What's up with your weather? How is it affecting your crops and breeding projects?
I had frost on the mornings of June 9th, and 10th. That's about 2 weeks later than average. No worries, I had only set out commercial varieties of tomatoes. The plants from my Beautifully Promiscuous and Tasty Tomatoes are still in a heated greenhouse.
Some tomatoes got damaged, even covered, in my coldest field. They did fine covered in my warmest field. Here in the mountains, topography makes a huge difference in where frost settles. And frost can often be attributed to radiant-freeze from the night sky, rather than freezing from cold temperatures. For example, I figure that on a clear night the leaves of plants will freeze at 40 F.
I planted common and tepary beans for a cold/frost tolerance testing on May 5th. I was delighted that they finally received some frost damage. This is the third year of treating them that way, and I didn't plant a control, so I was wondering if they were frost tolerant, or if they just didn't get a frost.
Our spring started warm, well hot really and rather dry. Early planted things took off pretty good. I started digging the first patch of potatoes, just for immediate use a couple weeks ago. There were no frosts this year to help select the more tolerant volunteer tomatoes, they are blooming now but so are some of the transplanted ones.
Last couple weeks, especially starting last Wednesday unusually cool wet moved in. About 9 inches total rain with most of it in two downpours with pretty much steady drizzle in between. Weeds are pretty established all over but my crops are well ahead of them. First patch of corn although badly lodged in the first storm last week has recovered and is about waist high. Noticed first flowers on common beans last week. Harvested turnip and a few radish seeds this morning and pitched the old plants between the corn rows for mulch.
Dry breezes and sunshine today so getting a lot of weeding done before the next round of rain, scheduled to start tomorrow.
My sweet potatoes are doing fine but I am a little worried about getting my new ones from the grower in Iowa. Weeks of cool rain there prevented their parent roots from sprouting slips. Assuming they come along with better weather there I may not get them till July but that should still be workable. I saved my slip roots and they continue to pump them out so I won't have any empty spaces in any event. Continued cool wet or even intermittent bouts of it will be an issue for sweet potatoes, they don't like that at all even for seed production.
I realized my past strategy of selecting for drought tolerance is a mistake, it doesn't help with rapidly fluctuating anomalies or extremes. My new strategy is fast maturity, allowing me to get some harvest during hospitable periods and multiple planting and harvests in more uniform seasons.
The 100 day frost free period has really become a 130-150 days period nowadays, getting corn to at least half dry on the plant before the first killer frost is so much easier. This is the first year where Ive managed to picked undamaged Granny Smith apples off the in winter, my tree use to lose the fruit in late March/ April 20 years ago, nothing nicer than a yellow skin ripe GS apple off the tree.
Most of our yearly rainfall falls in winter but rainfall so far this year is down on normal, had to dig a posts in a week or two back and found the clay that's at 30cm down still rock hard and dry, so more rain is needed but 10 day forecast shows little ( 4mm).
Snow, old folk from this area use to always say, ' it snows here 3-4 times every winter', and it did for the first 10 years here, but it hasn't snowed for 3 years now, will it do so this winter will be interesting?. Here in NZ we are seeing a rapidly changing climate which I put down to that we are surrounded by water, its known the oceans are warming faster than what was predicted and its certainly showing it. But i do have to say its made gardening much easier.
How is the weather?
My first instinct was to answer with 'crappy!' and just leave it at that :P it's been a disaster this year so far.
Honestly it's been so unpredictable and unreliable that my skills at finding the right time to sow and plant seem to get worse every year. The old rules don't work anymore and the generic 'standard weather year' seems to be a thing of the past.
Average temperature in May was colder than April, which was the first time since these things are recorded.
I already found mushrooms (Boletus edulis) in the woods that usually should come up towards the end of July with their peak in August. They are starting a good 6 weeks too early this year.
Last year was too dry and hot.
This year is cool and wet so far. Lost some plants to root rot in free draining sandy soil, which says a lot.
I am in the middle of california at about 2000 foot elevation,
I got snow about 5 times,
it use to be snow happened here about every 10 years, last 3 years I get snow a few times each winter.
this year I got a spring that was more overcast and rainy than most of my winters are,
it went from daily high temps of 40F to 50F and so overcast or rainy that nothing grew to full summer temperatures and full sun in a single day.
it was bad enough that sugar peas can't grow here well at all, any spring grown cool weather thing went to seed before they grew at all
the summer garden is just fine as I have a long growing season, so I can loose a few months on the edges and just be fine,
but my winter garden no longer happens as conditions are just to harsh in winter.
