Frost Chart for United States

Remove the banana from the pot and place it in a container with moist sand. Store the plant in the shed if the temp. will not drop below 50 degrees F. Stop watering and fertilizing and let the plant go dormant. You can also remove some of the leaves. If the plant is too tall you can chop it down before storing. It will grow back next spring.

If you think that the weather will warm up again after this first cold spell cover your plants. Tomatoes need lots of warm sunshine to ripen so you may be running out of time. If you decide to pick the green tomatoes put them in a brown paper bag with an apple and close it up. The ethylene gas from the apple will ripen the tomatoes.

You might be interested in this article on figs:

http://www.almanac.com/plant/figs

The Eastern Panhandle of West Virginia is in USDA Hardiness Zone 6. Figs are hardy from 8 to 11, or sometimes 6 or 7, depending on cultivar. So yes, once your fig tree loses its leaves in fall and goes dormant, before temperatures dip below 40 degrees F, move the tree into an unheated garage or cellar, in a dry spot. It will not need light during dormancy. Water the plant sparingly over winter, about every 3 to 4 weeks. Move the plant back outdoors once temperatures consistently are above 40 F in spring.

Fig trees may not produce edible, mature fruit until they are about 3 to 5 years old. It sounds like your tree does have the baby fruit starting, but these may not mature in time this season, since the fig needs to stay on the tree to ripen. If the fruit is larger than pea size, remove them before moving the plant indoors for winter, to help the plant conserve energy. Keep any fruit that is pea-size or smaller; if properly protected, these may survive the winter and grow to maturity the next year.

Flagstaff frost dates are
Last spring frost June 9
First fall frost Sept. 22

Prescott frost dates are
Last spring frost May 7
First fall frost Oct. 18

We will add more dates to our frost chart in the near future.

You can plant some veggies in the west side garden. Try spinach, lettuce, broccoli and maybe some below ground crops like carrots and onions. Plant sun loving tomatoes, peppers and flowers in the east side patch. Good luck!

Zi, Go to our Roses page for tips on how to plant and grow roses: http://www.almanac.com/plant/roses
Plant rose shrubs just after your last frost in the spring. Make sure you plant in a place that gets at least 6 hours of sun. Amend the soil with compost to add nutrients and mulch with compost to retain moisture and keep down the weeks. Water deeply every week. Add organic fertilizer when the roses leaf out in the the spring, then every 6 weeks all spring and summer until you are 6 weeks away from your first fall frost. See our Roses page for more details.