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Another 20 acres of wheat lost:
https://kentonline.co.uk/ashford/news/fire-crews-battle-20-acre-crop-blaze-270766/
I've never known so many crop fires as there have been over the past week.
Was on the M25 yesterday near junction 26 and there was a grass fire near the road. Had to look it up but the area is called Ramney Marshes .
Another 20 acres of wheat lost:https://kentonline.co.uk/ashford/news/fire-crews-battle-20-acre-crop-blaze-270766/I've never known so many crop fires as there have been over the past week.
When it is as dry as it has been it only takes a spark off a flint or stone as the combine works and it is ablaze. Some years you could not light it with a flamethrower
There was a time when after harvest a tractor would drive around a field of stubble and straw towing a burning rubber tyre on a chain. Thank goodness those days have passed.
But yes it's a famers nightmare in many places this year and all takes is a spark from a flint and the crops lost.
There have been several fires on the heathland around here recently.
They happen every summer (with a peak in school holiday time ) but the one a week or so ago was especially bad with people having to be evacuated from houses - fortunately it was brought under control before reaching them. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-hampshire-62174888
About 5mm of rain here since the beginnimg of June
The grass around the Weather Station at the Kew Gardens Observatory is clearly looking the worse for wear
What did I say about the rain following the cricket. It's raining at Headingly now !!
A walk in the woods today showed an understory of plants wilting or dried to a crisp, including brambles! It will not be a blackberry year! I kept trying to spot a butterfly, only to see it was a just another dead leaf spiralling down. Only former boggy areas had anything green. A dropped ciggie would torch the lot!Roger
Our garden blackberries are always really early. We've been picking them for a couple of weeks and they are pretty sweet and juicy. I don't know where the plants manage to find the water to create the juicy fruit because it's just dry dust underfoot, even after Wednesday's rain.
I noticed that even well watered outdoor tomato plants, standing in water, had the growing tips dried out and killed. Never seen that before but never had 39.8C, a steady breeze and -1 DP before either !
The leaf drop from trees is a combination of drought and hot dry air.
Looks like we and Headingley are about to get some rheavy rain.
Quite frustrating as the forecast made very little of it, but there are red radar returns heading this way. Only 14mm this month but this could add a bit.
Was going to go to an outdoor fete.
The landscape is starting to take on that 1995 appearance. Give it a couple of more weeks and it will be mirroring it.
1976 delivered two heavy thunderstorms to Colchester where I lived, one on 16th and the other on 20th July. The 2 inches of rain that fell made little impact on the yellowness given that the period from then until the August Bank Holiday was largely rainless.
We've had 7.5mm of rain here this month, 6.9mm of which fell on the first two days of July.177.5mm so far this year, most of which fell in February and March.Very parched here with trees showing signs of stress.
A major incident has been declared at Hankley Common:https://twitter.com/surreyfrs/status/1551198764316106752?s=21&t=vKMX3Epr9wmE6HIVoQKy8A
Perfect conditions for fires today hot, sunny and very windy.