Winter’s second bite

The effects of last winter’s weather are becoming known. Local gardeners have been reporting problems ranging from dead branches to total plant loss.
Two weather events in particular caused the damage being seen in gardens. The first happened on Jan. 16 when night temperatures went below zero. The second occurred right after the late winter snowfall; Temperatures plummeted to 5 degrees on March 2 and shot back up to 82 on March 8.
Rosemary is a perennial herb and quite a few specimens found in Lynchburg gardens are 20 years old. Cold weather killed many of them outright, and others were almost killed. Some rosemary plants are still in good shape, having lost only the tips of their stems.
Roses were spared any kind of serious injury. One exception is the new variety called Cinco de Mayo. This award-winning rose went from green to brown over the winter, and now there is no sign of life.
Almost every fig bush and tree in our area is showing freeze damage. Some of them are sprouting new leaves at ground level but not on their branches. No ripe figs will be harvested from these plants until next year.
Other figs have a few live branches with leafy growth on them. These figs will produce fruit this summer, assuming their flower buds were not frozen last winter.
Last fall, gardenias had bright green leaves. Now their leaves are dull green, and their branches are brittle. Most of them are showing no new growth at all. They are goners.
Crape myrtles suffered extensive dieback in some gardens but not in others. The affected trees need to have their dead branches removed. A few of them need more radical pruning because their only living wood is at the base of their trunks.
Dahlia bulbs left outdoors in the ground last winter were lost. One Lynchburg gardener brought a bag of dead dahlias to the Extension office and told us that half of his dahlia collection got wiped out. Extra mulch put over the dahlias last fall to insulate them from cold did not seem to help.
New perennials promoted by the University of Georgia’s Athens Select program are supposed to be very tolerant of heat and humidity. Unfortunately, they did not survive the winter. Right now, there is no green showing in Princess pennisetum, Fairy Coral Red abutilon, Panama Bronze hibiscus and Purple Queen iochroma.
A more promising plant is Miss Huff, an orange and pink lantana known for its cold hardiness. It came through the winter in fine shape while other lantanas died. New growth is already a foot tall.
So noted
Locusts have returned to many yards in our area. These periodical cicadas crawl out of the ground every 17 years. Although not expected for another four years, they have been reported in Altavista, Amherst, Appomattox and Madison Heights in addition to Lynchburg.
This unexpected event caused a stir at Virginia Tech, where an entomologist said, “It appears that this is an accelerated emergence of Brood II, which should emerge in 2013. This four-year jump is being seen up and down the East Coast.”