November 2018

Thursday 1st

 6 to 9 to 0°C. 3.53kWh. Cloudy start, becoming sunny in the afternoon with some showers. Cleared to a cold evening.

Finished clearing out the tomato plants from the polytunnel and moved in the dahlia plants. These are now limp from the frost and need leaving to dry out before cutting them back to rest through the winter.

Friday 2nd

0 to 9 to 6°C. 4.91kWh 1.3kW max. Frosty start but soon warmed up as the wind moved to the south with a few spots of rain in the evening.

Emptied the planting troughs and refilled them with fresh soil and more pansies and stocks.

Ordered the seed potatoes and onion sets for next year.

Saturday 3rd

8 to 13 to 11°C. 1.00kWh. Very cloudy with a warm southerly wind and a few spots of rain. The wind became quite strong by the evening.

Sunday 4th

 10 to 14 to 9°C. 2.47kWh 1,2kW max. Mainly cloudy with one sunny spell in the morning. The southerly breeze made it feel quite mild again.

Monday 5th

8 to 12 to 8°C. 618wH. A very cloudy day with a southerly breeze keeping it feeling mild for November,

Continued moving the Sweet William into their final 2L pots for flowering next Spring.

Tuesday 6th

8 to 13 to 11°C. 1.1kWh. Another cloudy mild day with a southerly breeze. Started raining late in the evening.

Wednesday 7th

8 to 12 to 7°C. 1.47kWh.  3mm of rain overnight then cloudy with a mild southerly breeze.

Continued digging over the patch in front of the wood shed. This has been left uncultivated for many years and is full of roots and the top soil is only about 10cm deep. So it is going to take some time and need a lot of compost digging into the subsoil to get it into shape by spring.

Thursday 8th

6 to 11 to 8°C. 752Wh. A very dull day with some short light showers. Heavier rain and strong winds are forecast for tomorrow and the weekend.

Friday 9th

 5 to 11 to 9°C. 637Wh. A very cloudy day with a few light rain showers.

Saturday 10th

5 to 11 to 9°C. 1.48kWh.  Another cloudy damp day.

Sunday 11th

6 to 11 to 5°C. 2.72kWh 800W max. Mainly cloudy but brighter for a time in the late morning.

Ordered the vegetable seeds for next year though not the peas and beans. I will order these in another order along with the flower seeds. There is a maximum of 40 packets in each order and combined there are more than this.

Spent the rest of the morning rodding out the drains and clearing out a blockage in the outlet chamber of the septic tank. Not the nicest job but makes a change from digging and it is satisfying when it finally starts running again.

In the afternoon raked up more leaves, mainly poplar off the lawn and oak from everywhere. Once the wind drops there is another autumn job; clearing leaves out of the gutters.

Monday 12th

 6 to 10 to 6°C. 2.2kWh. Cloudy with frequent short heavy showers though only amounting to 2mm rain in total.

Plenty to do in the polytunnel cleaning up the pots of dahlias and summer bulbs.

Tuesday 13th

 5 to 12 to 9°C. 3.09kWh 900W max

Sunny morning but clouded over in the afternoon with some drizzly rain in the evening.

Wednesday 14th

7 to 11 to 6°C, 685Wh. A very dull day.

Continued digging over the patch in front of the log shed

Thursday 15th

6 to 12 to 11°C. 1.53kWh. Grey clouds.

Friday 16th

11 to 12 to 10°C. 331Wh. Dark, cloudy and very humid.

All we have done for the last two days is sweep up leaves from the two oak trees and the many other smaller trees in the hedges. There are even more than usual, probably because of the warm summer. I think we might finally have finished since there seem to be very few still left on the trees.

Saturday 17th

 6 to 9 to 4°C. 1.89kWh. Damp misty start, finally clearing in the afternoon with some sunshine but too low to have much effect on the PV panels.

It looks like it may be coming colder next week so I have taken the begonia corms out of their pots and shaken most of the soil off them. They are still in the polytunnel covered in fleece overnight but once they have dried off I will bring them inside the house to rest. Last year we left it too late and the wintery weather in December killed a lot of them off before we realised.

