Topic: Plants had to go back into greenhouse - its so cold

[Crystalmoon]

Hi there it has been so cold here in Kent for the last week with freak 48 mile an hour winds & torrential rain I had to put young squash plants & headed lettuces, I had been hardening off in my sheltered garden at home, back into my greenhouse. I know I will have to start the hardening off process again before planting out at my allotment which is very windswept at the nest of times. I was wondering if anyone knows the latest date for planting out squash....I usually have mine in the ground by now.
When I do plant them out I could cover with plastic bottle cloches or make a makeshift plastic tunnel for them. What temperature would be the lowest you would risk planting out at? Many thanks Jane 

[BarriedaleNick]

I was thinking of planting mine out this weekend but they are still in the poly.  I guess I will leave them for a week now as I like to get them outside in the garden to harden off a bit first but I may just plant a few out - supposed to warm up on Sunday..

[galina]

Hi there it has been so cold here in Kent for the last week with freak 48 mile an hour winds & torrential rain I had to put young squash plants & headed lettuces, I had been hardening off in my sheltered garden at home, back into my greenhouse. I know I will have to start the hardening off process again before planting out at my allotment which is very windswept at the nest of times. I was wondering if anyone knows the latest date for planting out squash....I usually have mine in the ground by now.
When I do plant them out I could cover with plastic bottle cloches or make a makeshift plastic tunnel for them. What temperature would be the lowest you would risk planting out at? Many thanks Jane 

Night time temperatures were not particularly low the last few days and it is going to be warmer quite soon.  I would plant out this weekend and if it is windy (or sluggy) with large bottle cloches or cloches. 

For established squash plants the lowest they can deal with is +4C.  Seedlings  need more.  They love anything over 20C daytime which we should get quite soon.  Other factors matter too.  For example hardening and the size of the plants too.  Larger plants being more able to withstand wind and lower temperatures.  One way of making everything warmer for these plants is planting through black plastic, like Pescador has beein doing.  But there are drawbacks to this too with slugs hiding under the plastic and the need for careful watering to get to the roots.

I must admit that mine just about always sulk for a bit, and if somebody knows how to stop that, I'd be listening very hard too ;)     

[johhnyco15]

mine have been planted out for a couple of weeks now so sulking nearly over can just see new leaves  appearing courgettes the same  I've around 100 tomato plants out and they are growing well despite the unseasonable weather runner beans are going great guns however i have put  a wind break around them so they are pretty snug no wind damage at all thinking ill put out my french beans this week they have been outside for two weeks now its just the wind really

[Crystalmoon]

Hi Johhny wish I had put a wind break around my new gooseberry bushes, just been down to allotment to inspect storm damage & I've lost lots of gooseberry branches with small fruit on them. I had put them up against a small wall so one side of them is still ok but the sides facing out are pretty wrecked. Also lost a cucumber & possibly another one, wind ripped a hole in my small poly. The one courgette I had planted under a plastic bottle cloche has survived & is flowering so I really need to be able to get the bottle off it soon so it can be pollinated. The one Butternut I'd planted out under similar cloche looks ok, just a couple of yellow leaves. Luckily I have replacements for the cucumbers at home. I am so grateful I didn't plant out all my squash etc when we had a mini heatwave a couple of weeks ago. I just put those few bits in the ground to see how they did.
There is so much damage at my allotment site, lots of broken greenhouse windows, poly tunnels destroyed etc, very sad to see. I got off lightly really.

Thanks Galina I will keep an eye on the night temperatures while I start to harden off the plants again. I am planting the squash & courgettes through good quality thick membrane but not plastic....so the soil is a bit warmer & gets water ok & the slugs so far don't seem to like the coarse texture of the membrane I've used.

Hi Nick, I'm going to have to keep an eye on the wind speeds as my new plot is very exposed. Like you I will probably wait a week for most of them but may put a couple in under cloches. 

[squeezyjohn]

It was colder on June 1st here in Oxford than it was on Christmas Day!  And that's the figures from the Met Office, not just me exaggerating. 

[tricia]

I guess I've been lucky here in the south west! For veggies I only grow tomatoes, courgettes, squashes, sweetcorn and salad - they have all been out for the past ten days or so, initially protected. Now only the sweetcorn are protected from slugs and snails with bottle cloches which will remain in place. We have had some lovely warm weather recently with night temperatures in double figures, so no problem with the plants sulking! I picked my first Cavili courgette this week - admittedly only about 4" long - and the Shooting Star and Sure Thing varieties also have small fruit growing.

Tricia 

P.s. All my veggies are planted through membrane.

[Crystalmoon]

Hi Squeezyjohn, I can certainly believe you, it has been so cold here in Kent that our heating has been coming on automatically as the temperature inside the flat is dropping below 15 degrees at night indoors!!!!!

