Bruce watered the Garden by hand Sunday, 4/10/11 starting at 11:00AM. Small tomato plants in C1 were apparently killed by frost damage Saturday morning, 4/9/11 where the KCALIVER19 Wunderground station (located about a mile north of the Garden near Mark's house) showed a low temperature of 35.2 degrees F at about 7:00 AM. None of Mark's potatoes showed any signs of frost damage which supports a conclusion that the micro cliamte at the Garden of Grace is colder and perhaps windier that the micro climate At Mark's front yard (close to the KCALIVER19 Wunderground station). The combination of sleet and hail that fell between 7:00 and 7:30 PM Friday night might have also been a factor. All of the recently planted tomato plants in rows A1 and B1 under row cover were not damaged and looked healthy.
All of the potato plants in Rows ABC3 and CD10 where also frost damaged but all of the plants appear to have survived. The Lasota Russets were the smallest plants and appear to have sustained the greatest damage (blackening of about 40 to 50% of the leaves and stems (uppermost apical meristem tissue was killed but lower shoots/meristems appear to have survived.
It appears that someone from the Asbury Landscape team cut the grass/weeds near the compost bins and all along the East fence next to the parking lot. This was very helpful since the Friday volunteers had started to weed this area but quite a bit still remained.
Too bad about the little tomato plants...35 degrees is pretty chilly. Hopefully that is the last breath of winter.
ReplyDeleteThe potatoes at the GOG auxiliary 1 were unharmed by the frost. Buckwheat, planted as a cover crop, was well burned by the frost however.
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