Winter in the South / Summer in the North

[Mike in Nelson]

Many of my palms are still throwing and opening leaves... quite odd for this time of year in NZ.

Same here Michael. Most of my garden is still growing - even my Ensete v. Nelson city has had very few frosts so far which very unusual.

Howea, Phoenix, Nikau are all growing spears. Hyophorbe indica seedlings were still growing slowly but brought them inside anyway just to be safe.

My thinking is that the soil temp just simply hasn't dropped low enough this winter to halt growth.

[philinsydney]

Someone's sago palm took a battering in Armidale, where it dropped to -11c:

see entry by Freeze 06/30/10 at 05:43pm

http://forum.weatherzone.com.au/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=115941&page=197

[philinsydney]

There is a tantalising chance of snow in the Blue Mountains tonight as a cold pool passes over from the SW. We'll have to wait and see.

[PalmsZA]

Hi all

Pretty much stock-standard winter weather here. Havent been below 9c down the bottom. All in all things look good.

Ty: I hope things warm up soon down-under!

[Tyrone]

Thanks Dennis. This last week or so has been the coldest period of mins in recorded history for Perth. We've got another week of it before we approach something more normal and rainier. So far though, no casualties.

Best regards

Tyrone

[ariscott]

We had a few drops of rain yesterday literally!! But then, it is clear sky again tonight... Weird!!

Regards, Ari

[tropicbreeze]

Minimum overnight temperature 21.3 (70.3F), middle of the night for a few hours it went back up over 26C (78.8F). Peak humidity 83%.

Maximum today 32.5C (90.5F), low humidity 29%.

Ari, you got rain yesterday??????????? Where's mine? Never even looked like raining in Noonamah. The bit of cloud here didn't look like it could do anything. All I've had is wind ..... dry, dry wind!

Robbin, one of the families migrated to Australia, ended up in Brisbane. So they probably really did like warmer weather. But some of the others just liked wearing warm clothes rather than having warm weather.

"Someone's sago palm took a battering in Armidale, where it dropped to -11c" I'm surprised when Armidale's temperature gets above -11C. That's one cold hole there, worse that either Goulburn or Ballarat.

[ariscott]

a few drops, Zig... you are not missing out on much!!!

Regards, Ari

[Gileno Machado]

This was actually the wettest June in decades...547 mm of rain during the month, with a concentrated 200 mm/day episode a few weeks ago, which caused several river flodings and lots of damage to the small towns nearby. My palms on the sandy beach loved the weather though. The minimum temperaures dropped down considerably...23°C this morning...brrrr...cold !!!

[ariscott]

That's it Gileno... they are going to make fun of you now... When I complained that my minimum was 17 deg and it was cold, they all made fun of me

Regards, Ari

[ariscott]

That's it Gileno... they are going to make fun of you now... When I complained that my minimum was 17 deg and it was cold, they all made fun of me

Regards, Ari

[Exotic Life]

Ouch! The other side of this heat and long drought period we have here. Because there has been not much rain last month and the months before have also been very dry, nature is crispy and very dry!

Since this afternoon a big naturefire is running, in only 3 hours 150 hectares are burned to ash and they can't control it so far. Houses and business in the close area and small towns are evacuated. Trees are green, but the drought is defitnely there.

I only got 15 mm rain this June and in that area from the fire only 3-9 mm rain.

Edited July 2, 2010 by Exotic Life

[Tyrone]

Not good Robbin. That is what it's like in Australia. Bushfires are a part of life. Some plants need it to germinate. I wouldn't think European plants would though.

It's 0.5C here this morning after a min of 0.3C. The airport is -0.4C after dropping to -0.5C. Still it's an hour until sun up so who knows how low it can go. This is getting very monotonous. This is worse than the record cold in 06 because that came and went. This is hanging around for too long.

I wonder how my friend Mark is going in Baldivis with the frozen lawns and the D sp pink crownshafts.

Tyrone

[Tyrone]

At 7.11am it hit 0C, the airport -0.8 and good old frozen Jandakot -1.9C. Yuck.

[Daryl]

Ouch! That's miserable cold. We had a rainy night last night with 12mm, which was good for the garden. Min about 13C and a nice sunny morning today...I hope it stays like this for the rest of July!

Daryl

[happ]

Hi all

Pretty much stock-standard winter weather here. Havent been below 9c down the bottom. All in all things look good.

Ty: I hope things warm up soon down-under!

Dennis

Are any of the World Cup games being held in Durban? I think South Africa was a good choice for the games since it has such a mild winter.

Nothing much happening here. No stratus for the past 2 days but temps are staying coolish none-the-less.

