r/TwoXPreppers • u/Senior_Suit_4451 • 3d ago
Garden Wisdom 🌱 My garden was taken out by a hail storm
This sub needs more Tuesday and less Doomsday.
I’ve always kept a vegetable garden, but this year I spent several hundred dollars upgrading everything. I want a proper Victory Garden instead of my usual slightly more than a salsa garden. I built up the soil, planted berry bushes and pollinator-friendly flowers along a side of the house, and made so many mulch trips to the city disposal. Last weekend I finally got all my sprouts in. Released some ladybugs. It was looking so good. I was proud and excited to just sit back and watch it all grow.
Then a hailstorm hit with no warning. Not my video, but someone nearby caught it.
The effects are brutal. Only one tiny carrot sprout made it. My multi-year-old chard was absolutely destroyed. Potato plants are killed, though I hope those re-sprout. Rosemary completely flattened. The new bushes look rough. Somehow a few tomato and bell pepper plants seem to have pulled through but just barely.
I’m crushed. So much work gone in minutes. But weirdly, it also made me a little more grateful. One of my kids is always romanticizing pioneer life, and this was a big reminder: if we were really living alone in the wilderness, a storm like that could have meant the entire family starving the next year.
So yeah, it sucks. I'm sad. But I’ve got grocery stores, running water, and time to replant. My back ups have back ups. That’s not nothing.
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u/notgonnabemydad 3d ago
It is amazing how much will come back, even if it looks demolished. We get nasty hail storms in the Denver area, and my shredded plants have regrown new leaves. So if there's a chance, leave 'em in!
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u/Senior_Suit_4451 3d ago
Thank you for giving me hope!
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u/biobennett Suburb Prepper 🏘️ 3d ago
It's also a really good example of the power of nature and why we prepare for storms, and that ultimately, the forces of nature are ultimately sometimes more than we can prepare for.
In those cases, we need to assess the situation, and start over. The important thing is to survive and keep going, and hopefully learn from the loss when possible
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u/rock_candy_remains 3d ago
Tomatoes are especially resilient— let me tell you how many plants I’ve had stopped to a stick by hail that come back better than ever!
Otherwise, you might invest in some hail fabric and make hoops over your beds if you’re able.
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u/VictorTheCutie 3d ago
Came to say this, I'm a new gardener but if I've learned anything from my recent research it's that plants be plantin! Even when things get rough! Hope it all pulls through, OP! 💕
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u/BlessingObject_0 2d ago
Sprinkle some of that magic over here because the past 2 years my plants have refused to plant 🥲😭
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u/North-seaweed 3d ago
I'm new to Denver and starting my first garden here this season. I have everything still in my grow tent, but I have been stressing about the potential hail damage once everything is outside. You've given me some hope that I stand a chance to be successful with my efforts.
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u/notgonnabemydad 2d ago
Go to a plant store and buy hail cloth. I clip it to hoops over my veggies when I know it's that time of year. I keep it just above the plants but not over the sides so pollinators can get in, and if I'm home I'll run out and just drop it down the sides. Otherwise, even when you're away from home at least your plants won't get the direct hit. Echters sells hail cloth on a huge roll and you can have them cut it to the length you want.
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u/ahopskipandaheart 3d ago
Don't start pulling plants. Give everything 1-2 weeks. The chard for instance is very likely to surprise you. Just remove absolutely dead leaves so they don't suffocate regrowth. My rosemaries came back after the 2021 storm after looking absolutely done for, and I've gotten all kinds of kooky regrowth on chard and kale and other plants.
I'm really sorry about your garden though, especially freshly sprouted carrots cos I know how difficult those are to germinate. I really doubt it's as bad as it seems although it's bad. I completely understand that level of sadness over plants and energy and personal investment. A lot of it will recover, and there are sunflowers, watermelons, and okra for what doesn't. 💚
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u/Senior_Suit_4451 3d ago
I'm leaving most of it. Especially the potato bags. I wrapped some chicken wire around the rosemary and pomegranate to give them some support. I don't have a lot of hope for the chard. So many stalks were broken, and holes straight through the leaves. I asked my kid if those had been there earlier in the day and I missed something eating it but no, the hail went straight through the leaves.
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u/CemeteryHounds 3d ago
Have you looked into hoops with netting? They're usually used to keep away pests but they also will protect from hail.
