Sizzling Summer Bits and Bobs.

[Primrose]

What a relief to wake to some cooler air this morning. Unfortunately we seem to have seen virtually none of the rain here. Some containers we left out on our patio overnight still barely have their surfaces moist so I doubt whether it has done any good at all. The straw- like surface which is our lawn is also barely damp so I doubt any of it has penetrated down to the roots.
I was so hoping we would have a decent overnight downpour. The ground is gasping for it.

The little twitten footpath near is almost ankle deep in dried fallen leaves and I spotted yesterday that the beech tree near us is already dropping beech mast The little "nuts" are completely empty. And poorly formed conkers are already dropping from trees in our local park. If wildlife is struggling with the drought now, some of it is going to struggle even more in autumn when food stocks will be very low for some of them.

[peter]

Had decided earlier in the week to meet my rugby friends for a beer Friday evening, third of the way there the first thunderstorm blew in, dog usually hides under the table during thunder, walking along quite calmly on the lead.
Halfway there on a narrow pavement my right arm brushed against a bramble, sudden intense pain, look at my arm to see a drunken wasp cheerfully injecting me. Had to divert quarter mile into town centre proper and back, to find somewhere in town still open that sold antihistamine, last time I was stung I had a monster swelling and dodgy reaction, thanks Tesco Express.
Got to my beers and got joshed a lot as I'm not usually seen with an alcoholic drink up the club.
We watched three further thunderstorms blow by, the dust has been properly laid, but it won't help our rock-hard pitches much. The frarmer in our group said that an inch of rain on one pitch is what's needed and in volume that's a quarter of a million litres, or about five full size articulated lorry tankers.

Nice to have cooler weather with an attendant breeze

[Geoff]

Bit of refreshment here, 3.6mm last night and another 6.1mm this morning. Many watering cans are 10 litres. A mm of rain is a litre per square metre so 10mm of rain is a can full per square metre so not a bad watering, might last a day!

[Monika]

Useful statistics, Geoff! We woke up to the lovely sound of heavy rain this morning. It produced 5mm so far but there is more to come, hopefully, especially tomorrow.

[oldherbaceous]

Strong winds and plenty of warmth, have dried any good the rain we had last night did...

[Primrose]

Have decided its s time to treat myself to a rainfall measuring gauge. There seem to be several available online. Then I'll be able to stop guessing how much pathetic rainfall we actually get !

Do those of you who have them just stick them in the ground or wherever and just leave them to get on with doing their , emptying them after every rainfall or are there ones which retain and measure annual rainfall? Any recommendations.

[Westi]

It's on it's way to those up North!

MattW you are definitely in the firing line for this yellow warning & totally right about floods! We were lucky as had those few showers last night to dampen the soil & avoid the run off! I'm silly though & want to get down to the lottie as my winter cauli's are outgrowing their pots & the winter leeks need evicting! The bees have had their share - I'll keep one for next years seed, but expect they have self sown already in the heat!

[Monika]

Primrose, we just have one of those funnel-shaped transparent plastic gauges stuck in the back lawn, away from overhanging trees, bushes or any other tall plants. I read and empty mine every night and record the result (as well as minimum and maximum temperature, air pressure and humidity) and have done so for more than 30 years. A friend at the other end of the village does the same but his equipment is automatic and computerised, and at the end of each month we compare results which are always remarkably similar. His gauge cannot cope with snow, however, whereas I just empty the snow into a bowl, melt it in the microwave and then measure the water - result! So I would certainly recommend a simple funnel-shaped thing.

[Primrose]

Thanks Monika. You won't have had much funnel emptying to do for the past few weeks ! I've decided this morning that my favourite sound of the day is the slow trickle of water into our water butts. Thank heavens for some steady rain this morning , although not sure how long it will last for.

We recently had to have our house front roof guttering slightly realigned as it was slightly angled towards the downpipe at the "wrong" side of the house, so no rainwater was being directed to the downpipe at the end where the water butts were connected.

[tigerburnie]

Just back from summer holidays in the Outer Hebrides, better see what damage last nights storm did.

[Stephen]

After Friday's storms, today's rain is ideal, soft and gentle. That does mean very small in volume but little run off. It will keep me off the plot until it stops, so I"m off to get some groceries.

[MattW]

Winds seems to have whipped most of the water away here but my butts are considerably healthier. Think I might have to invest in a water butt pump. Beginning to regret having such a long garden.

[oldherbaceous]

A real shame, my lovely heavy cropping Czar plum tree, split in half yesterday in the strong winds....really annoyed with myself, as I saw the split in the trunk mid week and thought it was a job for another day....

[Cider Boys]

Hello Old Herbaceous, I'm sorry that your plum tree has split, I know the feeling. I have had three of my very old apple trees split recently.

Best wishes

Barney

[Primrose]

Shame about your plum tree OH. I suspect that quite a lot of our trees have been feeling the strain and arre under stress as a result of the recent drought. Is anything at all which can be done to save it in terms of some hefty labour somehow pulling the two pieces together again and strongly strapping and binding the trunk together before disease has a chance to set in, or is the tree too old and heavy for that?

Is easy to think that because tree roots normally go so deep they can't still find water and survive in a drought but I wonder how much watering it would actually have needed to prevent this accident happening. An awful lot I suspect. You would probably need to leaves hose running all day to make a difference and difficult to know just how far the roots will have spread. That's a lot of water if you are on a water meter. .