Wednesday was another poor day for late July. The temperature struggled up to 17.2°C (63.0°F) well short of where it should be at the moment. It was cloudy for most of the day and from late morning through to the middle of the afternoon the cloud was thick enough for it to try to rain. It only wet leaves not the ground and it didn’t record anything on my rain gauge.
With a few days of cool dull weather it’s easy to forget to water outdoor plants. When it’s dull and cool I know the tomatoes in the greenhouse will go a couple of days without watering but it’s so easy to forget outdoor plants thinking they’ll be alright and manage on the small amounts of rainfall we’ve had.
Clearly our peas have suffered over the last few days and have turned from a healthy dark green to almost yellow. There’s a few pods left to harvest but the haulms can then be cleared away.
Our main crop potatoes look like they’re urgently in need of a good drink. I’m not really into watering potatoes so it will be a case of finding out how they’ve performed when they’re lifted after the tops have died down. By the look of them that’s not going to be very long.
We’ll need to keep watering our sweet pea plants if we want to prolong their flowering period. All the flowers were cut today and I’ll give them a good watering on my next visit.
A drop of water from the sky would be very welcome especially if it fell at night.
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Apparently, tomorrow is real rain day in the south (not sure it'll get to you in the north - I think you'll have the gales instead !).
ReplyDeleteLike you, I don't go in for watering potatoes (too much else to worry about on the plot), so my first and second earlies lost their leaves weeks ago, when they crisped and blew away in one of the many windy spells, and are now sitting in bare 'concrete'. In contrast, my main crop Sarpo Mira potatoes (which are supposed to be drought tolerant) still have lots of tall, green foliage.
We are supposed to miss any rain on Friday but at the moment Sunday looks like it will be wet. We grew some enormous Sarpo Mira potatoes a couple of years ago. I might try one of the Sarpo varieties again next year.
DeleteGrew Sarpo Mira for the first time last year (also fairly rain free) and they were huge - leaves and tubers. Made good baked jacket potatoes.
DeleteWhen we grew them the kept on growing well into the autumn rather than give up in the middle of August. Blight resistant as well!
DeleteTorrential rain forecast here all day tomorrow, so no watering needed. We're off to Wales. Sigh.
ReplyDeleteNo rain forecast for us on Friday so it will be watering duties as normal. Have a lovely break in Wales.
DeleteI have forgot to water the plants too. However in Malaysia, it's very hot. Forgot to water the plant is not good! ;)
ReplyDeleteWe don't normally have hot days Malar. If we have a hot day I remember to water the plants but when it's cool windy and dull I forget.
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