How to protect your garden from an early frost

Learning which species can tolerate a cold snap and how your patch reacts to different kinds of frost will serve veg growers well as autumn nights lengthen

There are a few dates in the gardening calendar that all growers ought to be aware of – and frost dates should be top of the list. The exact date of the last frost of the year is anyone’s guess, but it’s important to know how to anticipate that first frosty night and how it affects our plants. Understanding which of your plants can withstand temperature drops and which cannot is key to planning what to sow and when.

There are two main types of frost: air and ground. An air frost occurs when the temperature of the air drops to or below the freezing point of water (0C or 32F), whereas a ground frost occurs when the temperature of the ground drops that low. Each can happen separately, though they often occur together, and both can damage plants to different degrees.