Climate change from my point of view and what to do in our gardens part I

I was born in 1973 in Haspengouw, the fruit region of Flanders in Belgium. My first memories are seeing me playing in front of the Christmas tree with its typical seventies multicolor Christmas tree lights. When I looked out of the windows I saw snow, heavy snow and frost flowers adorning the glass, we had only single glass back then. We lived on a rather busy street but in those seventies I remember the street being completely auto free due to a thick layer of snow. My father took us (me and my older brother) on the sleigh and we could ride on the street without seeing a car in half an hour. Those severe winters are imprinted in my memory. Summers were moderate, heatwaves were rare and most of those summers were rainy. Temperatures in summer were moderate with the highest temperature being 33 degrees.

In the early eighties I remember that during winter lots of kids at my catholic school came to school with the sleigh 🛷 so winters were fairly snowy and cold but towards the end of the eighties snowfall became less and temperatures in winters seemed milder but at that time we thought it was temporarily and that it would become normal soon.

Early nineties my grandfather, a dairy farmer, said to my brother and me: Boys, there's something wrong with the climate, what I see today I've never seen before. Winters are not worthy of the name, spring starts earlier and summers seem warmer and last longer. My grandfather was born in 1915.

At the end of the nineties we started to talk about it in the family but my father was sceptic 🤨, according to him it was just a milder episode and nothing serious. In 2003 we had a scorching hot summer, full of drought but the temperature record of 37,2 degrees (from 1958) wasn't pulverized. Winters at that time were mild with no snow to talk about.

Things definitely started to change as of 2015: Winters without snow, frost days dropping at a rapid rate but much more rainfall. Summers became hot and dry with early autumn becoming a continuation of summer weather so much milder. In 2019 we had the hottest summer in history and the highest temperature record from 1958 was completely smashed to bits. It was the first time we surpassed the 40 degrees hurdle. In fact the record was pulverized with 3 whole degrees Celsius being 41,2 degrees. Drought, heatwaves and Ridiculously mild winters were becoming normal and in 2020 the 40 degrees hurdle was taken again! Roses started to bloom as early as April 14 while thirty years ago this was early June. Now my father told me: You were right, I can't deny it anymore, climate has and still is changing.

I had always grown the roses which were most suited for Western Europe: The old roses (with exception of the Teas, Tea Noisettes and China's), Hybrid Teas and David Austin roses. But the past ten years I saw them suffer in our secluded walled garden. Scorching hot weeks on end and dry as the desert 🏜. If I didn't water them each other day they would have died. May became the rose month with a spectacular flush but by June and July it was too warm for most of the roses and they went dormant: No growth, no blooms, no nothing. After a few years I couldn't take it anymore and I started to switch to Teas, Tea Noisettes and China's and the result was spectacular as they kept blooming, even in heatwaves. My other roses, which were dormant during the hot weeks, started to grow and bloom again in early September when temperatures were not so high anymore. In fact they bloomed like crazy with the best blooms of the season and they kept going till the end of October.

That's the situation today and there's one red line in this: Springs start much earlier, summers are hot and dry with several heatwaves, autumns are mild and winters are shorter, much milder but more rainy. 

Our climate zone moved from 6b to 8b in only fifty years.

In the next chapter I'll talk about climate change proof gardens and roses...