Scotland Weather discussion

[101_North]

At least it's mild! The weather tedium continues unabated. Can't even manage a frost at 3c this morning. Better make the most of any sunshine today as from tomorrow onwards it looks like the cloud sets in for days on end of permagloom! Great stuff! Winter really has forgotten to show up this year at all. 

[Benvironment]

11 hours ago, Hawesy said:

Very similar numbers here. It’s been a mild but not spectacularly mild month. Mean currently running 1.5c above average at Leuchars. It may not be exciting but as others have noted the sunshine has been welcome at this time of year!

Crikey, what a difference a short distance makes. Today the sun is blazing but aside from the odd day or two it's been ridiculously grey and sunless here since December. Jan 22's mean temp for up here on the hill is currently 4.8C, which is just a shade behind Jan 2020, my warmest January (since 2011). 

Looking at the forecast for the final week of Jan, there's a chance this month could end up matching or even exceeding that. As has been the trend in recent years, and especially the past 12 months, it's night time temperatures that are notably higher. Easily my least snowy January too. Interesting though, how I had both my warmest and my coldest January's in the last two years.

 

[Quinach]

Off to a good start today, clear blue skies and calm conditions.

Temperature just scraped over freezing point and now 0.3c; overnight low of -1.9c with a thin veneer of ice on the usual susceptible surfaces.

Good ploughing weather has brought in hundreds of avian guests from Aberdeen, mainly herring gulls but nice to see the more dainty black-headed gulls as well.

 

[Halfamilefromnowhere]

Bright mildish after down to 1.7C lat night now around 6.2C although chilly wind with wind chill at 2C, field cam proving frustratingly temperamental but while awaiting another visit from broadband/camera bod have set up a much cheaper camera looking straight north (Ben Klibreck is straight ahead over the trees) which is working fine and none of the problems of its much more expensive rival in the top field. 

This is the view taken just now.

[mardatha]

Was pure white and glittering in the moonlight at 3am but when I woke up it was melting. Still fabulous sun though - somebody mentioned that was going to end?

[Stockaree]

I’m sitting in a park in Edinburgh , I’m sure there’s a simple answer but what makes the clouds appear just before going in front of the sun , happened several times this week 

[Puffy MacCloud]

Yesterday morning’s beautiful blue sky lasted until lunchtime and then it started to cloud over. The cloud didn’t come from anywhere, it just sort of appeared slowly out of nowhere and filled in gradually until by mid afternoon it was completely overcast. Still bright enough, but overcast. Today has seen a continuation of this process with the cloud cover thickening to the point that it’s been dull all day. Quite a contrast to yesterday morning.

Temperature is now the high for the day at 7.4⁰C up from a low of 2.6⁰C at 00:11, humidity is 91%, wind is 1 to 6mph westerly with a maximum gust of 11mph at 11:28, pressure is 1037.0hPa steady, no rainfall has been recorded today and 0.2mm recorded in the last 24 hours, cloud cover is 8/8 and the dew point is at 6⁰C.

I’m having dinner with the Laird tonight. He’s arranged a whisky tasting. This will get messy. I’m taking both of my portable oxygen bottles, just in case…

[NUT]

Has been quite nice last couple of days and relatively chilly but soon back to the boring mild grey fest from tomorrow............Unless anything changes it's not gonna be a winter that will be remembered (OK did get snaw couple of weeks ago) but that's our lot so far

[Hairy Celt]

@Puffy MacCloud generally know as a session - enjoy!

Nice mild sunny day here. Except it's January and not supposed to be mild!!

[Norrance]

Sunny all day here too and feeling mild with little wind and a max of 8.1C. Min of 0.5C with a bit of frost on the ground first thing which is about as near wintriness as it has been this month.

Edited January 21, 2022 by Norrance

[Ravelin]

A high of 11.4C this afternoon says it all. 

[Hairy Celt]

43 minutes ago, Ravelin said:

A high of 11.4C this afternoon says it all. 

[johncam]

Heading up to Aviemore on16th Feb , hopefully be some snow on the cairngorm by then

[Hairy Celt]

1 hour ago, johncam said:

Heading up to Aviemore on16th Feb , hopefully be some snow on the cairngorm by then

[Northernlights]

Mild breezy day here too Cows enjoying walking to neeps every day as ground gets dryer.

More and more suspicious of a cold snowy spring even February as nature tries to balance this benign weather we are having just now. Add in a very cold Arctic and winter has a long way to go .

[Hairy Celt]

1 hour ago, Northernlights said:

Mild breezy day here too Cows enjoying walking to neeps every day as ground gets dryer.

More and more suspicious of a cold snowy spring even February as nature tries to balance this benign weather we are having just now. Add in a very cold Arctic and winter has a long way to go .

Yes. There have been winters where we've been in despair at this time and later, then February and March have been much colder and even snowy.

However, for us coasties, the longer it goes like this, our chances of seeing lying snow in the garden dwindle rapidly through February as the sun gets stronger. Nothing is settled yet, though we do need a pattern change pretty soon. And just on cue, a cat wakes up and vocalises agreement. 

[Hawesy]

10 hours ago, Hairy Celt said:

Yes. There have been winters where we've been in despair at this time and later, then February and March have been much colder and even snowy.

However, for us coasties, the longer it goes like this, our chances of seeing lying snow in the garden dwindle rapidly through February as the sun gets stronger. Nothing is settled yet, though we do need a pattern change pretty soon. And just on cue, a cat wakes up and vocalises agreement. 

Yes that’s certainly true for us coasties (and nice to see you back HC). There are now at least some signs of a change as high pressure retreats southwards by midweek, allowing more unsettled weather. Some colder 850s too so the prospect of snow on the hills! 

