Prepping for the Arctic Blast

The Arctic Blast sounds like a new slush that they might offer at Sonic, but we're taking it as seriously as we know how.  They are predicting cold weather.  The last time Tricia looked at her phone, she told me that they said it would be 9 degrees in Jennings.  9 degrees.  At that temperature, I don't know if it even pays off to cover plants, but I've got some tarps.  We might as well try.

The turnips that I had planted may be a lost cause as I didn't have quite enough tarps for them.  The greens were going to be for me.  The turnip roots for the cows.  We'll see if they survive.  Under the blue tarps you see is the spinach and radishes and some mustard greens.

The cilantro and the green onions are going to be left uncovered.  I don't know if they will survive.  The broccoli and brussels sprouts are covered.

The swiss chard, kale, kohlrabi and cabbage are all covered up, too.

Here is my new experiment.  Last time it reached the low 20's I lost two tangerine trees and a satsuma.  The navel orange tree and the tangerine that survived took 2 years to recover.  While the navel orange produced again this year, the surviving tangerine did not.  I had them covered, too.

This year I tried something.  In addition to covering them, I ran heat lamps to each one.  This is the heat lamp under the tangerine tree.

The new satsuma tree was small enough for me to flip the garbage can over it with the heat lamp inside.  Who knows?  It may make it so warm under there that it cooks the little tree.

And finally, here is the heat lamp under the covered up navel orange tree.  This is the one that I had just picked all the fruit off of it.

Will they make it?  Only time will tell.  I'll uncover them in a few days and we will report if the heat lamps did the job.

While we were out walking to the barn to do the evening chores, we began to hear sirens.  One after the other.  They turned off the main road and onto ours and stopped at our next door neighbor's house.  We could see flames and then the firemen jumped out and started spraying things down with water.

We didn't want to be nosy neighbors, so we didn't walk over.  The firemen had it under control quickly.  It didn't seem to have spread to their home.  It looked like it was confined to a barn behind his house.  I'll find out for sure, but I didn't see his heat lamps on his chickens like he always has on.  If I had to guess, it could be that he moved his birds into the barn and somehow the heat lamp caught the barn on fire.

No one was injured and their home was saved.  It's a good thing to live exactly one mile away from the Hathaway Rural Volunteer Fire Department.  They were on site in three shakes of a billy goat's tail and got it put out quickly.