Devastating Cold

Hello from Western PA where it is right now a balmy 40.5 degrees.

The five baby bluebirds that I had in one of my boxes is history as of last Wednesday. I found them-- all five of them-- frozen to death in the nest.

I should be busy hybridizing my standard dwarf bearded iris right now. Instead they are frozen, wind whipped and just generally destroyed.

I am holding my breath that my daylilies make it through this cold.

I am frustrated and more than a little angry, but there isn't thing one I can do about the weather. I just hope that it warms up soon before I lose what's left of my mind. :-/

Not the babyblue birds-awwwwwww thats so sad!!! I just bought a bag of blue bird treat to try to get them to come in closer to the house!!!
I just checked my weather bug and with the windchill its 38 degrees! My garden looks ok so far-but we have tonight to get through and its gonna be another cold one. I worked in the garden yesterday as the snow fell!
They say we will warm up yet this week-we had better!
Sorry to hear your flowers are taking a beating.

Indashade, hang in there, the weather will warm up. Sorry to hear about the baby birds. Don't loose hope.

Inda, I feel your pain. I'm loosing plants right there with ya. The old saying around here was don't plant until Memorial Day. I guess I should have waited. "T" :(

Poor little mites!! The birds and ya'll!! Hope it soon changes for the better!

Oh, I feel so bad for the baby birds. Mother Nature is being very cruel this year. We are having 50 MPH winds today and it's supposed to continue through tomorrow, then snow again on Thursday. I go through periods of just wanting to give up on the yard this year, but I have too many plants going to do that, so I just keep repotting and putting them outside whenever I can.

Oh Sherry, I am so sorry to hear your news. I hope for you, that it warms up and you will be able to recover from the damage. Maybe more birdees will come your way. :)
Hugs,
Michele

Inda that's awful! I think it's been a weird spring for everybody. Hang in there!

I know just how you feel inda. It's been tough here too. Bringing everything in at night that I can and hoping that my fish are alive every morning I get up. I hope that it warms up soon too. We have tonight and tomorrow night still with cold temps and then on wednesday night it's supposed to be in the 40's. That's so sad to hear about the baby blue birds :(
I hope you can hang in there. It's tough when you loose lots of plants. It's been really depressing for me since this is my first year and nothing is really blooming when everyone else is posting pictures of their nice plants in bloom. Here's hoping for warmer weather :)

awwww poor birdies :-(

i spent 3 hours bringing all the sensitive stuff back into the GH. as i have been transplanting seedlings and filling up the space as i was taking things out my did i have to get creative

I've lost almost everything... between the cold, chipmunks and my cat (the ones I rescued from outside my cat "took care of"... she'll eat anything and if she don't like the taste she'll just tear it apart.... sigh, all my nurturing gone to waste, all my special plants gone and all my seeds I'd had such hope for gone. Atleast I haven't found any dead birdies, that's so sad! I've got my feeder full at all times, so far the chipmunk is having a ball, I think he's cute but MY PLANTS! I knew I should've traped him while it was nice.... when it warms up he's gotta go. I'll live trap him and move him to the park.... when do they have young? I don't want to take the chance of taking a mother away from her babies. I've only noticed one, but where there's one there's usually a few. Too bad he's cute and my boy likes him.

Inda...so very sorry about the birds and the bad weather. Hopefully it will soon be over...((((Inda))))

Inda, I can sympathize with you as our weather has been extremely cold too. Last night it was 20 degrees and now 33 and dropping.I just hope the little Hummingbirds that arrived from a warm climate make it. The weather this year is just unbelievable. So sad about your baby birds.

Sorry to hear of your bad weather. We had a cold early spring, but it has warmed up considerably lately. In fact, it is too warm during the days. Our nights drop into the mid 40's, but we expect that. The nights are never warm here. Our birds have been slow in arriving. We've seen pine siskens, finches, swallows, robins, hummingbirds, and grossbeaks. They've been a bit slow in arriving, but are building nests.

We consider June 1 a safe planting date around here, so we could still get a cold snap, but I don't think we'll be dealing with the bad weather you guys have been having. So sorry to hear the season is off to a bad start down there.

