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A Gardener’s Weather Diary - May week 4
Sunday, 22 May 2011
Missed it again!
Saturday was a breezy, mild mostly cloudy day. The main weather event was to be some overnight rain into Sunday morning. Once again it didn't happen and a couple of showers left us with a rainfall of just 1mm.
In the garden our border come hedgerow still looks good despite the lack of rain but the lawn is now dry and starting to develop some dry patches. The lawn won't get watered as it will soon recover once we have some rain.
Garden border
On the plot we have planted up our trial bed of club root resistant cabbages and cauliflowers. This is following the rather successful trial I saw last year on the Beech Grove Garden TV programme.
The plants have been well spaced out to give them plenty of growing space - perhaps it's a bit of wishful thinking. All the plants had produced excellent root systems in their module cells.
Cauliflower - Clapton and cabbages - Kilaton
Each planting hole was filled with water to give the plants a good start in the dry ground. They have been covered with butterfly netting to not only keep away the butterflies but also the wood pigeons who can devastate a crop in just one day.
Cabbages and cauliflowers after planting
Monday, 23 May 2011
Cute or not!
Sunday was to say the very least extremely windy. It was windy and sunny all day with the wind only relenting in the evening. Not a very pleasant day at all.
Wind speeds Saturday into Sunday
It most certainly wasn't a day for gardening and I thought about some bird pictures and then suddenly noticed that our large feeder had run out of sunflower hearts. This is rather unusual as I try to avoid it running out completely. It was then I spotted the likely culprit.
Looking cute and furry in the magnolia tree it was more than likely that this grey squirrel had finished off the sunflower hearts. It's a rather rare visitor to our garden.
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Grey squirrel
It was then that our neighbour's cat arrived on the scene to scare off the squirrel and any birds that were around.
This cat visits our garden on a much too regular basis It's quite a pest as far as the birds are concerned. I know a few places where in takes cover under bushes lying in wait for any unsuspecting birds. I think it knows the sound of my footsteps as it hastily departs our garden as soon as I approach.
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Just a nuisance
Tuesday, 24 May 2011
Windy yet again
Monday was yet another windy day. Will it ever stop?
Our cold frame is now chock-a-block with plants waiting to be transplanted into their final positions on the plot. I've been hoping for some rain so transplanting is easier but it looks as though it's not going to happen. I'll gradually start transplanting them as we shouldn't have any more frosts now so courgettes and winter squashes can be planted out. It will just involve watering them well to get them established until we eventually have some rain.
Our garden greenhouse tomatoes are now starting to grow rapidly in their grow pots and the larger plants now need securely staking so they don't collapse under the weight of tomatoes they will be carrying in August. Well that's the plan hopefully.
A packed cold frame
Greenhouse tomatoes
Wednesday, 25 May 2011
More young birds
The Chelsea flower show has started this week and there is much discussion about how the exhibitors are struggling with the recent hot weather. Do they refer to our superb April weather or the pretty average May weather which has been dry and windy so far. Unless something spectacular happens in the remaining few days of May, which isn't forecast, it will turn out to be virtually spot on average temperature wise.
Next week Springwatch returns to BBC. If they were filming here they would have missed most of the nesting birds. Young blackbirds and sparrows have been about for a week or so. I've managed to take a couple of pictures of a young robin and yesterday I photographed this youngster. We couldn't decide between greenfinch or goldfinch until it flew into the magnolia tree and received some food from a parent greenfinch.
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May 2011 average temperatures
Young greenfinch
Thursday, 26 May 2011
Fledged
Wednesday was mostly cloudy and breezy at times.
I visited the plot to water the tomatoes and to check if the recent strong winds had done any major damage. I thought the tomato plants would be dry as the plot greenhouse only has an automated vent and can get very warm in the sunshine but they were still moist which was a surprise.
The recent strong winds had removed the environmesh cover from the carrots and just a few bricks had probably stopped it blowing away all together. The mesh wasn't damaged and was soon put back in place. Just hope the carrot flies haven't had chance to invade our carrots.
Wind damaged carrot protection
Our three surviving blue tits fledged early this morning. All the details are on our video which can be found from this link.
Blue tits ready to leave nest
There were far more white roses than pink. Both are very pretty.
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Pink and white wild roses in flower
Friday, 27 May 2011
Showers are no good!
Thursday was another day with a few showers, a little sunshine early afternoon, but mostly cloudy. Although we had more showers they're not doing any good as far as watering the plot and garden are concerned. As soon as the rain falls it dries up in the sun and wind without any chance to penetrate into the soil.
In May we have received 26.4mm of rain, all in the form of showers which have soon dried up and this is shown in the graph on the left. On the right hand side is a graph estimating the amount of moisture that is lost from the soil based on the temperature, wind and sunshine for each day. This so far totals 61.0mm for May, more than twice the amount of rainfall. I'm sure we wont have lost all this moisture as it's not in the soil to be lost due to the previous dry months.
Saturday, 28 May 2011
Disappointing for May
Friday turned out to be much the same as the last few days, mostly cloudy and cool. The weather over the last few days has been disappointing for May. This month has not managed to reproduce the pleasant temperatures of April.
We went to Fairburn Ings RSPB reserve for a walk and it was the wild roses that stole the show from the birds. Along the walk there were lots of wild roses on flower and a sprinkling of foxgloves.
Fairburn Ings
Just like garden plants though these wild roses have to fight of the ravages of pests. This lone caterpillar was looking menacing on one of the wild rose bushes.
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Caterpillar on wild roses
