Rainy

SW Bowland. 12 miles NE of Preston. Thunder heard just to southeast of here about 30 mins ago. Perhaps Blackburn way. May have been some earlier but I had fallen asleep in chair while watching tennis. It's one of those heavy eyelid days,. A bit of faint drizzle now and they were still shaking the meadow hay till about 10 mins ago. Black clouds all round, thiough somewhat lighter to SW. Still and hunid and midgy out there. Temp fallen back to 21C.

SW Bowland. Mass of dead black cloud looking south. Over Wales, Cheshire and Merseyside I daresay. Expanding towards here with huge curly tops. Mostly blue skies to north with a few cu bubbles. Quite a nice E breeze here at times reducing the sultry feel, but temp now 24.4C. SAT24 is interesting just now. Lots of worm like features all over the S and SW England. Convection over the higher ground and ridges? eg Downs?

SW Bowland. How are you for wasps this year? Grr. Two wasps nests already established within 10 yards of the house door. One S facing, the other E facing. Didn't have any nests close by during the last two summers. Hardly saw any wasps feeding here then despite growing fruit in the garden and lots of blackberries in field hedgerows. Thought they had all died out in all the wet and the cold ...!

SW Bowland. Rain on and off since 4.30pm. Light-moderate. Moved in from ESE. No thunder. Still gloomy and overcast now except towards NNE direction. But rain seems to have stopped. Can't see any tall growy towers any more, so presume convection is dying down. Been some amazing cloud formations today. Often tall narrow pipes as well as the huge caulifllowers. All very slow moving. Calm most of the day and not a breath of wind at present, but when the rain approached quite a strong E breeze got up. Mains electric supply lost all afternoon too. Preston area. Don't know why.

Hello fellow Lancastrians. Can see from SW Bowland that some wierd cu or cunim are growing fast over Burnley and Manchester direction, or in the hills near there. Have posted pics in Metcheck Gallery just now. Haven't had time to work out how to post pics on here. Looking like it could be a rouigh afternoon.

SW Bowland. 550ft. May was wet. Total 131.7mm. 40yrs average same site, same kit is 85.2 mm. So this May had approx 155% of approx. SW Bowland. Sorry -- phone rang. May had approx 155% of avaerage here,

Bowland Lancs. Been lots of Painted Ladies about this last week in the sunshine. Seen them sipping nectar on lilac and chive flowers. We've lots of nettles, marsh thistles and knapweed here around the fields. So plenty of food plants for the new broods during the summer. I do wonder if they are territorial once they have found a suitable place. I saw two having an aerial battle over the veg garden and the loser being chased off. Very few orange tips this year so far. Just one peacock butterfly. Good number of whites. No small tortoiseshells and only the odd one last year. They really have crashed. We used to have a lot hibernating here and on the first good sunny morning in Spring they would be out investigating early flowers.

Yes, thank you to the teams and all others involved. Really enjoyable following your chases on the live stream and watching with you those awesome storms. I'm amazed how you hunt them out. Thanks also for the great still pics and videos. As someone fearful of storms, I am impressed by your bravery in close encounter with lightning flashes, standing there and catching stunnjng pics. I'm wondering if the car hire firm was happy with cars returned well dented by golf ball hail?

Bowland, Lancs. Saw one Painted Lady briiefly on the morning of Bank Holiday Mpnday, 25th. It flew away northwards. I was surprised how strongly it flew. Almost as powerfully as a bird. I wondered if the hot plume last weekend had helped to bring the invasion? By the way, not seen any Small Tortoiseshells this year. Only one or two seen last year. Usually we have lots emerging from hibernation on warm sunny days in springtime. Also only seen one Peacock butterfly.

SW Bowland, Lancs. Stair rod deluges. Some with hail. Only 10.8C. Odd chinks of brightness.

Earthquake nr Ulverston. Today I was away from home, nr Carnforth, about 5 miles N of Lancaster and thus about 12 miles or so from the epicentre. Got a good shaking from this eartnquake and the rumble was very loud. Had gone there to look after my grandson and was downstairs sittiing on the sofa at the time. The new double glazing really rattled and at first I thought a big lorry had driven up to the front door. Didn't take it seriously as local quarry blasting takes place. Only found out about the eartnquake when I returned home this evening.

My first ever post on NW ! Hope it works. Can't find a suitable thread. Just wondering is anyone else is suffering with hay-fever type symptoms today? I've been working outdoors every day this week in this welcome dry but strong E wind. Felt increasingly out of sorts, tired, sneezing and with sore eyes. Noticed similar problems sometimes other Aprils. I don't suffer later in the main hay fever times, thank goodness. BBC Ceefax gives high tree pollen count for many areas at present. Other years birch pollen from Scandinavia was said to be causing problems in the UK. Sure enough, a Google search under birch pollen shows there's an extra big surge in Denmark at present this season. Nicely upwind. http://politiken.dk/newsinenglish/article689879.ece