I don’t cover clematis. If you have some old sheets or light blankets or wind row cover wrap them loosely clipping the edges together with clothes pins. A good time to cover is always sooner than you get around to it. For me that would be before the twighlight hours when I cojuld barely see what I was doing.

I never thought about clothes pins. Great idea, I have a ton of them. I hope you're around today I have another question.

It will get above freezing around noon, and will get in the 20's again tonight. Even if it gets sunny (snow right now) would it be okay to leave the covering on the plants? I'm using large trash bags and the wind is still brutal, no way do I want to hang out in the flowerbed again.

Plastic bags alone aren't a good choice for covering plants for frost protection since it isn't a good insulator. Plastic greenhouses work because the plastic contains a large mass of air that is heated and then held in place by the plastic (and many have a double layer of plastic and the air trapped between the two layers is the actual insulator), but plastic bags over the small air mass around a plant will do virtually nothing as the heat contained in the small air mass is quickly lost. If you use clothes-pinned sheets with plastic over them, that may work better since the sheets will provide insulation and the plastic will block wind. However, in sunny conditions the air trapped by the plastic will heat up and damage the plants worse than the cold (voice of experience when a vent in a plastic high tunnel blew closed) so unless it is totally overcast, I would remove the plastic, and even if it is bright overcast I would check the temperature periodically since solar radiation does come through clouds.

Like mnwsgal, I have left sheets covering plants for several days when I have had to leave for work before temperatures were above freezing. Spun bond row cover is made specifically for leaving over plants.

Or with the clematis, just let them take their knocks. They will recover.

I have never covered Clematis not in pots nor in the ground. We had unseasonably late snow and frost here and none were damaged.

I think next time I'll let them take their knocks. lol. The 35 y.o. Clematis was thriving, and it did well all these years with me doing nothing & I forgot to cover it yesterday.

Every spring I totally forget about late freezes so I grab trashbags, which have worked in the past.

By the time the sun came out the plants were in shade so I left them alone. I really hope the two buds on the clem didn't die because this is it's first time blooming.

85 degrees this week! :)

Update on the plants. The top of the vines blackened. About a few inches on each one. Do I leave them alone on clip the dead part off? There's also another chance for another freeze, if I clip them should I wait until all freezes are gone?

Those babies are hardy!

I would wait to prune off blackened leaves until you see some new growth or until last frost expected. The stems might still be alive and put out new leaves.

They're doing great except for the top part of the vines where they're blackened. I was thinking the same thing, cut that part off after the last freeze. One of the plants that I thought died last year after I planted it, it's two buds weren't effected at all. That surprises me. I can't wait to see the flowers since I forgot what I planted there. lol (am I the only one who does that?)