Hyde Heath Weather reports by Gary Beynon from his own garden observations and measurements
January February
January February
January
You only have to look at the fields and some of the roads that were flooded to realise that January was a wet month.
There were two very wet days with 23 and 19.8mm but it was the ongoing rainy (and snowy) days that just added to the overall picture. Rainfall was over 50% above the 40 year average; not the wettest January which was in 2014 at 190.1mm and with over half of the 40 years with above average rainfall.
The trend over the 40 years is getting wetter and January rightly has a reputation for being wet!
There was snow as well which caused the usual chaos despite the small depth. We had 8 days when some snow or sleet fell; something we are not especially used to in Hyde Heath. The temperatures were all over the place ranging from a maximum of 12.0° to a minimum of -2.8°.
However, compared with January 2020, this January was actually colder but from the figures the various averages are distorted by the differences in temperatures sometimes on a day to day basis.
Part way through the month my Oregon Weather Station started to play up a bit (many years old) so I bought another; since then it has of course worked fine but I saw this as a warning.
I have compared the readings for 2 weeks and find that the new instrument reads between 0.5 and 0.8° lower than the old one with both the max and min figures; using frosts as a guide the new instrument looks to be more accurate.
As of February I will be only using my new instrument---providing it doesn’t fail on me!!
There were two very wet days with 23 and 19.8mm but it was the ongoing rainy (and snowy) days that just added to the overall picture. Rainfall was over 50% above the 40 year average; not the wettest January which was in 2014 at 190.1mm and with over half of the 40 years with above average rainfall.
The trend over the 40 years is getting wetter and January rightly has a reputation for being wet!
There was snow as well which caused the usual chaos despite the small depth. We had 8 days when some snow or sleet fell; something we are not especially used to in Hyde Heath. The temperatures were all over the place ranging from a maximum of 12.0° to a minimum of -2.8°.
However, compared with January 2020, this January was actually colder but from the figures the various averages are distorted by the differences in temperatures sometimes on a day to day basis.
Part way through the month my Oregon Weather Station started to play up a bit (many years old) so I bought another; since then it has of course worked fine but I saw this as a warning.
I have compared the readings for 2 weeks and find that the new instrument reads between 0.5 and 0.8° lower than the old one with both the max and min figures; using frosts as a guide the new instrument looks to be more accurate.
As of February I will be only using my new instrument---providing it doesn’t fail on me!!
February
February turned out to be a month of contrasts; on the one hand the temperature shot up to a dizzy 15.2°C, and on the other saw a minimum of -4.4°C. There was a cold spell early in the month with temperatures hovering around freezing all day (on just one day,10th, it didn’t actually get above 0°)
Then a warmer second half with temperatures at maximum between 10 and 15°. Little wonder that the daffodils and crocus all came out.
There was frost evident on 11 days and snow flurries on 5 days which fortunately didn’t amount to much. The ground has now dried out a good deal compared with the start of February which saw most of the rainfall.
Rainfall was below the 41 year average at 52.6mm but the average figure hides a very wide range from 8.5 up to 144.5mm.
Interestingly the rainfall trend over the last 41 years shows that it is getting wetter with the trend line going from about 40 to 70+mm.
Compared with February 2020 this year was drier, less warm (despite the dizzy maximum) and colder. Last year saw about the same number of frosts but no hint of snow although there was a fall in Stokenchurch on the 10th, and you may remember Storm Dennis (it gave us a ruff time).
Then a warmer second half with temperatures at maximum between 10 and 15°. Little wonder that the daffodils and crocus all came out.
There was frost evident on 11 days and snow flurries on 5 days which fortunately didn’t amount to much. The ground has now dried out a good deal compared with the start of February which saw most of the rainfall.
Rainfall was below the 41 year average at 52.6mm but the average figure hides a very wide range from 8.5 up to 144.5mm.
Interestingly the rainfall trend over the last 41 years shows that it is getting wetter with the trend line going from about 40 to 70+mm.
Compared with February 2020 this year was drier, less warm (despite the dizzy maximum) and colder. Last year saw about the same number of frosts but no hint of snow although there was a fall in Stokenchurch on the 10th, and you may remember Storm Dennis (it gave us a ruff time).
