On May 1, 8:02 am, "Peter" wrote:

Hoar frost on May the first, indicates a good harvest.

An east wind in May, it's your duty to pray.

Two cold spells with differing outcomes. Presumably there was a
collection of parish records of tithes or something for a scrivener to
come to this conclusion?

But what conclusion? He wouldn't have known about the Norwegian school
of thought and that the first saw is about and anticyclone over the UK
and the second is one of an anticyclone over Iceland and a Low over
Scandinavia.

And he could only have been going by market records for the long term
forecast even if he did.

So does it work?
It has obvious connotations to flowering and pollination but these
lores are also present in earlier months and apply to large animals
too, not just flowers.