I've started this because it is the second or third most significant weather event of this year so far in my opinion and discussion has been limited. Below are some facts for my station in Laindon, S.Essex, which is heading for record breaking low rainfall. I know this not just a S.E region low rainfall phenomenon so how is your region fairing and does anybody have lower figures than mine?

July rainfall - 0.0 mm, 18.6mm since June 1st

No single day this year with over 9mm of rain

January, March and April less than 15mm in each month

Year to date 136mm. Annual mean here since 2009 is 620mm

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We actually had some fairly heavy rain on Wednesday night. Blackbushe only reported 3mm (which is also the July total) but I think that is too low as it was quite a downpour. That's the only measurable rain for over 3 weeks though.

It was also clearly pretty localised as Odiham recorded nothing more than a trace - and has had no more than a trace any day since 1 July.

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Not really a drought though even if your location has been dry. June saw close to 40mm of rain in this part of the south, and even though I'm not sure what rain event rob is referring to but last Saturday night saw a few millimetres here, and hailstones along the road towards Chichester. Today we have already had rain with what looks to be a lot more just east of us.

No measurable rain here all month. We did catch a few heavy showers at the end of June. But its exceptionally parched now. 

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https://www.sepa.org.uk/media/594305/220721-water-scarcity-report_final.pdf 

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What a great thread - I think this year's dryness is the untold story of the summer.
Locally here in West Somerset it looks more akin to early Autumn in some places with trees dropping their leaves.
Usually for round here it is also fairly brown / yellow instead of the lush green.
Notably all the Elm trees are also dying off from Dutch Elm disease. Some have made it to 15 years old or so and they always die at some point but this year even the young saplings are dying.

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Yup, I've also been mindful of this one as I wonder how long it'll be before water restrictions will be in place here at Kent. Most of our reservoirs are running below average levels with a couple bordering on minimum values, at least according to this web site which has just been updated: https://www.southernwater.co.uk/water-for-life/reservoir-levels

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There's been 184mm here so far, average for this point is 420mm and yearly average total is about 800mm so well down.
We seem to have missed rain affecting the south a few times. It was a very dry winter here too and second half of 2021 was below average so quite cumulative effect.
Things generally coping OKish but most grazing is browner than any year since 1976.
Winter cereals are not bad, one of the plus points with them is main growth is much earlier before it gets seriously dry, but wheat is struggling now and will have poor bushel weights due to thin grains as plants died back prematurely before normal ripening.
Spring sown crops are another matter and unless irrigation is available potatoes and sugar beet are going to be well down unless there's a decent 25mm or more within days (unlikely).

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I've started this because it is the second or third most significant weather event of this year so far in my opinion and discussion has been limited. Below are some facts for my station in Laindon, S.Essex, which is heading for record breaking low rainfall. I know this not just a S.E region low rainfall phenomenon so how is your region fairing and does anybody have lower figures than mine?

July rainfall - 0.0 mm, 18.6mm since June 1st

No single day this year with over 9mm of rain

January, March and April less than 15mm in each month

Year to date 136mm. Annual mean here since 2009 is 620mm

Heavens above. Those are incredible figures.

It's your total for the whole year which is incredible.

That works out as 5.41 inches.

Btw the record dry year in this country was/is held by somewhere in Essex and its something like 9.4 inches or 235.94mm.

That record was made in the 1920s.

You could break that.

 

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I've had no rain so far this month. One or two barely measurable showers at the most.

They just dampened the dust literally.

 

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Driest here since 95, possibly 76, pastures burning up and some trees losing leaves. Very little rain this month and the recent high temps have burnt things up. Not far west in the Blackmore Vale a place normally lush and damp it is one of the driest spells in living memory.

 Southern Water are already applying to abstract more water, yet the Test and Itchen are already at low levels so another month and there will be problems.

 Any rain in the last few months has been of a showery nature so it is quite varied from one place to another, but it is generally very dry.

What a great thread - I think this year's dryness is the untold story of the summer.
Locally here in West Somerset it looks more akin to early Autumn in some places with trees dropping their leaves.
Usually for round here it is also fairly brown / yellow instead of the lush green.
Notably all the Elm trees are also dying off from Dutch Elm disease. Some have made it to 15 years old or so and they always die at some point but this year even the young saplings are dying.

 Yes the ones round here have gone all of a sudden again with some brown and bare looking hedgerows

My perception is that it has been quite dry this year in Bristol. Looking back over the past few years, rainfall this year so far has been at the low end but nothing exceptional, as can be seen in the following table, taken from a PWS nearby. 

