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Frozen Sars :(

Hey everyone, just wanted to see if anyone has any info on at what temp will Sars freeze too much and die. I was moving out of my apartment and had a bunch of my Sars of various types in a warmed cooler. I put the cooler in the trunk of my car. The issue was that after I unloaded all of the plants that were in the car I forgot about the cooler in the trunk. The plants sat in the car for 2 days and froze solid. The temp was about -25ºC. I have since brought them inside and put them in my indoor heated greenhouse and in water trays slowly bringing them up to temp. Do you think that any of them may make it through this? I am pretty sure that my vft's/sundews/mexican pings will not make it but I am hoping that the Sars will. Right now I have priced it out at about $200 worth of Sars and 3 years of growing so it is a pretty big loss.

me ---> :headwall:
 
Duuuude, that sucks. Is there still some green on them? Are the rhizomes still white? -25C is pretty cold, but I'm sure they'll manage to live.
 
The medium is still frozen solid. The plants are still green but I just brought them in an hour ago. I guess I will need to wait and see if there is still any green on them in the morning.
 
As long as they did not freeze dry they should be fine. Mine are also frozen but they are still moist.
 
What do you mean freeze dry? The plant medium was still moist and wet when they all froze.
 
Let them thaw naturally.

xvart.
 
What do you mean freeze dry? The plant medium was still moist and wet when they all froze.

Being frozen for long periods will prevent the plant from moving water around. Water will be locked in the media in the form of ice crystals. That is what I meant by freeze dry.
 
Well, I will see in the morning just how much damage has been done. Thanks all, you have given me some confidence that maybe I won't lose the whole works.
 
i think that putting them from a frozen car to a heated green house might shock them more than anything, i keep my in an unheated garage where they freeze up occasionally with no ill effects. I'd say let them thaw out where they normally would be. as long as they don't stay frozen for weeks at a time, which would keep them from getting water as Mr. Truncata said.
 
  • #10
Well I looked at the plants this morning and all of the pitchers are turning brown and drying up already. I am not sure if the roots were damaged at all yet. So at this point it is possible that they may recover and it is possible that they may not. Will have to keep an eye on them and while I am waiting I will start up a whole new batch of seeds just to get my mind off of it even though the seeds take a million years to grow up to mature plants.
 
  • #11
It's pretty hard to kill sarracenia by temperature alone.

No problem in thawing them, but make sure they warm up *slowly*. If you bring a frozen VFT into a 70F room it will turn to brown mush. But thaw it gently and it will be fine.
 
  • #12
Were the plants dormant?? Sarrs will easily survive 25F for a brief period if dormant (I assume you mean 25F and not -25C, which is artic temps!!). Tropicals will die if frozen, though if the roots were not frozen they may grow back from them. Good luck!
-
 
  • #13
Woodnative, RavnKing is from Canada, it's entirely possible that he saw -25C weather. Crazy thought...

I hope they're tougher than that, temps around here have been in the single digits (lowest I've seen was 8F) with HIGHS in the 20s. But then again, it's a nice 51F out right now, so... Hopefully the worst is over. :)

My Sarrs outside appear ok, they are losing some color but not much. No winterization at all, alas. The VFTs I had out died pretty spectacularly though, the one I repotted was essentially sitting on top of the media (whoops), the other one -- the one I really wanted to keep -- died after I finally freaked out and brought it in about 2 weeks ago.

Ah well, live and learn.

There was that great picture-full post in the bog forum about a guy planting an in-ground bog in Canada, who was winterizing things and keeping them alive after being submerged in 5+ feet of snow at well below zero. Can't find it handily now, though.

Edit: Ah, here it is:
http://www.terraforums.com/forums/showthread.php?t=104642

Most of the pictures are gone, now, however.
 
  • #14
Just so everyone is clear, I am in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. Pretty much central Canada. The temps here swing from 40ºC in the summer to about -40ºC in the winter. It was only -25ºC when the plants froze which to us is not really cold as you do acclimatize to it. Good thing it was not the previous week as we broke a bunch of records and with the windchill one day it was -51ºC which is pretty much -60ºF. We make it through no problem but the tropical plants don't like it so they have to be brought indoors in the fall. Like I said though, I will keep them under the lights and see what happens and maybe a couple will have survived but by the looks of them right now, I am not getting my hopes up.
 
  • #15
Whoops. I didn't realize you were in central Canada. I grew up in Pennsylvania/New Jersey and that is too cold for me!! mcantrell- Snow is a great insulator.....plants buried under that much snow will be feeling temps at the freezing mark even when the air above is much colder!
RavnKing I hope they come through ok. If not, you will have the space for new plants.
 
  • #16
aww man hopefully they will be ok.
 
  • #17
Oh, wow, I just realized 8F is -13.444C. That's a bit hard to get my head around.

And I'm rather worried about my plants at home, now. :(
 
  • #18
They might be alright - I did something just as dumb - had my sars and VFTs in the basement, perfect hibernating conditions, then got impatient to play with them, so when we got a sunny day in CO I put them outside for the day. A couple days later I forgot about them, and it got near zero at night. I brought them all inside, and the VFTs look like toast, but the sars might be okay. I'm just leaving them for a few months until it warms up enough, then I'm going to repot and see if the bulbs are good or mushy. That'll teach me to mess with my plants in the winter...
 
  • #19
Since they were in a cooler in the trunk of the car, they were protected from the lowest temperature and probably stayed in the vicinity of the average temperature those days. That helps and my Sarrs might get nearly that cold. But mine are dormant at the time and, as I read your post, your plants weren't dormant before being frozen. That's a problem. I'm not surprised that the pitchers are toast, but maybe you'll get lucky and some rhizomes will have survived.
 
  • #20
Well what was the outcome? I'm curious.
 
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