Everyone is talking drought as this is written - Saturday/Sunday, June 15/16th. Of course, by the time you read it, there might be spills of rain. But, in general, it is well to be prepared. Programmes on the air and in print advise mulching with tree bark, compost, grass cuttings (put on thinly) layers of newspapers, even plastic. One man in Meath lost a fine handkerchief tree or dove tree or ghost tree (anyway davidia involucrata) after last year's drought but hopes that a small sprout from the base may give hope.
Others take the good that last year's sun brought. Wonderful hawthorn blossom; the promise of heavy fruit crops of various kinds including the humble sloe. There are wins and losses. Southern Tree Surgeons send out a sort of newsletter. They, too, tell us that the larger shallow rooted trees like beech and birch also suffered badly through the drought. Not just the newly planted. And the energy in producing prodigious crops of seed may have drained the trees' reserves. This happened, they write, after the 1976 severe drought (fine summer to most of us) the effects of which could be seen on beech ten years later.
They tell us a lot more. Stressed trees may attract harmful in sects. Defoliation and woodboring by insects may stunt the growth for years. Yes, trees in your garden need looking after. The drought, if we may call it that, has brought the river down. Hardly anything green grows in it. The stones are often covered in a sticky brown mess. Fish are few. And when you read in the papers of a fish kill, remember that somewhere downstream people may be using the water for drinking.
Even if treated. Fish kill does not mean human kill, but it gives you pause. And it probably helps to sell bottled Irish water. Meanwhile, the soil is falling away from ash and birch and beech roots in another man's plot, and the mower as it keeps the grass paths tidy, takes huge parings of bark and wood. If you're in despair about the drought, take consolation from the words of that well known Yorkshire weather prophet Bill Foggitt, whose family has been logging the changing times since 1830. He foresees the dry spell as going on until St Swithen's Day, July 15th. After that, he says, as reported in The Sunday Telegraph, it will be a very wet summer. That will surely please some people.