Last few days have been warmer than normal while still being very dry too, still no rain looking ahead the next 10 days, high air pressure means there will be frosts during this period though.
We have had cool temps and rain almost everyday this month. I haven't seen much in the way of mildew or the like so glad about that but nothing is growing like it should, just not enough sun. Cincinnati OH to the east, reports about 7 inches for the month but my gauge measures to 5 inches and has been full and emptied three times. Yesterday was the first full day of sun this month with just a little rain after dark. I got a lot of weeding done and some mowing.
A lot of the big corn and bean fields north and west in the flat lands were never planted and much of what was either didn't come up or is turning yellow in the mud.
Another 1 and 1/2 inches in 1/2 hour little sprinkle last evening and possibility of another one today. Then supposedly a few days of mostly sun, will see I reckon.
We currently have the largest and strongest high air pressure cell on the planet sitting over us at the moment, meaning no winds, sunny and night time frosts (-2.8C this morning), due to move off to the east this weekend which will allow warmer sub tropical air to move down onto us.
A northerly wind flow from the tropics has delivered some incredibly warm overnight temps for the middle of winter,18.2C or 64.7F at 6.00am
Currently 96F on my thermometer, about 35.5C I reckon, and very dry. I started marking the calendar every day over 90F or 32.2 C. I don't know why but 90 seems a threshold for me as far as going out to work, actually anything over 85 depending on humidity can send me to the shade. I work from dawn till about 11 AM spray off with the garden hose and don't go back till the sun falls below the trees in the west. I'v though about getting one of those little flashlights you wear on your head so I don't have to wait for daylight.
I don't know if my thermometer is accurate or not, how would a person know that? It's very old, in a heavy brass case. I remember when I bought it at the LL Bean store in Maine I did so partly cause all they had on the same shelf, in the same spot read the same so I figured they had to be pretty good or they would vary, like most others I'v seen do. Still it is always off from the "official" readings on the TV which come either from Louisville KY or Cincinnati OH. They will often say for example the high was 88 or the low was 5 when respectively mine said 92 or -1. Don't seem possible if mine was inaccurate that it could be so in both directions. Plus both of those places are miles away. Mine is against a concrete wall under a porch so the sun never hits it, if it was wrong I would guess it would be on the lows not the highs. O'well I don't really care, it says 96 and it's hot and I like my old fancy brass thermometer so I as far as I'm concerned it is the authority.
I got invited by a university to participate in an on-line project to map location specific temp and precipitation for my state. Just have to log in everyday and report for my spot. I went to the presentation but lost interest during the introductory explanation of the difference between weather and climate. Also it sounded like a lot of trouble logging into a web site everyday, I was afraid it might interfere with my afternoon naps.
Even in the shade thermometers need to be in screens, I remember when I had want I thought was accurate place south side of a post, 1.25m above ground, never had sun on it even during the longest day, built a screen to house and boy want a difference in recording, 2-3 degC drop in max temp.
A lot of snow disappeared off the mountains today due to warm winds, they had very little snow anyway, I can see some of NZ ski fields will go broke in the coming years, its half way through winter nearly yet most are still closed due to no snow.
Even in the shade thermometers need to be in screens, I remember when I had one what I thought was in a accurate place south side of a post in a windy place, 1.25m above ground, never had sun on it even during the longest day, built a screen to house it and boy want a difference in recording, 2-3 degC drop in max temp.
A lot of snow disappeared off the mountains today due to warm winds, they had very little snow anyway, I can see some of NZ ski fields will go broke in the coming years, its half way through winter nearly yet most are still closed due to no snow.
We had a low of 3°C tonight, now it's almost lunchtime and it's 11°C. With drizzling rain, just interrupted by heavy rain.
Next week looks slightly warmer and less wet, but still cold for July (8°-16°C).
Ah well, the joy of Swedish summer ;) just saw tourists in winter jackets with hats and mittens at the gas pump, while the neighbours kids walked around in shorts and t-shirts to buy ice cream hahaha.
Anyhow, I'm guessing that the greenhouse will not produce a ripe tomato before August and I might have to build a roof for the TPS seedlings, they are drowning. Lost about 25% to root rot by now.
Got some nice rain. Garden soil is nicely moist again and just got my well controller fixed so haven't watered yet this year. Have been having a weird oscillation between hot and cold. Maxima and one moschata squash caught some June frost- noticed the damage about a week later. Tomatoes put on some serious growth this week.
Halfway through winter and still no snow on the ground which is the fourth winter in a row, hasn't even rained much at all either.
