North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

[Matt Demmon <mdemmon@gmail.com>]

I can't help you with pecans specifically, but if you left the pots outside over the winter, you may be in trouble. Many plants cannot handle having their roots frozen as hard as they will be in a pot exposed above ground vs. if they are grown in soil. I have most of my plants on pallets off the ground in pots during the summer, but come fall, I take them down, pack them tightly together on the northern side of our barn for as much protection as possible, and anything I know to be especially tender goes into our stone basement where it is generally between 35 and 45 all winter.

In my experience, pawpaws, chestnuts, mulberry, osage orange, honeylocust, apricot, peach, and gingko will die here if left out in the winter, and only survive in the basement. Apple, native plums, willow, serviceberry, raspberry, aronia all scoff at the cold. This is just the things i can think of off the top of my head that I've grown in pots. Hope that helps in the future.

And as Lucky says, it may take a few years to see. He sent me some bare root pecans once that didn't really enjoy the trip from z7 to z5 where it was a month colder in the spring, and they hung on for 3 years with almost no growth but finally didn't make it.

-matt demmon
z5 se MI

On Wed, Feb 17, 2010 at 8:52 PM, James Geoffrey Steen <geoff_steen@yahoo.com> wrote:

To any knowledgable Nafexer,

I planted a bunch of pecan seedlings, started last year in 3-gallon pots, today in the ground. Noticed that the pots were icey blocks and wondered if such the pecans' roots might be damaged by freezing. The parent seed is from a thick-shelled northern type, planted now in Marshall, NC, zone 6b.

Concerned about my day's plantings...

James Geoffrey Steen

c/o Raven Ridge Farm

284 Catawba Drive
Marshall, NC 28753
(828) 649-9261  (h)
(617) 470-9436  (c)

-- 
-matt demmon