The wild thing that can cause damage to the plant is the weather, and there are a number of gardens that have been swept out overnight due to this and there can be nothing much done to fight against these acts of nature as they also play an important role for the growth of the lovely plants too. But it is a pity to face the dangerous hailstorms that destroys every plant we have tended with so much care and affection spending some much of our time also.
As we see the rains we are overjoyed about the fact we do not have to water the plants as the rains are the best element to quench the thirsty plants. But as these drops of rains turn into tiny globules of ice there is an emotional feeling and I have undergone this feeling when I was a blooming gardener and my garden was totally destroyed in 10 minutes of severe hail.
So, now that I had learnt the evil effect of a hail, I had an option to overcome it. I started to keep big clay pots within 10 feet of my garden and whenever there was a sign of hail I would run and shelter the plants immediately within no time. This avoided me from watching my plants being destroyed on different occurrences. I have never witnessed hail more than an inch in diameter, but if it had occurred in baseball sized lumps the pots arranged surely would have been destroyed too.
But, when the number of delicate plants in my garden spread it is impossible to have a pot for each one of them and run out to keep each one of the pots before any damage has already taken place. So, after a lot of thinking I decided to build a horizontal, retractable screen method of strong but flexible wire mesh which could be pulled out over the total garden area for immediate protection when there was a sign of rain. This stopped the rain from falling through and also collected the hail which dripped slowly till the next day. This project was an expensive one costing many hundred dollars, my blood, sweat and tears that is immeasurable. So I cannot advice this method to all gardeners.
It is unfortunate that if our loving plants are lost due to the balls of ice and cannot be replaced much. You can just tender them with care and try to bring them back over a long time and it is a doubt if they will survive after the hail for several weeks. If you there is a forecast of more rain or wind they should be kept covered as even drops of rains or a strong wind could damage them at this delicate stage.
Hence, if the place where you reside is prone to regular hail, you should surely have some emergency plan to safeguard your plants against it as just watching them being destroyed helplessly is not a good idea.