Page 6 - Simply Veg Issue 2 2016

summers and milder wetter winters. Well
they got that right this winter. December was the warmest December on record, and the end of December through into January saw further records being broken for the most rain falling in any 24 hour period. No doubt you will have seen on the news the devastation and ooding in
various parts of the
UK, notably Cumbria
and Yorkshire. I can
only speak for where
I live in the lower
Wharfe valley, but the
closure of a number
of bridges damaged by ood water and no longer safe is causing major travel headaches for locals. Three bridges that hit the news
are at Tadcaster spanning the Wharfe, at Collingham also spanning the Wharfe, and at Elland spanning the Calder Navigation canal. All three bridges will be closed for at least
a) b) c)
Provide better channels for dispersing ood water, and better ood defences. Change what we grow, where we grow it and how we grow it.
Take up stamp collecting instead. My other concern, is that if these mild
chairman’s thoughts By David Allison, FNVS
Given the nature of our hobby,
the weather is never far from our thoughts. The meteorologists are telling us that due to global warming, we will experience warmer and drier
a year and cost millions each to replace, as they are beyond repair.
Of more concern to gardeners is the damage to our plots where, since boxing
day many in this part of the world have been under water, and are still, as I write this in Mid Feb they are still completely saturated, and will not be workable for months yet.
Quite near me are Cottingly Bridge allotments near Bingley, this time in the Aire Valley. A number of top class growers and exhibitors have their plots on this site, and my local DA have arranged a visit this late summer, see Northern Branch newsletter
for details. They promise us that the site will be back in tiptop shape ready for our visit, I think we are all eternal optimists, it’ll be better
next year!
A little further a eld
at Mir eld, West Yorkshire, is where West Yorkshire DA members Dave and Olive Peel grow their exhibition veg, as can
be seen opposite, their site looks more like a paddy eld than an allotment. It will be vital, once the ood water has subsided to test the soil to see what nutrients have been leached out.
I don’t want to get too despondent, but if this is going to be typical of weather patterns
The damaged bridge over the wharfe at Tadcaster
in the future, it seems to me we/the country have a number of options,
Of more concern to gardeners is the damage to our plots
winters continue, how will this affect some of our crops that require a cold or vernalisation period to break dormancy in Spring? I am thinking of blackcurrants, rhubarb, garlic, strawberries, vines etc., and how it will
affect their cropping potential. Here in my part of Yorkshire, we have had, as I write these notes in mid Feb, a couple of nights of ground frost, and one night of air frost just below freezing, and it’s still raining!
On a more positive note, at the Trustees meeting in Jan, the afternoon was allocated to discussing the future of the NVS, in terms of strategic planning, effective
6 simplyvegetables
Water pouring into my allotment and...
...the pathway between the allotments