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Daylight Savings Time and Gardening
What is
Daylight Saving Time?
Introduction to Daylight Saving Time
Daylight Saving Time - part 2
Daylight Saving Time studies - part 3
Daylight Saving Time studies - part 4
Daylight Saving Time studies - part 5
It’s later than you think! Since today Daylight Saving Time begins, it really is an hour later than it was at this time yesterday (or does that sound as confused as most of us are?).
How did we get into this pickle of moving time about as if it were a chess piece?
The Encyclopedia Americana credits Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790) with suggesting that a plan be adopted “to save on candles and provide a longer evening of light.”
England’s author of Waste of Daylight, William Willett, not only wrote in favor of, but campaigned for his plan of using daylight.
It was World War I’s fuel and power shortages that pushed forward the adoption of a plan, with Germany “the first nation to adopt such a system, in 1915.”
The U.S. had a short-lived system from 1917 to 1919, but it was repealed because of strong objections by farmers.
It took a second World War to move Congress to enact a year-round daylight saving time, with European nations soon following suit.
In 1986 Congress moved the beginning of daylight time from the last Sunday in April to the first.
Still, daylight saving time isn’t observed uniformly. Western Europe observes it from the last Sunday in March to the last Sunday in September.
Britain ends theirs in October, and Russia, China, and other countries only maintain daylight saving time in the summer.
As for Gardening and this time change:
Did you notice that some plants bloom for only a day? If you have a hibiscus bush or any of the Hemerocallis genus (better known as day lilies), in your yard, you’ve probably noticed that they practice their own form of daylight saving time.
The beautifully colored Morning Glory (Convolvulus) is only open during early sunlight hours.
If the day proves too cloudy, most of these plants will either not open or only open briefly.