Does anyone know what the long range weather forcast is? Any sign of this cold weather ending.
No guarantees with the weather forecasts, ever! But this site is has lots of info:
http://www.metcheck.com/V40/UK/FREE/today.asp?zipcode=West%20Midlands
Many thanks for that. I think I will go to bed for the next 2 weeks.
Thanks for the link.
Now what the h*** am i going to do to.
Is the cold weather going to end before June ?
I want to plant some seeds and I want to plant them now.
Let's hope the frosts are gone way before June this year!
coo er ... I've just put in the home town and wind chill is down to -5 - pooooo >:(
...don't think the frogs will be making an appearance yet!!
debs
I hope it changes soon, my soil seems to be either too frozen to dig, or too wet to dig.
You want to complain flowerlady- it's goign to me -10 here according to that site! :o Think I'll get out my heated propagator & plant some seeds indoors just to feel as if I'm doing something!
Really useful link - I checked my area and found -10 windchill on Wednesday :'( but at least there is no rain forecast - the last thing my clay soil needs is more rain.....but then I looked at the following week and guess what..rain, rain and more rain :'( :'(
Oh blimey, we've not got much rain forcast, but -4 degrees C on Wednesday morning with the wind chill factor making it feel like -10. :o :o :o
Makes me feel a little less guilty about not being able to get down to the lottie to put weed sheet down/plant anything!
just checked my weather forcast via that link looks like im going to need the snowshovel and for a few days too :( its been dark and bludy freezing wind here all day odd flurry trying to fall already
Friday is my allotment day, but we're due heavy snow. I know digging snow in is great for the soil, it is packed with nitrogen, but it is hard and cold work.
Quote from: amphibian on February 27, 2006, 19:02:58
Friday is my allotment day, but we're due heavy snow. I know digging snow in is great for the soil, it is packed with nitrogen, but it is hard and cold work.
Did an Eskimo tell you this? Don't forget It's only the yellow snow, the stuff you can't eat that has the nitrogen!
Brian
rain rain go a way come back another day
I use Firefox as my web browser (security/usability reasons) and you can install an add-on that tells you the weather forecasts for the next few days at the bottom of the window. Really easy for me to peek and see if we're expecting any frosts - it tells me Manchester's in for -4 tonight, -3 tomorrow night and -2 Thursday night.
Brr!
Melanie
www.weather.co.uk is quite good - it gives a 10 day forecast. It looks as though the frosts are with us through into the weekend, but then a rise of several degrees from the start of next week - typically 3C at night 8C during the day. Still not exactly tropical, but better than we have right now.
Bright sunshine and blue skies here right now-only prob is---------it`s ruddy cold >:(
Lifted the nets on my cabbage in the bright sunshine and thought 'that's a lot of whitefly'. Silly me, was a snow flurry ::)
If you click on this,
MetCheck Soil Forecasts (http://www.metcheck.com/V40/UK/FREE/trendmaker.asp?VARS=SOILT&VARS=SOILT10&VARS=TEMPSFC&VARS=SOILW&VARS=SOILW10)
and you have already entered your area or post code, then it should take you to a graph that give you forecasts for soil temparature at the surface, at 0-10cm and at 10-40cm and soil moisture levels at 0-10cm and 10-40cm. Don't know how accurate it is as it is quite new and I am just going to compare the graph to real conditions as the year progresses to give me a way to interpret what is shown.
Jennym Thanks for that link, have book marked it. My area is not showing any snow this week but I put in my sisters post code in Kent and there is a possibility of snow at the weekend. I am supposed to go and visit for a week on Sunday but may cancel don't want Lorna jnr hitting bad weather on her way home.
Quote from: Gardenantics on February 27, 2006, 19:11:15
Quote from: amphibian on February 27, 2006, 19:02:58
Friday is my allotment day, but we're due heavy snow. I know digging snow in is great for the soil, it is packed with nitrogen, but it is hard and cold work.
Did an Eskimo tell you this? Don't forget It's only the yellow snow, the stuff you can't eat that has the nitrogen!
Brian
Well yellow snow would contain more nitrates, but snow and rain account for upto 12lbs of nitrogen per acre per year. However when snow falls on frozen ground the nitrogen is not absorbed but runs off as surface water when the snow melts, before the ground has thawed sufficiently to absorb it. Digging the snow into the soil ensures that it melts at the same time as the soil and is then absorbed, this is why snow has been known as 'poor man's manure' in the past, and was traditionally ploughed in. Oddly enough other trace elements present in snow, through pollution, such as sulphur, are beneficial also, providing their acidifying properties are countered.
