Trouble with wind
This anemone was completely untroubled by the effects of storm Ophelia, maybe because anemones are commonly called windflowers
I am sure that everyone is heartily sick of hearing about storm Ophelia (on the radio it always sounded like ‘stormaphilia’ which must be a love of storms) but the power went off yesterday afternoon and was off for almost 24 hours so I was unable to post while we were being battered by what was, according to who you listened to, the worst storm for 50, 60 of less years. It is strangely ironic that it was 30 years to the day after the ‘great storm’ that hit the south of England. Of course there was no damage there this time but I happened to be ‘hit’ by both.
As it happens, the storm seemed to do less damage than expected here but I believe that to be because of the gales we had in February 2014 which caused real havoc and thinned out the weak trees. Yesterday’s storm was supposed to pass in about 4 hours but it lasted much longer, from about 12 till 12! What was weird was the lack of rain and the warmth – it was like being in front of a hair drier. Anyway, it is all over now, till the next one.
Fuchsia ‘Whiteknights Pearl’ was looking so good last week that I planned to feature it
But after Ophelia had her way with it, it hardly seems appropriate
What was shocking today was to see the effect of the searing wind on plants. I am not convinced that the strength of the wind exceeded February ’14 – I remember standing in the garden terrified as the roaring wind sounded like an animal. But yesterday the wind was relentless and scorched the leaves, sucking the life out of them.
The yacon took a battering
The squashes were, er, squashed
And the pear tree looks like someone took a blowtorch to it
The Biking Gardener 
That is so strange. I associate tropical storms with torrential rain and humidity, but you are right, it really does look as though the plants were parked in front of a giant hair dryer.
What do the meteorologists say? Did the low pressure pull in air from north Africa or something?
It was an ex-hurricane that tracked up the east Atlantic, unusually far east and north. It brought up warm air and south east of the UK had temps of 24c – very warm for this time of year.
wondering if in Ireland you saw the sun as aball of red and the skies went orange here was a sight to see all to do with the fires in Portugal and Spain and the dessert sands . was aweird feeling for sure.
we didnt see the sun much!
My heart goes out to you! I was saying prayers for you! Having recently gone through Harvey here in Houston I know the damage these huge storms can do. I hope your garden and everyone affects makes a complete recovery. I am fighting soil compaction and having to revive the biology in our soil after it sat under water for a couple of days. Worse else where. We read that the whole Houston area sank 2cm. from the weight of 3-4 feet of rain in 4 days.
We didnt have anything compared to you – you have our sympathies! the odd thing was that there was no rain here at all – just wind. Power keeps going off, now three days later and some areas are still without power. I hope you all recover.
Thank you, we are working on it 😊