81.8F\ 27.6C

Edited July 3, 2010 by happ

[ariscott]

At 7.11am it hit 0C, the airport -0.8 and good old frozen Jandakot -1.9C. Yuck.

Way too cold, Tyrone. I hope everything is still going well.

Regards, Ari

[Tyrone]

It just gets worse. I've never seen a forecast for zero temps in Perth before. Not just one night, but 2 nights. This could be the winter we never want to remember.

Forecast for Saturday

Partly cloudy. Light to moderate S/SE winds.

Precis: Partly cloudy.

City: Max 15

Mandurah: Max 15

UV Alert: Nil , UV Index predicted to reach 2 [Low]

Fire Danger: Coastal Plain: NOT RATED

Hills: NOT RATED

Forecast for Sunday

A cold morning with frost in susceptible areas, followed by a cool and partly

cloudy day. Light E/SE winds.

Precis: Partly cloudy. Early frost.

City: Min 0 Max 16

Mandurah: Min 6 Max 16

Monday Partly cloudy. Early frost. Min 0 Max 17

Tuesday Partly cloudy. Min 3 Max 17

Wednesday Mostly sunny. Min 3 Max 19

Thursday Showers developing. Min 4 Max 19

Friday Showers. Min 9 Max 17

[Daryl]

At least Friday's forecast offers some hope...Luckily your microclimate will keep things a bit warmer. As long as your garden stays above freezing you will be fine.

After some warmer nights, we are expecting a cold one tonight, and I can feel it already...who came up with the idea of winter anyway???

Daryl

[peachy]

After a nice soaking 12.3 mm of rain overnight, I did a bit of work outdoors today. Even did a bit of digging in the playdough while it was soft enough to get a spade into. (getting it out again was the hard part) Tonight we are forecast to drop to 1c, which means bad news if it goes much lower than that. Wet palms and freezing temps are not a pleasant combination. Tyrone, keep the mulch up and doses of seaweed, thats about all one can do when its dropping down to freezing. Most palms will surprise you how much they can tolerate. Those which cant handle it probably will have croaked already. I am still finding spears growing on everything here so maybe the palms know something we dont ?

Peachy

[Tyrone]

True Daryl. I'm so glad I designed some canopy and got a microclimate happening here, many years ago. We've never had zero forecast here before, so we're entering new territory here tonight and tomorrow. My garden won't freeze I'm sure. Even my Foxy Ladies are solid dark green, and the coconut has grown about 3 cm of spear since last weeks cold event. It did stop though for a day or two.

Peachy, you're right about the mulch. Everything is mulched and beneath that is sand which stays warm due to the trapped air. Many of my palms are incredibly still growing. I just noticed a new spear on my Dypsis saintelucei, and of course D decipiens keeps chugging along like an old diesel generator. Even my frangipani has most of it's leaves and it's in a very exposed position. Maybe tomorrow it will throw them all off in disgust.

One thing my wife pointed out to me to cheer me up is that we are getting up to sunny days of 16 or 17C. She said it could be worse and we get cloudy days of 13,14C after 0C nights. So true.

Best regards

Tyrone

[tropicbreeze]

Looks like our weather is going into a nose-dive, that high pressure is swinging the winds to the south east. And it's been quite windy. My place is more sheltered, the strongest wind gust has been 20.9 KPH (11 KTS). Noonamah AWS which is out in the open more on the flats and virtually no trees has been getting gusts to 35 KPH (19 KTS)

Overnight the minimum temperature dropped to 19.8C (F) with the humidity peaking at 50%. Maximum today was 32.2C (F), with a low humidity of 36%.

Tyrone, it's all in the lap of the gods. Maybe burned offerings might appease them. Won't please your neighbours I'll bet though.

[Exotic Life]

Another warm night with a minium from 20.1C and a bit cloudy at the moment with a temperature from 26.9C. Forecast for next week not bad either, but still very dry.

@ Tyrone. No, not good indeed. We are a quite small country so bushfires like this is don't what you want to see, and like you said there are not many plants over here what need a bushfire to germinate. Hopefully it will warm up for you and other people over there soon... winter is one of the worst nightmares..

[Mike in Nelson]

Another big fat low heading our way. But sunny days forecast for Nelson. Yay!

[Jonathan]

One thing my wife pointed out to me to cheer me up is that we are getting up to sunny days of 16 or 17C. She said it could be worse and we get cloudy days of 13,14C after 0C nights. So true.

Best regards

Tyrone

Welcome to my world!

I'd pay dearly for your maximums though.

Good luck, and I hope the frost misses you.

