Friday 13th February
Thursday gave us another damp morning adding another 4.2mm to the monthly total now standing at 87.4mm, which is 19mm above my 42-year average when we are barely half-way through the month. There was a slow rise in temperature during the morning, quicker after the rain ceased, peaking at 9.6C at 14.58 being 1.3C above average. The slow decline in temperature accelerated after 23.00 with a low of 4.2C at 06.59 early Friday, being 2.3C above average.
Friday after first light revealed that fog had formed limiting visibility to around 400m but by 07.30 it was beginning to thin as was the cloud cover. However, as I finished this report at 08.30 I observed that the fog had thickened, with visibility down to around 300m.
The wind will come from an easterly direction today, later northeast, before backing into the northwest on Saturday. By Sunday we will be back to the moist, milder air from a southerly direction.
Saturday will be the day to enjoy outside, after a cold start following a possible light air frost, due to the skies clearing. This will be thanks to a transitory ridge of high pressure pushing across the country. Sadly, by the time Sunday arrives, that ridge will have disappeared with further cloud building as new depressions arrive from the Atlantic bringing more rain.
The forecast track of the jet stream indicates that next week we will return to the pattern of unsettled weather with little signs of any high pressure bringing consistent drier weather.
Experimenting with my macro lens brought up the details in such a small flower as a snowdrop with the centre just a few millimetres across and positioned about 2 centimetres from the front of the lens. The heads of snowdrops face downwards so good to enjoy the details in such a small flowerhead. There was considerable difficulty in holding the flowerhead vertical to look inside.