April becomes Dry

This April is looking like a decent month after a wet and windy start. There will be a good deal of dry weather especially in the first half of the month but temperatures may rise to spark off some heavy April showers. What the milder temperatures will do though is to geet growth off the ground once again as the trees are currently showing very little signs of any growth. The temperature during this 7 to 10 day dry spell will peak at around 17 or 18c. Recently in the past 3 Bad Summer years April has been good and the High has moved South to allow a jet stream of wet and windy weather over us. At the moment the jet stream is to the North of Ireland so this will be kept updated.

Dry March in Sligo

Sligo had a drier than normal March with only 54mm of rain. This was in contrast to most parts of Ireland that saw over 100% of their normal and parts of Ulster that saw half of their rainfall total in the last 3 days of March

Crazy March 2010

Well not so much but the weather that ended the month was very stormy and snowy especially in the North. Overall March was slightly drier than normal but continued the colder than normal trend in temperatures. However for 29th/30th/31st March there was more rain than for the rest of the month in a lot of places in the North. Nearly 50mm of rain fell in some parts of Ulster falling as snow and giving a depth of 4inches in Cavan and Monaghan and drifts of up to 1 foot on the mountains..

Becoming Unsettled

The Long Range models are showing a much more unsettled outlook now for the rest of March and April with the Atlantic fronts meaning a reurn to daily rain or showers. Temperatures will climb somewhat from recent values and will be in Double Figures much of the time. Rainfall will be slightly above average and the overall temperatures will be around the seasonal average.

Irelands Long Range Weather Forecast

Stick that on your power cord!

The weather for the remainder of March in Sligo looks very dry and settled. So far 2010 has been quite a dry year compared to last year and it looks set to continue for the first month of the Springtime. Temperatures are remaining quite low though and this is having a major impact on both Grass and Flower growth.

Rainfall for the year in Ireland would usually be around 250mm to 300mm by the beginning of March in the Northwest of ireland and the Daffodils would be blooming. However this year has been very different. Daffodils are only at the start of their growth as of 7th March and look set to actaully bloom at what was once their normal date of 17th of March here in Ireland or St Patricks Day.

This years rainfall total is only just over 100mm and the total rainfall figure for the Winter Metreological months of December, January and February in Sligo was only 182mm after a November with rainfall of 354mm. This was caused by the Big Freeze in January 2010 and the blocking Anticyclone that came with it.

High pressure was over Iceland and Scandanavia for most of the Winter keeping Irelands Atlantic rainbelts well to the West and North in the Atlantic. At times these rainbelts went to the South of Ireland and over France and Spain causing storms and floods there that we would otherwise have had.

How long is this dry spell going to last it is quite hard to tell at the moment but there is an interuption on 11th March 2010 and whether this will signal a return to the Atlantic Pattern of weather in Ireland after the 3 Months of very dry weather it will be intersting to see but the overall long range weather forecasting picture for the month would seem to suggest that dry weather will be more in evidence in March than wet and that any rainfall periods will be short lived.

Long Range Weather Update....

At this stage there has been a big shift in Long Range prediction and it now looks like November will be a very wet and cold showery month in Ireland. After a very cold first week though temperatures should rise slightly for most of the rest of November but there will still be wet and windy spells.

LIKELY FORECAST

NOVEMBER
Wet and Cold for first week. Milder for the rest of month with some dry spells

DECEMBER
Wet at first then a long dry spell but wet again for Xmas