Another Short Lived Hot Spell

All through this year, we’ve had the occasional day or couple of days of very warm weather. The last couple of days have been very warm and it’s probably the last time this year we will get some hot weather. The temperature on Tuesday reached 27.7°C (81.9°F) pretty warm for September but Wednesday turned cool and cloudy with a temperature only managing around 15.5° C (59.9°F) through the day. 

Temperature & Sunshine Records 11-17 September 2020

We made the most of the good weather and had a couple of days visiting some National Trust properties. Our first visit was to Fountains Abbey and Studley Royal Water Gardens. We weren’t all that sure about how a visit would go taking into account the coronavirus restrictions. When we arrived the car park was very busy. In the large grounds of Fountains Abbey, there didn’t seem to be all that many people and we enjoyed our wander around the abbey and water gardens.

Our second visit out on Tuesday was to Clumber Park. Rather than make our usual walk around the more formal gardens we decided to find the path that led to the far side of the lake. This involves crossing Clumber Bridge which has recently been restored after vandals destroyed it.

Ruby enjoyed her visit on both days and it’s probably the longest walk she’s been on so far. She seems to enjoy a picnic lunch provided it was followed with a few pieces of apple for dessert. 

Although the weather has turned cooler there is no sign of any rain in the forecast so with any amount of luck we will be able to get some tidying up and digging done down at the allotment. It might even be the case that we need to water some of the brassicas and leeks that were planted recently.

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

Busy Time Harvesting

How time flies. I hadn’t realised how long it had been since my last post. That’s partly because there’s been nothing particularly unusual with the weather during the first part of September and because we’ve been busy harvesting and planting at the allotment.

It’s that time of year when we dig up our maincrop potatoes. They’ve done well this year and we should have enough potatoes to see us through winter. They’ve been sorted and dried and are stored in paper sacks in the garage. We’ve started picking apples although some need a little longer before they’re ready. The same is true for our pears. The ones we’ve picked are now boxed up and stored in the summerhouse. 

We were trying to dry our summer grown onions at the allotment but decided they would have more chance in the cold frame at home. The day after bringing all our summer onions back home our winter onions sets were planted.

With potatoes and onions harvested it now means we have plenty of beds ready for autumn digging. Last year at this time the ground was so dry we couldn’t get any digging done and once it did start to rain in the middle of September it didn’t stop all winter. Hopefully, this year we’ll get our autumn digging done and we’ll be better prepared for spring next year.

The forecast is for some warm weather over the next few days so I’m hoping to get some digging done as well as harvesting our remaining apples and pears.

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

Summer 2020 - Good or Bad?

Firstly let's consider the temperatures and rainfall for August.

Average Temperature & Rainfall Records August 2010 - 2020

As you can see from the table above it turned out to be a fairly average August, although it managed this with extremes of high and low temperatures. August 2020 recorded both the highest August temperature of 31.2°C (88.2°F), and the lowest of 3.9°C (39.0°F). Rainfall too was around average. We certainly had enough rain through August to keep the plot and garden watered.

Summer 2020 hasn't been one of the best. We've had a few very hot days but they have been just that a hot day rather than a prolonged spell of hot weather.

Average Temperature & Rainfall Records Summers 2010 - 2020

Summer 2020 finished 8th equal out of 11 summers which is rather disappointing. Rainfall over summer was above average but at least it meant we had very little extra watering to do. Certainly, the rainfall has no doubt helped towards a good potato harvest this year although we still have some maincrop potatoes left to lift.

We're only a couple of days into September but the rather cool trend has continued into the new month. 

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

Almost A Frost - In August!

Last night the temperature dropped to 3.9°C (39.0°F), almost cold enough for a frost. It's the coldest August night I've recorded in 10 years taking over from 31 August 2010, when the temperature fell to 4.6°C or 40.3°F.

Temperature Records 29-31 August 2020

August 2020 now holds the record for the highest and lowest August temperatures of the last 10 years. On the 7th and 11th, August the thermometer hit 31.2°C or 88.2°F.

Hopefully, tender vegetables, such as courgettes and beans, will have survived the cold early morning temperature.

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

Cold For Summer

The last week has been cold, windy and wet. It seems like autumn has arrived rather early this year.

Temperature & Rainfall Records 23-29 August 2020

The week's rainfall amounted to 29.0mm or 1.14in with most of it falling on Tuesday from storm Francis. It's brought this month's total up to 65.8mm (2.6in) which is around average for August. It's put allotment visits on hold this week.

Friday was one of the lowest daytime temperatures I've recorded in August with the thermometer only reaching a maximum of 14.0°C (57.2°F) making it the third coldest August daytime temperature since 2010.

August Daytime Temperatures 2010 - 2020

I've circled in red the lowest Daytime temperatures of the last 10 years. The forecast for the next few days is for the cool daytime temperatures to continue but at least it should remain dry. I might be able to make a start on lifting some maincrop potatoes over the weekend if the forecast is correct.

