This cold wind is taking its toll.

The cold wind which has been blowing from the East since February 20th is taking its toll in several ways, the worst of which is that the morale on the plots is pretty low and may leave its mark.

As we all know, everything is WAY behind, crops that are begging to be released from their cramped greenhouse and cold frame homes cannot be planted in such cold soil as we have at present. We have a good proportion of new allotmenteer tenants who were told at the end of last season not to despair as rarely did 2 consecutive bad seasons occur but unless there is a sudden change in the very near future of the weather pattern this will be the case. I do not want those young families to give up yet but who wants to spend their spare time with children for company on a cold,windy, cloudy allotment site ?
Just for interest, I have put two photos on of my garden at the same time of year, two years apart, the first in April 2011 and the other of the same view 2 days ago (6.4.2013).
Notice the cherry leaves, out full in 2011, now not even budding. Clematis over the arch in full flower in 2011, just thinking about showing buds now. The temp has been around 12 degrees different daily on average. This will knock on for the whole season as far as vegetables are concerned unless we get a lengthy Indian summer. Jet stream, please shift yourself northwards SOON!

 

 

2011
2013

Another talk given to a county garden club, this time the village of St Teath heard the tale of how, why,etc and listened to the journey of the long path to setting up this successful allotment community. The garden club had invited the local allotment group along too so I expected the varied and numerous questions at the end of my talk. I was heartily thanked by the club's secretary and exchanged emails with the allotment group for furtherdiscussions after mutually agreeing to swop visits in the near future. The constant frosty, icy evenings seem to relent a little for me to get home without any problem even tho frost set in later that night.

                              A pic of St. Teath village centre here.

We have one area undeveloped on site, one corner that is quite damp and haven't really known what to do with but after several similar suggestions, we are to plant an orchard  consisting of 3 pear, 5 apple, 3 cherry, 2 plum,
2 crab apple (for the blossom). These have arrived now bare rooted from Fothergills and must be planted as soon as I can, They were substantial trees, arrived well packed and represented good value at under £100 for the lot (exc. the crab apple).

I'll brave the cold wind this week coming, plant them with stakes and ties and if the weather doesn't change, it'll stay as it is. Makes sense.