Phoenix Tropicals Gardening

[phoenixtropicals]

I have a friend that lives in North Phoenix and has a small guava tree (2 feet tall) and a new mango tree (4 feet tall). Following is an excerpt, from a chat, of my advice on protecting these trees from freezing this winter. Keep in mind, this advice is for someone who lives in town. Outside of the city, in the desert, temperatures will be colder, and more extreme measures might be necessary, like including an incandescent bulb in the tent.

>Don't bother covering them unless the news is predicting a frost warning.

>Most internet weather sites will tell you if there is a frost warning.

>then

>buy two frost clothes

>one for the mango, one for the guava

>for the mango, make a skirt around it

>like a tent, with the ground as the floor

>use cloth pins to gather the skirt aroud its "waist"

>it will be too much of a hassle for you to completely cover the mango and the weight of the cloth would require you to make some kind of a structure in that case

>so you can just protect the lower half

>chances are actually low that your plant will get damaged anyways

>the frost cloth is just a precaution

>most winters it will not actually get cold enough to hurt your plant

>buy the frost clothes at a local nursery

>expect to pay over $10 for each

>use rocks or bricks or something around the base of the frost cloth to keep it in place

>it is essential that you seal the tent to the ground

>the ground is your source of heat at night

>simply wrapping your plant will accomplish nothing

>plants don't have an internal source of heat like people. Putting a jacket on your plant does not work. Making a tent with the ground does.

>the guava is small enough that you could cover it entirely, put a chair next to it to support the cloth, then put the edges of the cloth to the ground to make a tent

>when it gets bigger, treat like the mango

>you'll probably only need to do this 4 times this winter in the second half of December and January

>and most the time it won't even be necessary