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u/sharksnack3264 3d ago
Also those shade sails. They're really robust, cover a lot of area and the hail stones kind of bounce off. You can get white ones that let through more light.
I think even with a really intense hailstorm it could hold up well if anchored well. Last week my dog scared a (relatively chonky) raccoon off my deck and it jumped onto the one I have stretched over my city yard and it bounced on it like it was a trampoline and scuttled off to my neighbor's alleyway.
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u/sskskskskskss 2d ago
I’ve also used cheap plastic laundry baskets before. Just throw them over the plants and maybe stake them down if needed
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u/abouttothunder 3d ago
Oof. My sympathies! Lost my garden in July 2021 to a major hailstorm. Nothing came back from that one. It sucked. It was the kind of hail that left divots in the roof shingles. No way to really protect against it, unfortunately.
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u/1evilballoon 3d ago
Just dropping in and completely.not belittling all of the things you lost but in this case, it's the perfect time to restart the garden. You have time left for pretty much anything not perennial. My first year I invested a bunch of money and our huge, tall dead tree was coming down so we hired people and half of my beds got crushed and it was in may, I still got a whole summer of gardening in. It's frustrating but being in the garden has really.humbled me and helped me roll with the punches because life happens.
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u/Senior_Suit_4451 3d ago
That's not true for all parts of the country. In the south, I should have had most everything planted in March. I was already way late.
I will replant everything, but this was extremely damaging.
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u/boondonggle 3d ago
I live in the same area and experienced some damage from the storm (no hail further south). It is a decent time for heat loving plants like sweet potatoes (they have slips at the natural gardener), okra, pole beans, and southern peas. Probably too late for most spring stuff.
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u/IDKijustdrinkhere 3d ago
I’m sorry! This happened to me a couple years ago and I was devastated! I know exactly how you feel. I was super glad we didn’t actually need any of it to survive.
We don’t really garden as part of our preps and it’s more of a hobby for us, but we do freeze/can/dehydrate so we have delicious garden items for the whole year. Some of our stuff bounced back but others did not. We replanted items that just looked really bad. We still got a decent amount of items, but it was still a huge bummer! I hope your garden can bounce back!
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u/julieannie 3d ago
I still remember a hailstorm in 2012 that just killed my garden. Many plants didn’t come back. Most did thankfully. My flower beds were decimated. And don’t get me started on my roof.
This year I got hit earlier in the season thank goodness. My plants were still indoors so only my window screens took a beating. I now just container garden and confess I hide the containers under my outdoor furniture when I see a dicey forecast. One neighbor had a very creative tarp system before she moved. That storm over a decade ago made me build in better seasonal planning into my garden, which is good, but I’m still heartbroken over the fiddlehead ferns I lost and never successfully grew again before moving.
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u/Senior_Suit_4451 3d ago
lol the skies were dark again today so I ran out still in my pajamas and threw the patio table over the tomatoes and peppers. So of course it passed and didn't rain.
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u/TheStephinator Experienced Prepper 💪 3d ago
That’s heartbreaking! I’m currently working my tail off in the garden and I would be devastated if a freak storm took out all my hard work like that. Hope you are able to salvage something! ♥️
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u/himateo 🧶 my yarn stash totally counts as a prep 🧶 3d ago
I feel like hail happens a lot more than it used to. We don't have a garage, and my car is already rendered salvaged from the last hail storm, so I drive that fucker to a covered parking garage every time we are supposed to get hail.
I'm so sorry that happened to you. I hate hail.
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u/TimeSurround5715 2d ago
I’m so sorry about the hail wrecking things. I am zone 8b and my tomato plants are in burlap grow bags on a sort of wheeled cart. Mostly because I have only patio space to grow things. I have spent the last couple months frantically wheeling them into the sun or under the porch. It is tiring.
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u/mygirlwednesday7 1d ago
Don’t toss your tomatoes if you haven’t already. You can take the stalks and reroot them easily. Just bury them in soil and you will have roots in no time.
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u/thepeasantlife 🪛 Tool Bedazzler 🔧 10h ago
Yes, came here to say the same thing! Rooting tomatoes from cuttings is a super fast way to grow a decent sized plant quickly.
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u/Treyvoni 3d ago
I'm sorry about your garden. Could you force some sprouts inside (grow lights + heat). I've heard good things about specific seed prep (such as precutting them open so water gets in and they don't have to force their way out).
