Until this week, it's been decidedly cold and stormy so far this summer. We went straight from winter to summer, trading in coats and boots for shorts and sandals. Bizarre, but at least it's better than much of the rest of the world. Europe is having an intensely hot and dry week, England's canals and Italy's rivers are drying up, and the US is facing earlier and more intense wildfire seasons.
Today's visible satellite image shows a country mostly bathed in sunshine, although we did have clouds passing overhead. Yesterday and today were quite warm in the sun, but the air is still cool under cloud cover. Last year, the buds started flowering around the 14th of July, which was pretty late. This year, they are not yet close to flowering, so again late.
The good news is that the Albarino is coming on now, still very small compared with the Pinot Noir planted at the same time, but we've lost only four plants. I thought we had lost many more. I will be treating the vines with great care. I need to also tie some of the 5-yo Solaris up.
Sadly we have lost a pear tree to disease in the orchard and may lose another. I am praying that whatever caused it has not spread to the other trees. It looks like we may have a good crop of apples this year, so may be pressing juice and/or cider.
The contractor who is to install the telephone poles for the remainder of the vineyard has been stuck on another job but is supposed to come in the next couple of weeks. Hopefully, it won't be too disruptive or destructive. Alex managed to secure lots of telephone poles for the vineyard from the Eir work crews who are replacing poles in our area. That saved us a lot of money. The $ has reached parity with the € for the first time in decades, but the rate of inflation is a killer. Everything is skyrocketing in costs. I've bought a bistro set for the vineyard so at least we'll be able to sit there and watch the progress.
