nice pics!..I have blooms on my cannas too..they haven't been there that long :-( ..when will you dig them up?..soon right?..I've been thinking about it but was putting it off..

I'll wait until after a few frosts have hit before I tackle the digging. As long as I get to it before the ground starts to freeze they're fine, it's just that I'm not fine with waiting until the most miserably cold day to do it... which is what usually seems to happen!

my cannas are in pots..I'm planning to dig soon..

i'm looking forward to it. For the last few weeks the gnats, midges, whatever have made it nearly impossible to work in the garden--in your eyes, nose, ears. And mosquitoes. WV NEVER had mosquitoes until recent years. And it was never humid here. The last two summers have been like living in a rain forest. The creek behind my house always dried up around mid July and didn't start up again until fall/winter rains. But now it's not only been running, it's often been in spate from localized torrential rains which have become more and more common, causing flooding in parts of the county that have never, ever had flooding. And that during what used to be the dry season.

Oh boy. We're in unknown territory. I'm not even going to get into our not having winter anymore either.

The last three summers have been unbearable for biting insects here as well. The other bugs haven't been too bad, but like you said anything that bites is thriving.... plus while they're trying to bite you they're also flying into your ears and behind your glasses (in my case). I'm worried the frost will just make them more desperate!

As you can see my garden looks like a rain forest this year and the uncut lawn squishes whenever I venture out. Droughts are still way more depressing though, even with these cloudy, gloomy skies that we get every day.

Nicholsworth- I have decent luck overwintering. All I do is put them in the coolest spot which doesn't actually freeze, leave them with some dirt around and wait for spring. Some of the older types need drier conditions and I store them in a tub or bucket, some of the newer types need to be kept damper and I usually throw these clumps into a plastic bag before storing. If they start molding I open the bag a bit, if they look dry I close the bag some.

I've overwintered elephant ears 2 winters now with success..wrapped in newspaper in a box..sounds like the cannas should be ok with the same method..

I have a canna more than a decade old. I don’t even bother to wrap in newspaper. I let the tubers dry out and throw them in a garbage bag that I loosely twist closed. This goes into a 60-degree basement. Never lost one.

jana..I didn't really "wrap" my elephant ears well..more like folded the paper around them to keep them from touching..I read they shouldn't touch each other..

How do you get your elephant ears to the stage you can wrap them? I had mine in a bucket in a warm spot last fall but it seemed like forever before the leaves shriveled up and the bulb was all that was left.

This year it's gone out of control and I may need a machete more than a shovel. Between the cannas and this I have some digging to do.

"peppermint stick' arundo donax. I'm guessing it made it to about 16 feet tall this summer.

katob..your EEs are gorgeous!..I dug up my inground EEs today..the leaves are on for now..the last 2 years I cut them off before I started digging..it sounds like I might need to cut the leaves off..I don't want to wait forever to put them away..still have 2 pots outside..

I really like that pot color!

I have two other kinds of elephant ears, and they're in pots. They're slower growing ones and it's so much easier to deal with them that way.

Now it looks like our first frost will be wednesday or thursday. The muhly grass is not going to like it and I could probably cover it, but....

katob..I love those pots too!..had to have them lol..my EEs were already planted when I bought them..I realized how much I like growing EEs in pots after having 2 pots this year..what a beautiful combination of plants you have!..sickening to see frost ruin it-but it happens every year :-(

No real frost down here as of morning of 10/23. I had a thin film of ice on my windowshield 3 days ago but no frost and the Paulownia leaves have still not fallen as they do nearly instantly on the morn after first frost. Tomatoes and ornamental sweet potatoes are looking sad but have not been frost burnt.

Some frosts here but no truly hard frost. Alyssum continues to do well on my balcony. Zinnias were looking ratty though green so ripped them up. Red cypress vine is dead.

Now over 2 weeks from my last comment here, and still no frost on my plants. Temps get down into the high to mid 30s but with overcast skies it has been frostfree. Tonight may change that though as it was a sunny day and it's already 38 by my outdoor thermometer. My collection of ornamental sweet potatoes (I grow 11 types) are still in vine. After frost kills them back, I'll dig and store the tubers for next year.

We had a killing freeze here in east central Kansas back on the morning of October 16th. My zinnias had a very frosty look until the ice melted. This is a closeup of a zinnia bloom taken on the morning of the freeze.

ZM

It's snowing here.

Yep it’s here :(

We hit the 20s tonight, but I have been enjoying flowers right up until today. Good night annuals! See you again next year.

Beautiful photo, ZM!

Yep twas a "shock" waking up to a blanket of the white stuff. Can't complain ... Heck it's November already. I've seen snow falls in October before.

Finally hit our 'First Frost' last night. As the sun rose this morning, the Paulownia leaves started falling, and by 9:00 the trees were totally bare. It's like a switch is flipped as it happens so surely, and I guess it really is a biological switch.

This is about a month later than usual for this area as 2nd week in October is the traditional expected date.

Geoforce you must be in shock today. First frost last week and first snow this week!

We have snow as well. I rushed out after getting the kids from school and dug the cannas and dahlias. I hope I got enough for next year, but snow was coming down so heavily I cut things short.

I didn't even know there were that many ornamental sweet potato varieties out there!

Katob.. Yes it was a bit of shock but then next day it went up to 50 or so and by night all the snow was gone except for where it was piled from clearing other areas. Worse yet, last night the temperature dropped into the low teens with a fair wind. Not nice at all Thick skim ice on all open water, and it stayed all day despite bright sun till late afternoon.

It's nuts out there. Lows in the 10s (!) one night, then 40s a day later, today it's about 50 and drizzly. I'm ok with the cold, if it would just stay cold. It's the temperature swings that are hard to adjust to. Well, on the bright side, because it's well above freezing this weekend, I can finish the weeding I had planned before the last yard waste pickup next week.