RHS explores hardiness issues

Thu, Jan 7, 2010

Royal Horticultural Society

The RHS has now closed its UK survey to find out more about how hardiness is affecting the plants that we grow. The survey asked for specific detail about how plants in your garden coped with the very cold winter of 2008/9. Results are expected soon.

Last winter was the coldest UK winter for 13 years and January 2010 the coldest for 20 years. ?Despite this, the trend to milder and wetter winters is still expected to continue, with snow and frost becoming less of a feature in the future. According to Peter Stott, Climate Scientist at the Met Office we should not experience cold winters as often.

“The famously cold winter of 1962/63 is now expected to occur about once every 1,000 years or more, compared with approximately every 100 to 200 years before 1850.”

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- who has written 872 posts on My Climate Change Garden.

I am not an experienced gardener - more of an enthusiastic amateur who learns by trial and error and who is keen to "manage" the effects of shifting weather patterns on my garden. Writing this blog is my passion and it has evolved over 12 years to inspire engagement with climate change outside our back doors, in our personal gardens and green spaces. My mission is to fertilise and expand this platform to grow a community of global gardeners communicating about the effects of climate change on our plants and exploring how each individual can make small changes in our lives to become more sustainable. The future of our gardens and #OurPlanet is in our hands - please plant your own seeds for our collective sustainable future.

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2 Comments For This Post

  1. Karen - An Artist's Garden Says:

    umm – that is interesting about last winter being the coldest for 13 years – I didn’t know that fact – although I did know it was cold as all my young canna were killed off. I hope this winter is not as bad – we don’t have central heating in this house 🙁
    K

  2. Debbie Says:

    Sorry to hear your canna departed – mine spent the winter in a pot covered with straw in an unheated garage but were better than ever this year .In fact they are still flowering and brighten my day with their rich orange petals – see my next blog for a glimpse of what I mean!
    Hope you have better luck this year.