Report of the Meetings for 1894. 41 



APPENDIX II. 



On the Injuries done to Gardens by Frost, May 1894. By Eev. 

 David Paul, LL.D., Roxburgh. 



It seems desirable that some account should be preserved of the 

 remarkable series of frosts that occurred in the month of May 1894. 

 On the nic?ht following Saturday, the 19th, the thermometer at 

 Roxburgh Manse, protected in the usual manner, and standing 4 feet 

 above the ground, fell to 29° ; and another thermometer, unprotected, 

 and standing 2 feet above the ground, fell to 27°. On the afternoon of 

 Sunday, 20th May, which was a very cold, unseasonable day, a heavy 

 shower of hail fell. That night the two thermometers fell to 285 

 and 26° respectively. On the night of the 21st, the readings were 

 28° and 25°; on the night of the 22nd, 28° and 25-5°; and on the 

 night of the 23rd, 28° and 26°. There were thus, on the five successive 

 nights, 18"5 degrees of frost recorded on the protected and more 

 elevated thermometer, and SO^S degrees on the lower and unprotected 

 one. It is not an unusual thing to have a frosty night in May, even 

 in the end of May, but a succession of five frosty nights, and that, 

 too, after the middle of the month, has not happened, at least, for 

 a great many years, and must be of the rarest occurrence. The 

 Saturday and Sunday were both cold days, the max. readings of the 

 thermometer being only 46° and 49°; but on the Monday, Tuesday, 

 and Wednesday the sun shone out brightly, and the max. readings 

 rose to 55°, 59°, and 60°. 



As was to be expected, the damage done to vegetation has been 

 very great. I shall only record what has happened here at Roxburgh. 

 Potatoes in the garden have been completely blackened, and those 

 that were 6 inches high, or more, have sustained injury from which 

 they can only partially recover. The Gooseberry crop is much injured ; 

 the berries are whitened and shrivelled, and fall off at a touch, so 

 that I do not expect to have more than half a crop. Currants, both 

 red and black, will not now yield anything like what they would 

 otherwise have done, except on trees nailed to the wall. Strawberries 

 have suffered very severely ; in almost all the expanded blossoms, and 

 even in the nnexpanded, the carpels are blackened and killed, and 

 the crop must be a failure, except in the case of the later kinds. 

 One cannot speak positively with regard to the promise of Appleg 

 or of Damsons, but it is almost certain that the produce will be very 

 small. Pears and Plums both being well set before the frost came 

 on, do not appear to be injured. The young shoots of Peas have not 

 escaped, nor those of Ivy and Beech, nor the flowers of the Ash. 



In the herbaceous border a great many plants have been blighted 



and injured, both in leaves and bloom. They certainly have not 



suffered so much, at this time of the year, for a quarter of a century. 



The advanced state of vegetation, at the time, made the frost more 



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