Here in North Yorkshire, 2024 was undoubtedly, a very strange year as far as the weather is concerned. Which means a strange year for the Hostas.
Recent TV forecasting say that now we are technically into the meteorological autumn that the summer was cooler than recent years, on average.
Let’s start with the winter of 2023-2024. This was a long, wet, but mild winter. This meant that all those nasties such as slugs and snails survived in much larger numbers than would be if we had a long cold winter. Spring was quite late, being very wet until about May. There was very little snowfall. What did fall only lasted a day or so.
Hostas were later coming up, than we would normally see. They were much more reluctant to emerge in general. This could be that they were waiting to dry out a little bit after all the rain we have had since Xmas. We noticed that Hostas that were sheltered from the rain, started first.
One of the first Hostas to emerge was in late February, giving us hope for the Spring. Hosta Chinese Sunrise poking its little pips through the surface of the compost, then taking a further 3-4 weeks to open the first leaves.
Hostas slowly emerged over the next month or so. All those tender young leaves were waving about in the wind by the middle of April.
Then what happened? As if sent to test us, we had several hailstorms. These caused much damage to the fresh foliage, so much so, that we were removing some of the newly grown growth to try and reduce slug attack to the damaged foliage.
The most damaged Hostas were those with very large leaves and those with tall stems. These were generally the giant and very large Hostas such as Hosta Diamond Lake & Hosta Empress Wu.
There was very little we could do other than to tidy them up as much as possible. The good news, looking on the bright side, is that the damaged foliage was all fairly new growth, and would be replaced by other new growth fairly quickly.
By the time Spring arrived, we were already 2-3 weeks behind that of a normal Hosta growing year. Hosta foliage damaged by hailstones, and well behind, we felt that spring had arrived… albeit not until early May.
During late Spring and well into Summer, we had periods of very wet weather, followed by spells of extremely hot weather, meaning that we had to water all the pots, and often the ground they were planted in. Periods of too hot and too wet, was the story for this period. Even now, some of the Hosta borders have cracks appearing in the soil. Can’t seem to keep them wet enough for the periods of hot weather we get.
However, the biggest issue was that of the wind. We can’t remember a year when all we seemed to get was windy weather, and on occasions, wild windy weather that causes untold damage.
The wind was not only destructive to the foliage of the Hostas, particularly the large ones, but to the tree canopy above, with quite large branches falling on top of the Hostas.
The wind also dries out the compost on the pots. We seem to do much more watering when it had been windy. Longer petioles become brittle and break.
We don’t know if this year is one of the windiest for a while as we can’t find any specific statistics, only averages. It certainly felt like it was extra windy.
All our Hostas are grown outdoors, and therefore must cope with whatever the Yorkshire weather throws at it. It will mean that some of them could look quite untidy, even through the summer, but if they grow here, they will grow anywhere.
They will never be protected like those grown in polytunnels, but they will be ready straight away for whatever is thrown at them.
This summer has given us, a combination of conditions, that as humans, we don’t particularly enjoy. We like to have longer, settled periods, of half decent weather, that is somewhat predictable. Hostas are no different.
We, and I am sure you will agree, are glad to see the back of such a summer.
We are not wishing summer away, but let’s look forward to better conditions next year.
Hostas can’t talk, but they are certainly telling you something similar by the way they react to the weather.
They never really reached their full potential this year. A lot of varieties didn’t even flower.
A lot of our Hostas are already saying, “enough is enough”, and there are definite signs that they are starting that journey into their dormancy period, at least a month earlier than normal. That’s a very short growing season. Late to start, early to finish. Don't worry, they have had enough time to fulfil their season’s needs.
Don’t get me wrong! It’s not been a total washout, but please, next time, less wind, and more weather that suits the time of year more closely, the way I think it used to be. A proper winter, to reduce those wee beasties. A proper Spring and Summer with no mad variations in rainfall and temperature.
We love to talk about, and to a degree, moan about the weather, and from a lot of Facebook posts, we see that we are not alone. Let us know how you and your Hostas have managed to cope with the conditions.
Looking forward to a year, next year, that doesn’t break any weather related records.
We know we still have a little growing time left this year but lets all look forward to fantastic Hosta displays in 2025.
To learn more about Hostas, you may interested in reading : Grow and Maintain Hostas In Containers, Benefits of Companion Plants, What Are the Common Mistakes to Avoid When Growing Hostas?, Ways to Protect Your Hostas from Slugs and Snails and "Uncovering the Advantages of Bare Root Hostas:
Shop for Hostas HERE
John Plant
Rewela Hostas
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