Congrats on your wee ones!!! Did you do the happy sprout dance? There's two feet of snow over top of my container ghetto after today's big storm so they're warm & comfy for the time being. Won't see any sprouts this far north until second week of March at the earliest. Thanks for sharing!!!

Congrats! Likewise here, won't see any until maybe the end of March, but more likely April. Unless we get an early spring like last year, I might see some earlier.

Karen

I am also expecting fabulous germination this year after all this sub-zeroness and ice and snow!

Congratulations! I can't believe this works! Happy Plants!

My faith was weak... they had me worried during the ice and slush, with no snow to shelter them. They are such amazingly tough little things. Yes, I danced in the driveway :)

Dancing naked in the driveway? Oh, yeah, the naked part is only for solstice, right?

I had mountain phlox and blue dianthus sprout on 12/20/10 it was -6* out. Got them in the greenhouse and doing great. So fun to go out and see GREEN when it is -12* out there. 65 days to spring!!!!

Okay now. I'm having nightly freezes and my plains coreopsis and red yucca have sprouted. What do I do now? Can they stay there or should I protect them somehow? They are cold hardy but I'm not sure that applies to sprouts.?

If you're worried, toss an old sheet or something over them as long as you'll be there to remove it in the morning.

Would you be worried? I don't know if I should be worried or not. Haha.

Oh yeah, I worried last year when I was a newbie and I threw an old sheet over my containers with sprouts one night--one night--when it was going to drop below freezing. Didn't need it--just made me relax a little. Sprouts were fine.

KK. I will relax then. :)

They're perfectly fine... I have mine against a brick wall, which probably helps with holding some heat. Not much, though. They have gotten about four hours of direct/dappled sun in the past week. I worried too, manda, we don't have the snow cover here to protect them. But the first two sprouted before this streak of cold began (link) and they are growing visibly.

I am running an experiment on how fast jugs heat up and how much they cool at night-- they have not gone below 40ð at night even with the same nightly (and daily) freezes and very little sun.

Here is a link that might be useful: January Weather zone 8 MS

Mine are against the chain link fence with all day sun. I did have them against a northern wall a few weeks ago but it never gets any kind of sun there, so I moved them out.

I think I'll start another two coke bottles today. I finally got some people saving jugs for me, so hopefully I'll get a whole bunch going first of February. :) :) :)

manda3 - you're going to need to watch those WS jugs in full sun really close so the sprouts/seedlings don't fry. The temp inside the containers can climb very high with that much direct sun. I'm in Z5b/6a CT and my containers are in mostly full shade on my east/west breezeway. If you haven't seen my sprout photos in other posts, let me know and I'll post them here. You'll still get amazing germination in shade.

yup-- in direct sun the temp jumps 15* within minutes. Even on a cool day, after an hour it climbs that much again. On a nice day in the sun it can get to 90*+ very quickly. I'm keeping a spreadsheet of temperature related to sun hours so that we in the warmer zones might figure out optimal jug placement... there are just not that much data or even anecdotes for us! :)

I think it might have been Token (Z7) who posted last year what the temperature got inside his hoophouse and inside a container that was in the sun. I don't recall the exact number but it was well over 100*. If I'm not mistaken, he also posted about losing quite a few WS containers of sprouts his first year that got fried in the sun.

Hmm... Well, one of my neighbors moved out, so maybe I'll move them to the North side of my house. That'll keep my Southern neighbors from eyebrowing the coke bottles every day. I moved them away from the garage's north wall also because that area is always wet. If that doesn't make sense, check my profile picture. Hehe. My house is East facing.

I have two containers of solstice-sown cornflowers sprouted! The temp today got up to 37, melting snow on some of my containers, and I saw those sweet little babies looking up at me! I really couldn't believe my eyes--I would never have thought anything could germinate during the weather we've been having. They're up against a south-facing wall, but after reading these posts I'll have to make sure they're not in full sun. I believe they have some shade from a nearby crepe myrtle, but I'll check tomorrow to see just how much sun makes it to them.