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COMING TO AN END.

© Michael Campbell

With another year coming to a close it is time to take a look back and see what progress and mistakes have been made in the last twelve months. The first thing that comes to mind and of coarse is always a conversation topic when gardeners meet is the weather. What an exceptional year we have had! The spring arrived very early and created an unusual scene in the garden with early and late spring flowering plants in bloom together. Frequent dry periods meant that the flowers lasted longer than usual without being decimated by rain and hail showers as in other years. The spring was followed by a wet spell for the early part of the summer and thing were beginning to look like they were following the usual pattern until the beginning of August when suddenly the rain stopped. Week after week of dry weather with not a drop of rain, everything had to be watered on a daily basis just to keep them alive. From the first of August until the end of October we only had rain on three occasions and that was mostly at night.

The Mediterranean plants loved it with bougainvilleas and oleanders flowering for months. Even when the weather did eventually break there was no significant amount of rain, and as I write this, one could not say that the rainfall is anything like normal. Add to that a very mild winter with only two nights of frost, and that was not worth noting with only minus one degree recorded. Sunshine is also breaking records for this time of the year with more that average sunny days being recorded at the various weather stations around the country

So, how did the garden cope with our own version of global warming? Hedges, especially Grisellinia and Escallonia have never stopped growing since last winter and required cutting every three or four weeks. As this is not one of my favourite gardening pastimes I am not at all impressed with this growth pattern.

The spring bulbs flowered to perfection and seemed to love the mild dry conditions, as did most of the early summer bulbs, with the rains coming just in time to keep the foliage growing longer than usual and fattened the bulbs up nicely for next season. Hardy cyclamen also enjoyed the unusual spring weather with some of the tubers almost double the size they were this time last year. The foliage lasting well into the summer with some of the tubers even sporting a few leaves as the new seasons flowers were appearing.