The big chill: counting the cost - and sitting it out

URBAN FARMER:A surprising number of crops survived the snow and ice, writes FIONNUALA FLANAGAN

OH, HOW I hate January, sighed OPW gardener Brian Quinn, as he and fellow gardener Meeda Downey shiveringly surveyed the still-frozen walled kitchen garden in the Phoenix Park late last week. “I mean, wouldn’t it be great if you could just cancel it? But instead you just have to sit it out.”

Gardeners around the country, waiting impatiently for the sowing season to begin, will know exactly what he means. But given that it’s still officially winter time, and judging by the recent bout of icy weather, it seems that there’s still quite a bit of “sitting it out” left to do.

Just like the rest of the country, the OPW’s walled garden has been battered by snowstorms and bitter frosts over the last number of weeks, as temperatures plummeted to record lows and the ground turned to ice. Pipes in the Phoenix Park froze, burst, and then froze again so that the water supply to the garden is now cut off until the necessary repairs can be made. What crops were in the ground froze solid while those above ground became a very welcome meal for the local wildlife.

With the entire park blanketed in snow, its hungry bird population had to quickly look for alternative food sources – and it found them in the walled garden’s winter cauliflower, calabrese and Brussels sprouts. “The pigeons must have been starving, because they just devoured them,” says Meeda as she points to the well-pecked remains of once-healthy plants. “I suppose that we should have netted them but it didn’t occur to us that we’d need to do that in the middle of winter.” Even the usually-resident robin has temporarily abandoned the walled garden in search of any nearby bird tables.

But apart from burst pipes and hungry birds, what other damage has the big chill caused in the OPW’s restored Victorian kitchen garden? Well, remarkably little, as it turns out. Brian and Meeda had already stripped many of the crops from the beds in preparation for planting later this spring, and what vegetable crops remain seem surprisingly unaffected by the cold weather.

The green manure planted last autumn also looks quite unscathed as do most of the herbs and the soft fruit beds. In fact, the only reminder of the storm-force, icy winds of last week are just a few, small, fallen branches from the mature trees which surround the old brick walls. Those and the gardeners’ tent (a leftover from last year’s Bloom show) which buckled under the weight of the snow before being ripped to shreds by the winter gales.

“We were lucky, really,” says Brian. “Big trees came down in other parts of the park but not here. If one had, it would have taken a whole section of the old wall with it.”

Elsewhere, other urban farmers may not have been so lucky. Garden structures like glasshouses, polytunnels and fruitcages have taken a battering, as have many plants. According to Stephen Alexander, vegetable crops advisor with Teagasc, some vegetable crops will be a write-off due to the severity of the freeze. “Anyone who took a gamble and left potatoes or carrots unprotected in the ground (rather than covering them with a deep layer of straw or lifting them in autumn) can forget about them – you’re not going to be able to rescue them now. Winter cauliflower is also vulnerable to the kind of hard frosts that we’ve experienced over the last few weeks, as are spinach and scallions. I know one commercial grower in north Co Dublin who’s afraid of looking at his scallion crop because he expects that it’ll be a complete write-off.”

For several days during the first week or so of January, daytime air temperatures in Dublin stayed below freezing – a very rare occurrence, according to Stephen. “Minus 7ºC was recorded at Dublin Airport during that week, and that’s an air temperature. You can take away another 5º to get an idea of what the ground temperature was like, so we’re talking temperatures of around minus 12ºC at ground level, which is what vegetable crops will know all about.

“But having said that, many winter vegetables are surprisingly hardy, even in such prolonged low temperatures, including kale, leeks, Brussels sprouts and spring cabbage. Root vegetables like parsnips will also be fine, although while the ground was frozen, it was impossible to dig them up.”

Those urban farmers whose plots were covered with deep snow can also count themselves luckier than those without, as the snow acted as a sort of insulant, partially protecting the ground and the plants from severe frosts. “Those parts of the country that had little snow will actually have suffered more as regards the low temperatures,” says Stephen. “But we don’t fully know yet what damage has been caused to crops, so it’s a case of sitting back and seeing what happens. But we expect that while the cold weather will have an impact, the bulk of vegetables will be okay. The only other worry will be plant diseases, such as botrytis, setting in as a result of the cool, damp conditions that will come with the thaw.”

In the OPW’s walled garden, Brian and Meeda are counting themselves lucky. And while winter’s icy grip is still very much in evidence, there are some small but consoling signs that spring is waiting in the wings. While tidying up the raspberry canes last week, Meeda noticed a small but vivid flash of red where a bright ray of winter sunshine was hitting one of the wooden supports. On very close inspection, she spotted a family of ladybirds, huddled together deep within a tiny gap in the joint between two wooden posts.

Astonishingly, despite the low temperatures, they were still alive, and waiting for the opportunity to pounce on any greenfly that make an appearance in the walled garden in the months ahead.

Now that’s what I call a truly shining example of sitting it out. Perhaps spring isn’t so far away after all. . .

The OPW’s Victorian walled kitchen garden is in the grounds of the Phoenix Park Visitor Centre, beside the Phoenix Park Café and Ashtown Castle. The gardens are open daily from 10am to 4.30pm

Next week Urban Farmer in Property will look at fruit and vegetable gardening courses available this spring

Fionnuala Fallon is a garden designer and writer