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10/12 air frost days

Posted: Fri Jan 06, 2017 5:31 pm
by Greg Gruner
Out of the last 12 days (December 26th-January 6th), I have recorded 10 air frosts. Only Dec 31st and Jan 1st failed to record a temperature below zero.
There were no extremely low temperatures in that period (the lowest in those 12 days was -3.4C on Jan 3rd) nor were the maximum temperatures unusually low. It was more a case of clear skies leading to radiation cooling. The lowest temperature of the winter half year still stands at -5.4C on Nov 30th.
The same period was also very dry with the only rainfall being 6.3mm on Jan 1st.
Looks like a change on the way, though, as there is some rainfall now and cloud means there is unlikely to be a frost tonight.
What has been missing so far this winter is snow - I keep looking at the forecast charts and hoping that we may get at least some of the white stuff!

Re: 10/12 air frost days

Posted: Sun Jan 08, 2017 11:55 am
by Nicholas Gardner
Greg, out of the last 14 days (going back to the 26th Dec) there have been an unusually high amount of frosts here too, one of them 'severe'. There have been 5 air frosts with the coldest being -4.3°C on the 3rd Jan. Anything below -2°C ranks as a rather hard frost for here and are quite unusual. Most of the time the land breeze that blows gently at night under typical frosty conditions stirs the air up just enough to stop the temperature from dropping too far in this river valley location.

As for snow, I haven't seen any snow lying on the ground since the 26th December 2010. The years 2011, 2012, 2014, 2015 & 2016 were all completely snowless with snow only seen falling but not settling in March 2013.

Another mild, bright day with a few sunny intervals. Yesterday's maximum was 12.4°C and today (Sunday 8th) is already up to 11.2°C at 11:30. Despite the frosts the grass has grown more vigorously this winter than usual. I think it may be down to the very low rainfall amounts as the soils are normally pretty soggy at this time of year. I've been having to cut the lawn once a fortnight this winter so far. Oh well, another cut coming up today; still the smell of freshly cut grass reminds of spring......