Monday, 02 January 2017

Provisional Seeds Orders Underway

A rather belated Happy New Year to anyone who reads the ramblings about my gardening exploits and weather musings.

 

Sunday wasn't a great start to the new year with a damp, cold and cloudy day. The temperature steadily fell from 10.0°C (50°F) at midnight, as the new year began, to 3°C (37°F) by the middle of the afternoon. The day's rainfall amounted to 6.6mm (0.26in) our wettest New Year's Day I've recorded.

 

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Rainfall & Temperature Records for 01 January 2017

 

The start of the new year is a time to look forward to a new gardening year and we're busy sorting out our seed and plant orders for the next season. It also involves setting up our new web site for 2017 where I record our planting and harvesting details. Our provisional seed list for 2017 can be viewed by clicking here. I'm sure it isn't a complete list and I'll need to keep amending it as the season progresses.

 

By the time our new web site is sorted out it will hopefully seamlessly link with both our blogs.

 

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In the garden there are already signs that the start of the new gardening year is under way as the first bulbs push their way through the frosty ground.

 

Wednesday, 04 January 2017

A Windy Start

If temperature was the only thing that mattered Tuesday wouldn't look too bad with the temperature reaching 7.8°C (45.0°F) a little above what we might expect in early January. However, there was a bitterly cold, gale force wind blowing for much of the day. Our wind speed records for Tuesday indicate higher values than we had for either storm Barbara or Conor at the end of December.

 

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Temperature and Wind Gust Speeds for 29 December 2016 to 03 January2017

 

At least it's kept any frosty weather at bay for the first few days of the year.

 

Friday, 06 January 2017

Ready Frozen Veg!

Wednesday and Thursday have been much better January days with some long sunny spells. However, sunny by day at this time of year usual means frosty by night and the last couple of days have backed this up.

 

Funnily enough on Thursday we'd visited the greengrocer's in Horbury and bought some fresh fruit but we turned down the easy option of buying a few vegetables deciding instead to check out the state of the vegetables on the allotment. We arrived down at the plot in the middle of the afternoon to find the grass still white with frost.

 

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It was crunchy to walk on and as you walked icy footprints were left embedded in the grass. I'm sure it wasn't doing the grass much good but it's tough stuff down on the allotment. Although the sun was out there was still frost on the ground.

 

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Clearly there hadn't been enough warmth in the sun to melt the frost. After taking some photos and video I decided I'd better see if our vegetables were still edible.

 

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Carrots - Autumn King, Parsnips-Gladiator and Leeks-Below Zero

 

This little lot along with a few Brussels sprouts should keep us going for a few days.

 

Saturday, 07 January 2017

Doesn't Feel Any Warmer

It was a little bit milder on Friday but the downside was, it was cloudy with a little bit of light rain on and off throughout the day. At the beginning of the year, it's tricky to know when to start blogging about either the mildest or coldest days of the year.

 

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Temperature & Rainfall 2017

 

As we are now a week into the new year I've decided the time is right. Our mildest temperature of the year occurred as the midnight hour struck and the new year began when the temperature was 9.2°C or 48.6°F and the coldest was 05 January when it fell to -1.7°C or 28.9°F. There's a fair chance that the lowest temperature of the year will be set in the next two months whereas we'll have to wait for June, July and August for the highest of the year.

 

Thanks to our plot neighbour I've been able to repair a section of our compost bins.

 

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One of the old interwoven timber fence panels used to construct the compost bins was falling apart and no longer able to hold any material back. I was given a sturdy piece of timber fencing panel and thought I'd get it in place before anyone else decided to make use of it.

 

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I've erected it in what I'll term a temporary fashion although knowing me it may well finish up a permanent job. At least I might try to knock in the posts a little bit more which won't be so straightforward as the posts are starting to split at the top. The climbing rose in front of the fencing panel needed some further serious pruning but I expect it to recover.

 

I've finished editing a short video made on our first visit to the plot in 2017 on a very frosty afternoon.

Disclaimer

This weather site is operated as an amateur weather station site and should not be used as official data. I make every effort to ensure my data is as accurate as possible but I cannot guarantee that the data meets the requirements of the Meteorological Office or other professional weather monitoring organisations.

©M Garrett 2016