Snow, hail, sleet… in May

We have been wondering what impact the very cold and frosty April, followed by more cold weather at the beginning of May, will have on our crops and our production this year.

The contrast to 2020 has been stark.  Talking to Ian in a polytunnel which may have reached 10 degrees, he reminded me that this time last year there had been days where polytunnels reached 100 degrees!  Ian describes the impact of our contrasting temperatures as ‘swings and roundabouts’.  Some crops like Chinese Brassicas like the cold polytunnels, whilst English seasonal veg e.g lettuce and beetroot are on the small side.  In the polytunnels plants aren’t going to seed quite as quickly, whilst outside planned crops aren’t ready to harvest.  A whole bed of lettuce outside had just come to a standstill… hopefully the temperature will improve in time for them to resume their growth?

Overall the effect of this very cold spring will be a more pronounced hungry gap (the gap between harvests).  This year we may have nothing to harvest where we usually have something (all those leaves).  And this may mean we are buying-in more for our crop shares, and if this same is true across the country we may find less English veg available and therefore at a higher price.

The polytunnels are full of seedlings ready to move on, but we haven’t been able to prepare the land and it has been too cold to plant them out.  There has also been a delay in sowing seeds that should have been sown beginning May, so we are behind… Ian is confident we’ll catch up – though it is all a bit of a juggling act (seems nothing new there then!).