The thunderstorms did breakout as forecast but not over Marlborough. The rain radar showed a vigorous line of storms developing and spreading northwest from London, near Oxford and to the Midlands then Wales. As a result we had many hours of strong sunshine that lifted the temperature to a peak of 21.1C late in the afternoon at 17.28. This peak was 3.8C above my long-term average but less warm than on the previous two days. Initially overnight the sky remained mostly clear so the thermometer began to fall steadily but just after 01.00 thin cloud began to drift across from the depression that slowed the decline reaching a minimum of 6.3C at 05.47 just after sunrise at 05.19 in Marlborough. The UV level rose to a high level for the second consecutive day.
Tuesday revealed a cloudy start the day after a little brightness before 06.30 as more cloud from the low pressure system over the Bay of Biscay continued to feed on a light easterly breeze.
The depression is very slowly easing westwards into the Atlantic and gradually beginning to fill whilst the high premise to the north has been building down over the country with a rise of 7mb since yesterday with a reading of 1017.6mb at 08.00.
Whilst gardeners and farmers bemoan the lack of rain since the end of February, the rate of evaporation from ground sources and plant life, surprisingly, continues at quite a high rate. Six days this month has seen in excess of 4mm of equivalent rainfall lost on each day. Whilst we had 0.6mm of precipitation on Sunday the total loss for May, from evaporation, now exceeds 40mm.
The high pressure centred to the north of the UK will build a little higher whilst at the same time it will slowly extend its influence further south over the UK that will, from Wednesday, produce more fine, sunny and dry days with little sign of precipitation of any significance until after the weekend and, possibly well into the following week.
This will be the last image of tulips from Malmesbury Abbey Gardens that I took in 2006. The following days will contain images from the Swannery at Abbotsbury near Weymouth, a home of over 600 mute swans.