It is now officially spring. I have cleaned up the yard after the devastation of this winter. This winter should not have been bad, and wasn't that that, until that unusual cold front that hit us in February. Our Dec/Jan typical winter was pretty typical, and everything in the yard held up pretty well. A little tip burn on the more sensitive subtropicals, but nothing extreme. Then after the cold, things started to warm up for us in January to the point that almost every mango in the yard started flowering. But then in February we got a late cold front that brought the temperatures in my yard down to 26 F one night and hard freeze for 3 days. Every mango flower stalk turned black and died and the amount of damage was severe, most plants either dying outright or dying back to the trunk / complete defoliation. I had a papaya that had 3 dozen fruit on it that all froze. See below for the temperature plot in my yard
Since then I have been able to assess the damage. Most (but not all) things I had covered up survived and many with minimal damage. But every subtropical that was not covered took major damage. Every citrus tree looks great and took no damage. And because of all the chill, the deciduous fruits all bloomed very strongly. So like with most AZ winters: A very mixed bag.
