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Winter Weather

The night of January 6th brought loads of snow and freezing cold weather. The nursery was brought to a standstill for nearly a week, but most plants are fine. At least it is giving us a chance to decorate our shop! The Millais family was trapped for 3 days, and the only way in or out was on foot. Being only 3 miles from the A3 where an estimated 1000 cars had been abandoned, we seem to have had more snow than most. Nearly 25cm of the white stuff fell and did a fair amount of damage. Pine and birch trees could not cope with the weight, and many branches came down, but the plants underneath generally survived. However, some Rhododendrons also could not cope with the weight of snow, and we have large plants squashed to the ground with broken limbs. These will need pruning off in the next few weeks to allow vigorous new growth from the base in the spring. Other damage included the collapse of 2 small polytunnels, and damage to the fabric of our shade hall where we calculated that each peice of netting was supporting more than 2 tonnes of snow! This was the first major snow for 20 years. It will have insulated the plants from the worst of the cold (several nights below -12C), and we do not expect any long term damage.

Article Date: 14 January 2010