Wednesday 8th October, 2014.
My little rain gauge has been working overtime so far this month. After recording only 13 mm of rain for the whole of September, it was threatening to overflow after the first five days of October. It was reading 118 mm (not far off 5 inches) when I emptied it on Monday morning. And there is more to come. This is the forecast for today:
Wednesday, 8 October 2014
Weather: Showers soon becoming isolated during morning, then a band of frequent/ heavy showers moving through later in afternoon. Mostly dry at first this evening, then frequent/ heavy showers later in evening and overnight.
Wind: South or SE 15-20, locally 20-25, then decreasing Variable 10-15 later in night.
Visibility: Good, possibly moderate in showers.
Temperature: Min. Air 9°C and Max. Air 14°C
Rainfall (mm): 8-15, risk 15-30
Comments: Heavy rain, with risk localised flooding. Spring tides, some harbour/ quayside flooding & coastal over-topping likely, especially tonight (high tide 00:17 am). Thunder/ lightning possible in showers. Strong winds.
There isn't much to write about this week apart from the weather. Work in the garden and walks have been neglected since Thursday because of a phone call from the hospital late on Thursday to let us know that Tim could have his hernia procedure on Monday instead of waiting until November. There had been a last minute cancellation.
After spending most of Thursday clearing leaves out of the ditches and gutters in preparation for expected heavy rain, we had to drive into Douglas on Friday for Tim's pre-operative assessment and again on Monday.
We were lucky with the weather on both days. We got back to the glen before the heavy rain and gales arrived on Friday afternoon. On Sunday night another band of severe weather passed over the Island. Trees were down all over the place. Four were partially blocking the roads we normally take to the hospital, and the main road through Ballaugh was closed because a tree brought down the power lines.
When it got light I noticed an unfamiliar "plant" in the snowdrop bed near the little apple tree.
It turned out to be the honeysuckle-covered top of a dead holly which had been growing out of the bank above the ditch. We had decided that it would be too difficult to cut down when we were removing dead holly branches last winter and that we would just have to let it come down in its own time. Luckily it fell in the best possible place . . . missing both the apple tree and the hawthorns. It isn't even blocking the ditch and the trunk can stay in place until we feel like dealing with it. I will just cut off the end which is covering the snowdrops.
We had to be at the hospital on the outskirts of Douglas by twelve o'clock and allowed an extra half hour for the journey. It wasn't necessary. The emergency services on the Island really are amazing. I had my camera handy to take photos of the post-storm devastation - but there was no evidence of the stormy night apart from a few small branches at the side of the road near Bishopscourt. The road through Ballaugh had been reopened and all the major debris removed from the roads. I drove Tim home in the late afternoon in brilliant sunshine and it was hard to believe that the day had started out so badly.
This week I have been obsessed with beech nuts, or more accurately - beech pods. I am even learning some new vocabulary and can report that this year has been "a mast year" - a year when the beech trees and oaks produce a bumper crop of nuts and acorns. The beech pods from the trees down by the road are not a problem but the big tree near the house drops its pods on the lawn and the lawnmower doesn't like them. They annoy me too because they are quite hard and take ages to decay. If they are not removed before mowing the mower chops them into smaller bits and they are even harder to remove from the grass.
Tim swept up a lot of pods over the weekend but the gales have brought down even more. I am waiting for better weather and then I will try to remove them from the lawn just before mowing.
Usually the seeds which our beech trees produce are just skinny shells with no nuts inside - but this year we have also had some fatter seeds with proper nuts inside. They are very small but they are edible. Someone on TV said they are poisonous but a lot of people wrote in and said that they had been eating them for years with no ill effects. I tried one but it didn't seem to have much flavour.
The crabapple tree is loaded with fruit. It was labelled as a John Downie when I bought it but obviously isn't. It looks more like the illustration of the Yellow Hornet crabapple. The blackbirds eat some of the fruit - but not until it appears to be overripe. And I did see a pheasant up in the tree last last year enjoying the fruit.
While I was looking for a good twig to photograph, I noticed this unusual caterpillar. I believe that it is the caterpillar of the pale tussock moth.
This is an unfortunate victim of the first October rain and gales. This old hydrangea gets too much shade and the new growth is always too soft to support the weight of the flower heads especially when they are wet. The whole plant flopped after the rain - and the wind didn't help either. I had to do a fairly radical pruning job - but the same thing will probably happen next year.
The next few days are likely to be uneventful and not very photogenic. Tim will be convalescing and I will continue tidying up in the garden if we get some good weather in between the gales and floods!
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