Summer 2022 Chat

[stainesbloke]

2 hours ago, Snowycat said:

Beautiful.  I’ve had a sunflower year this summer.

 

Thanks I love late summer flowers like rudbeckias, they’re so cheerful. Your sunflowers are pretty They look like they’re thriving with all the warm sunshine

Edited August 5, 2022 by stainesbloke

[stainesbloke]

9 minutes ago, Wimbledon88 said:

Great pics. You seem to be in a semi rural location there with the open countryside and great sky views. Lucky. Could do with some of that.

Cheers Am about half way out from the city centre. I have a great view to the south and west, yes I’m certainly very lucky and grateful, and I enjoy watching the weather here

[AderynCoch]

36C here with a hot breeze, perfect for drying clothes. It's not supposed to go below 23C tonight but after tomorrow's cold front temperatures should be more normal for the next few days (high 20s).

[stainesbloke]

1 hour ago, Don said:

I have loads of spiders in the house too, virtually in every room!  Not seen too many flies or moths though.

When the spiders come in the house here, it usually means rain is coming. I let the daddy long legs spiders stay as they hunt and eat everything else, including other spiders

[Methuselah]

5 minutes ago, stainesbloke said:

When the spiders come in the house here, it usually means rain is coming. I let the daddy long legs spiders stay as they hunt and eat everything else, including other spiders

Aren't spiders known for their patience, SB?

[stainesbloke]

2 minutes ago, Ed Stone said:

Aren't spiders known for their patience, SB?

Hehe Indeed! They need to be in S England

[Frost HoIIow]

Speaking of spiders I noticed a couple of giant house spiders over the last few days. Don't normally see them in the house until about late September. It would seem they're out looking for mates a bit earlier than normal this year. I don't kill them though I just scoop it into a cup and drop them out the window as the wife doesn't like them in the rooms at all. Ordinarily I would have just left them to go about their business. Gotta be quick though with trapping it as they are very fast at darting away from you.

 

[Cheshire Freeze]

9 minutes ago, Frost HoIIow said:

Speaking of spiders I noticed a couple of giant house spiders over the last few days. Don't normally see them in the house until about late September. It would seem they're out looking for mates a bit earlier than normal this year. I don't kill them though I just scoop it into a cup and drop them out the window as the wife doesn't like them in the rooms at all. Ordinarily I would have just left them to go about their business. Gotta be quick though with trapping it as they are very fast at darting away from you.

 

They’re grim.

Can’t let them go as the next thing you know they’re chilling on the sofa next to you or running across your bed. No thanks.

I had a huge one crawling up the side of my bed last year, almost filled my pants as I was about 1 foot away from it.

[Methuselah]

7 minutes ago, Frost HoIIow said:

Speaking of spiders I noticed a couple of giant house spiders over the last few days. Don't normally see them in the house until about late September. It would seem they're out looking for mates a bit earlier than normal this year. I don't kill them though I just scoop it into a cup and drop them out the window as the wife doesn't like them in the rooms at all. Ordinarily I would have just left them to go about their business. Gotta be quick though with trapping it as they are very fast at darting away from you.

 

Despite my mother, and one of my daughters, screaming whenever a spider appears (and yours truly being bitten on the goolie by one) I've no problem with spiders. Flies though, are just an irritation -- they drive me round the bend!

And then there's that perennial question: If God gave us 'dominion' over all of his other creations, why did he create wasps?

[snefnug]

47 minutes ago, stainesbloke said:

When the spiders come in the house here, it usually means rain is coming. I let the daddy long legs spiders stay as they hunt and eat everything else, including other spiders

The daddy long leg spiders are recent incomers. They are cellar spiders and spin, if that’s the right word, long filaments that drape your ceilings and walls, and yes they eat our lovely helpful house spiders.  I don’t usually advocate death to anything - other than cellar spiders.

Edited August 5, 2022 by snefnug

[Cheshire Freeze]

9 minutes ago, snefnug said:

The daddy long leg spiders are recent incomers. They are cellar spiders and spin, if that’s the right word, long filaments that drape your ceilings and walls, and yes they eat our lovely helpful house spiders.  I don’t usually advocate death to anything - other than cellar spiders.

I love cellar spiders for the very fact they prey on house spiders! Cellar spiders don’t bother me in the slightest.

I introduced a couple of cellar spiders into my room to defend against house spiders.

Edited August 5, 2022 by CreweCold

[Weather Enthusiast91]

1 hour ago, CreweCold said:

I had a huge one crawling up the side of my bed last year, almost filled my pants as I was about 1 foot away from it.

You have my sympathy, as being an arachnophobe myself I know all too well how you would have felt.

At one point when I was younger, I was about to put my shoes on and just as I was about to put my foot in one of the shoes, I noticed a huge house spider had taken up residence in there.

I am OK with cellar spiders though.

Edited August 5, 2022 by Weather Enthusiast91

[Weather Enthusiast91]

5 hours ago, stainesbloke said:

Very warm in Prague today, forecast is for a high of 35°C, it’s already 31°C at midday with little in the way of a breeze. Estofex has a level 2 alert for severe thunderstorms across much of the country for this evening and overnight, keeping fingers crossed. The rudbeckias are doing well, at least.

I love being surrounded by flowers. It's a good feeling. 

[Frost HoIIow]

1 hour ago, CreweCold said:

They’re grim.

Can’t let them go as the next thing you know they’re chilling on the sofa next to you or running across your bed. No thanks.