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

Weather's Going Downhill

The weather has certainly gone downhill from those hot sunny days of the middle of the month. The last week has been much cooler with some rain on most days although it hasn't amounted to anything significant. The month's rainfall now stands at 37.8mm (1.5in) which is around average for August.

Temperature & Rainfall Records 18-24 August 2020

In the middle of the month, the average temperature was on course for being the hottest August I've recorded but with the cooler weather of the last week and the forecast of cooler temperatures for the remainder of the month, it's unlikely to hold on to that record.

Whilst we were visiting the plot, between the shower,s last week I had to spend some time sorting out an issue with the pond filter. The water flow through the filter is usually pretty high, but over the last few weeks the flow had been getting less and less. Cleaning the filter helped a little but never really returned the flow to the sort of level I was used to.

By Sunday morning the flow had almost stopped completely so urgent measures were needed to sort out the problem before the water quality had time to deteriorate. I cleaned the filter again, but this time it had no effect on the flow. I removed the pump from the bottom of the pond and removed all the debris that had accumulated around the pump. I checked the pump was working before replacing it in the pond and allowing it to sink to the bottom. There was still no improvement. I undid the connection where the water enters the filter and found there wasn't much of a flow which meant that the pipe connecting the pump and the filter was blocked. There was nothing for it but to remove the pipe from the pond and see if I could find the blockage. The pipe runs behind all the plants in the photo above so removing it isn't the easiest of jobs. All this was done between taking shelter from the constant showers on Sunday afternoon.

The fish didn't mind all this activity and thought it was time that they got something to eat. Luckily I managed to find the blockage which turned out to be an old gasket. I'm not entirely sure how it got there though.

Of course by the late afternoon once I'd sorted out the problem the showers died out and it was a pleasant enough afternoon.

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

A Week of Storms and Torrential Rain?

Social media posts and the news have been full of details of the hot weather, storms, and torrential rain that have been around over the last week. I've got the impression that the whole country was affected by the storms judging by the pictures of lightning and flash flooding. A new term has even cropped up on the weather forecasts now "Tropical Nights" and apparently we're getting a lot more of them now than we use to. A tropical night is when the overnight temperature doesn't fall below 20°C or 68°F.

Temperature & Rainfall Records 10-16 August 2020

Our weather then didn't match up with the rest of the country. We certainly had a couple of hot days on Tuesday and Wednesday when the temperature made it to 31.2°C and 31.0°C respectively. That's 88.2°F and 87.8°F and high enough to get them into my list of top twenty hottest days. You'll see from the temperature records above that overnight temperature fell below the 20°C required for a "tropical night" and checking through my records we haven't managed to achieve that over the last 10 years. The nearest occasion was 01 June 2010 with 18.9 or 66.0°F.

As for the storms and torrential rain they never reached us either. In the garden, the lawn looks very autumnal covered in leaves and the grass turning brown through lack of rainfall. At the allotment too it's very dry.

These leeks at the allotment look very dry and they've been on the regular watering regime trying to get the young plants established. Strangely at the allotment, the grass paths continue to grow alarmingly quickly despite the lack of rainfall.

The forecast for today, Sunday was for some decent rainfall through the morning and afternoon but that once again has failed to materialise.  We've had some drizzly rain on and off all day ensuring that the ground is wet and putting any gardening on hold but, so far, only depositing 4.2mm or 0.17in of rainfall bringing August's total up to 9.4mm or 0.37in. Midway through the month, on average, we'd expect in the region of 25mm or around an inch of rainfall.

However, those hot days and a lack of rainfall are not a good gardening combination. There's more rain in the forecast for next week so I'm hoping we won't have to do too much watering. For record, purposes here is my table of the top twenty hottest days I've recorded.

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

Too hot for digging potatoes

We went to the allotment this afternoon (Monday) with the intention of digging up the rest of our trial potatoes. At home it didn’t seem all that hot but once at the allotment it soon became clear it was a bit too warm for digging up potatoes. The afternoon temperature reached 27.2°C or 81.0°F.

The tops of the potatoes are dying down now so the crop underneath isn't going to do any more growing.

I needed to change the crop protection for two of our beds. We had environmesh over our salad bed and normal netting over our new brassica bed. The better option was to have the Enviromesh over the brassicas to give some protection against aphids as well as cabbage white butterflies. It was hard work making holes, in our now rock hard ground, for the plastic piping supports for the netting covering our salad bed.

Besides swapping around the coverings on these beds we managed to do a reasonable amount of harvesting. We picked our first kohlrabi Ballot but we have no idea whether this is the right size for picking or not.

The intention is for this to be grated and added to our coleslaw mix. We also harvested cabbage and carrots both of which will be added to the kohlrabi in the coleslaw.

The forecast is for another warm day on Tuesday and Wednesday before temperatures fall back to normal towards the end of the week. I will probably leave digging any more potatoes until the weather cools down. We will probably have to do some watering this week as it’s been almost a month since we had any reasonable amount of rain.

 

Temperature and Rainfall Records 12 July - 11 August 2020

There is just the chance that we might get a thunderstorm which will save us from having to do any watering.

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