Year to end July	mm
2012	577
2013	344
2014	582
2015	373
2016	484
2017	335
2018	338
2019	358
2020	577
2021	507
2022 (to date)	324

 

 Rob

We had some moderate intensity showers on Wednesday evening which took the edge off the dryness here. The ground is still hard but my lawn does now have a few bits of green growth even in the sunny area.

However, we've missed the showers forecast for today so far and there is very little rain forecast for the next few days - even though St Albans does appear to get more rain than down the road in Welwyn Garden City where I used to live. Not sure why that is but could be a slightly higher elevation and being closer to the Chilterns here, which seems to cause instability under certain conditions.

Anyway, the puddles down the unmetalled private road round the corner have all dried up again so at this rate it won't take long before we are back to full brown. 

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Not really a drought though even if your location has been dry. June saw close to 40mm of rain in this part of the south, and even though I'm not sure what rain event rob is referring to but last Saturday night saw a few millimetres here, and hailstones along the road towards Chichester. Today we have already had rain with what looks to be a lot more just east of us.

Several areas recording less than 1976 to this point. Jan to June was low this year which may also be a factor.

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I have no rainfall statistics for here but it feels like the driest period I've lived through since 1976. Comparable even to that period perhaps. There was some rare thundery rain on the 19th July but it was a feeble attempt and gave no more than a dampening to the ground. Trees especially silver birch are looking autumnal and loosing leaves like they do in November. 

 

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We had very little rain in May and nothing measurable in June and hadI been posting this yesterday, I’d have said none at all this month but we had drizzle this morning for a good four hours.  I can’t measure it, due to mating pigeons destroying my gauge, but we had small puddles on the road, although they’ve dried up now.

Our lawn is yellow and crispy and verges along roadsides are the colour of the cornfields.  Our green and pleasant land is yellow and our mill pond is green with algae as the river level is so low, it isn’t flushing through the pond.  Fire and rescue services are fully stretched with grass and woodland fires.  In other words, we’re very dry!  

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We had very little rain in May and nothing measurable in June and hadI been posting this yesterday, I’d have said none at all this month but we had drizzle this morning for a good four hours.  I can’t measure it, due to mating pigeons destroying my gauge, but we had small puddles on the road, although they’ve dried up now.

Well, I guess it's not funny for you - but blimey, that has to be the weirdest way I've heard of to lose a weather instrument!

I guess that's why the one I've got came with anti-bird spikes. I'm especially glad I installed them, as ironically I was watching two pigeons following each other round the lawn earlier (and around the weather station)...

As for rainfall, it's been pretty dry here recently, so much so that the day before the really hot weather I emptied a bathful of water on the garden... didn't seem to do anything, really. We've had 4.8mm of rain since then - a lucky downpour in the middle of the night on Wednesday and a couple of showers today.

July's total here is 4.8mm and the year so far is 205mm. January and April were dry here (16mm and 11mm respectively), the other months up to June all having had at least 20mm.

 

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My annual total so far here is 266mm up to today, probably about 100mm or so lower than the long term average.

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https://www.sepa.org.uk/media/594305/220721-water-scarcity-report_final.pdf 

I know that I was the first person on this forum to highlight these reports, but thanks for keeping us up to date with the latest such report whilst I am on my break here in the Scottish Borders.

As others have said, there is a difference between a lack of rainfall and an actual drought.

It is true that there has been ongoing lack of rainfall where I normally live in Edinburgh. However, there has been the odd day when we have actually had some recorded rainfall.

The big issue though is that we keep on just getting the odd day here and there with some recorded rainfall, only for it to then be bone dry for days on end (or at the very least, have little or no recorded rainfall during those periods).

Luckily, those dry periods are never long enough to amount to any official drought, so Edinburgh has never actually had any official drought during this summer.

However, those drier periods mean that the rainfall totals on those days when it does rain are never enough to prevent the overall deficit from continuing to grow and that is why there is an ongoing lack of rainfall (albeit without any actual drought).

Those dry periods build up and cause the grass to turn yellow, but any rain which we get then helps to make everything green again, so it is probably those interruptions in what would otherwise have been a completely dry period and severe drought situation, which have helped the grass to end up being not as brown at any time as it was in 2018 when we did see more in the way of drought conditions, albeit over a shorter time frame.

Here in the Scottish Borders, the situation isn't quite as bad as it is in Edinburgh and whilst Edinburgh (along with Aberdeen) is in a moderate scarcity situation, we are only at alert as regards to water scarcity down here.

In another post on this forum, Noodle Doodle gave his opinion on why there is such a scarcity but even with that, I would very much like to see our rainfall totals return to normal with the deficit being made up as that is the only thing which will quell my own nervous disposition and concerns over this particular issue.

 

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