I know summer is nearing its end because the birch trees are now dropping those horrible little seeds that get stuck in your socks and all in the carpets. I hate having to hoover up every 2 days!

I'd be very worried if I had a birch tree growing in my house!

Those horrible little brown seeds from the tree about 10 yards away all land on the back doormat. Swept up mant times a day. They come in through the wet room window as well.

For days on end, it has seemed as though no matter what the latest weather forecasts throw at us, we always end up with that same old borefest which consists of a wee bit of cloud and a wee bit of sunshine with absolutely nothing happening which is even remotely interesting in terms of our weather, and with the temperature occasionally popping up to just over the 20°C mark.

Despite a much poorer forecast for today, that is exactly what we have yet again and to me, that has to be the most boring weather which anyone would ever have to put up with on such an almost constant basis, so can someone please change the record before I go completely insane with all of this boredom!?

Yet another vile, rank and disgusting Saturday to end this abomination of a summer and this one looks like it will be the worst of the lot. It's just beyond surreal 

Windy, grey and utterly depressing with the usual nuisance value light rain that will likely persist on and off all day, making the day a complete write-off, but will add up to very little. Another disgusting min of 13.8C and barely any higher now at 14.7C. It's a disgrace to be seeing virtually no diurnal range at this time of year.

Likely to have no sun at all today meaning that two of the three vile days to record no sunshine this month will have fallen at weekends. It's more than a sick joke 

Largely due to June, which was by far the best month, this summer is actually the 4th sunniest this century behind 2003, 2018 and 2013,  but it sure as hell doesn't feel like it due to weekend after weekend of utter garbage. Would have been a totally different perception had Monday and Tuesday's weather fallen at the weekend but it never does because every summer it's the same ridiculous nonsense with Saturday and Sunday seeing worse weather than the weekdays 

2019 has to go down as the most unrelenting bland, uninteresting year of weather I can recall. Nothing memorable has happened. I cannot recall a year with so many rain days and so little settled weather having such a low rain total. September is the last chance for a decent month in the summer half of the year and that looks like getting off to a hideous start. Just a never ending nightmare 

Yet another vile, rank and disgusting Saturday to end this abomination of a summer and this one looks like it will be the worst of the lot. It's just beyond surreal 

Windy, grey and utterly depressing with the usual nuisance value light rain that will likely persist on and off all day, making the day a complete write-off, but will add up to very little. Another disgusting min of 13.8C and barely any higher now at 14.7C. It's a disgrace to be seeing virtually no diurnal range at this time of year.

 

What's wrong with a min of 13.8C? Somewhat on the high side but nothing out of the ordinary. My min today was 14.1C. What would you prefer the min to be, what is the August average for Aberdeen?

Yet another vile, rank and disgusting Saturday to end this abomination of a summer and this one looks like it will be the worst of the lot. It's just beyond surreal 

Windy, grey and utterly depressing with the usual nuisance value light rain that will likely persist on and off all day, making the day a complete write-off, but will add up to very little. Another disgusting min of 13.8C and barely any higher now at 14.7C. It's a disgrace to be seeing virtually no diurnal range at this time of year.

Likely to have no sun at all today meaning that two of the three vile days to record no sunshine this month will have fallen at weekends. It's more than a sick joke 

Largely due to June, which was by far the best month, this summer is actually the 4th sunniest this century behind 2003, 2018 and 2013,  but it sure as hell doesn't feel like it due to weekend after weekend of utter garbage. Would have been a totally different perception had Monday and Tuesday's weather fallen at the weekend but it never does because every summer it's the same ridiculous nonsense with Saturday and Sunday seeing worse weather than the weekdays 

2019 has to go down as the most unrelenting bland, uninteresting year of weather I can recall. Nothing memorable has happened. I cannot recall a year with so many rain days and so little settled weather having such a low rain total. September is the last chance for a decent month in the summer half of the year and that looks like getting off to a hideous start. Just a never ending nightmare 

I could understand this tone better if you stressed the fact that this is just a quirk of fate whereas you are making it appear that there is a 7 day cycle of weather which is most evident in the Aberdeen area and which has never been documented in the scientific media.