I guess I just wanted to vent, but it's funny-- I didn't feel any better. Tomorrow is supposed to be warmer and then hopefully back to normal. I have so much outside work to do it isn't even funny.

I was really upset about the baby birds, but all I could do was remove the nest and hope the parents try again. I haven't even SEEN or heard a bluebird for the last two weeks. There is one little female hummingbird that seems to be permanently attached to the feeder in my backyard. I guess this cold weather is hard on all of the wildlife.

*SIGH* Hopefully the worst is over.

it was 22 degrees this morning in northern michigan i don't have any hope of ever seeing a warm night again the birds are all back but freezing i have to break the ice off the birdbath and bring in the hummingbird and oriole feeders to thaw out
i haven't brought anything out of the greenhouse yet this spring and the gas bill seeps climbing
who ever knew that gardening could be such fun

I really feel so sorry for you guys 'up north'!! It must throw everything into utter confusion and sounds miserable!! Even here in VA I have had to turn the heat back on in the last couple of days!! It's crazy and unheard of at this time of the year when we should be in the 70s and at least the 50s at night!! However, I have to say that I am not looking forward to the blistering heat and if the present climate forestalls this eventuality then I will take it. My plants are certainly loving it and have never looked better!! Hope the chills leave you for good and soon!!

Inda, the worse is not over. We have a freeze warning for tonight also. My yard looks like something from the Munsters or Addams Family with all the sheets around my plants and bushes. I wonder if we're loosing our fruit blossoms also? "T"

no more freezin here!!! yahoooooo only a few things hit but not lost!!!!! its 50-48 with the wind chill!!!
I sure hope ~~~~~~~thats the last of it!~~~~~~~~~(wave)

I am sorry for you south there.. it has been warm enough here for over a month :)

This must be the global warming we keep hearing about.

Sledder-- I see from watching the Weather Channel that we ARE on tap for one more cold morning. It has been 22 degrees here the last two. My iris flowers all look like soggy crepe paper, so I don't think one more sub-artic morning can do that much more damage.

*sigh* again.

Yes, one more night. I don't own enough sheets for tonight's freeze which is suppose to be the coldest we've had yet. You and I have had more winter in the spring than we had in winter. I love snow but not in the end of May... "T" :(

MaryE - don't get me started, dear. "Global Warming" = hogwash. Over the past 400 years, a study I read ("scientific" in nature) claims the overall earth temperature has increased about 0.4 degrees. Um, yeah, I don't know about you, but it's freezing cold at my house, it snows and gets hot whenever it darn well wants to, and I don't blame global warming..

Now, shifting weather patterns (cold where it once was hot, and hot where it once was cold) I might be persuaded to believe. But Global Warming, never......

-Jennifer

I have to agree with you there AngelSong

As far as the weather goes here, supposed to be 28 tonight and hopefully by what they say, the last night of cold. I sure do hope so!!!
I'm tired of having my kitchen full of pots and everything outside flopping on me. I've put sheets on the MG's outside since I can't bring them in and sofar, so good :)
One more night of sheets

Oh, I'm so sorry, IndaShade! That must have been awful! But I'll bet the parents will try again ~ post about it when that happens, will you? Maybe that will make you feel better? I hope so!

And to all of you who are dealing with the nasty cold ~ I feel for you. We're having severe weather, too, but at the opposite end of the spectrum. It's been so hot some days that everything fries. Kinda' nice out this past week, but a couple weeks ago it was well into the 90's (Maybe we hit 100? Or maybe it was only close). And rain ~ what's that? It's been so long since we've had any. It looks like it will rain today, but I'd better be quiet so I don't scare it away. Last night the weatherman said this May is the driest May since 1886 ~ that's not hard to believe.

i think ourmay has been the wettest i have seen for a while it rained 3 times in the last week and looks like it will again tonight

