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Front Range Gardening Challenge - Hail

The Rocky Mountains are beautiful, but they tend to bring some particular challenges to those of us who brave growing fruit and vegetables on the Front Range. Hail is a particular concern, as is late season snow. I was able to protect my garden from a May snowfall only to see it all destroyed by two hail storms of dime-sized hail that came from the south the night of Memorial Day at 2 and 4 am. Not even the plants on the south side of the house that are usually protected were safe. But we were able to replant with new plants thanks to local area nurseries so we will still have tomatoes and peppers and other good things.

We have a mature tart cherry tree in our front yard that produces every third year or so. It would every year except for the hail and late snows. Last year was phenomenal and it's a good thing I canned a bunch of the harvest because this year the hail got most of the crop. For the first year I've seen a squirrel enjoying cherries. I'm guessing since everything else is late in ripening this year, they've decided to hit up our tree.


Juneau watching the squirrel and not really caring about the cherries.
Since the hail significantly reduced the cherry crop and also hit the rhubarb pretty badly, I have very little of both just now. So I decided to combine them into a favorite recipe for fruit syrup that can be added to cocktails to give them a nice flavor. I've made the syrup with rhubarb and cherry before and canned it for the winter. This year I'll combine them and have just enough for some July 4th rhubarb/cherry margaritas or daiquiris. Totally worth it.




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  1. UnknownJune 27, 2019 at 10:20 PM

    You should buy some agribon covers to avoid hail damage.

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    Replies
    1. GinaJune 28, 2019 at 9:50 AM

      We have structures and netting to put up in advance of a storm, but do not leave it up all the time as I like the aesthetics of seeing the plants rather than the netting most days. Unfortunately, I didn't pay attention to the weather predictions Memorial Day night and the 2 am hail caught me by surprise.

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