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Winter is Coming

chriscoli

chriscoli

Administrator
For those of you who over-winter your hardy pond plants outdoors, how do you do it? I'm considering burying some small pond tubs in the ground for overwintering hardy pond plants but I'm not sure how deep they need to be to protect the plants well in this area. I've read that our frost line is at about 2 ft, so do any ponds need to extend below that to protect the plants from the abuse of freeze/thaw?

Last year I left most of my hardy pond plants outdoors and kept them moist but not submerged. Some made it but many did not. I brought the more sensitive ones into the garage near the window where it will get down to freezing on the coldest days but not much below. Most survived quite well. I've got a lot more pond plants this year and it'll be quite a bit of work to bring them all into the garage which is why I'd like to leave some out if I can.
 
Frank Cowherd

Frank Cowherd

Global Moderators
Staff member
Hey, it is 100 F out there. Are you dreaming of cold weather??

My water lilies and water iris and arrowhead and something that looks like a small cat tail all survive in my ponds overwinter. The lilies are at least two feed down, but some of them and all the rest are maybe 18 inches under water max. I throw away a lot of the extra growth every year. and when it freezes the pond surface solid so I can walk on it I use a flat end shovel and sheer off the tops so they do not add to the bio load in the spring. I have never seen in the 12 years I have been here more than 5 inches of ice on the ponds, usually only an inch or two. I have always assumed the hardy plants would survive well as long as they do not get frozen and therefore as long as they are below 5 or 6 inches of water, they would be fine. I even have hornwort survive sometimes, not always and duckweed seems to survive also.
 
Z

zendog

Active Member
I have a small pond that might be 2 feet deep at the deepest. I also have a small bog (filled with pea gravel) that the water from the pond filters through and that is about a foot deep. I'm pretty sure the bog freezes most of the way down, if not all of the way during the two harsh winters we had before the last one.

In the bog my dwarf cattails, iris, pennywort, pickerel rush and japanese rush all come back every year just fine and I'm pretty sure the foliage from the iris and rush stay green and just keep on growing. These are all hardy plants and grow at the surface in wet or flooded areas so the fact they survive is no surprise. I've also heard some people say their lotus had survived a full freeze of the roots, but I think it is best not to risk them.

Everything else from my tubs joins the lily at the bottom of the pond for the winter. Once the surface leaves have pretty much died off I cut them all and just lower them into the pond where they make submerged leaves and settle in for their winter nap. I keep an airstone going to keep some gas exchange during the winter to protect the fish, but otherwise it is frozen solid. The airstone is just for the fish. Even during the worst winters recently, I doubt it froze more than a foot and I've had no losses.

If you bury and tubs (like a half barrel, I'd suggest that you bury them to the rim and consider putting a piece of the Styrofoam insulation over it during the coldest part of winter with plywood on top and rock to keep it in place. That should keep it from freezing too much and killing lilies, etc. I've thought of doing that myself as my collection expanded and I'm running out of room at the bottom of the pond.
 
B

b considine

a dude playing a dude disguised as another dude
I bring my planters inside and place them in a cool, dark spot. So far, almost everything has come back the following summer.

Blaise
 
Prince

Prince

The ONE who is The ONE
My pond is two feet down. My lily survived this winter. I also have Louisiana Water Iris that are planted just below the surface that over wintered too. I added some Cana lilies this year and Wisteria that and interested in seeing how they over winter. The Wisteria is fully submerged. I also have a deicer that I got during the first snow storm last year.
 
mchambers

mchambers

Former CCA member
Frank wrote:

"I even have hornwort survive sometimes, not always and duckweed seems to survive also."

Figures that duckweed would survive. It's the cockroach of aquatic plants.
 
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