I planted a handful of seeds in May of 2014, and this is their second winter without protection. I'm in Lubbock (7b), and we had two cold snaps this winter; one was a low of 6, and the other was 4. Fast forward a couple of months, and I was pleasantly surprised to find new growth in several seedlings.

These seeds were provided by Jwitt--thanks buddy!

They are hardier at this age than when their "trunk " is 1-5" thick because most of the plant is below ground.  Until they get about 12" diameter they have a high mortality rate once the temp drops below 10. Once they start trunking they will grow out of extremely cold conditions. 

That makes perfect sense, because I just learned that the 2-3 foot tall baby Filifera at my rent house is a goner... I guess I should've used Christmas lights like I did last year. I don't know how I've never learned about seedlings being hardier at the strap stage. 

These little guys made it but i had to perform a bit of surgery on them. They also had tall grass around them.

They should take off! Hopefully they are where you want them and not needing transplanting. Now to get them to that trunk,Ed stage!

I suppose this means I should've plant mine instead of leaving them potted.  

I had 200+ in 7-10g pots that died this year while 1g plants in the ground survived.