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in-ground What's your minimum average outdoor nighttime temps to put your plants in the ground?

Skydiver

Skydiver

Not looking for anything scientific, but if you have some knowledge to drop on the board for the betterment of all growers, that would be outstanding, just trying to get a feel for what sort of temps everyone looks for to safely transplant your peppers into the ground.
 
I only plant in container but I don't let my peppers go below 50F or my 'maters below 40F to be safe for nighttime temps. Yoo could just grow in gallon size containers to be ultra safe and plant them in the ground mid to late May.
 
Freezing.

Up here the old Homesteader's rule was- Do not put anything into the ground until Memorial Day. According to the Farmer's Alamanac, the low temperature at home on May 31 for the past few decades has been in the mid-thirties to mid-forties. While this was originally for more cold-hardy plants such as cabbage, kale, beets, and such, I've found that unless you get a hard frost which actually freezes and damages leafs, most peppers are remarkably hardy to cold weather as long as you break them in a little bit prior to planting out. Since you have a longer growing season, you wouldn't have to push it quite so much.

A good idea is to go to the Farmer's Almanac and plug your area in and check past years for a low of mid- to high-forties.
 
I also try to keep temps above 10C although 2 nights ago I left plants in the greenhouse and it got down to 3.8C briefly without any problems, and the last few years we've had several nights below 10C even in July. Cold nightime winds are probably the biggest concern for me in the spring.
Here I usually don't plant anything in the ground until at least mid June, we had frost june 8th a few years back:(
 
I said to hell with it and put about half of my dirt plants out in the greenhouse last week when I left home for work- generally, with the heater on it'll stay about 20°F above ambient. So far it looks like my gamble is going to work out- in the past week, minimum temp in the greenhouse at night has been 41°F so I should be in the clear unless we get some freak low down into the low teens. It helps that I've got a big box fan hanging from the ceiling that circulates the air. I've seen people do something similar with plants outside, akin to using helicopters over orchards during hard frost mornings.
 
your in Pitts so you sholdn't have to wait that long, like cappie said, night time temps avg. above 50F should be good. I use the Memorial Day rule of thumb, but down here in SC by memorial day night temps really are above 50
 
hotenuff4u said:
your in Pitts so you sholdn't have to wait that long, like cappie said, night time temps avg. above 50F should be good. I use the Memorial Day rule of thumb, but down here in SC by memorial day night temps really are above 50
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Yeah, been loving what the extended forecasts around here are showing, I was kinda aiming for high 40s/low50s F.
Still have some time to go, though, so it will give me ample opportunity to finish up out in the yard. Bought a tiller, ripped up the entire one side of my yard, now I need to frame it in and divide it into stepped terraces so I can level it out.
 
hotenuff4u said:
your in Pitts so you sholdn't have to wait that long, like cappie said, night time temps avg. above 50F should be good. I use the Memorial Day rule of thumb, but down here in SC by memorial day night temps really are above 50
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Here in SC, I have always heard the Good Friday rule of thumb. Checking the 10 day forecast, the lowest it is forecasted is 48F next Thursday. Our last frost date is April 15th though. I am already hardening off the plants and plan on having that finished by next weekend, but not put them in their final home until the following weekend at the earliest. Most of my plants are still in 3.5" pots and some in 1 gal, so it is still easy to pull them inside if the temp drops.

I shoot for consistantly over 50 as well, but if it gets to 47 or so for a night I don't worry, but try to avoid 45.

jacob
 
If I was planting in the ground, I would wait till middle of april here in east tn. Since I do most of mine in pots I will put them out whenever nighttime temps are not supposed to dip below 45 or so.
 
I only worry about freezing, and even then a night at 32F doesn't hurt them much. It's the high 20's that will kill them. Cold weather slows them down a little, that's all. The warm days and abundant sunshine more than make up for it IMO. Plus, sunshine is free, grow lights are not. That being said, I think early starts in January under lights give you a stronger plant when it goes outside and contributes to a longer growing season with earlier and more pods.
 
I find that prolonged cold winds and/or cold nights can drastically slow down your plants or even kill them, especially if they're accustomed to being babied in warm, wind free growrooms. Before I learned to have patients I had many disasterous grow seasons, but that was many years ago
 
According to every thing I've read 18c/66f. I should think 15 or 16c isn't going to kill them. We rarely go that low here.
 
AjarnV said:
According to every thing I've read 18c/66f. I should think 15 or 16c isn't going to kill them. We rarely go that low here.
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They certainly don't need to be that warm, my house isn't even always that warm. Tonight our high is 6C and I'm not planning on heating my greenhouse
 
In Florida where i live, it is not unusual to have night time temps below 45f even at this time. It never seems to have any long term effect. My harvest will begin by June at the latest.
 
AjarnV said:
^ This is the info I've read from other "experts". Kind of a moot point for me though. :)
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Someone should tell these "experts" that they are way off. Probably redwoodcity/ecoseeds B.S.again:)
 
Here's what my first corn and my tomatoes looked like when I put them out in the greenhouse on March 20th-
24239_411463761534_522391534_5535878_309556_n.jpg


And Here's what they looked like on April 2. Everything in this picture is 45 days from seed-
24829_414645486534_522391534_5616833_515189_n.jpg


I think they're going to survive just fine, thankyew
Nighttime lows have averaged 28°F ambient and generally the gas heater keeps the greenhouse 20°F warmer than ambient. First night I left them out there it got down to 15°F outside and the greenhouse thermometer registered a low of 40°F which scared the crap out of me as they'd been down in the Lab, where nighttime lows are 65°F but it didn't seem to shock 'em too badly. I leave a box fan going on low, it's hanging from the ceiling so it circulates the air from top to bottom really well. Along with all of these I set a LOT of peppers out there too, and they are all going gangbusters- maybe it's the extra light that's reflecting off the snow that's helping them :lol:

So yeah- I guess I can safely say you're good down to 40°F/4.5°C :)
 
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