[DeepSouthBamaGRITS]

WHAT???? I’m in 8b (coastal AL) and worked outside all day yesterday and was sweating until I came inside around dusk!! I ALWAYS check my weather app on my PC to make SURE we aren’t going to have a SURPRISE COLD FRONT come thru like we did in March when we were to be 35(F) but we had a wind chill of 21(F) that got ALL my berries (wild huckleberries, dewberries, blueberries & ALL my fig trees)!! My peach & pear trees had already bloomed and were setting fruit so I lost all that fruit for this year’s harvest!! I checked those trees yesterday and NO FRUIT. The berry plants/bushes looked like the fruit had been literally FREEZE DRIED on the bushes. My huckleberries had a bumper crop this year as did the blueberries that were actually starting to turn from pink to blue…way way too early (In March!!) AND I COVERED THEM WITH SHEETS & TARPS!!
I showed a low predicted of 53(F) for last night. Just checked the current temp outside and it is 45(F)!! WHAT THE HECK???
My fig trees have leafed out/died back 6 times since October last year with this crazy warm/freeze, warm freeze weather we have had but the March freeze temps dropped excessively from the day time temps we had been having by over 40 degrees and fig trees do not like such sudden big drops in temps. They have not fully recovered from March as I just checked them closely yesterday! They were FINALLY trying to leaf back out! Tiny green leaves at the nodes but had a lot of dead stems still that I did prune back. In March they were fully leafed out and I even had baby figs. These are well-established GROWN fig trees (over 12 ft tall each! I did lose 4 younger trees (4 yrs in the ground) but were producing fruit. Three came back from the roots but one never did.
I did notice they were spraying us like roaches yesterday and should have known when I see that many “trails” that something out of the normal was going to happen. It never fails as I DO watch the skies close!
I have already harvested one round of potatoes, some garlic and have 2 ft tall tomatoes that are already blooming so the garden may have taken a hit. Kinda scared to go out and check, now!
Saturday nights massive storms that rolled thru our area knocked out my power for several hours. It just so happened I had just put my incubator on LOCKDOWN the day before. I had 21 eggs that had LIFE (as I candled them before locking them down). With the power outage, the temp in the incubator did drop a good bit and it took time for it to heat back up so I wondered if I would even have a hatching. Yesterday was hatch day and at 10:45pm I had my 1st hatch & had 8 more pipping. This morning I have 3 baby chicks total…and I ALWAYS have a high success rate hatching eggs…ALWAYS!

Do you ever feel like giving up when so many things seem to go wrong on your homestead???
Folks, SATAN IS ON THE LOOSE IN THIS COUNTRY is all I am going to say…HE & HIS MINIONS WILL NOT BREAK ME as I am a CHILD OF THE KING & MY GOD REIGNS!!!

Sorry for the rant…I’m just finding it very hard to comprehend all that I’m being hit with lately but THIS TOO SHALL PASS!

[buffalo03]

That cold front in March melted my potatoes, but the came back and the wind from the last storm didn’t help any. They are just starting to bloom. How bad do you think this will do to my harvest. This is only my 2nd year growing potatoes. Thanks

[DeepSouthBamaGRITS]

I’ve had to cut back my potatoes twice since I planted them in January. Frost/freeze burned/slimed the tops but I trimmed them back & they recovered. The March UNEXPECTED freeze got the buds for the flowers on mine so my potatoes were small that I’ve already harvested but as I said I still have my 2nd crop yet to harvest so fingers crossed they will have some size to them.
If your potatoes BLOOMED then you have potatoes as this is when they are growing the potatoes for harvest which shouldn’t be too long now for you. You should be good. In my honest opinion with the crazy weather we’ve had (in my normally hot/humid zone), we may have a hard time growing much of a garden this year as our temps were hotter in Jan, Feb & March than it is now so the heat-loving crops I plant may not fair well or produce good harvests with the cooler temps than our NORMAL that we are having now.
GOOD LUCK and I hope you have an abundant harvest of potatoes!!

[backwoods-countryboy]

I’m right next to you over here in Coffee County and it did the same thing to my crops as well that march cold front got me on the pairs and figs. The figs are just now starting to recover slowly I even lost the mulberries and they’re starting to slowly recover now it didn’t seem to bother my potatoes I guess because they were so small they hadn’t bloomed yet.

[DeepSouthBamaGRITS]

Glad to know that it isn’t just me that is having issues with this crazy weather! I’m hoping my fig trees will recover as that big drop in temps last night is like the big drop we had in March. We just didn’t have the windchill temp of 21(F) that we had in March. I have no clue how cool it got last night but it sure wasn’t indicated on my weather app. I do show a low of 43(F) tonight. It is 70(F) here now with an extremely low humidity of only 28% and THAT is almost UNHEARD of here! Something just isn’t right with the weather!!
Maybe we can survive this crazy weather and have some kind of harvest this year…who knows anymore!
Thanks for responding. Good to know there are others experiencing the same issues as I am.

[R-N]

I am considering investing in some army surplus parachutes to cover my fruit trees!

[NanaKK]

Arkansas Ozarks here Zone 6b. Woke up to 39° this morning, only 9:30am and it’s just 48°.

I’m itching to plant tomatoes and peppers but holding off till May 5th. I remember 2017 May 3 rd we got snow.

[Unknown Member]

👍 same here in Mountain Home

[MannaHollow]

Thanks for sharing I am a recent transplant to AR OZ. I was contemplating planting Tomatoes/Peppers. I think I will wait!

[EvW]

One upside of not being able to bend over and plant is that these cold fronts don’t affect me that much :-}

[Grannysquare101]

80’s on Saturday and 32 and snow this morning… Who is responsible for giving Mother Nature her drugs!! LOL! Hope the peppers are OK.

[Clint]

The government

[ClosetMouse]

… years ago, don’t remember the year, early 70’s sometime … but the second week of June .. we left for a two week vacation and for the next three nights it was 28F or lower … it had been one of those very warm mid April/May trick weather events and my garden was doing wonderfully .. potatoes were already blooming and it was beautiful … when we got back the slugs had eaten the residue down to the roots in the ground … was very sad …

[BakerHillFarm]

That is just terrible!

[R-N]

Oh man! That is terrible!!!

[backwoods-countryboy]

I’m over here in South Central Alabama and it’s a solid 40° outside here I just got off work and it’s almost 2:18 A.M.

[BakerHillFarm]

Supposed to get another cold day this Sunday. Our homestead is usually about 5 degrees colder than the surrounding area. We are on a hill with a large pasture across the street and timber on the east and west. Creates a bit of a cold pocket.

[R-N]

I remember getting a 4 inch snow in mid April in central Alabama in the 1960’s. It was a freak storm non forecasted storm but it did happen.

So I guess you can’t trust the weather.