Summer Weather

[astragalus]

Facing a week in the 90s (F) and still no rain.  Only the astragali and eriogonums are happy.  The garden is beyond parched and the usually lush field is brown and hard as rock - miserable summer.

[brianw]

Any water effect must be down to me under glass but my Rhodophiala (ex Harry Hay) is erupting with apparently 9 flower shoots breaking the surface over the last 2 cool nights.

[Matt T]

A good chance of catching the aurora borealis tonight if you have clear skies: http://www.swpc.noaa.gov/products/planetary-k-index

A planetary K-index of 4 or above should give an aurora display at our (Scotland) latitude.

Here's the chart for now as the webpage automatically updates:

[brianw]

Any water effect must be down to me under glass but my Rhodophiala (ex Harry Hay) is erupting with apparently 9 flower shoots breaking the surface over the last 2 cool nights.

The effect of 1 days growth. That closest to the front rim of the 9" pot is growing at 4mm an hour this evening.

[Maggi Young]

The effect of 1 days growth. That closest to the front rim of the 9" pot is growing at 4mm an hour this evening.

  Magical, isn't it ?!!   The joys of bulb  growing.

[brianw]

  Magical, isn't it ?!!   The joys of bulb  growing.

and 4 days on

[Maggi Young]

Great potful - aren't they  elegant?

[Anthony Darby]

Beautiful. 

[David Nicholson]

It's all the Jet Stream's doing! This has been the worst Summer, and there have been some pretty bad ones, since we moved to Devon 29 years ago. June was mostly nice but since then it's gone down hill at a pace. Yesterday was mostly dry, apart from a couple of short, but heavy, showers until the heavens opened around tea-time. The last four days have been unfailingly wet, the soil in the garden has a porridge-like consistency and any plant more than a few inches high is beaten into a sodden defeat. I really do, sometimes, feel like ripping the place apart, laying gravel over it, and go and do something else with my time. The thing is that it doesn't look as though it's going to get any better.

http://www.netweather.tv/index.cgi?action=jetstream;sess=

[johnralphcarpenter]

Hot and dry here, David. 30°C yesterday.   

[johnw]

Brian  - What a lovely pan of Rhodophiala.  Is this Harry's free-flowering R. spledens or bifida?  I've never been able to flower it.

As for weather it is abysmal here, temps are in the low 20's but the humidity is the worst I've seen it. Usually this last for 3-5 days but we're headed for our 3rd week of this. We've had to shut all the windows and doors as the everything would be sopping wet.  Just when you think it can't get any worse dense fog rolls in off the Atlantic in the evening.  Motion has slowed to a near stand-still. I nearly fell delirious from the heat of a boiled potato at the dinner table last night.    The ocean temps is at 20c and our favourite nearby by beach had water temp at 23c yesterday.  I pulled weeds 2 weeks ago and they sit in a pile growing away.

Friends are having a memorial today for parents, they were able to cut branches of two Rhododendron auriculatum and Magnolia grandiflora '24 Below' in full flower for the tables.  Those surely break a local record for late auriculatums.

Have a look at the humidex readings:

Yes it snowed in Calgary Saturday.

johnw
 

[johnstephen29]

Hi David the last few days have been lovely and warm here in East Lincolnshire, today started out great, I managed to get the hedge trimmed which I hate doing and also loath the hedge except if we didn't have it the garden would get blown to bits, then the heavens opened and it hammered it down.

[brianw]

Brian  - What a lovely pan of Rhodophiala.  Is this Harry's free-flowering R. spledens or bifida?  I've never been able to flower it.

johnw

That is what is available here as Rhodophiala ex Harry Hay. I also have R. bifida and R. pratense. From memory the first 2 are so similar I don't think I could tell them apart the last time they were in flower together, and the last not very little different. As their flowering time gets triggered differently depending on my treatment I don't always get them together to compare. I think they all flowered in the past just as easily. I will know over the next month or so. This year I have kept them dryer than I did in the past so need to get back into a routine.

[David Nicholson]

Looks like you will have a drop of moisture today Ralph Torrential stuff from late last night to further add to my porridge (soil) but just beginning to pass over now. with the next lot pending later today and tomorrow.

[johnralphcarpenter]

Correct! 1/3 of an inch so far, and very welcome too.