Weather 2012

Here is Campanula pyramidalis  - I think.  Fran

And another shot.  Fran

Trond, I should have said "I hope all of you who need rain, get some!" I don't imagine Lori is asking for any either- we haven't really had rain to the point of being a problem, and we have had some warm days between! I've started working on my third new planting area of the year, and its in the low end of the yard- that was pretty mucky yesterday, heading back out now...
I have started to have your problem, though- slugs! They were always around, but I rarely saw damage, but I just realised they were bothering more plants, including some in the rock garden- some of the damage was hidden for a while, I think, since it blended in with hail damage.. I had to put out some treats for them a couple of days ago, which I hope I have not been misled in thinking is not too toxic to anything but slugs?- some iron based pellets.. in future I'd rather just use DE in sensitive areas, but wanted to make a fast diffference so those plants can recover in the short time before cold weather starts...

Fran- glad you have at least some plants hanging in there!

Idaho has been hot with many days over 100F this summer. It did rain this morning, something most welcome but only made it humid. i notice that the plants in the  garden are mostly unaffected by the heat, even such seemingly sensitive species as Eritrichium nanum are seemingly unstressed. i have also noticed that even a slight drop in temperature for a few days and plant growth goes in to overdrive. The grasshoppers have come out with the heat and have been grazing on many of the alpines but i have held off on extreme measures since it seems that the grazing stops shortly after the first or second offense. perhaps the plants respond with their own countermeasures.

We continue with the up and down from day to day and even day to night- Last night was something like 7C, tuesday forecast for 15C as a high, and 28C again by the weekend; chance of showers or rain forecast for 4 out of 7 days... out now again for some more garden building and/or planting...

Coffee by the lake in Sylvan Lake Alberta, yesterday, while we waited for mom at the doctor... actually I only sat there long enough for the photo- yesterday was around -6C plus windchill, light snow over a couple of days and a little drifting.. Supposed to be above 0 by Monday, and 8 by Tues if they stick to that..

Trond- although it's not that cold out with a coat on- not hard to stay warm just below freezing- still at the beginning of the season it feels worse, and on a cloudy, windy day- I didn't stay out there long...lol Its very pretty and white here- it really does look like mid-winter with a few inches to nearly a foot of snow on the ground in various spots- and has just kept snowing (lightly) over the last few days.. And they took away our above 0 temps for Monday and Tues- now -1 to -4C and snow and clouds continuing right through! We still have plusses forecast, but only 5/6 Wed/Thurs instead of the 7/8 they had for Mon/Thurs.. looking more like this snow may last longterm!

Mark- congrats- hopefully- on the new job, and hope you don't get too much out of Sandy!

That's balmy alright, Todd! We were warm much of September, but that's warm daytime- we had regular frosts starting long ago-- which is a good thing here: if we don't have regular night frosts to tell the plants to get ready for winter, they can be caught out by sudden cold, as happened in 2009..

Keep safe all you East Coasters. No doubt we shall get the tail, and much diluted end, of it next week.

Sandy was half of the national news cast here tonight, too! Of course it's still a pretty significant storm for eastern Canada, too, one death already in Toronto, from windblown debris, and they mentioned 4 metre waves on lake Ontario; at least 70,000 people in Quebec and Ontario without power already, far more in the U.S.... I only recall one hurricane remnant from my 10 years in Toronto, but it wasn't that distinguishable from any other wet windy day..
Hope all are well and power outages are not too long lasting ..
Our forecast is for still below 0C temps next 2 days, then up to 10C by the weekend..

Good to hear you and yours are safe, Anne, I know that's not true for everyone..

And we've been mostly below average since winter descended on October 20 and we have had snow since then, even though we had some melting a couple of days; now around a foot (variably) on the ground.. We got to somewhere below -20C the other night, but now are supposed to warm up again, possibly as high as 5C daytime this week, average now is 0C..

! My internet connection is not nearly good enough right now to try to see videos-- is this a serious effort?

The last few days we were several degrees above freezing, but now we have a week forecast with highs from -4  to -14, today through Thursday the coldest.. Snow forecast for 3 of 7 days, but doesn't look like it should be much (knock on wood!)

Trond - I really enjoyed the video and was gullible enough to think it was for real.  However, even as a parody, it is well done and I have deep admiration for the people who made it - and aren't they a good looking lot?  Fran

Frances Howey
London, Ontario, Canada
Zone 5b

Hoy wrote:

cohan wrote:

! My internet connection is not nearly good enough right now to try to see videos-- is this a serious effort?

No, it is a parody and ironic work of students ;) (if I remember right)

That's good- I thought maybe with your recent rain the country was washing away  ;)

or Weather 2013. (whether or not we like it)
Predict -6F (-21C) Wed night in NE Massachusetts, USA.  This takes me below what I feel is the effective USA zone 6a.  Some snow tonight.  Our coldest weather may come Feb. 7-14; so this winter may be quite a ride.  Will be spreading some salt marsh hay and putting out bait for voles, perhaps after digging out in the AM.  Will try to cover Allium "Summer Drummer", approaching 2 ft in height, with Styrofoam.  Will cover Cyclamen hederifolium and purpurescens/repandum, which are all wonderfully leafed out, so inappropriately for a long, dim, frigid winter.  Neighbor in adjacent town reported Cyclamen growing in her lawn, so with gardening, there's always a place for hope (I hope).

Charles Swanson Massachusetts USA z 6a (lows possibly from -13F to 3F more or less)

I think officially the UK has had the wettest year on record (and probably our records go back as long as anywhere). Where we are in Kent our average rainfall is about 25 inches per year - this year we have reached over 35 inches! It is all relative of course and there are many people in areas of higher rainfall in the west, and near rivers, who have had a really bad time. For many of the later flowering woodland species it has been a real benefit. However, to put this in perspective I think the lowest rainfall ever recorded in the UK was in Kent, back in the 1920's, at around 10 inches or less, and we generally fluctuate between around 20 inches (very rare) and 30 inches (more common). This will all seem very mild for those gardeners in continental climates, or further north in Scandinavia, where the weather is so much more dramatic, but we are a nation of definite weather watchers!!

Still considering ourselves lucky here compared to so  many places with troublesome weather! Our winter (at least as measured by snow on the ground) started very early, but while we've had a lot of below average temps since late Oct, on the other hand we still haven't had much in terms of extreme cold, which we could have easily by now.. Also no really heavy snowfalls even though it's been white more than 2 months..
knock on wood!

Was hoping to head back into the mountains to pick a few seeds after the New year but saw the forecast . Might stay home for a bit and see what happens

http://www.metservice.com/national/warnings/severe-weather-warnings