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I put this in the "weather in your garden" thread but some people may miss that so it's going here too so everyone gets a chance to see it.
So this is just a heads up for gardeners thinking now about starting early seeds indoors or putting plants into greenhouses for spring, it's looking like late winter/early spring is going to be quite a lot colder than the winter is right now. Some folks might also want to think about taking steps to protect at risk perennial plants that are already established outside in their gardens.
We're being warned here in Canada on the news that there is a Siberian polar vortex that is on the move now that will be coming down through North America starting sometime at the beginning of February and that it will be lasting all of February and likely into March. That's the official forecast - subject to change of course just like the weather.
I looked online and found this additional information about it from an agricultural weather forum that has news for USA too, it has a weather tracker map there of the expected route the polar vortex will take as it travels from northern Canada down to the southern U.S.
Location: East of Seattle since 1992, 615' Elevation, Zone 8b - originally from SF Bay Area
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We can't put vegetable or annual plants out until Mother's Day here anyway, we have had snow in early April. In fact we seem to have a better chance of snow in February than any other month, so this is not really unusual other than how long it's supposed to last.
We can't put vegetable or annual plants out until Mother's Day here anyway, we have had snow in early April. In fact we seem to have a better chance of snow in February than any other month, so this is not really unusual other than how long it's supposed to last.
That's exactly what I was thinking as well. February and March can be ugly here too and there's been enough wandering polar vortexes in recent years I think most of us have become accustomed to what they can be like. But they don't usually seem to last more than a week or couple of weeks at most before moving on so the prospect of the forecasted 4 to 6 weeks for this one (if it comes) is not a welcome prospect. Thus I thought it was worth the heads up so folks can be prepared for the duration of it. I hope it doesn't come, or if it does that it won't last as long as is being predicted.
I have some doubts that it will last that long, but yes, early February will be cold. I'll make sure to flip the compost before the compost arrives and then cover it up so it can hopefully stay somewhat thawed and warm through the cold temperatures.
Bring it on. This has been the mildest winter for a few years now that I can remember.
I won't go so far as to say "bring it on" but it is just now starting to make it's leading edge appearance here this week. If it gets very cold sustained temperatures I'm hopeful that it will kill off all the swarms of millions of invasive Eurasian brown marmorated stink bugs that found their way to the west coast last summer.
Those things are horribly destructive and in all my life I've never before seen such massively huge swarms of big aggressive beetles as what arrived here with last summer's repeating heat waves and drought.
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