I had a huge one crawling up the side of my bed last year, almost filled my pants as I was about 1 foot away from it.

Yeah that's the problem as I'd imagine they can crawl up the legs of the bed and then onto the cover. 

[damianslaw]

2 hours ago, TheOgre said:

Last night was the first chilly night in ages. I was really cold working outside last night it felt like a spring evening. One thing noticeable about this summer has been muggy evenings.

Yes we've had little if any polar Arctic, maritime or continental Air. Lots of returning polar maritime, tropical maritime and tropical continental which whatever time of years means humidity and mild minima. 

[AderynCoch]

Surprisingly you don't really get those massive tegenaria house spiders here. They do occur, but they're rare enough to make the local news when one is spotted (like here: https://bratislavaden.sk/foto-v-petrzalke-sa-objavili-velke-pavuky-ktore-mozu-narast-az-do-velkosti-13-centimetrov/ - one reaction basically translates as, "Which street? I might have to pack my bags."). I saw one on the wall outside my flat a couple of years ago but that's all.

I say it's surprising because just about everything else here creepy-crawly-wise is more common (mosquitoes, hornets, large bugs, etc.).

 

 

 

[stainesbloke]

1 hour ago, snefnug said:

The daddy long leg spiders are recent incomers. They are cellar spiders and spin, if that’s the right word, long filaments that drape your ceilings and walls, and yes they eat our lovely helpful house spiders.  I don’t usually advocate death to anything - other than cellar spiders.

I read some years ago that the cellar spiders haven’t been in the UK that long, are they from the continent? We don’t get the huge house spiders here very often, there are other species that I’ve not seen in the UK. The cellar spiders eat everything. 
The spiders I really hated in the UK were another imported species, the false widows. Aggressive and ugly!

Edited August 5, 2022 by stainesbloke

[kold weather]

Last day I'm green N.Wales. Whilst not super wet here I've probably seen more rain in the last 5 days than I've seen in the previous 60 back at home.

I'm going to be very interested to see the state of the grass/remains of ponds and lakes will be once back.

Looking increasingly likely there will be little rain for the next 10 days as well. So probably the driest summer spell I can ever remember even beyond the warm dry 2018.

[snefnug]

1 hour ago, kold weather said:

Last day I'm green N.Wales. Whilst not super wet here I've probably seen more rain in the last 5 days than I've seen in the previous 60 back at home.

I'm going to be very interested to see the state of the grass/remains of ponds and lakes will be once back.

Looking increasingly likely there will be little rain for the next 10 days as well. So probably the driest summer spell I can ever remember even beyond the warm dry 2018.

North East Wales calling…. Tanked it down for a while today.  But, you can understand “How Green was my valley” as a phrase.  Apart from the harvested silage and corn fields we are abundantly, beautifully green!

 

Edited August 5, 2022 by snefnug

[snefnug]

3 hours ago, CreweCold said:

I love cellar spiders for the very fact they prey on house spiders! Cellar spiders don’t bother me in the slightest.

I introduced a couple of cellar spiders into my room to defend against house spiders.

careful Crewe, your room will soon resemble halloween House with the quivering little buggers in the corners eyeing you up thoughtfully….

[TheOgre]

Today has been cool but I’ll take it as next week is pretty much summer weather perfection for many. Warm to moderately hot and sunny days and cool nights (other than Sat/Sun).

While mid July was great to experience I’m sure next week’s weather will be more pleasant and liveable.

Edited August 5, 2022 by TheOgre

[Man With Beard]

3 hours ago, kold weather said:

Last day I'm green N.Wales. Whilst not super wet here I've probably seen more rain in the last 5 days than I've seen in the previous 60 back at home.

I'm going to be very interested to see the state of the grass/remains of ponds and lakes will be once back.

Looking increasingly likely there will be little rain for the next 10 days as well. So probably the driest summer spell I can ever remember even beyond the warm dry 2018.

There was a very distinct change in grass colour when I drove from one side of Birmingham to the other yesterday. By the time I'd got to Oxford, an almost complete transformation from green to yellow. Here in Hampshire, it looks more like southern France than the UK at the moment.

Where would you put this summer on the all-time list for Hampshire? I feel we've had a very good rub of the green here locally since the start of July, not a single day below average here, today probably being the closest and it was still quite hot! I don't think we're quite in the "classic" category yet e.g. 1976/1995/2018, but if we really do get several days close to 30C next week as the ECM thinks, I think we'll be closing in on summers like 2006. 

The sign of a classic summer to me is they have a moment when you feel "this is just not going to end". 1976/1995/2018 all had that moment. I kind of feel in that place right now about this summer.

[slater]

I’ve just been reading all the summer 3 month forecast that was released from various outputs back in late May , not one is right for the summer in England.

[Don]

5 hours ago, CreweCold said:

I love cellar spiders for the very fact they prey on house spiders! Cellar spiders don’t bother me in the slightest.

I introduced a couple of cellar spiders into my room to defend against house spiders.

These are the spiders (cellar) that are currently residents of my house.  I don't mind them but get fed up with the webs lol!  Anyway, unlikely to see any huge house spiders soon!  Strange how cellar spiders prey on house spiders, given how much bigger house spiders are!

[Earthshine]

Not often you see a forecast like this for my location.  Even during classic summers we struggled to get above 30°C, we've already had 34°C back in July and many days above 26°C.  We also had the highest June temperature since 1976.  So far this summer has been seriously impressive for heat!