Weather

[Marigold]

Same here. I’m in the middle of a massive project to increase the volume of rainwater we can save in the winter, to top up our pond in summer. We already have 500 litres of storage, 300 litres of which can be diverted straight into the pond by hoses attached to the butts, but I’m organising more and bigger butts in more useful places, to give three sets of 500 litres each. This has meant detaching and cleaning out the sludge from the bottom of each of our present butts, an annual job which needs them to be empty enough to tip the sludge on to the garden garden, so after months of dry weather it suddenly needed to be done in case it rains this weekend. I’m not very hopeful, despite the forecast, as there’s the usual ‘dry channel’ on the weather maps between the two wet corridors on either side of North Hampshire!

We shall have to adapt the height on the diverters fitted to the downpipes, as the new bigger butts will be taller. The usual sort of diverter simply acts as a weir to send the rainwater across into the butt until it fills, and then diverts the excess back down to the drain. However, a lot of moss from the roof etc comes down the pipe and gets washed either into the butt or the drain/soakaway, which isn’t ideal. You can buy diverters with a filter that ensures clean water goes into the butt and down the drain, by catching all the muck and filtering out finer particles as well. This is needed if you’re collecting water for use in a domestic system, eg flushing the loos, and desirable but not so essential if simply storing water for garden use. The filter diverters are expensive at around £40 each, whereas the ones we have could be re-used. So I’m thinking about it. Probably not, but comments welcomed!

 

[chrismahon]

We tie fine mesh plastic potato bags over the end of the feed pipes and throw them away when full. We do have a big problem with leaves, which then settle to the bottom and clog the filter on the pump.

 

[LadyA]

Think the rainfall we missed all summer must have about caught up now! We've had such heavy rain over the ladt few days!

 

[bigyetiman]

We had a brief downpour in the night, more sun today

 

[LadyA]

Think we can safely say our drought is over! Torrential downpours for the last few days, and more to come.

 

[dianefairhall]

Crikey - I don't come on here for a couple of days and it has been completely transformed! My Sussex hen avatar has gone, too.

 

[dianefairhall]

Seems I'm not an active member any more, either! I've only been away for two days!

 

[bigyetiman]

I appear to be a nothing

 

[bigyetiman]

Sorry it just came back up as active member, I must have slipped into the Twilight Zone briefly

 

[Marigold]

I appear to be a nothing

Schrodinger’s member?

 

[LadyA]

How's the weather treating everyone? So hard to believe we're almost in October. This year has just gone insanely fast!

Think we can safely say, the heatwave is over! I've even lit the stove the last couple of days (mostly because I had a teenage guest, so needed a lot more hot water than I normally would!). Still, won't be many more days, I think, before I'll be lighting it every day. My oil boiler bit the dust last Winter, and I honestly don't think it's worth the investment of a new one, when our Govt. are moving toward banning them in the coming years. I have radiant panel heaters on the ceilings, but they are electric, and with the current energy crisis and soaring cost of electricity, I'm reluctant to turn them on, even though they are quite efficient. Tomorrow, I have a guy coming to see about repairing my living room fireplace, which has had a chimney plug and the fireplace opening covered for a few years. It's a step backward, I feel, but we are being told there is a real possibility of blackouts over Winter, in which case I won't be able to light the stove, which has a boiler on it. So, at least I will have some form of heat that isn't electricity dependent.

Today is a gorgeous bright, breezy day, if a little cool (but not cool enough for the stove so far). I've got laundry blowing in the breeze, hoping it will dry before it rains again. My potatoes, planted earlier in September, are growing very well, so ??? And I completed my flowerbed. All suggestions of what else I can plant in it now are welcome! So far, I've got snowdrops, daffodils, fritillaria (?), heathers and a couple of chrysanths. plus the roses that were already there, and an enormous cat mint, which I will be cutting down shortly. I've hacked out as much as I can of the Solomon's Seal, so hopefully there'll be not quite such a jungle of that next Summer!

 

[Margaid]

Well done Lady A. The nights have been quite cold here and I've twice lit the woodburner when I've been working in that room and have run the central heating a couple of mornings until I get enough solar gain through the windows. I'm kicking myself that I didn't top up with oil a couple of weeks ago but I don't need it for a few months and just hope the economic situation regarding the pound will have improved.

I've planted wall flowers and sweet williams which should flower after the daffodils and crocus. I like to plant perennials if I can but they don't always survive more than one season. I have winter flowering pansies providing colour at the moment.

 

[bigyetiman]

Been cold in the mornings, in fact we had a frost this am.
Once the sun gets up, it has been nice and warm with a breeze, great drying weather

 

[Icemaiden]

I'm keen not to put the GCH on for as long as possible. The bathroom was 11.5°C this morning, so my shower was quick! But I didn’t have central heating for the first 20 years of my life & it didn’t kill me then...

Our energy supplier is forecasting that our gas & electricity bill for the next 12 months will be £5500 ? . That's partly down to our house always being cold despite double glazing, cavity wall insulation etc. But it's also caused by teaching stained glass & glass fusing. One 9kW glass fusing kiln & one 10kW kiln certainly have an impact on our energy bills!

 

[LadyA]

Today, we are being hit with what I assume are repercussions from Hurricane Ian, which has caused so much damage in Florida. We have very strong winds and heavy rain.

 

[Hen-Gen]

Like most people I really worried. Electricity in Shetland is in any case about double that in the rest of the UK. Unfortunately pensions aren’t. I currently spend approximately one seventh of my income on electricity. If the projected increases happen then I’ll be pushed into extreme fuel poverty.

 

[LadyA]

Like most people I really worried. Electricity in Shetland is in any case about double that in the rest of the UK. Unfortunately pensions aren’t. I currently spend approximately one seventh of my income on electricity. If the projected increases happen then I’ll be pushed into extreme fuel poverty.

I'm very frugal with electricity anyway, but what really annoys me is that the actual usage part of my electricity bills are only about 1/4 of the total! Rural Standing Charges - is a charge just for being connected to the grid - are over €1 per day, even if you never use a single watt, so that, tax and Public Services levy (also tax, but not called tax!) make up most of my bill!

Still, today, with no heating on in the house, and at 5pm, it's still 21C in my living room, which is excellent.

 

[LadyA]

Oh, what a fabulous day! We've had lovely bright sunshine and no wind. No heating needed - I've had all the windows open all day, and it's still reading 22.4° in the house!
I've been out mowing, weeding the new flowerbed and planting some more bulbs - more of mum's miniature daffodils, chinodoxia, and more snowdrops.
This is my very favourite time of year!

 

[LadyA]

I was woken during the night by very heavy rain battering on the window, and there was one loud roll of thunder. It seemed a brief storm though, because when I woke up this morning, all was clear and bright. There's a very fierce wind blowing though.

 

[bigyetiman]

Pouring with rain this morning, but 15C at daybreak. I see from the forecast we could get a warm plume of 23C next week