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Utah Zone Denial

21 years ago

This winter has been a fairly mild one with very little snow and a whole lot of rain-unusual for the Salt Lake area! Some of my ganzania flowers I planted are starting to regrow and all my rosemary plants are blooming vibrantly blue blossoms. A trachycarpus fortunei, planted on the south side of my home, is recovering from it's first winter. An experimental gardner, I also have overwintered an oleander in the crevice of my bay window garden. Surprisingly my pomegranite also is sprouting back with green leaves! My eucalyptus tree 'gunni' is giving new growth. I decided to plant this variety of eucalyptus tree after a friend in South Salt Lake successfully overwintered one for 3 years and it now stands to be 15 feet tall. A mimosa tree 'silk tree' is also starting to awaken from it's slumber.

I'm beginning to believe Utah's climate is more mild than previously thought:D

Comments (9)

  • 21 years ago

    Believe away.

    I laughed at a neighbor who planted flowers a month ago.

    It worked for her.

    The year I moved in, it snowed on mother's day. I planted three times that year.

    Utah's climate is absolutely more milder than thougnt.

    TODAY.

    Best of luck.

  • 21 years ago

    Thanks brpgreen for responding! After looking around my pond today, I also see that my New Zealand Red Flax is beginning to come back to life. I was sure it was dead! LOL! Same thing is happening with my Lily of the Nile-Agapanthus. If only the rain would stop! I need to get outside and start weeding:(

  • 21 years ago

    I think the entire intermountan west had a very mild winter, our ponds and lakes barely froze at all. This keeps up, I'm shifting over to bananas and coconuts.

  • 21 years ago

    Just when you think Utah is more like Hawaii it will become Siberia. In the early 90's we had an extreme winter and all the Purple Cloud Plums died. A few years later thousands are being planted again. Oh well, enjoy them while you can. Just make sure you plant lots of hardy things along with the wimps.
    Good Luck, rk

  • 21 years ago

    And just when you thought there'd be no more snow... look outside this morning & you'll see mother nature has a sense of humor!

  • 21 years ago

    We're in zone denial in Boise as well. I'm always planting things that shouldn't make it through the winter, but somehow manage. Just have to be willing to take the chance that one of these years it won't make it!
    Funny that you got snow last week. We are supposed to be high desert up here and it hasn't quit raining for 10 days. I've never seen it rain so much, it's crazy. Our flowers should be beautiful this year, if the sun ever comes out!

  • 21 years ago

    Very true about the rain! I can't remember having this much moisture! Today is a drastic change being in the upper 80's! Many of my plants are starting to bloom! A perennial ganzania hardy to zone 6 is blooming a storm in my rock mulched desert garden on the south side of my house.

  • 21 years ago

    The rain this year and "mild" winter are I think, atypical.
    So like others have said, enjoy whatever will grow when it grows.

    I needed to plant grass seed for a new lawn, but the rain wouldn't let me get the soil prepared and now, it's too hot for it to germinate--so I'll have a bare front yard until maybe next spring. while you enjoy your plants I get to look at (and the neighboors too--my bare front yard.)

    but back to "denial"

    e.g., a few years ago, the weather had turned warm at the middle of April. Knowing it's whimisical, I waited to set out my tomato plants until May 28. It was nice and warm. The next night it snowed and killed everything.

    The year I first arrived in Utah and started school at BYU, standing in the registration line at the beginning of Sept., it was snowing--I didn't like it very much, being from Louisiana.

    You may be luck enough to be in a "micro-climate" though & have good luck. For me, I'm in a "micro-climate" that has bad luck. Every year, when temps drop, my garden is hit with killing frost while the neighboor's gardens are untouched.

    And for growing veggies--Utah is terrible.

    I went back home for a visit.

    My uncle had his ladder out so he could pick tomatoes on the 8' plants! His bell-peppers were 6' high. His entire house, for foundations plants were Gardenias--about 4' tall.

    I've tried nearly every year to grow a Southern pea (Crowder pea, field pea). In my best year, from 100' row, I managed to harvest almost, 1 cup of peas.

    I guess I am in denial too, since I keep trying to grow those peas.

    Again, just enjoy what you have when you have it. And don't be surprised if next year everything is either frozen or burned up.

    Bob

  • 21 years ago

    Bob--Don't wait until spring to seed your lawn. You'll never get a lawn to do well if you plant in spring. By the time it's warm enough to germinate and has stopped raining long enough to seed, you've only got an hour or so before it gets too hot.

    I've had good results seeding in early September for fall germination, or waiting until mid to late November and doing a dormant seeding (it starts coming up as soon as conditions are good. Some varieties of grass seem to prefer the dormant seeding. I'm planting some native grasses, and streambank wheatgrass did fine with a fall seeding, but western wheatgrass seems to want the freeze/thaw cycles to do well.

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