Dorset Garden Diary - And The Drought Continues

Hi everyone,

Apart from a cooler day on Wednesday with an hour of light rain - which didn't make any impact on the soil but it was welcome nonetheless - it's been a hot and humid week with temperatures hovering around 27C 81C and today it's 29C 84F. Now I know to some of you this is a normal occurrence, but it's not here in England and especially not for this prolonged length of time (6 weeks).

The garden is starting to suffer. I thinned out the plums, some of them had already started to ripen and they've just shrivelled because of the lack of rain

Unfortunately, this is happening to other gardeners and their fruit crops.

This veg bed should be full of carrots, spring onions, beetroot and radishes but it's looking barren. I have been watering it but the daytime heat is turning the soil to dust.

 

The Pentland Javelin potatoes have failed

This is all I have from six plants (just under a kilo/couple of pounds) and they aren't looking that brilliant. The Charlotte's seem to have done better although this is all I have from three plants (about the same weight as the Pentlands). I have another six to dig up

And the outdoor tomatoes and cucumbers are struggling, I watered these this morning and they are already wilting

But the cucumbers in the greenhouse are doing well, we've had our first one - delicious

and there's more to come

We've had the first of the dwarf French beans

and I managed to get to these raspberries ahead of the blackbirds

The flowers appear to love this dry weather though, the snapdragons have sprung up all over the garden

These lilac perennials that I cut back after flowering in the spring have bloomed again

The ragged robin in the cottage garden

This lovely lily we inherited from the previous owners

and...the grass is now brown and dying off but these little flowers have sprung up

Well that's it from a hot and humid and dusty Dorset and there's no rain forecast this coming week either.

Regards,

DD

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