Cold temps, Fall/Winter 2020

Actually got down to 29.1 degrees here in north Florida last night. Connie and I had to cover a few of the plants last night, and expect more of the same tonight. Then temps will return to what is more normal for Fall and winter in north Florida.

We only covered the most sensitive plants. Connie has two patches of pineapple plants growing, and her pepper plants in her garden were still producing, so she hoped to be able to save them. Her tomato plants were history anyway, since the deer had taken a liking to them.

Speaking of deer, we have been growing citrus trees for decades now, and up to this year never had a problem with deer chewing on them. This year, however, they are being a real problem for some reason. Wouldn't be bad if they only chewed a few leaves, but they are taking off entire branches with their munching. I had to set up a couple of "bunny blasters" to scare them off.

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Guess I had better check them to make sure that the cold didn't damage them. Sheesh.....

And possums are getting at the ripe tangerines now, so I have to do something about them. They have already stripped a couple of trees of all fruits in our older grove.

Yesterday we had to fix a section of pipe that got broken by some varmint that evidently knocked against it and broke it off. Connie noticed the very low water pressure in the morning, so we had to go out and check things out working from the pump back to the house. PVC doesn't seem to last forever when exposed to sunlight.

Yeah, life in the country.

Im actually thinking of putting some styrofoam sheets up on top of the drywall in the reptile room. due to this weather in north fl

It's 31.1 degrees here right now. Wondering if we should have done more than just cover the real sensitive stuff tonight. Sure would hate to have to be fixing some busted PVC pipes that I am running water from for the fruit trees and such. They are just sticking out of the ground. But I guess they have weathered worse the past few Winters.

11.4 inches of snow at my house and 13 inches at work. It rained for 5 hours straight before snow came so it was mighty heavy stuff.

Might want to invest in PEX pipe. It is freeze-damage resistant. PEX pipe will expand if frozen and contract to its original shape when thawed. And it's do it your self easy.

Heck, the piping is mostly related to irrigation lines I ran many moons ago. I guess when it breaks, then I will fix it. I think that other pipe would have been just fine for a while longer if some klutz animal hadn't broken it.

Got down to 27.3 degrees here last night and appears to be headed for low to mid thirties tonight. The plants we covered seemed to do just fine, but some of the flowers Connie planted off the sides of the apron to the garage, well, not so fine. They don't look very happy.