It's going to rain this week!
This blog was published on 4 June 2019 and a similar pattern has emerged in 2020, except this time the months of March, April and May have been hot and dry ....
Hurrah, some rain is forecast. I know, it’s June, and we all want to be outside enjoying the sun and the last thing we want is rain. But 2019 has been a dry year so far. Down in the south-west, January was incredibly dry. Then summer arrived early in February, when temperatures soared and reached record highs in some part of the country. The rain returned in March, but April and May have had lower than average rainfall.
A worrying picture
The Environment Agency’s water flow and river level data for England look worrying. There were no rivers recorded as having above normal flows, in fact, more than half of the rivers that are recorded in the data had a daily flow that was below normal or notably low compared with the mean data for this time of year. In the south-west, the cumulative rainfall total for May is less than 40 per cent of the monthly long-term average. We are going to need higher than average rain over the coming weeks and months to help to replenish the ground water. Its beginning to look much like 1976 and 1977 which is not good news for our gardens. Hence my enthusiasm for the predicted rainfall.
Our gardens are already suffering. I don’t know about your soil, but my soil is dry! I garden on a heavy clay and it’s already baked hard. In fact, it’s hardly changed since last year. I’m planning for another dry year.
Its not too late to protect your soil and harvest some water
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