branches. It got worse through the day. I'll wait a while to see what happens. Don't think I can look at them all mutilated for a whole year. On the bright side: my bamboo portfolio is just diverse enough that I have a few who haven't started shooting yet or just barely. So the whole season isn't a total loss yet. Looking at the 60+ shoots on the nigra I'm guessing 1/2 will be ok. If so that's still more than I had hoped for on that one. We also had a couple of nice, small Japanese maples that we covered with quilts that look pretty wilted as well as a wisteria, I had custom built an arbor for, burned up.

So Fox, What did you find?

[foxd]

So far the Moso shoots look okay, maybe the very leaf tips slightly crispy on the ones that had started to leaf out.

Surprisingly the Kiwi looks like there is already some new growth.

There may even be a bit of the growth on the Clerodendrum bungei that has survived.

[bamboothew]

Sorry to hear about all the death and destruction out there. I live very near a huge heat sink so I stayed way above freezing but I know the nearby peach and strawberry farmers were biting their nails the last 2 nights, haven't heard damage reports yet

[dependable]

Had the same thing happen at a customer's installation a few years ago. The planting then put up extensive "ground cover" shoots later in the spring, we fertilized it and let it be. The following spring the grove put out strong shoots that had up sized as if nothing had happened. It was P aureosulcata.