By the light of the harvest moon

As autumn's whisper reminds farmers to reap their crops, inspect your produce for a suggestion of the winter to come, says Lia Leendertz

- Lia Leendertz

AS you harvest your crops, check the onion skins for an indication that the coming winter will be particularly harsh: 'Onion skin thin, a mild winter coming in,/Onion skin thick and tough, coming winter cold and rough.' Some believe this folklore could be attributed to the La Niña years. This atmospheric and oceanic phenomenon, the cold counterpart to warm El Niño, is characterised by a dry summer or even a summer drought --which would lead to thickened onion skins-followed by a cold winter.