Photo credit: Baltimore Sun/Susan Reimer
Over the weekend, I tested a new product designed to protect plants from a sudden frost and extend their bloom time. It's called FreezePruf and it is made by the manufacturers of Liquid Fence.
I sprayed my begonia and my dahlia thoroughly and left my coleus unprotected on the afternoon of what was predicted to be a frosty night.
Sure enough, the next morning the ground, and the cars, were covered with a silver frost and I checked my container plants for damage.
The coleus, as you can see from the picture below, was devastated by the cold, but the begonia and the dahlia seem fine.
I cheerfully reported here on Garden Variety that the product appeared to have worked as designed...protecting plant cell walls from the expansion and breakdown that freezing temperatures can cause.
However, when I took a look at the containers a couple of days later, the begonia leaves had browned and wilted. So had the dahlia, only slightly less so.
(You can see in the photo above that some of the leaves have browned slightly, although they have maintained their shape.)
I don't know what I did wrong. I sprayed the plants thoroughly. But both were clearly showing frost damage that had only revealed itself after the warm sun had "defrosted" the leaves.
I welcome anyone else's thoughts about what may have happened with a product that is getting all kinds of positive press. I am perfectly ready to believe I screwed up.
On the other hand, maybe it isn't nice to fool Mother Nature.
Photo credit: Baltimore Sun/Susan Reimer