Kitchen Garden Forum

It never rains but it pours

Thanks for the map link, Geoff. You certainly do seem to have a rain pocket around Bowland!

Looking at our area, up to 75% of average is just about right. Average rainfall gives us a pretty unpleasant spring usually.

Fortunately I spent two sweltering afternoons Friday and yesterday cutting all my grass, lawns and field - first time it had been dry enough for several weeks. I was expecting a cooler, restful day today, but now the forecast has changed from cool and cloudy to heavy rain this afternoon. At least I won't be watering except in the polytunnel. And I won't need the grass cuttings as mulch

The map was interesting and confirmed how it has felt here. I'm in Cumbria very close to where Cumbria is closest to the Isle of Man. Just about average rainfall. There has been a difference though, I think, in that there have been more dry, warm days than is normal, with heavier rain on the days it has rained. This might explain why the outdoor plants are much as normal but the ones under glass seem to be earlier than I would have expected.

Regards

Ian

NB - yes my first row of peas are podding now too and as soon as they're finished I will definitely be chopping the haulms up and using them as mulch. I'm wondering how effective pet bedding straw is as a mulch. The problem is that the ground needs to be given a really good soaking first. I guess thereafter, only a really heavy & prolonged downpour would penetrate it and top up the moisture levels below the soil.

Could do with the regional figures as well as the percentages - 75% of a lot up here is still plenty but less than 20% of little in the East is very little, hope you see what I mean. Raining at the moment by the way, that's why I'm on here!

PS : should have searched before I posted - more stats than you can cope with, one example

http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/climate/uk/ ... rages.html

Geoff wrote:75% of a lot up here is still plenty but less than 20% of little in the East is very little, hope you see what I mean.

That's what I meant when I said "Looking at our area, up to 75% of average is just about right. Average rainfall gives us a pretty unpleasant spring usually."

And many thanks for the link.

Very welcome rain on and off all morning. Just hope it carries on for the rest of the day

Starting from the link above you can get to some nice maps by selecting "Regional Climates".
They can be slightly confusing. If you select "View the Regional Mapped Climate Averages" and select, for example, "Rainfall" and "Annual" and look at different areas you find dark brown in NW England is 600-1000mm but in the East it represents only 460-560mm.
You can look at the whole of the UK with "View the UK Mapped Climate Averages" which obviously is not as detailed but removes the anomaly.
What fun there is to be had while the rainfall stats are accumulating.
Keep seeing cyclists going past whiles typing then realised it was this http://www.le-terrier.co.uk/ (saw a sign yesterday).

Being in the less than 20% area, I am very happy to say we have had some steady rain all morning. Yippeee! The rain dance did it!
Primrose, hope you got some rain too, lately I save water that i wash veg in etc and water the beds, it goes through the straw mulch OK. This morning
something had been digging under the mulch, luckily it missed the plants, probably a badger after worms.

You are lucky NB, in our corner of West Sussex it has been spitting and spotting most of the day, but nothing that will do any good.

Well, despite what I said this morning viewtopic.php?p=93464#p93464 the afternoon has turned out hot and totally dry. At least I had a good nap, expecting to be rained off.

Elle, I hope the rain comes your way too soon, we had a few spits and spots last week. It will take a lot more though to make a real difference and fill the water butts. I had been waiting hoping for rain, so rushed out and planted the runner beans and sweetcorn and some outdoor cucumbers and courgettes, they should take before the next sunny day hopefully

Dear NB, thank you for sending it our way - it is with us now . Hopefully it will stay a while and penetrate further than the top 2 mm of soil!

Thanks for finding that map, Geoff - fascinating, isn't it? No rain here today, just, literally, a few spots (I thought it was bird pee at first) which did not even wet the ground. Come to think of it, birds don't pee, do they? They just poo.

And the wind is still so cold and unpleasant. Flaming June, eh?

Geoff
Fascinating figures. Here in Herts we are in East Anglia and the rainfall over the past three months has been 36%, 11% and 15% of average, which is why I was so happy when it was raining.
It was raining this afternoon too (affecting the Lords Test too).

However, my onions are looking better than any previous year

We've had light rain all night, which was very welcome

I suppose the slugs will be out in force now. Still, something else to moan about