Kitchen Garden Forum

Johnboy wrote:Hi NB,
I still fall into the same category as you and hereabouts because of the hills it can rain all day just 1.5 miles away and here we will get no rain at all but that is typically British weather and nothing to do with a drought or global warming.
Traditionally the south coast, where you and PJ live, have been boasting for many years that you get more sunshine than we do up here and really there is your answer.
Because this year there is a drought condition about, your area is really bound to be the first to suffer. You cannot have record amounts of sunshine and then complain that because of the sunshine you are so hard done by when you have no rain. It is simply a fact of life!
Nobody has suggested that mulching would not help in this situation so I really cannot see your argument.
JB.

Hi Johnboy,

Many thanks for confirming the highlighted part. I think that is the point NB was making, so it's good to see the pair of you agreeing

..... and I was wondering what argument
After the detour, back to blackberries, a nice crumble with blackberry and apple perhaps.

As for the apples, they seem remarkably early to be cropping already down your way

Here in Carmarthenshire the blackberries are only just starting to form and l doubt if we will be picking before September, so may I respectfully suggest that all of this is nothing to do with global anything, but just part of the normal cycle and variation.

I did not actually say they were our apples Alan, actually we don't have a bramley apple tree, they were kent bramleys bought in our local independent supermarket. Though it appears you doubt we have apples Alan, but yes you can be as as you like, we are eating the first apples from our triple apple tree, my partner took the first in his lunch box yesterday, crisp rosy and sweet.

Colin I did not mention global warming, but for us it is weird to get ripe blackberries in July, it used to happen in september, and I well understand there are regional differences, so keep your cool.

NB - I didn't mention Global Warming.

OK Colin, sorry, I was just wondering if not what global anything means ?

When I said global anything I meant global anything. NB quite rightly referred to climate change, something that is always with us. If you read books like 'The Wrong Kind of Snow' then you will realise that extremes are always with us. Even in the Little Ice Age there were very hot summers and warm winters. Temperatures over the last 15 years or so appear to be at a standstill, but who knows what will happen in the future. Sun-spots are extremely low when they should be high and this raises all sorts of interesting scenarios. I keep a weather station and can vouch for the recent reports about it becoming less windy over the past few years. This seems to be global phenomen too even though instant 24 hour reporting gives a very different impression.

JW - what can I say. Trying to establish facts should not be interpreted as bullying, but it can sometimes be difficult to deal with opinions when these expressed as facts. You will no doubt have seen the comments on the other thread from KG.

So far I have picked eight and a half pounds of blackberries from the brambles around our allotment site.They are a bit maggoty but soaking them in a brine and vinegar solution soon sorts them out.Global warming or global anything, they'll be turned into Bramble Jelly!!

TV Report I saw recently on how early apples are in the UK - it certainly has been a strange year. Lincolnshire was also included in the state of drought, although we never got a hosepipe ban. It allowed water companies to take measures - but I am unaware of any taken so far.

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I wanted to reply (above) on the topic because it interests me (Weather patterns, global warming) - but yet again it's annoying to see the petty bickering going on amongst a selected few on this board.

As much as I wanted to avoid doing this, some clearly don't want to change and are hereby suspended from the forum. You will be contacted directly.

For everyone else, please keep chat friendly, non-personal and on topic of kitchen gardening..
If you ever feel a topic has turned nasty or badly off-topic, let myself or a Moderator know.


KGAdmin

I hadn't seen the TV report about early apples, but they are indeed very early, the pears in the garden look ready to pick too. With predictions from mini ice age to runaway warming it is difficult to come to any conclusions. However the weird effects we are getting is challenging for gardening in general ! We went a long time with no rain but like you no hosepipe ban as far as I was aware, we have lots of water butts, which helps save on the water bills.

It is unfortunate that climate, which is taken as average weather over 30 years is - well, taken over such a short period of time. And our memories play tricks.

When we went on a early Spring walk with our 88 year old leader this year, he commented that this was the latest Spring he could remember - ergo Global Cooling. Fast forward to April/May and the strawberries couldn't wait for Wimbledon - Global Warming. Now in July my Runner Beans are the latest I can remember. But how long do our memories cover when compared with some of the weather cycles of perhaps 400 years, 1000, 26,000?

Last Thursday I was comparing July weather records with a friend about 5 miles away. Temperature and pressure records much the same - their rainfall 58.4 mm, mine 99mm. The UK is a nightmare for weather forecasts as micro-climates are ten a penny. This is why, for newcomers to gardening, or indeed in my case as a newcomer to an area (only 6 years), it takes time to learn what will or will not grow in yourt particular area. Global weirding is, I suggest, fairly normal really.

Nature's Babe wrote:As global warming becomes global weirding, and change becomes the norm.
It used to happen in September, but we're picking wild blackberries already down here, so they are vey early this year.

Like last year there are virtually no wild blackberries round here, nor signs that there will be. We had become accustomed to picking them in August; now we just don't have them.

That is strange indeed Alan, do you have any theories about why that might have happened ? Blackberries are one of summers treats, and bramble jam or jelly is my sons favourite. Our garden had been untended for twenty years when we moved in here and it was a mass of overgrown shrubs, nettles and brambles - still is full of brambles around the trees in the wild strip beyond our garden.

Nature's Babe wrote: do you have any theories about why that might have happened ?

Not so much theories as an explanation. The last good summer we had was 2007, or was it 2006? The last few summers have been wet, dull and cold. This year is even worse