Gardening in the wrong climate?

I thought we were off to a good start this year. Last year, we ditched the giant, unyieldy garden space for a smaller, tighter spot. I had an exceptional harvest of potatoes with the Ruth Stout method, using goat bedding.

This year, we doubled the size and added zuchini, tomatoes, and melons.

The garden was all planted a few weeks ago, which seemed reasonable for our North Idaho climate. Unfortunately, a few days ago it got down to 27F and the frost killed everything that was poking up. I'm assuming the potatoes might survive (the potatoes coming up were actually regrown from last year -- I didn't pick them all, which may have been a mistake.) I have a lot of seed potatoes planted as well, that I'm not worried about.

A lot of people in the area seemed to have the same struggle. From what we know, people less than an hour away didn't have any frost, or at least not a hard frost.

This is pretty discouraging to have a 27F frost in June. It seems like every other year, we have something like that.

It's just making me rethink if this a good location for having a productive garden. I love potatoes, but it's not the only thing I want to grow!

I know that hoop houses would work, but I'd prefer to not be dependent on them. It's a heck of a lot of plastic.

How does Wheaton Labs do it, over near Missoula? Maybe that microclimate is better than ours? Our zone 5 fruit trees died, but most of our zone 4 stuff has survived.

Is there a way to plant or arrange the garden to make it more frost tolerant? I'm okay if we can't grow tomatoes, but it'd be a real bummer to not even be able to grow zuchini!

We've been starting to think about leaving our 11 acres for a few acres closer to town, possibly in a warmer climate that might be more forgiving.

Historically, this area was just used for logging and there was very little homesteading in the area. Just a bit southwest of here, there's a lot more farming/agriculture, even at roughly the same elevation. We're in a bit of a snow and cold belt.

Thank you!

Climate has done lots of crazy stuff over the centuries. Europeans used to start their plants in a "frame" or glass house. It's just repurposed window frames on hinges that cover a raised bed. Certainly zucchinis and tomatoes could be started in these, perhaps in pots, and transplant once all danger has passed.

I understand your doubts. 3 years ago I had late frost in late May - in zone 8b in hot central California. Producing vegetables is also very difficult for me, but I'm not giving up. My greatest foe is extremely intense high UV sun that burns everything even at relatively low temperatures, with mulching, partial shade and irrigation. You have to find out what grows the best and stick to it. For me its cucurbits and some greens in winter. Lands that have poor conditions for veggies can be still wonderful for ranching and produce high end meat.
For fruit trees/bushes I would recommend
https://honeyberryusa.com/
They sell plants that can handle Minnesota winters, late frosts, high amount of chilling hours.

See if your library has this.  I found it extremely helpful.

https://permies.com/wiki/46891/Resilient-Gardener-Carol-Deppe

27F after everything was already up is brutal, that's just bad luck more than bad planning. Worth looking at what actually survived though — sometimes a late frost like that reveals which varieties are tougher than expected, and that's worth knowing for next year. Cold frames or a simple low tunnel over the most tender stuff would have saved most of it, but you can only really learn that lesson the hard way.

Theodorin Maczynski wrote:Is there a way to plant or arrange the garden to make it more frost tolerant?

There certainly is. It will obviously depend on how severe the frost is of course, and your temperature history - once the plants start waking up and you get tender foliage or flowers these are far more likely to get damaged. I agree with those posting above, that selection of the fittest will help quite a bit.
As well as the obvious (avoiding frost pockets) I find that my frosts are worse where the plants are sheltered. It seems counterintuitive, but the areas that are more exposed, show less evidence of standing frost in the morning, whereas the little valleys are white still.
I've heard that planting a frost tender plant such as nasturtium can help find the areas of land that are slightly warmer, so you could plant more sensitive crops (like curcubits) there.
Then there are various ways of modifying the land so as to create microclimates. There are probably whole threads on that subject. Hugelbeds can create warmer soil (like long term hotbeds) but you also need to be careful about creating frost pockets, see the giant hugelculture thread. Rocks or berms arranged as sunscoops (possibly trees as well). Rocks to soak heat through the day and release at night. Maybe others have more suggestions.

We lived in northern MN and finally moved to southern Illinois.  Climate was one of the factors for the move. We had snow in June.  We were on a hill that was hit less by frost than surrounding areas.  Heavy use of compost early in the growing season seemed to help to raise the soil temp.  For more temperature intolerant crops we made use of plastic tunnels.

