View from the Rear Window - April 2022 ~ Crafty Cabbage

When you think of April, what comes to mind first? Is it, like us, April Showers? Well, maybe, we are going to have to rethink that one. Our weather station recorded just 10.2 mm rainfall for April 2022 and our rainwater water butts nearly ran dry.

Perhaps we were unlucky (or lucky if you prefer dry weather) so I checked out the Met Office's report for April. England with 24.7 mm had less than half its average April rainfall and Wales (46.6 mm) just over half its normal precipitation. Although Herefordshire lies on the England-Wales border, clearly it associates itself more with the former than the latter! Digging a little deeper, the Met Office kindly provides a map showing which regions are the dryest/wettest. Sure enough, the city of Hereford falls in the 20-33% of average rainfall.

Interestingly, the lack of April showers is part of a recent trend with April 2020 and April 2021 both drier than 2022 in the UK. Meteorologically, it was all down to high pressure over the UK this April which kept the rain out.

At the beginning of April, we were enjoying the cherry blossom and tulips...

Back garden - 2/4/22

By the middle of the month, the wild cherry blossom had gone, the tulips were coming to an end - though still colourful - while the trees were leafing up nicely including the red acer...

Back garden - 19/4/22

Our fruiting cherry is now in full bloom with hopes of a half-decent crop if we get to the fruit before the birds...

Stella Cherry - 13/4/22

As April draws to a close, wisteria is in flower along with the photinia behind it...

Back Garden - 29/4/22

Jobs in the Garden

1. Planting seeds = aubergine, sweet pepper, tomatoes, chillies, etc

2. Water the onion sets, asparagus, strawberries due to unusually dry weather

3. Plant seed potatoes (Blue Danube)

4. As the weather warms and the chance of frost diminishes, move vegetable seedlings from indoors to the polytunnel (to acclimatize)

5. Dig up the last of the parsnips sown in 2021 on April 24th

6. Install apple and pear codling moth traps

7. First asparagus cut of 2022 on April 22nd - two spears!

8. Last of 2021 potato harvest used on April 24th

9. Composting ad nauseum as material starts to arrive from neighbours' gardens

April 2022 Weather

Weather parameters for April 2022 are summarised in the table below:

April 2022
Weather Parameter	Value	Dates
Average Monthly Temperature	10 oC
Maximum Monthly Temperature	23 oC	16th
Minimum Monthly Temperature	-3 oC	3rd
Number of Air Frost Days	3
Number of Hot Days (> 25 oC)	0
Monthly Precipitation	10.2 mm
Greatest 24 h Precipitation	6.2 mm	12th - 13th
Number of Dry Days	25
Monthly Sunshine Hours (estimated)	156
Average Wind Speed	4 km/h
Highest Wind Speed	56 km/h	7th
Maximum Barometric Pressure (Sea Level)	1033.1 hPa	29th
Minimum Barometric Pressure (Sea Level)	983.0 hPa	7th
Average Barometric Pressure (Sea Level)	1016.1 hPa

Daily maximum and minimum temperatures for April 2022 are shown below [click once on the image to see larger plot]. Generally, days were warm and nights mild except for a couple of cold spells in early April. With hindsight, it was safe to plant outside from mid-April onwards.

The next plot [click for larger image] shows daily rainfall and solar radiation. Overall, April was a dry month with no rainfall in the second half of the month - a pattern similar to that observed in March. Average daily solar radiation values (aka sunshine hours) were up and down due to extensive and variable cloud cover during April.

Looking back over the past 3 years of weather data for the month of April, it is clear why April 2021 was less than favourable for gardeners - temperatures were lower and there were lots of air frost days. Fortunately, 2022 has returned to more 'normal' weather conditions with all the adverse weather events (frost, sub-zero temperatures) occurring at the beginning of the month.