Spring Derailed… but It’s Coming

March 27th, 2018

   I’ll try not to rub it in when I admit that I was enjoying 70-degree days in the sunny Deep South when everyone here was dealing with the record-setting, first-day-of-spring snowstorm.

Last week’s snow was more insult than injury.

See my photo gallery on gardens of New Orleans and the Deep South

   Though most of the snow was gone in a few days, the melting and resulting wet soil will set us back a bit on the start of the growing season. We were running a little slow even before that.

   I don’t think we’ll see much serious or long-term damage. The spring snow was more insult than injury.

   The two main issues were limbs that came down and evergreens that sagged from the weight of the snow.

   If you had some branch breakage, eliminate ragged stubs by making sharp pruning cuts to just outside the little rings where branches attach to trunks or larger branches.

   Don’t get up on a ladder to fix high damage. Call an insured professional to handle hangers-on and limit your cutting to what you can reach from the ground.

   Evergreens that sagged should spring back to form as temperatures warm. If they don’t by April, use soft ties (old nylons are good) to pull branches back together. Tie them inside the foliage rather than around the perimeter so you don’t see this botanical straitjacketing.

   Most perennial flowers are just getting started or still dormant. They should get back on track shortly – at worst with some browned leaves that can be pruned off as new ones grow.

   Early planted vegetables such as peas, cabbage, onions, broccoli, spinach, and lettuce are very cold-hardy and won’t be fazed by the snow, other than a slight delay in development while they were under snow.

   The buds of spring-blooming trees and shrubs also will continue on their way since they’re more sensitive to unusually cold temperatures than a temporary covering of snow. While a foot of snow is unusual for later March, temperatures in the upper 20s and low 30s are not.

   As we drift back into the 40s, flower buds should open and bloom nicely, albeit a little later than some years.

   Don’t worry about bulbs such as daffodils, hyacinths, crocuses, and tulips. Those are cold-hardier than most people think – especially the leaves.

   The worst that should happen with those is that bulbs whose flowers opened and were pulled over from the weight of the heavy snow will finish their bloom drooping rather than looking up and out. Even that won’t cause any lasting damage.

See George’s video on not worrying about bulbs poking up early

   For now, the best thing you can do is stay off wet soil as much as possible and don’t dig or till until it dries. Wet soil will end up similar to concrete if you compact it when wet.

   Warmth will be here soon, though. I saw evidence on a 10-day Lowee’s Group Tours trip to gardens of New Orleans and the Deep South.

Spring is already happening in Georgia, as we saw in this section of Callaway Gardens.

   We timed the trip to see the azaleas blooming down there in Zone 8 and 9 land, where the season is a good five or six weeks ahead of us.

   Azaleas are enormously popular in the South. We saw two of the country’s biggest and best azalea displays in western Georgia’s Callaway Gardens and at Bellingrath Gardens near Mobile, Ala. – not to mention in the front yard of a lot of homes.

   We have trouble growing azaleas (a popular version of the rhododendron genus) due to our poorly drained clay soil, poor placement (in full sun), and over-mulching.

   They don’t seem to mind the intense heat and humidity of the South, so long as they get some shade. They do especially well in coastal areas and along river deltas where the soil is sandy and well drained.

   The ample rain that places like New Orleans and Mobile get also help overcome the drawback of shallow roots. We can kill azaleas when it rains too much (due to our clay soil) and when it rains too little (shallow rooting means poor drought resistance).

   Besides the gorgeous azaleas, the Deep South gardens had roses in bloom already, new needles emerging from the bald cypress trees, and cool-season annuals in peak form (pansies, dianthus, dusty miller, and even petunias).

   A lot of the palm trees weren’t looking too good, though. The region was hit with two uncharacteristic freezes in January and February, and New Orleans even had two measurable snows within a month. They usually get one of those every 12 years.

   If it’s any consolation, we’re not the only region getting wacky and erratic weather.

See my photo gallery on gardens of New Orleans and the Deep South