Last night was the first time that I had to close the greenhouse up tight, because of the weather. The cold nights are begining to return to Colorado. The low last night was 42F. It snowed all day 40 miles west of my place, in the mountains. Ski season can't be far off. - Millet

OH ME GARSH! And I thought my summer was going fast! I hear that in Co. - even mid summer, temps can drop to 40's at night & back up to 80 during day. Hat's off to you for all that you grow there!

We had a forecast low of 46F here in the south of the UK last night so could well of been lower than that. I had my greenhouse door fully closed for the first time as well to protect a Kumquat, Limequat I've just re-potted as well as some seeds I'm trying to grow.

There's been so much rain here this month and the nights have been 50F quite a bit and it's still August!! What a nighmare!!

millet,
I wish you could send some of that cool weather my way!
Contrare to your problems with the cold, it has finally cooled off enough in phoenix that my citrus has finally begun to sprout a second flush of growth! I protect many of my trees with shade canopies in June, July, and a greater part of August to encourage more growth and less fruit and foliage burn from the sun. The heat out here can be quite brutal on the young citrus trees, and can actually make the plants grow extremely slow. However, once it cools off, from September to November, I can get six inches to a foot of growth from my plants!

About two weeks ago we had an unusual cold snap for my part of Florida when it went down to thirty four degrees in October! I thought we'd escaped any frost until a few days later when I noticed that half my sweet potato vines had turned black, but it didn't get the peppers which are slightly taller. Fortunately all of my container citrus were under tree cover so none of them took any apparent damage.

That motivated me to get the new plastic on the hoophouse which my daughter and I did last weekend. Haven't run the power yet nor moved any benches in but if we get another cold snap like that one I can have it all set up and ready to go in an hour or so. Sure would hate to see frost damage so early in the year when so many of the trees are covered in fruit. This will be the first year I have enough Key limes to be able to freeze some juice.

.....Alan.

Wow! I can't believe that we were nowhere near that cold here in NW FL. I think the lowest we got was mid-upper 40's. I guess it was the moderating effect of the Gulf as we are very near the coast.

Skeet

It was a shock to us as well. According to the paper it had been sixty nine years since we last had so low a temperature that early in the year. It's been much more seasonal since then, but I got that plastic up just the same!

.....Alan.

Just my 2 cents worth from up here...we had a unusually cold & cloudy October. This past Wed. was the first decent day in a long time -- mid 60's & some sun!!! Got the yard work done. Today, there was a winter storm further north. Many , many accidents & up to 12 inches snow, covering the sleet. Right here, it is mostly sleet & very windy. Unusuall for this time.
Oh please, no rain, sleet or snow next week from here to east coast!