Started my tomatoes yesterday, only Persimmon and Peron ive chosen for this growing season, though that is not counting the volunteer cherries that pop up around a propose built frame.
After the almost 20 inches of rain in the first 21 days of June it turned hot here. End of June and all of July hovered in range of 32 - 34 C and no rain. Not an especially good gardening season.
Today was nice however, only about 29 and some clouds, even a few drops of rain and a little bit of thunder, not enough to measure but sure felt good. Fingers crossed we will get something more substantial when the current tropical depression, formerly hurricane Barry arrives.
Quote from: reed on 2019-07-15, 03:03:59 PM
After the almost 20 inches of rain in the first 21 days of June
We have only had half that this year
It keeps raining here. The grass hasn't dried down like it usually does. No forest fires yet.
It's 1am and I'm sweltering here feeling amphibious with highs of 39C to look forward to later today. Thunderstorms forecast for the evening, thank goodness.
We had a hot spell June 22 - July 19 without a drop of rain and temps every day in low 90s F. July 21 - 22 we got about 11 inches and it's been very pleasant since then. Didn't really need 11 inches at once but feel lucky as places nearby got none, others got more.
Ground was cracked pretty badly so even though it came in downpours a lot of it found it's way in and ground is in pretty good shape right now. It's very weird how these intense little storms drench one spot and leave others dry.
Very glad that the fires are not so bad this year, my sister near Denver can breath outside this year. Satellites show most of the big fires this year are way north in the Arctic, apparently a lot of peat deposits have dried out and are on fire.
Not good to hear about peat fires in the Arctic.
Winter has continued to so none winter like with no Antarctica cold blasts, this is far from normal.
After all the rain and thunderstorms and cool wet summer weather (even for Swedish summer) - we have suddenly entered a hot week. 30C with high humidity and no wind.
The plants are suffering from not having developed big root systems, the soil is still moist atm but they can't keep up with evaporation.
I'm also waiting for blight to rise out of nowhere anytime. Perfect blight and mold weather now.
There's a chance that Sunday might bring the first snow in four years. From always having some snowfalls in winter to having none for the last 4 years its felt odd not having it, having grass stay green all winter and still keep growing is odd also.
I'v though about how to description the weather, I suppose odd is as good as any. Normal sure doesn't apply, it hasn't been normal here in twenty years, probably more. It also hasn't switched to something else consistent enough to be thought of as a new normal. It just keeps getting more and more freakish. We already went through snow disappearing from winters, that started gradually thirty years ago.
Some new things from past few years that amaze me is how much it can rain in a period of an hour or two, five, six inches or even more and it can do it in one spot and ten miles away not a drop. And how fast it heats up and dries up when it's done. We've had thirty inches in June and July and right now dry as a bone. The so far brief but spooky -25 C snaps in winter are new too.
Very little of any industrialized crops are going to be harvested in Indiana this year. The big irrigation systems installed over last 10 - 20 years didn't help a bit cause all the big flat fields were swamps at planting time. Yep, pretty odd.
Forest fires started. Heated up. Still geeenish. Direct seeded dry farmed tomato experiment seems fine but will be late.
At the point now where my tunnelhouse is warming nicely during the day so the tomato seedlings safely go out there permanently till plant out time early Nov.
Didnt even come close to snowing over the past weekend so its starting to look like this might be year #4 without snow
Still just hot and dry here. Can't go play in the creek, it dried up.
Supposed to catch a lot of rain this weekend. Intrigued.
Tomato project should be fine from here out afterward.
Unbelievable coastal gales for this time of year. I fear for my crops :(
The southern hemisphere is starting to enter a very strong Sudden Stratospheric Warming event http://joannenova.com.au/2019/08/rare-sudden-stratospheric-warming-in-the-southern-hemisphere-cold-weather-coming/
How this is going to pan out is anyone's guess but it may not be great for the Camote while being cooler thus more suitable for TGS.
It's just real real dry here which is great for maturing and drying of sweet potato seeds. Not good for much anything else. Supposed to be some chance of rain in next few days but also supposed to be getting hotter for awhile. It's been pretty pleasant temperature wise for last couple weeks, mid 80s F and down in 60s at night. Yesterday was 94 F and supposed to be hotter in coming days. Very dry air is odd for the Ohio Valley but makes the heat far less oppressive.
Lots of rain here in southern WI. Reasonably warm weather between storms. This has been one of those years when I'm glad my farm is on such a steep hill. I watched my grandfather's farm get flooded out 3 out of every 5 years, so "not in a flood plain" was on my list of dealbreakers when shopping for land. It may be near-vertical in spots, but it will never flood!
