This spring, there were a lot of reports of plants that would otherwise be hardy dying or having major setbacks in their growth. The most commonly affected plant seems to be the rose.
I attribute these plant problems to three main causes:
1) We had bitterly cold weather last October when plants hadn't gone into dormancy yet.
2) We didn't have our usual insulating blanket of snow which protects plants more than you would expect.
3) We had several late frosts where the temperatures went down into the 20s. And of course, that happened well after many plants had come back out of dormancy.
So if you've lost some plants this year, at least know that you're not alone. Sometimes the weather patterns we get into just don't help and there's not a whole lot you can do about it. It's very frustrating. At least we're finally into some warmer weather now so we can enjoy our gardens.