Frosts and winter chills are a problem for many gardeners during winter and the more tender plants need protection or losses can occur.
As we have become more adventurous in our gardens and containers, planting more exotic and tropical type plants, protection is needed or else we treat these desired plants as expensive annuals.
Glasshouses offer a degree of frost protection for tender plants but frosts do penetrate the glass doing damage also. A commercial product called ‘VaporGard’ has now been made available to the home gardener and this product has a multitude of uses including as spray-on-frost cloth.
Very simple to use mixing 15 mls per litre of warm water and then sprayed over plants for a good coverage. In cold weather place your bottle of VaporGard into a jug of hot water for about 5 minutes to assist in making the fluid easier to pour. VaporGard is organic and it provides a long lasting (2-3 months, longer in winter) film over the foliage which protects down to –3 degrees C.
New growth requires further applications but as there is very little growth through winter, this is not needed till the spring.
Note; for the full protection that Vaporgard can give against frost and chill damage it takes about 3 days to come into effect.(see below in regards to UV protection)
Putting on frost cloth and taking it off is a chore and more often or not, one either forgets or you get caught out. VaporGard overcomes these problems and becomes an all winter, first line of defense against the chills.