Impromptu cold tolerance experiment...

[jfrye01@live.com]

Past few days, the weather has been very nice for this time of year, daytime highs in the 70s and nighttime lows in the high 30s, so I have placed my potted Trachy and Butia on the back patio and left them there...anyway, last night, the temperature was forecast to drop to 33F, but instead, it dropped to 25F at my house...I woke up this morning, looked at the palms, and they still looked happy, but as we know, cold damage can take some time to set in, especially if the roots are damaged...I'm not worried about the Trachy as much as I am the Butia, but I'll keep everyone posted...

[Mauna Kea Cloudforest]

You worry too much. 25F isn't going to do anything to your butia. Both of these palms take significant amounts of abuse in the form of cold, drought, and so on.

[smithgn]

This ^ 25 degrees isn't much to a Butia.

[jfrye01@live.com]

Yeah, I know that normally it won't hurt anything, I just didn't know if being in a pot would make it worse...

[Mauna Kea Cloudforest]

Yeah, I know that normally it won't hurt anything, I just didn't know if being in a pot would make it worse...

Not for your average overnight frost like you just had. If it was below freezing during the day and super cold at night, it would be a different story. At this time of year at your latitude, radiative freeze events in late February are not likely to cause any problems with either t. fortunei or butia. Just watch out for the next arctic outbreak coming along towards early next week. One more round of cold is coming at least for you, it's not going as far south as before, but it will still impact you. You will probably need to bring them in for at least the first half of the week. After this next cold wave, you should be able to leave them outside.

[Alicehunter2000]

My triple Butia that was dug growing wild at my parents house a couple of years ago didn't flinch during our 2-thiry hour freezes and ultimate low of 20F. The first freeze was advective with 20 mph winds, the second freeze had ice.

The Butia was in a black plastic planter pot.....don't worry, be happy.

[_Keith]

How deeply, if at all does your ground freeze in the winter?

[jfrye01@live.com]

I'd imagine 3-4 inches, but I'm not exactly sure. Of course, when it does, it doesn't last long, and within 10 feet of the house, no freezing at all.

Edited February 20, 2014 by jfrye01@live.com