Last weekend turned out to be a windy weekend with the arrival of storm Malik on Sunday morning. It brought with it the windiest weather for some considerable time. It certainly blew away the murky cloudy weather that had been hanging around for a few days. The highest wind gust that my weather station recorded was 40mph the highest since 11 January 2017 when a speed of 41mph was recorded. That puts it into 4th place in my highest wind gust speeds.

Storm Corrie arrived hot on the heels of storm Malik in the early hours of Monday morning. It was another bout of gale force winds but the peak gust was 31mph, somewhat less than storm Malik.

We haven’t visited the allotment since the storms so we are unaware of any damage there but at home, the only damage was the overturning of Rubygate. The little wooden panel stops Ruby from heading up the garden and getting muddy every time she goes out.

Neither storm brought much rain with both storms together only managing 5.4mm or 0.2in. Indeed January’s total rainfall was fairly low at 17.8mm (0.7in) putting it into 12th place over the last 13 Januarys. January got off to a very mild start, with the warmest January day I’ve recorded with the temperature reaching 14.6°C (58.3°F) but the remainder of the month was nothing special and in the end, the average temperature for the month was only slightly above average.

The stormy windy weather has continued into the first few days of February. Often our coldest month February has begun on the mild side.