The frost watch

[Sunflowersinthewind]

I am almost obsessed with looking at the weather app now relying to figure out when I can plant out what I have bought and what would survive in my unheated greenhouse.

I currently have inside many fuchsias, snapdragons, busy lizzies and tomato plants. Outside in greenhouse, I have seedlings of marigolds, zinnia, aster, sunflowers and some plug plants of varying perennials.

When would you be planting out any of this. I know my tomatoes have to stay in. They are not the healthiest anyway, having grown them from seed too early but I won't give up on them. Also how safe is the unheated greenhouse do you think? Temps at night are due to go down to 4 degrees but feel like 1 degree!

Also if anyone else is wondering the same questions the post here! Honestly mumsnet at the moment has been my go-to guide for gardening questions.

I used wool pellets last year, making sure slugs couldn't climb up any other way from leaves touching (they seem to be able to leap small gaps! )

Also late night when letting dogs out a quick trip to greenhouse and check for intruders.

Hiya please can I join in with the frost fretting? 😆 I'm on day 10 of my seedlings being outside all day so thinking I might leave them out over night tonight and see what happens 🤞 potted out tomatoes sunflowers and cosmos last weekend and they've been outside ever since under a pane of glass and seem ok so hopefully we're all good now! I'm north west based near Liverpool - anyone else?!

Welcome to the worrier club @kiwi17 !

@aliasname I do have some stuff called slugless pellets. It works keeping them out of pots, need to apply liberally around greenhouse.

Quick photos of sunflowers and other assorted seedlings which are very small before I head out to do some planting

Wow you’re brave! Glad they’ve survived. I do wonder sometimes if we worry too much, but it’s a lot of time and care to scrap if it does freeze too hard.

@Sunflowersinthewind i’m in Wiltshire too. My greenhouse is getting too warm so my sown trays and pots are outside already, I only have tomatoes, cucumbers and courgettes in the greenhouse.
I find damn slugs get into the greenhouse too but I also have at least one resident toad in there so I live in hope that he/she helps!

I don’t think we’ll get a really hard frost now 🤞🏻🤞🏻

I'm still waiting on my plug plants being delivered so I can grow them on , it's such a sunny day here but we do have a few drop in temps over night coming up . I know it's a game of patience but come on !!!

All my seedlings are in my unheated greenhouse except for tomatoes in pots that are outside against a south facing wall.

We had a very slight frost last night, a touch on the car windscreen and east facing slates but everything has survived fine.

I'm potting up the chillies, and cucumbers today. Spring onions and herbs out to the cold frame to make some space.

I'm on the wilts/hants border, in a frost pocket but sheltered from bitter winds.

I hope you noticed the RHS no longer class slugs as “pests”? ☺️ They’re part of the ecosystem, to be managed not destroyed.

Well the RHS is very welcome to come and collect mine for their ecosystem 😁 in the meantime I will continue to take evasive action!

Snapdragons and some fuchsias out. Little Leo's are also out. I even saw some signs of life from the poached egg plant seeds I put out a few weeks ago. All seedling trays are now back into greenhouse. Dahlias can go in there on Monday. Progress!

Some photos and one of a sunbathing cat as well.

@Sunflowersinthewind my first time planting and I chose poached eggs. Did the whole packet as I was convinced none would grow. This is the amount I have now !
I am so proud of what they did that I can’t even contemplate not putting them all in the ground.
so today I have made a new planter just for them 😂

No idea why it loaded that photo upside down 😁

@Paranoidandroidmarvin wow look at them! Such healthy babies, they are really pretty plants and bees love them

.@Paranoidandroidmarvin they look fab! I’ve never grown those, will have to go on next year’s list!

I planted out a couple of sweetpeas and some small ammi majus and visnaga seedlings (which are still very small and delicate) on Friday to see how they coped and all are looking good this morning!

I think I'll plant some more sunflowers this week so I have a succession of them through summer - I got some Titan and Kong varieties to see if I can grow them as tall as my house. I'll be delighted and very surprised if that happens!

Anyone else on this thread in central Scotland?

I’ve got a few large-ish salvias on a windowsill in my flat, desperate to go out; I’m not sure how careful I need to be with relatively mature plants? They’re in 2L pots.

Attaching pic — this is our forecast for the coming week.

I have an allotment and I write a diary of how things progress, every year without fail there is a frost towards the end of May. I am in South East. I am always looking at the weather forecast and ready to dash up there and cover my tender shoots.

@Greensocksday nooo! Don't say that, I am ready to put everything out, things need to go out!

@LemonJuiceFromConcentrate I would say fine for salvias, I think they will cope if they aren't really tiny. I put some out on Saturday

I think salvias are pretty hardy aren't they? Should be ok. I'm not sure when to plant out my zinnia seedlings - anyone else doing them? They're in the unheated plastic greenhouse atm but have been in and out in the day time for a couple of weeks..

Thanks, both of you, maybe I will just go for it.

I think some salvias are more hardy than others and these are Nachtvlinder (sp. may be wrong) so quite tender … but I do have canes and fleece I can use to tuck them in if it gets really cold again.

I have zinnia seedlings @LemonJuiceFromConcentrate, mine are so tiny though. How big are yours? Mine have been in unheated greenhouse overnight this whole time bar for last week when it got really cold. That's probably why they are so tiny. I was thinking give them another week or so in the greenhouse

Sorry should have tagged @kiwi17 !

I just googled that salvia though @LemonJuiceFromConcentrate and it looks beautiful, RHS website does list it as hardy so think it should still be ok. But I am no expert

I bought a planter off Argos last weekend which I need to build, it was so cheap in the sale! And got myself some gazania too. Exciting times.

zinnias like the heat, mine are huge but were an early sowing, still in the greenhouse. I have planted quite a bit out, there may be a frost but I doubt it will be a killing frost now. The rain and slugs will be more of an issue. My tomatoes now have tiny fruits so they are still in the house.

there may be a frost but I doubt it will be a killing frost now

That’s reassuring — it’s the kind of distinction I was wondering about but didn’t feel confident making as a novice gardener. Like, surely there are frosts and then there are frosts ❄

@Sunflowersinthewind ah I’m surprised by that RHS designation! I grew the same salvia last year and it didn’t survive frost, but I wasn’t expecting it to because of what I had been told when I bought it. Then again it’s pretty cold here; down south it probably would be fine with protection.