Just to be sure I went on Weatheronline.co.uk  to look at the daily sunshine hours for Aberdeen (station 03091) in 2019 between 1st June and 29th August 2019 plus weathercast.co.uk for the last 2 days. It appears that Wednesday is by far the worst day of the month this summer with 37 hours and the worse days pair of the week are

Yet another vile, rank and disgusting Saturday to end this abomination of a summer and this one looks like it will be the worst of the lot. It's just beyond surreal 

Windy, grey and utterly depressing with the usual nuisance value light rain that will likely persist on and off all day, making the day a complete write-off, but will add up to very little. Another disgusting min of 13.8C and barely any higher now at 14.7C. It's a disgrace to be seeing virtually no diurnal range at this time of year.

Likely to have no sun at all today meaning that two of the three vile days to record no sunshine this month will have fallen at weekends. It's more than a sick joke 

Largely due to June, which was by far the best month, this summer is actually the 4th sunniest this century behind 2003, 2018 and 2013,  but it sure as hell doesn't feel like it due to weekend after weekend of utter garbage. Would have been a totally different perception had Monday and Tuesday's weather fallen at the weekend but it never does because every summer it's the same ridiculous nonsense with Saturday and Sunday seeing worse weather than the weekdays 

2019 has to go down as the most unrelenting bland, uninteresting year of weather I can recall. Nothing memorable has happened. I cannot recall a year with so many rain days and so little settled weather having such a low rain total. September is the last chance for a decent month in the summer half of the year and that looks like getting off to a hideous start. Just a never ending nightmare 

I could understand this tone better if you stressed the fact that this is just a quirk of fate whereas you are making it appear that there is a 7 day cycle of weather which is evident at least in the Aberdeen area and which has never been documented in the scientific media.

Just to be sure I went on Weatheronline.co.uk  to look at the daily sunshine hours for Aberdeen (station 03091) in 2019 between 1st June and 29th August 2019 plus weathercast.co.uk for the last 2 days. It appears that Wednesday is by far the worst day of the week this summer with 37 hours sunshine and the worst adjacent days pair of the week is Wednesday/Thursday with 102 hours.

Saturday and Sunday are both near the bottom of the pack but not the worst individually or by pair

Do your data give the same answer ?

Manchester Summer Indices 

1954 143
1907 147
1956 155
1912 156
1924 158
2012 164
2008 168
1987 169
1946 170
1909 171
1931 173
1978 173
1980 173
1920 174
1923 174
2007 174
1927 175
1948 176
1938 177
1922 178
2011 179
1985 180
1958 184
1972 185
1916 188
1986 189
1965 189
2016 189
1910 190
1936 190
1988 191
2010 191
1966 192
1998 192
2017 192
1953 193
1963 194
1993 194
2009 194
1902 195
1915 196
1981 196
1928 197
1962 197
1964 197
2004 197
1952 198
2000 198
1930 199
1974 199
1979 199
2019 199
1918 200
1944 200
2002 200
1951 201 

I would have been delighted with this summer if it had been preceded by a soaking wet winter during which the groundwater levels were restored to normal after last year's drought.  But, alas, it wasn't.  I commented back in the spring that the appearance of leaves on the trees was being held back by lack of water, and this proved to be exactly the case - the leaves came on in a flush when it rained.

Since then we have had what I call 'just in time' rainfall, in that when the lack of water was starting to get serious we've had a welcome amount to nicely moisten the soil.  But very often the rain has been followed quite quickly by a hot, very drying spell of weather, when the moist soil has been baked bone dry again. I have been digging at the bottom of my garden, and not only is the top surface like dust, the soil six inches to a foot down is rock hard dry clay.  A nearby beech tree is showing signs of drought in that leaves on the topmost branches have gone brown and fallen off, and there are other trees nearby where the leaves are curled up and drooping. Around the car park of a local supermarket the leaves on several of the small trees (I think they might be hornbeam) planted to give some shade have gone completely brown and dead - which means the trees have likely died themselves.

So I've been watering the garden since the middle of April, and by deducting my average household usage from the meter reading, I have worked out that I have used 8 cubic metres in doing this.  Most of it has been put round my apple tree, without which I'm pretty certain it would have died - judging from the rate that leaves were falling off it like confetti in late June.

Of course, my observations are very much 'IMBG', and I fully recognise that other people in other parts of the country have had a very different time of it.