[Halfamilefromnowhere]

13 hours ago, Northernlights said:

Mild breezy day here too Cows enjoying walking to neeps every day as ground gets dryer.

More and more suspicious of a cold snowy spring even February as nature tries to balance this benign weather we are having just now. Add in a very cold Arctic and winter has a long way to go .

My thoughts exactly, we have had snowy spells in the the last 3 May's ...

[Northernlights]

I"ll just drop this in here as the price of food /everything else will replace the virus as the main talking point this year. A butcher buying fat cattle at a mart.

FOOD PRICES…

What is going on?? Looking at my cattle line y’day really made me sit up & take note; 2x Bee Edge/£3.06 & £2.87 per kg & a hef from Penston@£2.96.(average £2.96) The same spec cattle, same farms , same mart,a yr ago; £2.30, 2.37, 2.43 per kg(av 2.36 per kg) Wanting to find out more, i spoke to Will from Bee Edge, one of our most regular suppliers & a really professional ‘finisher’ of beef cattle, so here’s some of his increased costs;

to FEED a beast per day has risen from £1.20 - £1.72, FERTILIZER prices have doubled,HAULAGE ( taking cattle from his farm to the mart) has increased by 40% in 18 months & so it goes on. Farming input costs infaltion rate is more than TREBLE uk inflation rates

Similarly, our increasing costs, apart from the obvious livestock prices, include; wages, packaging, electricity/gas, haulage(to abattoir & carcases returning to shop) & things like ‘seasonings’(apparently SALT is set to rise in price due to it being heavy to transport!!!)

So its definately time to realize that ever cheaper food(so cheap & undervalued by some that its literally thrown away)is not an option anymore.

Even our PLONK is under threat…Alister@ Villenueve Wines(& yes, i am a very reg customer!) explained to me that last yr a 40ft container shipping from Australia cost $1800, it now costs…wait for it….$16000-19000, its flippin scary isn’t it??

All of us who had parents/grandparents who lived through the war & never wasted anything, well, they had a point didn’t they??

The only consolation I draw from this is that all the bean counters at our buyers who for decades have calculated how little they can get away with paying us just to keep us producing are getting clobbered every week with costs rising by tens of percent. My own reaction has been to buy only what we can afford and hope the fall in production if it happens on enough farms will result in scarcity and prices going up even further for our produce.Putting good money after bad seems a bad idea  this year but goes against the grain of producing two blades of grass where one grew before.

Another dry breezy mornng here.

 

[Hairy Celt]

It's not Scotland but this is snowy:

https://vegasja.vegagerdin.is/eng/

I've just spent a happy 15 mins looking at snow not in my garden.  Forecast for Iceland looks cold for a few days.

Another mild morning but grey - apart from a very brief sunny blast an hour ago. Lightening up a bit now though....

 

[Sceptical]

Bright, dry and calm. Temperature 9°c. More Spring like than mid-winter.

[Puffy MacCloud]

There were twelve of us around the big table for the whisky tasting dinner at the Laird’s pile, plus a chef and two waitresses, and a very knowledgeable gentleman from Glenlivet who introduced us to various malts and a number of whisky-based cocktails. Food portions were small and whisky portions were large, just as I like it. The only black mark was when some sneaky blaggard spirited away (see what I did there?) the expert’s bottle of Glenlivet 15 Year Old Reserve, the nicest malt there, and hid it below the table for his own exclusive consumption. But I think I got away with it. A five-hour, six course dinner under any other circumstances might have been considered excessive.

Back to general dullness today with a high temperature of 7.9⁰C at 13:18 up from a low of 6.3⁰C at 00:22 and now 7.3⁰C, humidity is 93%, wind 0 to 6mph southwesterly with a maximum gust of 11mph at 10:17, pressure is 1033.5hPa steady, there’s been 0.2mm of rain today and 0.6mm in the last 24 hours, cloud cover is 8/8 and the dew point is at 6⁰C.

[skifreak]

Having a flick through charts for something more palatable, looks like lows to our north putting a squeeze on things and it could get pretty blowy particularly far North and the hills later in the week towards the weekend, but that could just be the warm up act for really stormy spell early February, and colder too? Very little snow in Jan 2020 on the hills either, then February, particularly in the West brought lots of snow and was persistently stormy into mid March. Would take a repeat of 2020 weather from here given the spring we had! 

[Northernlights]

Warmest place in UK this afternoon so washed cars and then finished pruning fruit trees in garden .Fairly  breezy , overcast and 12c maximum. Amazing day for January.

[Ravelin]

2 hours ago, skifreak said:

Having a flick through charts for something more palatable, looks like lows to our north putting a squeeze on things and it could get pretty blowy particularly far North and the hills later in the week towards the weekend, but that could just be the warm up act for really stormy spell early February, and colder too? Very little snow in Jan 2020 on the hills either, then February, particularly in the West brought lots of snow and was persistently stormy into mid March. Would take a repeat of 2020 weather from here given the spring we had! 

There does appear to be a trend from the last few GFS runs for a cool down and more changeable conditions from the start of Feb. Likely comin g from the NW rather than N or NE as the high pressure relents and the jet stream heads south. We'll need to see if the trend continues. 

27 minutes ago, CatchMyDrift said:

There always seems to be a link between snow on the Scottish mountains and snow in the NW of Italy. Now both with a lack of snow.

There's always lots of chat on the MOD thread of 'Genoa low'. That usually brings lots of snow to Italy, but also helps pull notherlies into Europe as there's low rather than high pressure over the Med. So there probably is a link, but I'm no expert. 

Decent day here (high of 10.4C), but still unexciting. We could do with some heavy rain soon to clear the crap off the roads as I'm getting through loads of screen wash.