If I were to do it again, I would use lots of raised beds that were designed to be covered. I would also invest in a high tunnel with a wood stove. The stove would not be there for regular use… just for those occasional odd temp drops

Someone said recently, maybe here, that spring (last frost) seems to come later and the first frost in fall comes later. The records (Fargo) show the first frost in fall is quite a bit later than 20 or 30 years ago. We had 32 degrees on May 20 of this year, colder in some areas. 6 days later we broke a record at 96. For gardening I think you would want to work around the typical frost dates for both spring and fall. I have been planting tomatoes (WI 55, 75 day) later and have had good results. Will put in my transplants this weekend, my latest tomato transplant date. Last year I had to rely on volunteer tomatoes as my transplants were a bust. They were likely just coming up in the middle of June. We had an early frost last fall, September 7, I believe. It did not kill the tomatoes (they produced) but there was frost on the leaves, it did kill the cucumbers a bit farther away from the trees. It was cold as the dew point was very high and the grass was covered in ice. This is where you need to think about Brix and the higher nutrient levels in plants as being kind of an antifreeze.

We may have a shorter growing season in the northern US but we also have some very long daylengths in summer. Garden with this in mind. You can do a lot in a short time with nearly 16 hours of daylight.


THE FARGO HECTOR INTL AP ND CLIMATE NORMALS FOR TODAY
                        NORMAL    RECORD    YEAR                    
MAXIMUM TEMPERATURE (F)   78       101      1893                      
MINIMUM TEMPERATURE (F)   55        38      1927                      


SUNRISE AND SUNSET                                                    
JUNE 12 2026..........SUNRISE   532 AM CDT   SUNSET   922 PM CDT    
JUNE 13 2026..........SUNRISE   532 AM CDT   SUNSET   923 PM CDT

Wow, thank you all for your replies!

Seems like I can't easily quote multiple messages.

My parents did a cold frame once and it worked pretty well. I think it's a good option for lettuce, but would be hard to make one big enough for squash, right?

The Resilient Garden: We pretty much can't grow corn where we are at. If we move nearby, we might be able to, but I'm not quite sure. I think on our very best summer, corn might be possible but it'd be a big gamble. I'll look for that book though, thank you!

We know a family who has a very impressive in-earth greenhouse. It's giant and has a wood stove for the very coldest nights of winter. I'd love something like that, but it's a big undertaking.

Interesting about brix content acting as an anti-freeze! I could see raised beds working well with portable coverings that can be deployed on clear nights, I guess before July.

It sounds like hugelkulture (if I spelled it correctly!) would help raise temperatures some, though I'd be surprised if it made the difference of a 27F frost or not. 30-32F, probably.

I'm on the opposite side of the States in zone 5B. There is a lot of things that I can influence in my growing spaces but an early warm spell followed by a late hard frost is beyond my skillset!

This year wiped out nearly every fruit tree in the area unless they were a late blooming variety. I have one apple tree that has managed to preserve its buds and it seems that I should have a half decent crop coming from it. This has influenced my next fruit tree planting to be focused on adding late blooming varieties to my mix as a sort of Mother Nature insurance.

It might be worth exploring different varieties of seeds for crops that you want to grow in a similar fashion. There is a term "landrace" that is used frequently on the forum which in laymens terms means creating locally adapted things that thrive in your specific climate. If you don't have a popular type of corn that grows well in your environment, maybe developing your own type would be a solution. It won't be instant gratification but it can be accomplished with some effort.

There is a book known as Landrace Gardening by Joseph Lofthouse which might be of value to you to explore. He is actually on the forums himself and has shared a ton of his experience with creating veggies that thrive in his local environment.

The Resilient Garden: We pretty much can't grow corn where we are at. If we move nearby, we might be able to, but I'm not quite sure. I think on our very best summer, corn might be possible but it'd be a big gamble. I'll look for that book though, thank you!

The specific crops are more examples for the broader, and more important, idea of how to garden now for successful harvest when life/weather/whatever sucks.

I also don't grow corn, but find the book invaluable.

Theodorin Maczynski wrote: I could see raised beds working well with portable coverings that can be deployed on clear nights, I guess before July.

Ideally, you'd build a frame/trellis over the beds, so that throwing a sheet or tarp over the plants would be quick and easy, and you wouldn't have to worry about plants being injured getting the cover on and off.

