Winter in the GH & PT

There’s not a lot of difference between Wiltshire and South Wales JJB? Not unless you are on a really tall Wiltshire hill!!

No you're right, but I believe V is near the coast???  And my GH's are on a slope down towards a frost pocket.  We're raised up and a  bit exposed  but not what I'd call tall.  Veggie always seems to report on weather a bit milder than I seem to get.  All to do with topography I expect.  I know that the village a few miles away can get totally different rainfall than us due to a ridge between us.

Just for you JJB, I've been looking at maps.  The 100m contour line goes straight through my house and down the garden.
I can see the sea/Bristol Channel and across the water to Weston and Clevedon - that should show you how open and exposed my garden is. As the crow flies, I'm 6.5 miles from the nearest coast in Cardiff Bay. 

OK I've shown you mine - now show me yours. 

That might take some time V, I don't like maps but I'll try.

Can't find a contour map but Google tells me I'm about 77 ft above sea level. I can see Salisbury cathedral to the SE about 6 miles away, I can hear the planes from Boscombe Down airfield and Porton Down, where they do the microbiological research, is about 2 miles away. It's some 25 miles to the coast. Notwithstanding all that I still think you have a less frosty early season in sunshiny south Wales

Thanks JJB.
We don't have a lot of frost here but I put that down to the trees giving some protection as the fields and hillside to the north will often be white whilst the garden is OK.

I think Nesh is a difficult word to track down it is first written into English language when Irish monks started to catalogue English words in the 9th century, with a meaning of someone susceptible to cold weather. It was pronounced hnesce which is of Latin origin so I believe it possibly has much earlier roots, and might well have been used either during the Roman period or soon after when there was a lot of migration around Europe. In the 16th century Nesch is a Dutch word meaning damp or foolish. So it’s possibly a mutation of Old English and used as a derogatory term for someone being unsuitably dressed for the weather.

If I had to guess I’d say it is probably post roman but, Latin of origin. It might well have been a derogatory term for invaders from Frankia who came from damp lowlands. To mean both damp and foolish they are quite an odd combination so likely to be said in jest of one’s enemy. This is only a guess mind.

We get a more extreme and longer winter here. Up on top of very exposed mountain. Our town goes from 1300 ft to 1425 feet. We can have snow falling and it be raining in Abergavenny..

Since 2010, when we were very cut off for 3-4 weeks, the councils added a snowflake warning triangle sign in the 3 roads that lead into us.

Are you up the Sugar loaf Mamsie?, back when I was in college many moons ago, and working for the council during the summer months, I was sent on an errant to pick up drain plasters for surface dressing and told to meet them on the Sugar loaf

The errand sounds like tartan paint but, it wasn’t there is such a thing!! However I only knew of one Sugar loaf, I later discovered there were two mountains and I was on the wrong one.

Hopefully in the greenhouse border and pots we'll have some spring onions, spinach, tatsoi, pak choi, mizuna, chard, wild rocket and baby kale. In some large trays we'll have lettuce, lamb's lettuce and winter purslane. All these have already been sown according to the timings this chart - https://www.johnnyseeds.com/growers-libr...chart.html

Then overwintering in pots maybe some Candissa cabbages, cauliflower and perennial flowers. Also the carrots currently outside in pots will go into the greenhouse and we'll pick them as needed.

That's an interesting chart - thanks! In case anyone's interested, the last 10-hour day in the UK is around St Crispin's Day (25th October), or exactly one week before Hallowe'en if you're not a Shakespeare/Hundred Years' War buff 

I don't have a GH (no space in my tiny garden), but I do have a conservatory that I sometimes use for growing stuff. Might sow some trays of lettuce and peas for baby leaves, but most of my winter crops will be outdoors under Thermacrop.

Not quite, we are in Blaenavon on The Blorenge. Our train used to be the highest level public train station apparently.. Its like we have our very own weather system.

Are you up the Sugar loaf Mamsie?, back when I was in college many moons ago, and working for the council during the summer months, I was sent on an errant to pick up drain plasters for surface dressing and told to meet them on the Sugar loaf

The errand sounds like tartan paint but, it wasn’t there is such a thing!! However I only knew of one Sugar loaf, I later discovered there were two mountains and I was on the wrong one.

Mikey, there is another Sugar Loaf over here in Ireland, it’s part of the Wicklow mountain range