I'm hoping for a late fall to make up for our late spring. I am seeing a weather indicator that I've never seen before: this year all the woolly worms on my property are blonde!
Now that we have made it through winter with yet again no snow on ground (4 years in a row) spring is looking like its going to bring extreme weather somewhere in the Southern Hemisphere because of the current very strong SSW that's right at its peak ATM, how its going to pan out weather wise no one knows but they do know that vast amounts of cold air will flow out from Antarctica. They also believe that earths troposphere will cool increasing tropical storm development
https://watchers.news/2019/08/22/southern-hemisphere-sudden-stratospheric-warming-2019/
I don't know if old maps actually said it or not but concerning the new unknowns of weather, the phrase "here there be monsters" sums it up pretty good, IMO.
When compared to the NH these SSW events are rare but its unknow if they are stronger as a result, computer models had the stratosphere above Antarctica at a 110 C deg differential, this is how the polar vortex is looking ATM, very out of shape and on the verge of breaking up.
(https://i.ibb.co/hYCPm1y/Capture.jpg) (https://imgbb.com/)
Your lucky, at least ya still got one. Ours has practically stopped. Not to be outdone though if last year is an indicator in a couple months we'll have 1/2 a dozen.
That graph you posted shows troposphere jet stream, the one I posted stratospheric polar jet vortex which when in this case goes hay wire sends the lower troposphere jet streams into chaos
Could be, I don't know. I'm not very knowledgeable about the atmospheric layers, air pressures and the like. The image I posted came from earthnullschool but I don't know what the different graduations on that site actually mean. I just went to the site to see if I could find more about it and after tinkering I found an image that looked just like yours. On the menu it's Mode- Air, Height - 70 and Overlay - Wind. I don't know what 70hPa means though, does it correlate to a more common unit of measure or is something else?
Any way with those settings I found an image at the South that looked almost exactly like yours and tilting the earth north with the same settings it's want I found. Here is another screen shot, with the site's menu showing and the settings I had selected. This shot shows portions of both, quite a difference to be sure but I don't really know what that means either.
If you click on the 10hPa, that is the height of the ozone layer of about 30km above earth, its the ozone layer that is going through turbulent period because the sun has returned back to the southern pole. The height is measured in air pressure, 10hPa being the lightest. Dont know why they cant have' Height' in height numbers instead of air presure
I dont understand what the bottom line 'projections' means though
I guess the projections are just different ways of displaying. I mostly use the site to watch CO and CO2 concentrations, guess I got a morbid fascination with it. CO is a good way to see fires, like the one in Alaska and those in Brazil right now. High CO is "normal" of course over places like New York, Los Angles, China and so on but when you see a dramatic one in a place like interior Alaska it ain't from folks commuting to the mall. I don't think there are any natural sources of CO other than volcanoes or fires. If ya zoom down on Kīlauea in Hawaii it is putting out a respectable amount but it can't hold a candle to the cities, let alone the fires. In most instances maybe all, where there's CO there is also CO2.
When I first found that site just a couple years ago it was pretty easy to still find spots with CO2 below 400 but it's a lot harder now. Even the Amazon or what's left of it, can't keep it below 400 anymore. Last winter while NH trees were dormant was first time I saw any spots over 500, they were small and fleeting. Bet that changes this year.
Going by the amount of smoke over Borneo there would be high levels of CO2
(https://i.ibb.co/cb7x9dF/b.png)
Yep, looks like a couple of hot spots there, CO2 of 438 was the highest I saw seems to originate close to the southern coast with a coupe intense sources of CO. A really hot one west across the water near a place called Jambi. Doesn't look like a very big city so must be a fire, hard to tell in areas where I'm not familiar with the geography. with CO fires and cities look a lot alike except fires are generally more intense at the source and cities are more constant.
Concerning how it effects my garden and breeding projects for one thing I'v completely abandoned the idea of saving potato seeds, maybe even of growing potatoes. Peas also are far harder to grow that they used to be. It's gonna be hard selecting for things that can tolerate extremes of heat, cold, wet, dry perhaps alternating in the same season.
Sweet potatoes are becoming one the easiest things for me to grow and breed. Even if cool wet spells in summer degrades seed production they still produce roots and since seed keeps for years it's easy to always keep a back up supply. Beans still do pretty good too, again easy to keep a good backup and many varieties produce good in many different conditions. This winter I'm gonna think on it all and come up with a core set of crops to focus on in coming seasons. Definitely gonna finally put some cow peas in dirt next year although I barely know what they are.
