American Maid, what in the world would cause this? The temps have been through the roof with heat indices around 110. Do you think that is it? Any other ideas?
Forgot to mention we have also had torrential downpours (3"+ per hour) in between the sweltering heat.
I think it's just the heat. We hit 96 here Sunday which is 1 degree short of the hottest temperature ever recorded here. The heat index was 105-110. I had several cultivators where the blooms refused to open today. It's now 10:30 PM and its still 88 degrees with oppressive humidity.
Jon
I've had blooms do weird things on really hot days--usually the petals flop backwards instead of forwards, but maybe humidity makes a difference in what direction they curl.
I had one cultivator yesterday which had three blooms that looked like balloons. They were all puffy but never opened at all during the day. Normally they open up fine when the temperature is only around 90 degrees. On the positive side, I had a new cultivator bloom for the first time yesterday and the bloom is still open today. That's pretty good considering the temperature was in the high 90's all afternoon long and didn't drop below the low 80's overnight.
100 degrees here, and was yesterday. Last year was such a pleasant summer, never got over 94, this year is making up for it. Whew....animals are having a tough time. Having to hose the horses down, lost 2 chickens to the heat. Just keeled over. Its tough, but Ill still deal with this rather than zero degrees in winter. Its a no brainer.
That's true. It can easily get to 100 degrees further up the coast in the Carolinas and mid-Atlantic states several times each summer. This is more of a rare occurrence down here. I don't mind the winter that much. Being able to do gardening things 12 months of the year is one of the things I like about it here.
I sure think it has to do with the heat ardesia, this also happens to my hibs when the days are really hot, just have to wait for cooler days to come.
Wilfred
We hit 100 degrees here in Ft Lauderdale today (Monday). It set an all time record high temperature.
Wow, that is unusual. We are in the 90's this week too and being on the coast that is unusual. The inland areas often hit triple digits however. The heat would not be so bad were it not for the humidity. The air feels like soup and the mosquites are plentiful. Not fun.
Yeah, it has never happened here before in 150 years of record keeping. The heat index was only 115. Phew
