Last night was the first hard frost.
The paulownia tree has dropped most of is large leaves over night! They dwarf the bird bath and The Buddha.
The Acuba plants and other evergreens also curl their leaves in a process know as abscission. It is thought that this may prevent moisture loss and prevent the leaves for freezing.
The basjoo bananas usually are not damaged until temps reach 25f so last night was right at the point of which they may have some damage.
The temperature will be up in the 50s by midday and 60s by midweek. This means a final leaf clean up and the beginning of winter maintenance!
atb
Arthur in the Garden! 
Always a pleasure to see other gardens up close! Frost is late in coming to Montreal, Canada, but we had our first sprinkles of snow yesterday. Time to switch to painting winter scenes! Launchings5
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Wow! Snow! Usually, here in the Mid-Atlantic states we get snow in late February or March with our last frost about mid-March.
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When we lived in Northern Virginia I had an aucuba just outside our bathroom window. I didn’t have to go outside to check on the temperature. I could always tell if it were freezing by looking at the aucuba leaves. They have a remarkable capability to recover.
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Yes, they are a great indicator – along with the water in the birdbath!
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We are experiencing the same thing here on the Gulf Coast, but most of my tropicals did not make it last year and I didn’t replant them. On the bright side, I can now clear some beds for winter annuals.
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Exactly! I wait until cold days to clean some beds as (in my head) I think it will be too cold for spiders, snakes, and other critters to be out and about!
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We’ve had our first snow and I’m already thinking spring.
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Those are some tough temperatures to bear! We had a snap cold front over the weekend too, but it’s been closer to 35 most of the time… Not much better, but every degree counts when you dip down into this range.
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I’m interested to learn more about what you do for winter maintenance! Do I cut my roses back now or in January? Should I thin overgrown beds out now?
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In general, you may trim everything now. If you are in a warm region you may want to wait until late winter.
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That is already-2.2 Celsius! That is cold already! poor plants!
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Yes!
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You have such a long growing season but I’m sure you always hate to see it come to an end. Our rhododendrons leaves curl in really frigid weather too.
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Me, too, hate to see it go!
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