Jonathan

[ariscott]

Looks like our weather is going into a nose-dive, that high pressure is swinging the winds to the south east. And it's been quite windy. My place is more sheltered, the strongest wind gust has been 20.9 KPH (11 KTS). Noonamah AWS which is out in the open more on the flats and virtually no trees has been getting gusts to 35 KPH (19 KTS)

Yes... it has been VERY WINDY & coolish the whole day.... Nice for people, not so much for my garden. Where is the humidity??

Regards, Ari

[Tyrone]

One thing my wife pointed out to me to cheer me up is that we are getting up to sunny days of 16 or 17C. She said it could be worse and we get cloudy days of 13,14C after 0C nights. So true.

Best regards

Tyrone

Welcome to my world!

I'd pay dearly for your maximums though.

Good luck, and I hope the frost misses you.

Jonathan

Thanks Jonathan.

Perth went down to 0.6C which sounds warm compared to last week. The temperature spreads around here are enormous and tend to defy logic in some cases.

Perth 0.6

Perth Airport -0.2

Bickley at 384m asl 5.5C

Jandakot airport -1.7C

Pearce airforce base -1.9C

Swanbourne (right on the coast north of Fremantle) 4.2C

Rottnest Island right in the middle of the Leeuwin current 10.2C

I reckon that you could grow a coconut on Rottnest Island if you found a nice little position in a north facing bay against a big rock face and were able to irrigate it. Pity there are no permanent residences there.

I think I dodged a bullet this time. I wonder how my mate in Baldivis went. He would have gone at least a degree or two below. The open exposed lawn across the road from me was white and sparkly this morning. It's a sunny partly cloudy day outside now. But tonight we go in for the same ordeal. This winter really feels like a roller coaster ride.

Best regards

Tyrone

[Tyrone]

Looks like our weather is going into a nose-dive, that high pressure is swinging the winds to the south east. And it's been quite windy. My place is more sheltered, the strongest wind gust has been 20.9 KPH (11 KTS). Noonamah AWS which is out in the open more on the flats and virtually no trees has been getting gusts to 35 KPH (19 KTS)

Yes... it has been VERY WINDY & coolish the whole day.... Nice for people, not so much for my garden. Where is the humidity??

Regards, Ari

Ohhh Ari. Has the humidity dropped below 80% again???? Only kidding. I remember how I felt when we had a 15C min after a long spell of warm nights and it felt cold. Now I'd kill for those warm humid 15C nights. I've gotta get to Darwin soon. I'm just scared I'll never leave. Everyone I know who's been up there says I'd absolutely love it. The idea of 20C mins in July is just so tantalising.

Best regards

Tyrone

[Tyrone]

Just checked weatherzone and they are predicting up to 80mm of rain to fall on Thursday night after a 19C day. Woohoo. Then the rain is here and night temps go significantly upwards. Wooohooo.

If we get that it's going to flood things, but I don't care.

Well I do, but it will be warm.

[happ]

Just checked weatherzone and they are predicting up to 80mm of rain to fall on Thursday night after a 19C day. Woohoo. Then the rain is here and night temps go significantly upwards. Wooohooo.

If we get that it's going to flood things, but I don't care.

Well I do, but it will be warm.

Hang in there, Tyrone!

Winter storms certainly raise the temperature but cold wet soil can be harmful.

Today was just another reminder that summer has not arrived in coastal California. Some areas were over 15 degree Fahrenheit below normal and the sun did not break through the morning clouds until noon. One weak upper trough leaves only to be followed by another. Strange summer

Maximum: 77F\ 25C [Normal: 88F\ 31.1C

[peachy]

Well after the rain on friday night, of course last night was cold....very bloody cold...minus 1 in fact. After getting wet then frozen I have some sick looking palms in the garden once more. The Siphokentia beguinii which had previously been romping through winter without a mark is suddenly looking very second hand. A lot of the smaller palms aren't going to make it either I feel. Never mind, when spring comes I will plant date palms and washies everywhere.

Peachy

[Exotic Life]

80 mm of rain?

That's about my rainfall from April, May and June together...

Last night quite cold to the 2 20C nights, minium from 15.9C after a maximum from 27.3C. We going back to a cooler summer weather type with temperatures between the 23-25C for a few days but the possibilities are there to go back to the 25-30C days again, one thing for sure there is no rain forecasted for the next 7 days again. But can't complain, got 2 mm of rain yesterday in the end of the afternoon, whoohoo!

We will see what's going to happen..