It's a tradition here to have destructive weather for the Memorial Day weekend, and my place is right in step. Last night, I watched from the safety of the kitchen door lite as a 16 year old pecan tree almost bent double in the wind. I tried to close the door going out from the new porch, but couldn't budge it against the wind. Rain was blowing in under the metal roof where the top of the wall hasn't been finished, a horizontal sheet of it. Retreating to the middle hall, I could hear things slamming against the rock of the house, like a small battle in the dooryard. The light show marched right through the house, lighting up even the totally windowless hall. It was a wonderful storm, which lasted only about 15 minutes but seemed much longer as it was happening. Later, all was calm for about an hour before a gentler rain began. I went out and looked in the coffee can I had placed on the back walk, and there was less than an inch of water, but the yard had puddles everywhere. It probably didn't give an accurate measure because horizontal rain is difficult to catch. Today, it is still raining off and on, and the thunder can be heard in the distance as the dark clouds keep the sun hidden. My plants look quite happy, except for the shrubs and small trees which lost limbs.

Just wanted to give all of you an update after our cold, windy and horrible start to spring.

The cold appears to be over (for now, anyway) and the weather has been exemplary, but I have to admit that I'm a bit skittish. A freeze right now would be the straw that broke the camel's back, but it HAS happened here.

The one bluebird box is still empty, although I heard the male calling for a mate this morning out on my clothes pole, and that made me smile. I think it's the daddy of the babies that died. I hope he finds a lady friend soon. :-)

My other two boxes have nests in them too. One box has Barn Swallows in them, and they are darling little birds. I checked last night, and Mrs. Barn Swallow has two little white eggs in her nest. Mr. Barn Swallow also sits on my clothes pole at times during the day, and has absolutely no fear of me. If my neighbors could hear me talking to this little bird, they would have no doubt that I had gone around the bend.

The other nest box-- and I can't BELIEVE I am allowing this-- has English sparrows in it. They are extremely mean little birds that will kill and throw bluebirds and barn swallows from their nest boxes to take them over, but after all of the hardship the birds have undergone during this cold spell, I simply didn't have the heart to remove the nest and eggs. So this is no doubt the ONE and ONLY time you will hear me say that English Sparrows are nesting in my bluebird boxes. (ECK-- I am turning into a SOFTY in my old age.)

My standard dward bearded irises are history, toast, destroyed and frozen, but the Intermediate bearded iris show some promise and the tall-bearded iris that didn't rot are going to bloom. I just won't have the iris seed crop this year that I would have had, but I can live with that.

Daylilies are fine-- a little frozen, a little wind whipped, a little leaf streak-- but I am sure I will have good bloom this year.

Hope this finds the rest of my compadres in the northeast in much better spirits. I know I feel better. :-)

Y'all warming up now???????

"eyes"

YES-- thank goodness-- we have warmed up! Thanks for asking.

Today is one of those kind that I love. It's overcast and warm, but not TOO warm, and VERY humid. My orchids love it, and I was finally able to put them outside.

Wonderful.........good to hear y'all can finally get to play with your "babies"!!!!

"eyes"

Indashade: Glad to hear the weather is beginning to perk up for you. It must be discouraging to think it's spring, then be thrown back into winter.

We're having a late spring here in Seward. I think we're about two weeks behind our usual. As of June 1st, most people would be planting their gardens, and they may do so, but I'm not entirely sure our weather is going to cooperate.

Still, we haven't had the weather problems you have, so I hope it all is over for you and summer is here in the northeast!

We went from cold, freezing and snow right into hot and windy. We missed spring totally here. The plants are having a hard time adapting to such a change. Even the ones I'm trying to harden off. They've been babied for months and now I'm trying to get them to take the heat and wind. They don't like it much. I think we've seen the last of our freezes for three or four months. Four if we are lucky. It's been a strange year all around, so nothing will surprise me now.

We've been having overcast, rainy weather, and that's probably the best "hardening off" weather. When we were having an unusually warm spell, the plants suffered from their time outdoors. Now they are less effected by the trip outdoors, and a couple days is all it takes from the greenhouse to the coldframe, then out on the tables.

sorry to hear about your baby bluebirds. i was just watching them last week,and wishing they would stay around and build a nest.