GRHinPorts

That would be my impression of summer down here on the central south coast too. Although I'm often aware that there are plenty of days where there will be some glimpses of sunshine here in Portsmouth but as soon as you go so much as 1-2 miles inland you are back under the grey muck.

The 2 year period Nov 2004-Nov 2006 saw a run of months that were predominantly drier than average. By spring of 2006 there was a significant drought affecting water supplies in the south. This was then followed by a 2 year period up to November last year in which there were more months that were predominantly wetter than average. With the floods of Summer 2007 a notable highlight. As most months since then have been drier than average I just wonder now whether we are now in a drier phase. I certainly don't feel that just because this Spring has been very dry that its necessitates the Summer will be a wash out. In fact I could be more persuaded that sometime through 2010 we will be threatened with hosepipe bans.

If the latest ECM and GFS T168 forecasts were to verify we could be in for a bit of cold spell which might bring down the CET somewhat.

I remember 1997 very well as that was the first year I was living in the UK but this cold spell in May really doesn't register with me - perhaps a factor of being down south in the snowless triangle that is Hampshire. What I do remember more is the 2-day heatwave on the 1st & 2nd over the General Election. I particularly remember the BBC commentary of that making reference to the weather - "more like mid June than early summer". Bear in mind I had no real reference of what to expect of the British summer months and those 2 days certainly gave me a false sense of perspective :lol: Not sure how much this was felt in the north of the country but it must have been quite a switch around to have gone from near 30C to having snow falling some 4 days later.

The link reef quoted is actually for 2007 and not 2008. Not that it makes a lot of difference because both summers people would consider poor...but June in 2007 was in fact 1 degree above average. July/August both a degree below average.

A 10.0 for April takes the running CET for the first 4 months of 2009 to 24.10 (average 6.025). Comparing that to the 1971-2000 averages we find that we are 1.3 degrees ahead of where we should be by this stage of the year. However of the last 13 years (going back to 1997) only 2 years (2001 & 2006) were still in negative territory at this stage of the year relative to the 71-00 averages. If we look at the 1997-2008 averages (a personal preference having lived in the UK since 1997) then at this point of the year the running CET total would be 26.33 which leaves 2009 a whole 2.23 degrees behind in relative terms. So in conclusion despite this being one of the 12th warmest Aprils on record, and despite it being homogenously mild since mid-way through February, 2009 as a whole cannot be seen as being particularly warm to date. Certainly not in relation to the past 12 years. I still feel therefore 2009 will deliver yet more above average warmth in the months to come.

LOL...You have to wonder why the Met Office bother. They must know the British media will spin this out of all proportion. Now if we don't get another 1976/1995 replica you can imagine how this will be viewed come September :lol: My only tentative prediction is that one of July/August will deliver a +17 CET. Of course so did August 2004 and that was a very wet month too

12.1 for me...an average May by the standards of the past 12 years.

Second successive Wednesday that has seen heavy overnight rain clear into a lovely warm sunny day...albeit today was more humid feeling.

This is the first winter in 10 years of gardening that I have lost some Dahlias that were left to overwinter in the ground and/or in pots. Probably as a result of some of those -10 degrees days in January.

Yes last year the only decent hot weather came in the first half of May when it regularly reached 25 degrees here in the South. Although I do recall that hot spell you refer to at the end of July. It was very humid and pretty brief.

I think people get confused with this when they look at last years and 2007's warm and dry's Aprils and Mays that then lead to pretty dreadful summers. A belief that having the summery weather in Spring means there will be nothing later on. Where as I think a more telling idea would be how much warmth there had been in the first 4-5 months of the year and then looking to see how much might come in the remaining months of the year. A belief that there is an average amount of warmth in any one given 12 month period and its just matter of when it will come. For example let us presume this years April comes in at 9.1 (1 degree over the 71-00 average) that would mean that to the end of April 2009 would have a pretty much average running total for the year of 23.2. Just 0.4 above the 71-00 average. I am therefore holding out some hope that the remainining months will at least be average and given modern years (say 1997 onwards) tend to be warmer than the 71-00 averages we might even hope for something more than that. As a comparison by the end of April 2007 was some 8.4 degrees above the 71-00 average. A correction in the summer would have seemed inevitable. Other bad summers such as 2002 and 1998 also had massive differentials to the end of April - 6.3 and 5.2 degrees above the 71-00 average. Where as 2006 is one of only two years which was in negative territory vis-a-vis the 71-00 averages come the end of April. And 2003 had the third coldest start of the last 12 years - albeit it was still ahead by 2.3 degrees to the end of April.