Edited July 4, 2010 by Exotic Life

[ariscott]

Good luck Tyrone.... I hope you get your 80mm of rain... it would be nice to get rain this time of the year, but hey... great weather & I am not complaining. As long as we don't get single digit minimum too much this year...

BTW, hurry up & get here, would you?? LOL

Regards, Ari

[Tyrone]

Peachy, my thoughts are with you. At least our ground is bone dry. Also it must be very teasing to try all of that easily accessible tropical stuff that the coastal gardens can get away with, only to have it fail during record cold.

The cold here is now record breaking. The previous record run of nights below 5C was back in 1997 when we had around 7 nights in a row below 5C. I remember that year because it was the first time in my life that I'd ever seen ice on my car. We'll have had 13 nights by the time the rain comes on Thursday.

To give you an idea how cold it's been, Geraldton on the coast at 28.8S fell to -0.4C today. That area is strongly dry sub-tropical, and coconuts fruit there. This has been a very cold winter so far.

Best regards

Tyrone

[tropicbreeze]

Overnight minimum temperature 21.2C (70.2F), humidity peaked at 94%

Yesterday's maximum temperature 33.1C (91.6F), humidity bottomed out at 44%

The strong winds of the past several days have eased. In fact after 11:00pm last night my weather station recorded only 3 gusts of 1.6 KPH up until morning. Cloud has moved in, on the satellite image it shows as being a bit scattered here but more extensive a lot further south. Would be nice to get a decent bit of rain, but then that wouldn't be our dry season. And Tyrone would probably go ballistic accusing us of stealing his rain.

Oh well, roll on the wet season. Only just over 2 months to any possibility of rain, 3 months to scattered storms, and 6 months before the full on monsoon.

Robbin, what are your relative humidity levels? Those make a great difference to plants.

Peachy, all I can do is cross myself and whisper a few prayers.

[Mike in Nelson]

Well after the rain on friday night, of course last night was cold....very bloody cold...minus 1 in fact. After getting wet then frozen I have some sick looking palms in the garden once more. The Siphokentia beguinii which had previously been romping through winter without a mark is suddenly looking very second hand. A lot of the smaller palms aren't going to make it either I feel. Never mind, when spring comes I will plant date palms and washies everywhere.

Peachy

I think you have climate as frustrating as Florida - nice and warm for 99.9% of the year and cold enough to knock your garden around for the other .1%

[Mike in Nelson]

Peachy, my thoughts are with you. At least our ground is bone dry. Also it must be very teasing to try all of that easily accessible tropical stuff that the coastal gardens can get away with, only to have it fail during record cold.

The cold here is now record breaking. The previous record run of nights below 5C was back in 1997 when we had around 7 nights in a row below 5C. I remember that year because it was the first time in my life that I'd ever seen ice on my car. We'll have had 13 nights by the time the rain comes on Thursday.

To give you an idea how cold it's been, Geraldton on the coast at 28.8S fell to -0.4C today. That area is strongly dry sub-tropical, and coconuts fruit there. This has been a very cold winter so far.

Best regards

Tyrone

There is an upside to all the lows we've been having, Tyrone - warmer nights.

[ariscott]

Rained today.... all HUGE 0.5mm... LOL. Hey, at least it is HUMID!! And it was SO COOL when we got home. Can't complain. It is July after all...

Peachy,

I hope it warms up for you soon....

Regards, Ari

[Jonathan]

Hobart Airport - the closest BOM site to me - recorded 3.8mm of rainfall for June - usually one of our wetter months.

Bone dry, and showing no signs of changing. Things are grim when you have to water your Washies in winter....

Send her down Hughie!

Jonathan

[tropicbreeze]

Strange weather for July. Started off all clouded over and then a bit of mist came in. Not unusual for this to happen in Darwin, right on the coast, but not as far inland as Noonamah. Not much wind but it was cool and the temperature only crept up to 30.0C (86F) by midday, then eased back a bit. Humidity also went up to 86% around the middle of the day. The sun peaked out a bit now and again.

Darker cloud moved in mid afternoon and we got a recorded amount of rain, a total of 0.2 millimetres! That's already broken my record for July for my place and it's still early in the month. Well, that's since I started recording about 5 or 6 years ago. And at 7:00 pm the humidity was already 93%.

Anyway, minimum overnight temperature was 21.2C (70.2F), peak humidity 94%. Maximum temperature today 30.0C (86F), with low humidity 64%. I'll have to check the records but I think this is the lowest maximum temperature so far this winter.

Typical of you Ari, you got more than twice as much rain as me!

There appears to be a big mass of cold air moving across but under the continent. May hit Tasmania and then NZ. I don't think cold air, even with cloud, brings much rain.