Lightening altered rain/hail is particularly rich in Nitrogen.
It has just started to snow here (in Herts)! ;D
very cold here but the sun is out in manchester
Have had some bright sunshine and blue skies but lots of snow clouds, which
haven't produced any snow ....yet.
Heard on radio, that lots of country has been badly affected with snow.
Bright, sunny, still and cold. Put some compost into the bottom of the cold frame today, ready to sow salad crops direct. - Hastings
Well I never knew that amphibian,
My horticultural tutor always condemned digging snow into the ground saying that it took much longer for the soil to warm up if you did. He convinced me by burying some snow in a trench, and it was still there two weeks later, when the stuff on top had gone. No mention of it's nutrient value.
Brian
Someone has just thrown a snowball at my window, and sure enough, the ground is snow covered again. I am in Cornwall and the duckpond still has ice over it and the ducks look very confused!
Quote from: Gardenantics on March 01, 2006, 18:35:56
Well I never knew that amphibian,
My horticultural tutor always condemned digging snow into the ground saying that it took much longer for the soil to warm up if you did. He convinced me by burying some snow in a trench, and it was still there two weeks later, when the stuff on top had gone. No mention of it's nutrient value.
Brian
If the ground is already frozen I can't imagine mixing snow into it would make much difference, indeed snow left on the surface reflects the sun away, and prevents the sun reaching the soil, mixed in with the dirt it loses its reflective property.
I dunno, I'd be open to some more research on this...
The ground will probably only be frozen superficially. If you bury the snow, you're putting it down where it'll be insulated, so it makes sense for it to take longer to melt.
well here in Berkshire, we have another brilliantly sunny day at the moment but bitterly cold still!.....yesterday afternoon (just like the day before) the skies got grey, then very dark and weird colours and a heavy flurry of snow fell....the ground here, well in the grounds & gardens of this block of flats that I live in are all covered with a crisp covering which looks lovely but where the sun reaches it....it's already melting.....
more could fall I think later in the day (& being a big kid at heart, would like to see just a flurry or two but not enough to makes things hazardous....much too cold to garden anyway at the moment! (that's what I keep telling myself - & got continued bad back problems still so can't do it anyway, so the weather is my consolation (or excuse) ???
H.P.
Talk about being a tease, it's started to snow again!! Will it last I wonder? :-\
(J19 of M25 ;D)
We had 1/4 inch of snow lying this morning, which melted during the day. There was a heavy snow shower during the last lesson this afternoon, but it's all gone now.
well after an absolutly glorious day and a chance to get to the allotment to carry out some weeding
ITS NOW A BLIZZARD !!! SNOW SNOW Every where lol
Poor old fella who had some tom plant growing put them into his poly tunnel and maybe a little tooooo soon as 4 of the 12 keeled over but there ya goo for trying to push it along i guess
carl
Just to make things worse, I was in Bali for the last two weeks - & came home to this!
A very unproductive day at the allotment today, I tried to dig, but my fork rang like a bell when I hit the soil. Even my chillington hoe would not dent the surface.
Later the sun came out, and it was quite warm out of the wind, the soil thawed quickly, but turned to a slippy slime, far too wet to dig.
I occupied myself by removing more turves from my virgin area, the grass had stopped the ground freezing in those areas.
It is snowing now, and is expected to be -9 tomorrow.
I was just going to comment that this must be the longest period of frost in ages.
Then I saw this.
well I'll count my blessings then tim ;D
well my brood and I are off sledging....
Well its been cold here in Oxfordshire, but dry. Went up the allotment on Wed afternoon and it was beautiful, managed a bit of hoeing and digging!
Sorry to all you under snow.
I've been at teh allotment today and it was very sunny, worked in just a t-shirt, lovely day.
Huge chunks of soil were still frozen solid, though.
Best of both worlds....went sledging on the allotment
(http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a157/fbgrifter/Resizeof2006-03-06Sledging.jpg)
long since i posted a pic but here goes
and of course have to include the view....
(http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a157/fbgrifter/2006-03-06TheView.jpg)
Well i thought it was cold here, but i've just come back from Skiing in Austria... it been like this since November and will be for another month or more..
(http://i33.photobucket.com/albums/d57/keef30/DSC00123.jpg)
In Suffolk today, the sun is shining, there's a blue sky, the birds are collecting nesting material, there was a daffodil out on my allotment and it feels really Spring like - at last!
It was wet at times in Birmingham, and it's distinctly milder.
Lovely sunny and spring-like day to day, it reached 25C on my sheltered patio.