Is that 45 for tonight? I suppose it must be. Nothing you have in the ground should be damaged at 45, although melons wouldn't care much for those temperatures. It won't harm them though it might stall their growth for a few days. I wouldn't cover anything at 45 degrees unless I had hot season plants in flats and just didn't want exposure to cold night air to make their growth stall for a couple of days. Remember that the row covers work by holding in the round heat, so put it over the plants in late afternoon while there still is heat to hold in. If you wait until significant cooling has occurred before putting the row covers over the plants, there won't be as much benefit to using them. It wouldn't hurt to cover plants you still have in flats as the flats don't insulate the roots the same way that being in the ground would.

When we are expecting cool temperatures, I cover plants around 4 pm so we still have warmth to capture from the ground. I normally don't cover plants in flats outdoors. I just carry them back indoors into the greenhouse. Remember that your row cover is one of the heavier ones, so it needs to be suspended above the plants a little. Letting row cover that heavy float directly on top of the plants without an adequate air space between the plants and the row cover can roast them on a sunny day and it doesn't take long for it to happen. With a row cover that provides anything more then 4 degrees of protection, I don't let it float directly on plants once the daytime highs are as warm as they are now.

That cold front came through, so last night/this morning was chilly as forecast and tonight is expected to be a little chilly as well. We only dropped to 50 here this morning and are forecast to drop to 52 tomorrow morning. Those aren't terribly low for May. I've had worse.

Count your blessings because it really could be worse. The low temperature recorded at Goodwell this morning was 35.

TY! Having a hard time wrapping my brain around the fact that I'm mowing while wearing a sweatshirt in May. GAH lol

Yeah. lol I understand. I'm mowing the high spots and, at least, a path.

I hope we can mow tomorrow if the sunshine can dry out the surface soil and grass today. Hoping we can mow is not the same thing as thinking that we'll be able to. After the last round of rain, even after 5 days of drying out, the mower still left ruts in the pastures, but not in the yard.

We have string-trimmers and scythes so we can hack away at the grass jungle with them if it stays too wet to mow. We need to do something to keep the grass short enough that we can see snakes, and the next rainstorm is not too many days away.

After doing my rounds around the mowed areas, I will not be mowing tomorrow. The ground just squishes everywhere I walked.

speaking of snakes, last weekend I went fishing in the ponds. Of course the grass was tall but I was being careful to watch for snakes. I had on boat deck shoes, shorts ,shirt and a fishing pole .

well in some really short grass I was easing my way around the pond and just as I stepped I seen it slither and felt something hit my ankle as I did my best to run in mid air.

I could see no evidence of being bit and I went to the truck and fetched my pistol to hunt the evil snake that took 10 years off my life. I knew it didn't go far as I was tring to keep my eye on it before my feet landed on the ground.

Luckily I found it and dispatched a plain ole black snake. He should of been more careful who he scared.

my string trimmer ran out of line and the mower quit lol The other day while walking on a normal path a very large worm snake slithered through the soaked clover. Yeah, I hear ya. I really wish I had a scythe right about now.

I hear you chicken coupe, I was wearing a sweat shirt today while mowing around wet spots. I think I mowed in more loops than straight lines. I did not see any snakes while I was cleaning up flood trash this morning, but I kept my eyes open. The donkeys were sunning themselves on the high ground and the dogs,were sunning on the back porch. I'm pretty sure I was the only one working. Ha, For some reason the ground seems to be drying out and stiffening up, can't figure that out?

Yeah, I have some patches that are fine, others that are flooded. My dogs really enjoyed the sun, too. It was precious, especially when they were out cold unaware of my presence and I turned the weed eater on. lol We all stopped and played. Even the kids rolled in the freshly mown grass to my dismay.

I cleared wild lettuce and lambs quarter that were 3 foot tall. The rabbit cages were stuffed with goodies, today. In the morning I hope to tackle some more before new storms arrive. I need to check the forecast.

I haven't seen any snakes the last few days. I hope the venomous ones drowned. The same is true of the gophers, moles and voles....I hope they all drowned too. I think that something good should come out of getting almost 14" of rain in the month of May so far, and there's nothing good about that much rain hitting the garden in such a brief time frame, so I'm looking for something to feel positive about.

Robert, I agree that your snake should have been more careful who he scared.

I wanted to mow today, but there's still standing water everywhere, so there is just no way. With rain in the forecast beginning tonight and continuing for every day in the 7-day forecast, I have no idea what we're going to do about the tall grass and the snake risk. Maybe we'll get out the string trimmer and just cut wide paths through the lawn.

Stockergal, It depends on what sort of soil you have. What I have noticed here following this heavy rainfall is that sand from our neighbors' property to our south, which is at a higher elevation than our place, erodes and is carried onto our place by heavy rainfall. That sand forms a new layer on top of our waterlogged clay soil, and the new layer of sand crusts over after a day or two of sunlight. If you are standing and staring at the sand, it looks hard and dry and crusty, even though 6" of rain fell on Sunday. Break through the sandy layer, though, and the clay soil is like pudding.

I don't mind picking up a little sand....it cannot make our clay worse than what it already is, but in 2009 when we had almost 13" of rainfall in one 24-hour period, we got 4" of their sand carried into my garden in that one day. It mostly accumulated at the bottom end of the garden where there were no raised beds at that time. I already had a beautiful garden growing well and heavily mulched. So what I had then was 4" of sand and a trillion weed seeds from their pasture on top of the mulch. It was such a mess, and that low end of the garden never has been quite the same since then. We've built two tall raised beds down there now, lined with hardware cloth to exclude the voles, so we can grow potatoes there, but we need to build more. If this rain keeps coming in heavy amounts and the plants growing at grade level at that low end of the garden die, I won't replant that area, and will spend the summer building more tall raised beds in the rest of that space.

Bon, Sounds like y'all had a good day in the yard. Scything is hard work and I don't particularly want to do it, but the rain may not leave us much choice.

Dawn

Yep, I'm running my friggin heater during the day in May...and wondered last night if I should pull in my tender orchids (that's quite below their optimum growth temps). Odd year....for sure.