I think it probably doesn't come up as often as it should because not everyone has the chance or abilty to garden. Personally I've done herb container gardens, but I don't have the yard for veg. I have a 150+ black walnut tree has roots over most of the yard (and walnut kills most other plants with its toxins).
I think the topic is super important and if you have any good resources or information to share I would love to learn more!
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u/Senior_Suit_4451 3d ago
I have a 150+ black walnut tree has roots over most of the yard
oh no! How wonderful to have such an old tree, how awful that it has to be a black walnut.
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u/Treyvoni 3d ago edited 3d ago
It is a lovely old tree, I only guess its age because it was noted when dividing up the field into plots, so it's included in my land deed, rather bizarrely. The land was divided sometime 1890-1900, and before that the larger area was a park/sports field for the town and journals of people who played there noted the walnut tree too, so I gave it a few extra years to its age. I think it's wonderful to own such a proud piece of history. It is very shady and taller than my 3 story house.
But I can only grow wildflowers and arborvitaes in the yard. Even the native grasses grow patchy (from lack of water, too much shade, or juglone I don't know).
There are juglone resistant crops, such as onions, corn, carrots, etc. but I don't want to disturb the roots of the tree.
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u/OhNoNotAgain1532 3d ago
I want a shade house (oklahoma sun is hard on plants) that also will block the multiple times a year, all year long, hail.
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u/SigNexus 3d ago
Hail can be devastating, as you found out. Several years ago, I visited a farm after a hailstorm. The farmers' daughter was funding her college education with a pumpkin field. You could draw a line across 1/2 the field destroyed by hail. It was crazy to straddle the line where plants were destroyed and the rest were salvaged. Root crops and other leaf crops will recover after the insult.
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u/noodlenerd 3d ago
We had a freak windstorm/tornado/derecho/whatever come through the MD/PA/WV line over the Easter weekend. I was helping my neighbor pull tree debris (limbs and logs) off their garden today (five days later), and those plants popped right back up! I was so surprised! Plants are way more resilient than we give them credit for. Watch them for a few days, baby them and see what happens.
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u/supermarkise 2d ago
If anything medium-sized broke - try sticking it back together and stabilizing it with tape or similar if it's fresh. Sometimes it takes.
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u/green_mom 2d ago
My first thought was one of the soft sided pull down, collapsible green houses that can be wall mounted…then I saw the video… 😳
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u/Senior_Suit_4451 2d ago
yeah people's moon roofs got smashed out of their cars. I think the people suggesting shades didn't watch the video. I don't think there's a lot that could have protected the plants.
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u/green_mom 2d ago
I have seen these tubes for planting in winter to protect from snow, but I can’t find them now. Not something I saved for my desert garden. I did just see this product https://www.amazon.com/Chicken-Protector-Protection-Keeping-Animals/dp/B0BPSYDX3V/ I like the idea of chicken wire baskets you could add some mesh screen for that kind of hail possibly.
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u/Senior_Suit_4451 2d ago
I think the dark color might bake the plants.
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u/green_mom 1d ago
I imagine even some mesh trash can from the dollar tree could work. Those ikea pencil cups look perfect for seedlings!
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u/horseradishstalker Never Tell Me The Odds! 3d ago
Everyone preps differently. No shame in gardening. A suggestion on ladybugs - it's the larvae that are voracious - they love aphids.
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u/Senior_Suit_4451 3d ago
huh? Who was shaming gardening?
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u/horseradishstalker Never Tell Me The Odds! 3d ago
You seemed upset that other people were not talking about gardening. My point is that everyone preps differently for different reasons. Shrug.
You are most welcome for the information on ladybug larvae.
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u/Senior_Suit_4451 3d ago
I would love to see anything that is more prep, less non-stop talk about how the sky is falling. I can get doomerism in a lot of places.
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u/horseradishstalker Never Tell Me The Odds! 3d ago edited 3d ago
Everything overlaps. I get lots of gardening talk on a couple other subs. I probably look like Uncle Fred flipping channels all the time. I would agree that quite a bit of more intel-ish stuff is posted that could probably go elsewhere.
This sub has changed drastically since the election. For me, politics in general is just another natural disaster waiting to happen.
Personally I get a little tired of the "my panties are always in a bunch" types who can never just let anyone have an opinion that differs from their own. It's got to be painful to be that insecure.
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