WEATHERING THE STORM

Mike Burks, Managing Director, The Gardens Group

As I write, we have had much lower-thannormal pre-Christmas temperatures, extraordinary weather in the US, and now record-high temperatures in parts of Europe. The chill of December is probably good news for the garden (although slightly early), as plants become dormant and will then be able to withstand the ravages of the rest of winter.

Advantages of a period of cold include the benefits for plants that need winter – blackcurrants for example, which will then set better fruit as a result. It may also mean that plant pests get nobbled, giving the garden a head start come the spring.

The challenge comes though when the weather warms suddenly. Some plants take that as a sign it is now spring, and early waking up followed by tough weather could cause problems.

With the amount of rain over the last few weeks and the very wet autumn surely has been enough to fill up the water levels in the ground, but over the Christmas period, we were walking in Yorkshire and noticed that the river Nidd is still dry in places. Where the river goes underground, that’s normally the case in the summer, but in the winter, it’s usually flowing at all points. Bizarrely though the reservoirs were overflowing, so it’s probably too much rain in too short a time and drainage working too quickly meaning the water is not filling the underground spaces. thegardensgroup.co.uk

The variability of the weather patterns caused by the changing climate has had some unusual impacts, including the magnolias in our garden flowering twice each year in the last 3 seasons. Quite why this is happening I’m not clear but it may be that a cool period after a hot spell is the trigger. Also, a now regular occurrence seems to be a second, late summer flowering of wisteria.

Last summer there were problems with the germination of wallflowers sown as seed in the heatwave. Sensibly the seed won’t germinate as it’s too hot but that means there was a shortage of plants in the autumn. Lettuce too takes umbrage at high temperatures when sown as seed and, as plants, will bolt (go to seed) much faster too.

In the long-term some studies suggest that yields of crops such as onions may be reduced as they will bolt earlier in the summer, whereas carrots may thrive with higher CO2 levels, and potatoes may have the same yield but with more but smaller tubers. Some of these impacts we are already seeing (onions are having a tricky time) but with others it will take longer to see what the changes will be.

The odd weather has an impact on us at the garden centre too, with a scrabble before Christmas to dust down snow shovels, search out grit for icy paths, and find the sledges – much of which was in vain although the grit salt came in handy! We had a run on watering equipment in the summer and at the same time were watering double time, luckily mostly using the water we had saved over the winter.

I’m not sure where this leaves us, but it’s a trigger to do as much as possible to be sustainable in our gardening. My top three are (1) to conserve water as much as possible by collecting your own rainwater, using natural mulches to keep the moisture in and to keep adding compost to the soil to make it more fertile and better able to hold onto moisture. (2) to keep our own garden waste and to convert it into well-rotted compost that can be used as a soil improver mentioned above and (3) to consider using companion planting principles which will also help encourage wildlife in the garden.

With the soil in good shape, so too will plants be in good shape, and they will be much better able to deal with the variations of the weather.