Exciting to see the hostas start to come up but it is early. At least they are in pots and you can move them if a freeze is expected, I don't worry about frosts anymore.

My husband just told me that a couple of my pots have begun to grow. Haven't gone to check yet, but I suspect that they are probably undulata. Our last frost date is in May! Our weather has been so crazy. Today (February 23) it is supposedly going to hit almost 50F and yet going down tonight to 10F tonight! I am going out right now to check on what is going on!

clausa

Chinese Sunrise

I'm pretty confident the CS will be fully leaved out before the clausa...

Pieter

Here in the uk its been very mild febuary just a slight movement but forcast cold next

Well I went and looked and there certainly are hosta that are awake. There has also been rodent damage. It could be that the rodent was trapped in the same area so it went digging and ripping up roots of the potted hosta. Disappointing. I wasn't able to check on all the pots in the that location and I'm scared to death to see if all the pots have damage.

Not sure how to handle the hosta that want to grow if the weather is so cold.

I really didn't want to deal with any hosta until April!

NHL, I totally get that! I have not seen any wakened hosta …… yet.

debra

Well, many of my hosta are awake! And many are damaged by rodents. Two or three pots have most of the crown gone. Some other pots had deep holes in them. Lots of pots had their roots ripped. What a mess! Disappointing.

All my hosta pots were not located there thankfully. I have heard of this kind of thing happening to others. It's just surprising when it does happen after many years of having no problems with overwintering in the same location.

And I can't believe I have to deal with growing hosta now! Way too early.

nhl that is awful news. What a way to start the season, too early and with damage. It is a good thing they are resilient and I hope they all bounce back. Rotten vermin.

I took some pictures to show. The first one is where the hosta were kept. There is a walkway over the window and the well that encloses it. My husband went to investigate and pulled all the pots out.

Here are some examples of the hosta pots. I took pictures quickly and didn't check if the pictures were good or not, so some are not clear. But it is clear that the rodent did damage!

Neptune had grown so much! Unbelievable! Any roots you see on top have been ripped by the rodent.

I think this was June. One of the worst pots. I think most of the crown is gone. There will not be much left. You can see the pot beside it. That is Wu-la-la with broken roots.

Deep holes in some.

Another pot in bad shape. Maybe Squash Casserole. The rodent seemed to have its favorite spots. And who knows, there may have been more than one. It even brought in some kind of grass!

Not sure how to handle all of the ones that are growing. Our temperatures are still going up and down. I will have a lot of repotting to do in spring.

I will also have to figure out what to do next year. Obviously I can't continue putting pots there as I have done so many years before.

NHL, that that’s such a major, major disapointment! Is it possible that the larger white roots connected directly to the crown are still there? That those roots you see are the “off shoot” (is that a word?) roots rather than the major roots? I don’t know if that makes sense…..

Isn’t this one funny?

debra

I was out in the 70+ weather today…..looks like one of my NOIDS I call Dead Ringer (DR for Fragrant Blue), looks like it’s pipping. I covered it up as temperatures tonight are supposed to drop to 28 F. That’s Wisconsin for ya! 50 degree change in a few hours, sometimes minutes!

debra

I'm not sure how warm it was today, but it was supposed to be 86 F this afternoon. My hosta think it's spring.

There are a few who are lollygagging, but those were the ones who were still up in January.

It was a warm January and February, followed by a cold, wet (freezing) two weeks in March (about 7 years ago) that resulted in the loss of most all my hosta to rhizoctonia root rot.

I'm wary, to say the least.

bkay

Debra, I don't know if the larger roots of the hosta are still there. I believe some of them will be fine, just smaller. But I am pretty sure a couple of pots are almost gone. It's like the rodent ate away the crown and made an nice resting place. I know June is in bad shape, but I have other Junes. It's those hosta where you only have one one where it hurts the most.

Temperatures here have been up and down, and now we are in a milder time with temperatures staying above freezing in the day and night. Unusual for early March.

I walked around the garden today to find my inground Guardian Angel has pips! I am really worried about how the garden will be this year. We could easily see temperatures plummet.

bkay, the loss of most of your hosta seven years ago was so sad. I am afraid of what is yet to come. Our frost free date is in May which is two and a half months away.

Instead of snow, we have gotten rain. I have to wonder whether some plants will not have made it through the winter.

nhl, I'm hoping for you that once you get to really look them over, it's not as bad as it looks like it might be. But I know you're a good judge of how your hostas should look when they come out of their winter home. We gardeners deal with so many variables!

bkay, that would be terrible if you had a repeat of that awful root rot! Sending good thoughts that it won't happen again.

I haven't seen any pips yet, but once the snow melts it all happens so fast it's hard to keep up. I've had just enough melt off to look out and think what a mess I have to clean up! Lots of leaves blanketing my hillsides, and the weeds grow the fastest. But I can see how some of the clean up I did in the fall has paid off.

Ben, I imagine in your zone 7b this is the normal time for your hosta waking up? They are looking good!

They are looking good Ben!

debra

newhostalady, I'm not sure what is normal for us but it seems early to me. My in-ground hostas are not showing much growth yet; maybe it's normal for containers to start earlier?

Last spring started out very much like this, but then we had a late hard freeze which caused considerable damage. I'm keeping an eye on the forecast and will move all my containers to the garage if we have another big freeze.

That's the good thing about pots---their movable!

It is normal for pots to begin growing before the other plants in the garden. Hosta begin growing when the temperature of the soil reaches a certain temperature. Since the pots don't have much insulation, they begin sooner.

One year when we got a late frost, I scrambled to find places to protect my plants. So I got the idea to put them in my husband's SUV!

newhostalady I have been thinking about your pot storage with added pets moving in. Just a suggestion for next year maybe cover them with burlap for breathability and throw an unused coconut basket down there too. That way they can tear up the coconut fibers and will leave your plants alone. I do this with my birds. They would tear up my baskets for nesting material. I just gave them what they wanted, and now they leave my stuff alone.

Thanks for thinking about me ilovetogrow! No doubt I will need to figure out something before I ever leave my precious hosta in that well again!

I have burlap. That might be something I could use. I don't have any coconut basket material, but will have a look out for it. I agree that something breathable would be the best material to use.

I would like to be able to use some kind of netting, but it would be difficult to get it to fit snuggly or stay in place.

Thanks for giving me some ideas!

Maybe you can find some old fashioned metal screen wire. You could put a "cap" on the pot, which might work. You could also cut a disk and fit it inside the top of the pot. It would have to fit snuggly, but it's a thought and might be harder to dislodge than a cap.

bkay