Diary 2012
May 11th 2012
After record breaking April rains which arrived shortly after the alarming maps of drought ridden counties were being shown on TV, we perhaps expected a warmer May. No such luck. The rain and changeable weather has continued and today in Chee Dale the temperature was just 6 Celsius. Plants which were well on their way in March stopped in April. Although the Cressbrookdale Cowlips and Wood Anemones are out there are virtually no Early Purple Orchids to be seen and the Wall Whitlowgrass (Draba muralis) is still in flower.
I have now finished publishing all 335 of the definite identifications of plants seen in Australia in 2007 - it only took five years. In August we are flying out to Western Australia again so I'm hoping for another bumper collection of photos to keep the Australian section going for another fve years.
March 28th 2012
We are experiencing another dry Spring with temperatures in the 20s Celsius and in Scotland records have been set with records at 23.6 Celsius in Aberdeenshire. The fruiting Cherry trees are out and the pink flowering Cherry which usually flowers in late April is already in bud. In the garden 50 shoots of Dactylorhiza fuchsii (Common Spotted Orchid) have sprouted (47 last year) . There were four on March 10th which seems to me to be very early for a plant which flowers in June. Elsewhere in England, there is a drought which affects the south east and now Yorkshire - no sign of rain at all.
Still that climate change thing -it's all gubmint lies innit?
February 1st 2012
We are in the middle of our first extended cold snap where the temperature goes just below freezing at night and stays at about 3 Celsius during the day. Nevertheless the early spring flowers and summer "hangers on" are still to be found. We found a good clump of Silene dioica (Red Campion) in proper flower and even a rather sad looking Lapsana communis ssp communis (Nipplewort) is growing locally. In mid January I went to see how many flowering plants there were and counted 55 including Centaurea nigra (Knapweed) and Poa trivialis (Rough Meadow-grass).
January 1st 2012
We in the north west of England have had only one cold spell this winter when the snow lay for about 3 days and the temperature went down to perhaps minus 3 Celsius but nothing like last winter's lows of minus 12 Celsius so far. Such mild weather overall means that some summer plants are still flowering. Nipplewort (Lapsana communis) for instance still has the odd flower on it. Early spring flowers are being reported regularly with early daffodils already out in some gardens but not yet in quantity. The Gorse (Ulex europaeaus) has been in flower for some time but some bushes are now covered in blooms. Again this is usually an early flowering shrub but this year there is much more of it in flower.
Still time for a cold snap though although temperatures to day rose to 12 Celsius.