After a lovely warm start to the month it's been downhill ever since, to such an extent that the month's average temperature is now just that, distinctly average for the middle of September.
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| Temperature & Rainfall Records 01-15 September 2018 |
There's no doubt that the allotment has taken on a noticeable autumnal feel as beds are cleared of summer crops and harvesting moves on to apples and pears.
However, one theme from summer is continuing and that is our continuing lack of rainfall. So far this month we've had some sort of precipitation on 10 days out of 16 including some rain today, Sunday. It's amounted to a grand total of 13.6mm (0.54in) falling in lots of small amounts which do nothing to alleviate the bone dry soil at the allotment and in the garden.
We did manage to plant our winter onions last week besides clearing more beds at the allotment. As the cleared beds are too dry to dig over, the backlog of beds that need digging over is building up at an alarming rate. None of the beds will be needed for planting or sowing seeds until next spring so there's no particular rush, but it's a job I like to do in short stints rather than have lots to do together.
We're not having to spend as much time watering at the allotment, as crops take longer to dry out now the weather is much cooler than on those hot summer days. Some crops though have still got plenty of time left in the ground before they're harvested. Our leeks have grown well but until some wet weather arrives they'll still need watering even if it's not as often. It would be a shame if we forgot them now after watering them for the last two or three months. The same can be said of our carrots, parsnips and winter brassicas.
The weather next week will be governed by the remnants of ex-tropical storm Helene. Whilst it might bring some mild southerly winds on the other hand they might just be strong enough to be gale force and there maybe even some wet weather as well. However, with the exact track of the storm still unknown there's a great deal of uncertainty about next week's weather.
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This lack of water is incredible. We have been getting really heavy intermittent showers since Friday. "Localised flooding"!
ReplyDeleteLooks like 3 low pressure systems are crossing the UK this week so we should get some rain from one of them I would have thought. At least with most crops now harvested there's much less to water!!
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