Gardening for Changing Weather Conditions
Use long term weather forecasts to plan you garden for the next couple of years
The seasons are changing
The world is coming out of a three year El Niño cycle. This is a weather pattern, which affects ocean temperatures in such a way that normal seasonal weather patterns are completely disrupted. The opposite of what is expected is what you get with El Niño. This meant that we had extremely dry summers with impractically wet winters in the central and northern parts of the country. This while the usual winter rainfall areas of the coast did not receive their rain in winter, but rather had flash floods in the spring and summer months. (You can just imagine the havoc this wrecked on agricultural and tourism.)
Now that El Niño is passing (thank goodness!) we are unfortunately entering yet another unnatural weather pattern.
La Niña.
Although prevalent weather patterns differ greatly from region to region, even within a specific country, the consensus is that while El Niño means drought for South Africa, La Niña means more extreme and higher than usual rainfall. While this is usually great news for gardeners (not so much for farmers who rely on predictable, non-disruptive rain), it does mean that you need certain contingencies in place to help your garden thrive.
Gardening with an eye on long term trends instead of short-term fluctuations.
To really understand this concept, you will have to do some research. While predicting weather is a science, it is still a dynamic science. Whereas chemistry and physics have principles that always remain true, meteorology is influenced by so many moving parts that things can change at the drop of a hat.
According to Grain SA the difference between El Niño and La Niña is largely seen in rainfall due to fluctuations in ocean temperatures.
(El Niño usually means crippling drought for large parts of the African continent)
“The opposite of El Niño is called La Niña, or “little girl” in Spanish, also with an occurrence of about three or four out of ten years. It is usually associated with above average rainfall for the summer rainfall area of South Africa.”
It’s not set in stone, but we can be sure of some things.
As we’ve said, predictions like this are estimates and can be months in the making…however – whether we get a strong La Niña, meaning a lot of rain for most of SA or simply slide back into neutral weather patterns, the chances of another devastatingly dry El Niño cycle is basically zero.
What does this mean for my garden?
For your short-term gardening goals this might mean that at lest your garden won’t be as dry as last year. However, with heavy rainfall expected for the first part of the year you might have to ensure that you have adequate drainage and check that your topsoil doesn’t get eroded by the gushing stormwater.
For longer term gardening goals, it might be wise to take advantage of the lower risk of drought to plant and establish larger trees and shrubs that can make the most of the next few drought-free seasons for their important initial growth and root spread.
Top Tip: The projections of El Niño or La Niña cycles are actually so much more than a mere rainfall prediction, but as non-commercial residential gardeners who simply want to make our homes pretty, it can still act as a guide for our short-, medium- and long-term gardening goals.
For a more scientific and in-depth discussion of what these predictions mean for South Africa, read on!
National Geographic El Niño discussion
