Spring has sprung, but last week's summer-like weather arrived maybe a bit too early for blooming foliage.

"Everything all of a sudden has started to bloom. Not just the early bloomers, but everything is all at once blooming," said Ben Stout, a biologist at Wheeling Jesuit University.


Much lower temperatures are expected over the next few days, and temperatures are expected to drop below 28 degrees for more than three hours, which is called a hard freeze. Because freeze warnings are posted for the entire Ohio Valley, Stout said anything with flowers could be in jeopardy.


"That's a pretty significant freeze, and given that a lot of things are in bloom, we're going to lose a lot of fruit I would say," Stout said. "Really anything that has started to leaf out is vulnerable and could lose its first flush of leaves."

Stout said many non-flowering trees in the area are pretty resilient and will get a second set of leaves; they'll just come out later than usual.

At Nicky's Garden Center, preparations were under way on Monday. Some smaller plants and flowers may be moved into a greenhouse or indoors. Larger plants have less of a chance of being salvaged in the hard freeze.

But Stout said some foliage can be protected.

"If you have low-growing shrubs and stuff, you can cover then with plastic and that will help. Try to keep the plastic down on the ground so you're getting a little bit of the residual thermal from the ground."


To further minimize the effect of the freeze on plants, experts at Nicky's said covering them with burlap, newspaper or cloth is a good option. They said if people use plastic as protectors, they should remove the plastic soon after daylight to avoid baking the plant.