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A Gardener’s Weather Diary - October week 3
Saturday, 15 October 2011
We’ve got soil back
On Saturday two things made a very welcome return. Firstly the sun shone all day after a week hidden behind clouds and after a chilly start it warmed up quite nicely in the afternoon sunshine.
Secondly we have soil back at the allotment. After our dry spring and summer our soil was more like dusty concrete than soil. Now after last week’s rain it suddenly breaks up into a dark tilth when dug. Even the grass paths have a spongy feel to them now they’ve received some rain.
At last it was possible to dig over beds as we cleared our summer crops off them. We managed to plant our remaining garlic cloves in the plot and plant some peas (Meteor) to see if we have any success at over wintering them to achieve an extra early crop next year. They can’t really do much worse then some of our summer crops which failed to produce any peas at all.
In the flower bed adjacent to our shed we’ve planted some wallflowers to give some colour and perfume in spring time next year. Details of all our October plantings can be found on our web site by clicking here.
Sunday, 16 October 2011
Cooler nights
The last few nights have been pretty chilly, a reminder that it’s the middle of October, and those warm un -seasonal days at the start of the month are now just a memory. To give our fig a fighting chance this winter as it’s just started to come into leaf we’ve moved it into the greenhouse for some extra protection. Our fig tree has had a most peculiar growing year, a full description of its struggles can be found under “dead or alive”.
The last few cooler days look to have put an end to our record warm October and the daily averages temperatures are now below the record breaking levels of 2001.
Monday, 17 October 2011
A mixed bag
Monday was a day of all sorts. We had some brief glimpses of sunshine amongst the cloudy spells and then in the early evening a strong wind picked up and we had a little rain.
The amount of rainfall was only 2.0mm so after a rather wet start we are now below average for the month yet again. With the sudden drop in temperature, strong gusty wind and rain it was a pretty unpleasant evening.
Tuesday, 18 October 2011
Pear damage
Tuesday was a windy day with a good deal of sunshine but frequent squally showers throughout a cold day.
I thought I'd managed to pick all our pears, but as I found out that wasn't the case, as the gale force winds managed to blow a pear off the tree and straight through a pane of glass in the greenhouse. The hole in the glass is where you can see out. I didn't realise how dirty the glass had become. Another job to add to that never ending list.
It's not the first time this has happened and it just goes to show it's a really bad idea to have a pear tree overhanging the greenhouse. Fortunately the breaking glass didn't do any damage in the greenhouse as it fell on some benching that we are clearing for winter.
I'll be looking to replace the pane with plastic. I've just got to find somewhere that will cut it to size.
Wednesday, 19 October 2011
Just a memory now
Wednesday gave us our coldest day of the month. That warm start to October is just a memory now as an autumnal chill has kicked in. The average temperature for the 1st of October was 19°C but today we could only manage a maximum of 11.2°C.
Our average temperature for Wednesday finished at just 7.2°C. The forecast is for a frost Thursday morning with the cooler weather remaining until the weekend.
With frost anticipated it’s probably time for us to pick our medlars the last of our tree fruit for the year. They will need to be bletted, a technique we have still to master. Bletted to me is just before the fruits begin to rot completely and it’s a fine line between bletted and rotten. I’m sure we ended up with rotten last year.
Thursday, 20 October 2011
Still a little warmth in the sun
It was our first frosty morning of the autumn. The grass was white with frost a the greenhouse glass was frosted. The overnight low had dropped to 2.8°C.
There was a good deal of sunshine in the afternoon and it was pleasant on the plot as the sunshine still has some warmth left in it. It was more tidying up on the plot. We decided to cut down our dahlias which had survived the frost without damage. The soil is still dry and could easily be knocked off the roots. These were placed upside down in the greenhouse to dry off. Just how best to protect them over winter is still to be decided but I think some straw is probably going to be our preferred method.
As beds are gradually cleared of their summer crops the flowers in more permanently planted areas around the fruit trees are still full of flower or have attractive seed heads which will be left for the birds to feed on over winter.