Raindrops keep falling on my head - I wish!

 We have just had the driest July in England since 1935. For some parts of the country (East Anglia, South and South-East) it has been the driest July on record. Hosepipe bans are in force, or about to come into force, in the south and south east. 

The lack of rainfall has not been uniform throughout the United Kingdom as this map produced by the UK Met Office shows:

July Rainfall 2022 as percentage of 1991-2020 Average

If you draw a line from the Bristol Channel to the Wash then, below this line, rainfall was about ⅕ its typical value. Above this line, but below a line between the Ribble and Tees estuaries, rainfall was around 50 % the expected value based on the 1991-2020 average. Scotland had the highest rainfall at around 80 % its average for July.

We had very little rainfall in Herefordshire; my Davis Weather Station recorded just 7.6 mm in July. My rainwater butts (capacity about 2500 litres) have all but run dry and I am having to use potable (tap) water in the kitchen garden.

The current conditions in my garden can certainly be classified as a meteorological drought and, possibly, an agricultural drought. This situation has been exacerbated by an unusually dry 2022 so far, as the plot below demonstrates (data from my Weather Station). Furthermore, precipitation in November and December last year (2021) was only about a third the amount of rain seen during these months in 2019 and 2020.

Monthly Rainfall (Hereford) for January - July (2020 - 2022)

To summarise, rainfall during the last 8 months (November 2021 to July 2022, inclusive) has halved compared to the same period in 2019-2020 and 2020-2021.

A few days ago, we paid a visit to the Red Kite Feeding Station at Grigrin Farm; I'll post a few photos at a later date. On the way back, we stopped off at Warren Woods, near New Radnor, to see the waterfall: Water-breaks-its-Neck. We've visited this spot many times for picnics or just to break up a longer journey. This photo is from the notice board in the nearby car park...

Water-break-its-neck Waterfall

...and this is what it looked like on our visit (4th August 2022)...

Water-Break-its-Neck Waterfall (4/8/22)

Confirmation, if confirmation were needed, that drought conditions are prevailing. With no rain forecast for the next fortnight, and temperatures once again expected to reach 30 ℃ and above, the situation can only worsen.