Well I just looked at the met weather forecast for this weekend & although the temperature is rising well the wind speeds here aren't dropping below 24 miles per hour this weekend....sigh...hoping what beginnings of fruit I have left will survive. Most of the flowers on my strawberries have been blown off already.

[Crystalmoon]

Wow Tricia we haven't seen double figures at night for a few weeks now. I've never put plastic cloches around sweetcorn before, I have plenty of large fizzy pop bottles I could use, do you cut tops & bottoms off & just use the central part as a slug barrier? Jane

[tricia]

I cut off tops and bottoms Jane. I only have 18 plants and find it easy to water each one directly using a watering can.

Tricia 

[Pescador]

Just for the record, I have used a weed membrane rather than plastic sheet so that any rainfall can get through, and underneath are circles of used coffee grounds around each plant which I have found to be a reasonably effective barrier against slugs.
Beware of the idea that a black cover will automatically warm the soil, as well as absorbing heat, it also radiates it well on cold nights.
I have yet to see any firm evidence that a black cover provides any overall rise in soil temperature.
Maybe a project for next year!

[Tee Gee]

I took my bottle cloches off today

[Paulh]

Never mind the plants having to go back into the greenhouse, I've had to as well!

[Crystalmoon]

Thanks Tricia I will give this a go.

TeeGee, I wish I could get hold of some plastic water bottles like yours, would give the plants much more room to grow...I am using the largest water bottles I could find in a supermarket which are very small compared to yours. May I ask how you were able to get hold of your plastic cloches? All the places I have asked that use those say they have to return the empties.

Hi Pescador, I have very heavy clay on my allotment so when we had a couple of very hot days here about a month ago the black membrane areas of my plot remained soft under the membrane while the rest was like concrete....so I know for sure it helps moisture remain in my soil but I'm not sure about the heat either. I didn't think about it radiating heat away during cold nights... not what I had hoped would happen especially as I am planting all the heat loving plants through it this year. I haven't tried coffee grounds yet but plan to do so when I can find a donor as I don't drink coffee myself.

lol Paulh me too, I've had to get out Winter clothing again. We are supposed to be getting warmer weather this weekend but it only seems to be reaching 18 degrees by the early evening which seems weird.

[galina]

I haven't tried coffee grounds yet but plan to do so when I can find a donor as I don't drink coffee myself.

Crystalmoon, any Starbucks and now also Costa coffee shops will give you coffee grounds for the garden.  When we go to London, we ask.  You don't have to be a customer.  If you ask after the morning rush, they usually have quite a nice sack of grounds.  This helps their 'green' credentials.

Pescador, my mistake - membrane, not plastic, sorry.  Yes very interesting about heat loss at night.  I thought the heat would be trapped in the ground by the physical cover, not radiated.  Live and learn.  My one and only (so far) try with black plastic (for potatoes) ended with soil too dry below the plastic and a huge amount of slug damage, but that was long before I started using coffee grounds.  Maybe time for a revisit with permeable membrane. 

[galina]

TeeGee, I wish I could get hold of some plastic water bottles like yours, would give the plants much more room to grow...I am using the largest water bottles I could find in a supermarket which are very small compared to yours.

Crystalmoon, Tee Gee and all,

gallon waterbottles from the recycling centre are the largest I have and I would also really like to know where to get these water dispenser bottles. 

There are these Victorian bell cloches on the market, but they are quite pricey. 
http://www.greenfingers.com/product.asp?dept_id=200462&pf_id=LT5590D&ptm_source=google&ptm_medium=shopping&ptm_campaign=under10&gclid=CISnw9b3jc0CFRITGwodUvYOsA

[Digeroo]

I managed to get just one large water bottle from work which got damaged.  The company got billed for any which were not returned.

[Tee Gee]

I am a bit of a scavenger / hoarder and it is surprising how over the years I have collected stuff that people have thrown out or left behind when they give up their plots?

These were left by someone who used to work the plot next to me so I do not know exactly where they come from originally.

An idea that comes to mind is why not cut strips of clear plastic 12"-18" wide and staple the ends together to form a sleeve. Then all you have to do is stick a few split canes into the soil around the plant/s then feed the sleeve over them to form an enclosure/ windbreak.

[BarriedaleNick]

I have tried coffee grounds as I have a virtually unlimited supply of the stuff and my experience is that it doesnt work at all.  I guess if it is super dry then it might be a deterrent but I think anything really dry would work as well - coir for example - but as slugs are more active when it is wet I don't think it will really work in practice.
I rounded up some slugs and snails and put them in the middle of a big ring of grounds and they just went right over it like it wasn't there - not a moment of hesitation.  Mine goes on the compost now..

[InfraDig]

Tee Gee, what are the sleeves the bottles are sitting in? Thanks.