It would also allow you to put multiple jugs of hot water under the cover between the plants. Even if the water cooled off, it will freeze before the plants because of the salts and sugars in the plant leaves. That might give one more layer of protection.

I was told about 40 years ago by a fellow in the climate business, that the climate was becoming less stable and that the result would be larger storms and less predictable highs and lows outside what we've accepted as normal. I know of people in my area whose grandparents told of certain lakes freezing enough for skating, but that would be considered a weather outlier now. Essentially "climate chaos". Planting more varieties that tolerate slightly different extremes, saving seed so that you can plant seeds that are learning to adapt to your specific ecosystem, and mapping and creating your own micro climates will all help. A quick example, one friend grows her tomatoes in deep plant pots and fills the bottom of the pots with fresh chicken bedding, puts topsoil on top, and them plants the baby tomato. The decomposing chicken shit seems to give the tomato roots that little bit of warmth they need to be successful.

Corn was grown in the colonial era, far colder then current temps, up into Canada. So the possibility exists.
They used a ridge-and-furrow system that caused frost to form in the lower areas. Cold air sinks. The tops of the mounds stayed frost-free. Hope this link works:


Anatomy of a Ridged Garden-Bed Complex:
Applying Soil Phytolith and Humic Acid Analysis and
Experimental Archaeology to Understanding Garden
Construction at Menominee River Garden Beds
Wendy Munson-Scullin and Michael Scullin

https://d1wqtxts1xzle7.cloudfront.net/109325301/Munson_Scullin_and_Scullin_2022_Menominee_River_Garden_Beds-libre.pdf?1703104523=&response-content-disposition=inline%3B+filename%3DAnatomy_of_a_Ridged_Garden_Bed_Complex_A.pdf&Expires=1781711311&Signature=OpMxHkqfB2SMhZ2eFWD~6rVz1l3AZra27tLhRw7joHWXbmUH4nLnFioW09ja5s4Fjci9gt4sgVtTHPX4Vv-iXaXsciVifS4JRhoUXRScRtZ~YN3NzFsaksCZFIqL1Ehakj9W4vnx0fxzUqNqf58HfTU6ubqu-yQA8Zj~NX-PkJBrFOQzWUCKrh8PECqbdUzSBMBGv5DWluKmOr5lmDzMTxTjfSvfC5q-yJDreXHXhy6PzQMs1ESlJM~kq5IEUw6uTnZU30Bm9vEi35AvNlkLGSH8hGXAtvRSsN3pvbEcbwM8Trea3AG4RIDAAsPVdT4kjbDoNFdeRKp5ADSaGAUFFA__&Key-Pair-Id=APKAJLOHF5GGSLRBV4ZA

Theodorin Maczynski wrote: "Is there a way to plant or arrange the garden to make it more frost tolerant?

Yes, try making microclimates.

https://permies.com/t/171230/permaculture/Simple-illustration-microclimate

A cold frame can be used to start squash.

Theodorin, I hope the replies here have given you some peace of mind. Even if you've been doing it forever, there are still years that kick everyone in the behind.

I've moved climates and spent a few years fighting against weather/bugs/sickness etc before learning that the best plan, especially nowadays, is to look at long-range weather to make bigger decisions (going to have a wet summer, entirely skip stuff that will get mildew, for example) but still to try a bit of everything every time.

Another thing I would like to suggest, as you're just starting-- TAKE NOTES. Especially as I get older I find myself not entirely sure about whether that summer was really hot or not. I keep a garden diary in the summer about overall trends- lots of rain, not much sun, how it affected us, pests, what came up and when. It helps a lot for planning the following year. I just now, maybe 12 years after establishing this garden, feel like I have a handle on what to do to get a reasonable amount of food for us.

Tereza Okava wrote:Theodorin, I hope the replies here have given you some peace of mind. Even if you've been doing it forever, there are still years that kick everyone in the behind.

Agreed, you never know what the "plague of the year" is going to be. Persevere!

One way to beat a surprise frost is to set up sprinklers. If ice crystals can't form, frost damage cannot occur. Personally I have been out at 4 am with a hose nozzle set to the widest sprinker setting, and it worked. Though I was pretty darn frosty myself by the time the sun came up.

In fruit orchards, they set up giant fans (or hire helicopters!) to mix up the air layers and prevent frost from forming. Extreme but effective.