The last few days of January and the first few days of February see us covered by Met Office yellow warnings for snow and also for icy conditions. These warnings change on a fairly regular basis and but for the last few days haven’t really described our weather conditions. It’s been cold and we had a few snow showers on Thursday but since then nothing. We've had some overnight frost but nothing very severe with the coldest temperature down to -1.2°C on Monday morning. It is the end of January after all we can expect it to be cold, frosty with a few snow showers thrown in.
As it’s turned out January wasn't all that cold, finishing up a little bit milder, by just 0.2°C, than expected. It’s finished up a little cooler than last year.
February is starting with a pretty chilly theme but in the garden the first signs that spring is on its way are there but they do take a bit of searching out. The hellebores pictured above are obvious as are the snowdrops below which will be coming into full flower over the next week or so.
Following from our snowdrops will be iris Katherine Hodgkin. I had to have a close inspection of the border to find any sign of them but then I spotted this little cluster of buds that will be soon coming into flower.
So even though February can be one of our coldest months, we've got the first flowers of the year to look forward to and then once March is here we can start planning for the main growing season.
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I see that a really cold month is forecast, but it's lovely to see those bulbs poking their way up anyway. I remember your irises from last year, they're so pretty. Let's hope the snow doesn't damage them. It really amazes me how bulbs grow in the coldest of weather.
ReplyDeleteIt was a lovely sunny day here on Monday. We even managed a bit of proper outdoor gardening. Frost forecast for tonight though.
DeleteWe must remember to buy some more of those fabulous iris to add to the ones we already have. I might have to take some photos again this year.
Yes Martyn, it seems that nowadays we get yellow warnings for what is completely normal winter weather.They think we've all gone soft!
ReplyDeleteGood pics.Are you using macro or portrait focus ? (or just a much better camera than mine)
Hi David
DeleteI took the photos with a Panasonic DMC-FZ1000. Haven't had it very long so I'm still getting used to it. I didn't use any special settings just let the camera take the strain. I thought it did pretty well with the hellebores which involved a bit of zooming to avoid me stepping onto the soil.
Still got some yellow warnings of snow and ice for Thursday.