Is the weather changing?

This year has been a really bad year for our usually beautiful Spring garden of Hemerocallis Daylilies of many colors and smiling faces to greet us in the early morning sun but not so much this year. Only about one half of all the plants even bloomed, some never put out buds some of them died. Of course the ones that died were some of our favorites. The ones that did bloom bloomed in an irregular fashion. Some of the singles bloomed as doubles and some of the normally double bloomed as single. How odd. We take good care of our plants, the right soil, the right fertilizer and water when they need it.

We observed that the plants did not grow vigorous and tall as they should. We also noticed many of the outer leaves turned yellow with dark brown tips. We suspect that the reason for the disappointing blooming year can be blamed on the weather changes and the plants could not adjust and reacted as if they went into shock. Global warming? I don’t know. I haven’t seen any data nor have I talked to our Weather Forecaster. What I do know from my years of observation and memory is that the Weather is changing.

We are located in the north east part of Florida in an area that is known for its many lakes. Most of these lakes are now dried up and are nothing more than a large hole in the ground with long wooden docks extending out into nothing. A few of the large lakes have survived the long term drought. Every day in the summer it used to cloud up, thunder with a roar, lightening (run for cover) and rain heavily for a short period, clear up and have a nice sunset. It’s not like that any more. The weather is unpredictable, hotter and dryer than it used to be with temperatures in the winter warmer than it used to be.  How will our garden grow next year? I guess we will have to wait and see.