MONCLOVA, Ohio — With the expected cold weather this week, farmers are starting to monitor their crops. It isn't strawberry season yet, but farmers are starting to prepare the plants now. The freezing temperatures could impact the crops.
Debbie Stevens-Laux, co-owner of Stevens Gardens in Monclova, said they are just monitoring the temperatures for right now. If the freeze was next week, then it would be a different story.
"We're going to have a lot of buds that are opening or actually into blossom, and at that point, we will absolutely have to cover or run irrigation if it looks like it's going to get below 32 (degrees)," Stevens-Laux said.
Normally, the farm doesn't have blossoms or buds during this time of year. Stevens-Laux said the mild spring caused the buds to come earlier.
Freezes are normally a possibility in April, so Stevens-Laux said they have two options to protect the plants. The first being that the farm can put out frost cloths over all the fields, which Stevens-Laux said is extremely labor intensive.
"We also have irrigation we can cover the rest of our berries with, which means that there's water running on them from the time the temperature starts dropping below freezing until the sun comes up," she said. "It starts warming the air and the ground and then it melts off the ice."
Although this may seem like it would hurt the berries, it stops the cold air from getting closer to the berry.
"There will be a little layer of water, and then the ice around the berry or the blossom," she said. "That keeps it right around 32 so it will not freeze."
Stevens-Laux said they aren't as worried about the strawberries yet because there's been so much rain. The WTOL 11 Weather team has been monitoring April rainfall, which already totals 6.07 inches and is 3.33 inches above average.
"With the ground being wet, that actually takes longer for it to freeze," Stevens-Laux said. "It puts heat into the air as it's trying to freeze or evaporate. So we're hoping that's going to be enough to keep the strawberries safe right now."
If homeowners have strawberries or plants they are worried about, Stevens-Laux suggested checking the plants and covering them with cloth or a sheet.
"Do not use plastic," she said. "Plastic conducts cold. If you put plastic over it it's going to definitely freeze even if it wouldn't of without it."
Stevens-Laux said the farm may lose some of the blossoms that are open, but they are not worried about a lot of crop loss.
"But Ohio, weather changes daily," she said. "It could be another frost-freeze later on. And like I said, after this one we'll probably have to do the covering. There's going to be no getting around it."