Does anyone know about this?

[richs]

I was reading an article on Brooks Garcia's website, and I read how he had stated that when they have hard frosts, he tries go get to the nursery before sunrise to hose off the plants before the sun hits them - I was wondering if anyone knew the reason behind this. I emailed him and never heard back ( I know I'm the only person in the world he has to deal with )but I was wondering if that is done to keep new growth from deforming or maybe it has some affect on the flower and/or pollen viability? We had a real hard frost here in California (VERY unseasonable) and I have noticed some growth that looks like it deformed during that cold snap - it fell to 35 degrees the night in question and there was a lot of new pitchers and flowers when it came - this was 1 1/2 months ago, but now I can see where some pitchers "corrected" themselves and grew out of it, whereas others look puckered. Now I sprayed them with Isotox 2 weeks prior, to protect new growth from aphids - I have found a few since, but it's just that - a few, nothing out of control.

[marcel]

Putting a spray on plants is a normal practice to protect the plants from frost damage (growers of fruit trees protect blossoms that way).
Spraying in the sunshine might however result in burns.

[richs]

Well now you've done it and I feel spoiled! Here in California, we never have to deal with that problem - I've heard of growers over here (Florida) spraying down citrus trees with water, during freezes, as it is supposed to "insulate" the fruit under ice. However, in all the decades I've grown carnivores, I've NEVER dealt with this. I have a few seriously deformed pitchers out there - one of the adult flava pitchers looks like a flava v. lowii!

[buckcity]

Am not positive but I seem to remember Brooks writing that he only did that when the new buds were bolting.

I move any sarracenia that are about to bloom under cover of a porch when frost is predicted, here in north Florida, else I loose all the flowers.