A cool start to August

August has started off on the cool side with plenty of showers thrown in for good measure. On the 3rd August, the overnight temperature fell to 7.6°C, the lowest early August temperature I’ve recorded in 12 years. In fact, since our mini heatwave finished in July our daytime temperatures have generally been below expected for around midsummer and this is the coolest start to August since 2010.

Temperature & Rainfall Records 09 July to 09 August 2021

The showery nature of the weather means it seems like we’ve had more rain than my rain gauge has measured. Although we’ve had showers nearly every day, so far this month our total rainfall is 15.6mm which can be considered around average for the first week and a bit of the month.

We have a stack of jobs beginning to pile up at the allotment. There are beds that now need clearing of their summer crops and potatoes to be lifted. The grass paths haven’t been strimmed for several weeks now and are very unkempt. It’s going to take a good afternoon’s work, perhaps even longer, to get them tidied up. I’m not too keen on strimming wet grass as it sticks to everything.

Some beds need clearing so the ground can be prepared for more planting. One bed needs digging over ready for some dwarf French beans to be planted out. These were sown in pots at home several weeks ago and will soon be ready for planting out. We’ve also got to prepare a bed for some sweet Williams which like the French beans were sown a few weeks ago.

Sweet Williams ready for planting out

I’m in the process of lifting some Apache and Osprey potatoes from one bed and hopefully this bed will then be prepared for a crop of overwintering onions.

Copyright: Original post from A Gardener's Weather Diary http://ossettweather.blogspot.co.uk/ author M Garrett