Winter is here!
 

I think we're in for another usually cold winter here in Texas, just like we had last year. Maybe even another cold spring and late frosts, but time will tell.

It's supposed to get down to 20F here tonight. Ouch! Tomorrow night, 25F -- so two nights in a row of it.

Hope it doesn't kill my cigar/firecracker (cuphea) plants, which can be marginal in an zone 8b to begin with. Or my Salvia leucantha 'Santa Barbara' -- last fall, I lost a couple because they were new plantings and hadn't established yet.

I am hoping that frost will end by early March. At least we have been dry so far and sans the ice storms we had last year, we can do without that:no: The light freezes are usefull in knocking out alot of the insects like, fleas, leaf hoppers and other sucking vile virus spreaders.

I have a group of 24 early seedlings already under lights in my garage(early start contingency). The refrigerator and hot water heater keep it above killing temps. I will start the back up group in 3 weeks.
Last week when I turned my compost piles they were steaming in the cold air, I have enough home made to add a cubic foot to each tomato planting.
My grapefruit and manderin trees will prevail.

Happy new years. A little over 60 days to first plant out for me ;)

I say we wont see a frost in March.

We will see how that plays out.:lol:

I hope my cigar plants live too.:(

Worth

Wow, what a life! We have real winter up here!

Suze, how late in the fall can you pick vine-ripened tomatoes from your garden? Last week? LOL

Kent & Kathy

[quote=kktwahoo;83327]Wow, what a life! We have real winter up here!

Suze, how late in the fall can you pick vine-ripened tomatoes from your garden? Last week? LOL[/quote]

It depends. This year, the fall plants held out until the first or second week of Dec, and I ate my last tomato just the other day. But we usually have two short seasons here, because the summer is so hot, and also because the extreme spring rains tend to do in the plants. So, it's not all it's cracked up to be. :-)

I finally pulled my plants yesterday to get ready for spring. Many green tomatoes still on the plants and got several ripening ones as well. Black Cherry was absolutely loaded.

Oh, well, so it is!
 

[quote=Suze;83479]It depends. This year, the fall plants held out until the first or second week of Dec, and I ate my last tomato just the other day. But we usually have two short seasons here, because the summer is so hot, and also because the extreme spring rains tend to do in the plants. So, it's not all it's cracked up to be. :-)[/quote]

Suze, I guess the pasture IS indeed greener on the other side!

We tend to have tomato weather from late May to late September, so we will try those long-keeping tomatoes this year, know anything about them?

Happy 2008!

Kent & Kathy

[quote=kktwahoo;83514]We tend to have tomato weather from late May to late September, so we will try those long-keeping tomatoes this year, know anything about them?[/quote]

I don't know much, other than to say that I really haven't cared for the few long keeper varieties I've tried in the past. I consider them sort of a novelty, just based on my experience with them.

But if you get good results with any particular variety, by all means, post back and share your experience. :)

I was planning to try one or two plants of all five or six varieties I can find seeds for. We are fortunate, as we have a bit over 20 acres to use. A large part of it is farmed chemically (modern corn & soybeans) and we get paid such a pittance, we have a deal with the tenant that we can use as much as we want (our LLC owns it anyway!).

Then, if we have any luck with them, we will let you know.

One thing we might need is a walk-in cooler. We do have a large attached garage, well-insulated, and in the seven years since we built this house, even at 10 to 20 degrees below zero, which only happens once in awhile, for a few days at a time, the garage did not freeze, so we can try keeping them in the garage "cooler" I guess.

Heres the weather for today my tomato plants are loving it.:)
[URL]http://www.wunderground.com/US/TX/Bastrop.html[/URL]

Worth

Perfect. I can't wait to get home and let mine enjoy the weather.

Yes, weather has been nice the last few days. Maybe Jan won't be so bad after all. :wait:

Went back and looked at the historicals for that 20 deg night I was supposed to get -- only ended up getting down to 24 deg.

It’s 2 AM and I checked the temperature outside and its 34 degrees and 50 in the garage.
It’s going to be cold all of the rest of this week at night.:evil:

I’m going to open up the door to the inside to let some heat in the garage for a while to warm things up a little.:yes:

Worth