Monday, 02 October 2017
A Wet September
I blogged enough towards the end of September about how it had rained most days in the month. By the end of the month we'd finished up with 28 days when some amount of rainfall had fallen.
Annual Rainfall Data for 2017 to Date
I've highlighted September's figures which indicate the 28 days with rainfall and also show that we had 35.1mm (1.38in)more rainfall than average in the month with 76.8mm (3.02in) of rainfall. That makes it our second wettest September in my records with 2012 holding onto the record with 79.2mm or 3.12in. We're still heading for a lower than average rainfall for the year though as that "departure from normal column" indicates. However, we're about 42.7mm (1.68in) below average at the end of September as that total of -88.4mm (-3.48in) needs adjusting to allow for October's rainfall.
I've been through my weather station records to determine if we'd had any more months with so many days of rainfall. As it turns out we have.
Rain Days with 0.2mm or more of Rainfall 2010 - September 2017
The shading in the table goes from red least number of wet days in a month to blue indicating the wettest days in a month. The only other month with 28 wet rain days was January 2014 but as there's 31 days in January and only 30 days in September I think it's fair to say this September takes the record.
In the middle of September we had some windy weather which was strong enough to blow over our runner beans.
Runner Beans 22 September 2017
They fell over in a very tidy fashion but I'm guessing that to fall over in such a way most of the supporting canes will have been broken at soil level.
September was the third month in a row with below average temperatures. After a promising start to the year with above average temperatures in May and June tempting us to think some good summer weather was on the way July, August and now September have all been below average.
Maybe an Indian summer is on the way?
Thursday, 05 October 2017
A Windy Start to October
October has got off to a windy start will gale force winds dominating the weather over the first 5 days of the month.
Temperature & Wind Speed Records 06 September - 05 October 2017
We'd avoided any really strong winds since the middle of September when the gales brought down our runner beans at the allotment. The winds over the last few days haven't done any damage at home apart from overturning a bird table which the birds won't have been too happy about.
As I looked around the garden this morning after more overnight gales, I didn't find any other damage. I noticed that this allium head had parted company with the rest of the plant. It's a pity as I think the dead heads look attractive and usually last through autumn and into winter.
It's also rained on the first 5 days of the month too which means we've had rainfall on 35 of the last 37 days going back to the end of August. Surprisingly there's no rain forecast for tomorrow (Friday) so maybe we'll get a rare rain free day.