Thought I would C&P a post this quote from one of the weather gurus in the NZ weather forum
QuoteRecord temperature change is now underway above the tropics in the stratosphere, especially at 30 hPa. This did not occur in 2002. The latest observations suggest this is not just a Southern Hemispheric event but a global air circulation change is now underway. Air chemistry is also changing along with the temperatures over the tropics. No one will know what this means, as it hasn't been observed before at this time of year in recorded times (records date back to 1979) .
(https://i.ibb.co/s29SVr1/Tropics-stratosphere-2019-to-2002-compare.jpg)
Last really nice day for awhile. 72 F and sunny.
Yesterday we had a good example of a föhn wind cloud, have seen better ones though, when I was a kid there was one that was 300km long and ruler straight
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nor%27west_arch
(https://i.ibb.co/g7ZRKts/IMG-20190923-113049-resized-20190923-074304572.jpg)
Tonight's the night. First frost. Low of 32 F tonight. Tomorrow a high of 39 or 40 F and low of 26 F the next morning. Even supposed to snow a little bit. Supposed to really snow out in Eastern Montana. Already snowed a lot actually, with more to come. Glad I have the rocky mountains to protect my garden from those extremes here in Western MT.
Squash vines in the backyard still look alive.
Still hot and dry here. Long range forecast shows possibility of some rain about a week from now. My gauge has been dry for 45 days, so why not make it 50? Even things I'm watering are not looking especially good.
27 or 28 F outside right now. Garden is done. Hope it warms up a little so I can roll up hoses and get mowers in for repair.
Still stinking hot here. TV weather talker in Cincinnati says tomorrow we may see hottest temp ever recorded in October. yea.
Low of 23 F predicted tonight
25 days straight of rain, no end in sight.
It's rained here a couple times in last few weeks for total of about 1/2 inch so still more than plenty dry. It has cooled off though, low valleys have had some frost but tomatoes are still blooming in my garden.
A great day in the garden today, warm enough to start working on my summer suntan. Not quite time yet to plant out my tomato plants or sow the corn and pumpkin, instead lots of weeding carrots, onions, skirret and parsnips seedlings. Bought Mammoth improved onion seed https://www.mammothonion.co.uk/cgi-bin/trolleyed_public.cgi?action=showprod_ONP1 from the UK so looking forward to seeing how they do
I had 2 nights that dipped below freezing last week.
So I carried 81 pots of citrus inside, then back outside after the freezes. Also 2 pots of sweet potatoes I still hope to get to cross. And 6 peppers. The basics.
Should be another week or two before next freeze. I am keeping watch.
Today we picked a bunch of lettuce, radishes, mustard, tomatoes and so on for a supper of green salad. I did some repairs to the driveway, setting big rocks in gravel to make sure holes don't come back, also cleaned the chimney.
Darned hot by time I was done on the roof, thought time of outdoor cold water showers was done for the season and it should be but not so.
Currently under a blob of warm air off Australia which may see Nov records broken today, this will give the purple asparagus a good kick in the guts. Keeping the surface of the beds that have only just being shallow sowed with carrots damp will need hand watering during the day
Took my citrus , 81 of them, outside for the day. I'm bringing them in tonight because it will get down about freezing tonight. But back out Monday I expect. I have many florescent and LED lights, but they aren't set up yet. I'll set them up over the next week or two.
Quote from: Walt on 2019-11-02, 06:26:08 PM
Took my citrus , 81 of them, outside for the day. I'm bringing them in tonight because it will get down about freezing tonight. But back out Monday I expect. I have many florescent and LED lights, but they aren't set up yet. I'll set them up over the next week or two.
I know of an old mandarin tree not far here that's on the side of a house that has gone through some heavy frosts over the years, ive got a cutting off it growing here. It went through a -15C in 2015, went and had a look at it a few days after and there was no damage, grows lovely fruit every year. Taking a fair bit of careful nursing to get the cutting established
I think many of mine would have survived several degrees of frost. Most of them are 1/2 to 1/4 Ponciris, But just a few days ago we had very warm weather. I don't know if they have had time to adjust to the cold.
I decided not to bet they could make it.
Next spring they will be grafted onto pure Ponciris, and I'll find out how hardy they are. But I'll be keeping the origional potted seedlings inside to someday find out how much variation there is in flavor.
In the meantime. I'm trying to locate lots of seeds from US 852, Taitri, and other 1/2 ponciris that have a good percent zygotic seeds.