Sunday 18th

 3 to 9 to 2°C. 3.39kWh. Misty start but soon  cleared to a sunny morning and afternoon. The wind has is coming from the east making it feel much colder

Monday 19th

2 to 9 to 4°C. 1.84kWh. Some sunny intervals but the wind feels really cold.

Once Pat has finished picking enough of the remaining chillies and peppers for the freezer I can pull the plants up and dig over the soil in the polytunnel.

Tuesday 20th

 2 to 4 to 3°C. 336Wh. A grey damp cold day.

Too cold to work outside so started clearing the hall, staircase and landing so I can paint the walls and ceiling.

Wednesday 21st

2 to 4 to 2°C. 558Wh. 2mm of sleety rain overnight followed by another grey damp day with a chilling easterly wind.

Removed loose paint and filled the cracks and holes in the ceiling and walls with decorators caulk; much better stuff than there was 30 years ago the last time I repainted the hall and staircase.

Thursday 22nd

 -4 to 3 to 4°C. 2.28kWh 600W max. Clear frosty and remained cold despite some sunshine in the morning. The evening is cloudy and slightly warmer so no frost tonight.

Despite being only 5°C in the polytunnel (the sun is too low at this time of year to put much heat into it) I pulled up the remainder of the pepper and chili plants. Also planted some lavender plugs, which were on special offer at less than half price, into 1L pots though they will need much larger pots next year unless I decide to plant them permanently somewhere. There are 12 of them, 4 each of purple, pink and white.

Pat picked the first of the Brussel Sprouts for our dinner.

Friday 23rd

2 to 4 to 6°C 279Wh. Back to heavy clouds but at least it is a bit warmer with very little wind.

Started replacing the short pots of short stemmed chrysanthemums with wallflowers which should flower on and off till well into the Spring.

Saturday 24th

4 to 8 to 2°C. 426Wh Another very cloudy day.

Planted 250 crocus bulbs at the front of the new perennial bed down the side of the drive. I only ordered them yesterday, less than half price in a Black Friday sale. Already starting to sprout but that proves they are good quality; some of them had 2 or even 3 shoots.

Sunday 25th

2 to 8 to 4°C. 562Wh. More dark clouds with no wind but stayed dry.

I also bought 100 mixed tulip bulbs which I planted 10 to each 7.5L pot. This was just part of my repotting of all bulbs at this time of year, hyacinths narcissus and tulips from previous years.

Monday 26th

 2 to 6 to -2°C. 1.01kWh. A brighter day with thin or even broken cloud in the afternoon and a clear frosty evening.

Continued repotting the hyacinths, narcissus and tulips.

Tuesday 27th

-3 to 5 to 3°C. 98Wh. Frosty misty start but started raining mid-morning. Only light rain but continued all day amounting to 5mm in all. Finally cleared in the evening.

Continued repairing and skimming the walls and ceiling of the hall, staircase and landing. These old walls need a lot of renovation before they can be repainted.

Wednesday 28th

 4 to 16 to 9°C. 485Wh. Much warmer than of late but with a very strong gusty wind and some light showers.

The wind has finally damaged the chrysanthemums which were already suffering from frost followed by heavy rain  and very little light. So we moved them into the polytunnel to dry out over the winter. They are very healthy plants with lots of side-shoots so I am hoping I can pot the best into 7.5L pots, some more in 5L pots and take cuttings from the remainder. Then I can get back to the 3 year cycle we had running before I broke my hip and then suffered a hernia the next year.

Thursday 29th

6 to 14 to 6°C. 1.66kWh. Another windy day but not as strong as yesterday and with a glimpse of the sun for a time in the late morning before it started raining again. Mainly showers but quite heavy just before dusk.

Finished repotting the spring bulbs. As usual something, probably blackbirds, has pulled a lot of the labels out of the pots, tossing them quite a distance, so I can't be sure which is which till they start flowering. They have even already done this with some of the pots I did earlier in this week. I have the same problem with the chrysanthemums so it isn't surprising that some labelled pink turn out to be yellow or orange.

Friday 30th

6 to 9 to 3°C. 3.23kWh. Sunny morning but a showery afternoon.