Thursday 5 January 2017

Weather summary - December and 2016

December was a very dry month with a total of only 11.7mm of rainfall.  Despite this the course never really dried out, as there were many still, mild nights with heavy dew and several frosts. Temperatures were a little above average but nowhere near the extremes of December 2015.  The average was 6.4° (10.3° in 2015) whilst the maximum was 13.3° on the 25th.  We recorded our second lowest December minimum on the 28th with -5.1°, quite a contrast with the 3.8° minimum in December 2015.  The frequent frosts kept soil temperatures low so there was very little grass growth.

2016 weather in brief
The rainfall total was 463mm which continued the trend for annual rainfall well below the average of 540mm for 1979 to 2016.  The average for the last ten years is 457mm so maybe this is the new normal.  Rainfall early in the year was unremarkable but then we had a relatively dry May followed by a very wet June and dry July and August.  We finished off the year with the wettest month in November (75.6mm) followed by the driest in  December (11.7mm).  January was relatively mild followed by two months of temperatures close to average.  April was very cold - just when we were hoping for some grass growth and the trend for colder May weather continued.  July, August and September were all more than a degree warmer than the average (nearly 3° warmer in September).
October was fairly typical temperature-wise but November was very cold with the 2nd lowest average we've recorded and the lowest minimum with -3.7°.

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