Both June of 2005 and 2006 were hot...In 2005 though it was the 2nd half that saw most of the heat (it was the warmest 2nd half of June since 1976) where as the first half was on the coolish side. June 2006 here in the south was very hot pretty much throughout from my memory. May was a pretty grotty month but a big high pressure arrived on the 1st and stayed until about the 12th with day time temps regularly exceeding 25 and sometimes getting beyond 30. The period 12th-25th was then cooler with a storm arriving on the night of the 20th-21st but still some days would have reached 25. The month then ended with another hot spell where I would think most days reached 25 and some maybe 30.

I distinctly remember watching a Christmas special of Gardeners World at the end of 2002 in which Alan Titchmarsh said he hoped we all enjoyed the spring of that year since it was one of the best he could ever remember. And then lo and behold 2003 delivered a spring every bit as good. ********************** With regard to this years summer I am a great believer in the British weather averaging itself out in the end. Take 2007 as an example...I was never very confident of summer once we got to the end of April with a +8 differential in the CET (January +3, Feb & March +1 each, and April +3)...that was ridiculous warmth and I was pretty certain the summer would see a balancing act which it did. Also in 1976, the year of the great drought, the years rainfall still came in pretty close to average when it tanked down the whole of Autumn. This year we have seen a pretty cold start to the CET. Going on the 1971-00 averages we are just 0.5 of a degree down to end of March but as I have only lived in the UK since 1997 I have also looked at the average from then to now (* )and on that we are a huge -3 degrees down to the end of March. So I would expect a correction of some sorts in the remaining 9 months especially as 2008 was the 2nd coldest in the run since 1997. One of the other things I have done is look at the differential for each month comparing the 1971-00 averages with the 1997-2008 ones. In the former series the CET averages out over each year at 9.75...whilst in the latter its 10.42...an annual differential of .67 degrees over the whole year. Now statistically you might expect that differential to be the same across all 12 months but this is far from the case. Some months (May, September and especially February) have been significantly wamer than the average differential (February almost twice as much even factoring in the cold 2009) whilst other months are falling short of the 0.67 differential. These include August and October slightly, July (amazingly when you consider the record heat of 2006) and December (which for all the complaints about warmer modern winters is the only month which has actually been colder (just at -0.03) over the past 12 years then it was between 1971-2000. So based purely on a belief that things will average themselves out my prediction is that the best of the summer will come in in July and August (perhaps after a disappointing June). I also think the chances of a record mild December cannot be that far off which when it comes will no doubt produce much wailing and gnashing of teeth on here * I chose to look at the CET averages for the years that I have actually witnessed because it helps to understand what I would call are anomolous months. For example the June of 1999 (at least here in the South) was a significantly nicer month (dry and sunny pretty much throughout - although with cool nights) than August of 2004 (pretty much wet and mild throughout) despite the latter month being over 3.5 degrees warmer.

In response to this thread I thought it might be fun to look at the warmest CET months...but I can only find the figures going back to 1900. This is what I came up with: January - 1916 - 7.5 February - 1990 - 7.3 March - 1957 - 9.2 April - 2007 - 11.2 May - 1992 -13.6 June - 1976 - 17.0 July - 2006 -19.7 August - 1995 -19.2 September - 2006 -16.8 October - 2001 - 13.3 November - 1994 - 10.1 December - 1934/74 - 8.1 That would produce an annual CET of a sweltering 12.75! I imagine if we had 12 such months that send the AGW argument into overdrive.

First post here...Please put me in for: 8.1C I reckon an above average 1st week will be superceded by wet and fairly cool weather for the remainder of the month.