Cold damage winter 2013/2014

[needmore]

The following conditions preceded the damage observations I've made: Many days with high temps below 32F, many days in succession with lows in the teens, a couple of nites in the single digit F's, a storm initially with lite freezing drizzle, then sleet, then 6-8" of snow. Additional lite snow on subsequent days. And finally at the end of the cold snap a low of -16C up at my house - roughly +2F, probably lower in spots, warmer in other spots. Trying to include only culms that I believe were NOT buried in snow.

Pretty much total leaf burn: Fargesia robusta 'Wolong' 5 years old, Ps japonica, Ps viridula mostly burned a few leaves remain, all above ground leaves on Phy nigra & Hale form (buried leaves fine), Phy aurea 'Holochrysa', Phy lofushanensis - surprising, this has been reported to be much hardier than this, Ps amabilis mostly burned, Sem yashadake 'Kimmei Inversa', Pl simonii, Phy prominens (1st year) and some others not listed that burned at warmer temps.

Noticeable to heavy burn on my moso but many green leaves still, same on Phy bambusoides 'White Crookstem'. The multiple vivax forms just starting to burn, Shanghai 3 just starting to burn, Phy aurita just barely showing burn, Sem okuboi more than half burned.

Seemingly unfazed lesser known bamboo - Sinobambusa intermedia, Pl maculatus, Phy fimbriligula, Phy rutila, Phy varioauriculata, Phy virella, Phy pinyanensis (seems to be form of heteroclada) Phy hispida, Phy makinoi, Pl oleosis (may have been buried in snow?). No damage on dulcis visible.

Many more are unfazed, others with light burn if anyone is curious about a specific bamboo let me know.

[Alan_L]

Brad, the burn you're seeing is the light grey-green, crispy look on leaves? Or is it blonde leaves? (Which I thought takes longer to show up)

[stevelau1911]

I'm seeing some of the light grey crispy leaves on the dulcis and decora meaning they had to have had some exposure even with the snow pack, but nothing significant yet at 0F so far. The atrovaginata and parvifolia still look solid so far, and they definitely had exposed leaves through the deep freeze.

The spectabilis divisions looked really curled up as the water drums partially froze over, but look uncurled now. I found that the 2011 culms on the moso bicolor have browning on the leaf tips which I didn't see before, but the leaves on the newer culms didn't show any problems. I'm guessing it may be related to the flooding we've had as the moisture should be able to seep into the greenhouse.

One unusual stat is that the greenhouse temperature is only 40F while it is 54F outdoors as the still partially frozen water barrels are slowing down the rate that the greenhouse thaws out. We are about 1 month away from what has historically been the coldest part of the year so I expect it to drop below 0F this year because we have already had 2 record lows so far this fall/winter.

[needmore]

Brad, the burn you're seeing is the light grey-green, crispy look on leaves? Or is it blonde leaves? (Which I thought takes longer to show up)

Not blond, those do take quite awhile to show up except for some of the ground covers which burn early and are tan already. The burned leaves will now look fine due to this torrential rain that is falling, they will fool one briefly but will show their true colors in the cold snap next Monday...


EDIT: For example, I know this Pl simonii to have nearly total leaf burn and they will drop in a few weeks but hydration can make them seem vital still. A few of these were buried in snow and really are green but those on the left in particular are fried.

[stevelau1911]

Sometimes you can still see the damage through the hydration. With the decora leaves below, you can still see the browned leaves even though the leaves are clearly hydrated as it is raining while this picture was taken.


Oddly, the much younger shanghai III which was planted this spring is holding up a lot better than the decora. The initial deep freeze did cause checkerboard patterns on the leaves, but on the 0F night, this was completely exposed and never got damage.


The dulcis seems to be even less hardy than ever at 0F because it got hit even harder than the decora as shown below.


The parvifolia and atrovaginata should stay evergreen until it gets a few degrees below 0F, and I believe they should be the last ones to burn out of any of my boos with exposed leaves.



This is not a bamboo, but it looks like my blackberry plant is already more damaged than it was by the end of last winter.

[Tarzanus]

Warm weather and some drizzle hydrated my fried bamboos as well. For a day - now it's windy and again everything ended up in curls. Temperatures are finally above freezing, so there won't be more damage for now. We expect several rainy days, so perhaps bamboos can recover from cold shock a bit.

[JWH]

Two plants here have noticeable leaf damage after our cold snap, a booshoots tissue-cultured "fargesia denudata" that I've been told is not really denudata but something else, and Sinobambusa tootsik 'albostriata' (hopefully) only has leaf damage on the youngest culms.

[needmore]

I had just shy of 12cm of rain yesterday and even the many piles of recently cut culm tips are re-hydrated and look alive.

[johnw]

[quote="JWH"]Two plants here have noticeable leaf damage after our cold snap, a booshoots tissue-cultured "fargesia denudata" that I've been told is not really denudata but something else/quote]

So do they any idea what it might be? Surely it can't be too hard to figure out. Possibly a Borinda?

johnw - +4c & rain

[Tarzanus]

My Fargesia denudata Lancaster 1 seems to be completely unaffected by cold. It however was almost completely affected by vole family living right below. I might take it out next year, create some divisions and try to get at least one of them start spreading. It's actually getting smaller for me.

I think it is denudata. It has very little leaves, and a whole bunch of them. They start growing on top, and almost no growth appears on the bottom part of the culm, so the whole 6 month culm looks like a stick with bushy top. Following year it leafs out completely and starts its weeping habit. If it doesn't get eaten before spring....

[stevelau1911]

Now that it has dried up, the leaf burn is much easier to see. My weather sensor for outdoor temperatures is very close to the house foundation to avoid being snowed on so it may have actually dipped to -4F instead of 0F for the bamboos.

Decora got frost bit pretty hard, but it looks like there's still some green left in it.


Shanghai III looks about the same as decora


Atrovaginata got hit harder than I thought it would, but I think this is more about moisture failing to reach the extremities because it looks like the leaves are either unharmed or curled up with damage. This is also the top of the culms where it takes the longest for water to reach.


Parvifolia suffered a bit of leaf burn, also mostly on the extremities.


Since the tarp for parvifolia was just sitting on the ground, I re-tarped it hoping it can stay there at least through the coldest months.

[needmore]

Brrrrrrrrrr! Easier to see damage this AM -13C, no snow cover, a little windy and ground saturated so the top few cm of soil is now frozen.

[JWH]

Two plants here have noticeable leaf damage after our cold snap, a booshoots tissue-cultured "fargesia denudata" that I've been told is not really denudata but something else

So do they any idea what it might be? Surely it can't be too hard to figure out. Possibly a Borinda?

johnw - +4c & rain

Johnw-
I only have second-hand knowledge that Booshoots' denudata plants were not true denudata but something else much less cold-hardy. It'd be great to figure out what species it really is! My "Denudata" was looking okay after 3 nights of 22-24f. Started showing leaf curl & damage after one night of 16f. Two more nights at 11f and 15f inflicted even more damage.

December 15th, a couple days after our arctic blast ended, looking re-hydrated, but had these "freezer-burned" looking streaks in each leaf:




Today, alot of leaves have turned brown and dropped:

[Tarzanus]

After prolonged cold, we received prolonged rain. All bamboos that were affected by cold are now showing different kind of stress. Soil is completely saturated and Moso began to look like crap. I don't believe it will keep more than a couple of leaves this winter.

Hopefully all that (sometimes standing) water will drown voles.

[needmore]

Does not look like denudata for sure, one might look at their selection of other similar species and round up list of possible suspects in case it was a mixup among inventory. Borinda seems quite plausible.