The weather has been recorded in some form or another at the garden for many years. Since 1956 we have been an official weather station for the Met Office. Observations are made every day at 09:00hrs GMT and once they have been recorded they are entered into the Met Office Database which adds to the overall picture of the past weather.
Last month's weather chart can be downloaded here (pdf - 18kB)
At Edinburgh we record max & min air temperatures, the grass minimum, soil temperatures at 10cm, 20cm & 30cm, precipitation (rain or snow), hours of sunshine, wind speed and direction, visibility and cloud cover.
Monthly Averages
| Weather | Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Daily Max ºC | 6.6 | 7.0 | 9.0 | 11.3 | 14.7 | 17.2 | 18.7 | 18.6 | 16.3 | 13.1 | 9.2 | 7.1 |
| Daily Min ºC | 0.9 | 1 | 2.4 | 3.9 | 6.5 | 9.4 | 11.1 | 10.9 | 9.2 | 6.5 | 3.1 | 1.5 |
| Sunshine Hrs/month | 50 | 74 | 107 | 140 | 178 | 174 | 170 | 159 | 123 | 95 | 66 | 43 |
| Precipitation mm/month | 54 | 42 | 44 | 39 | 47 | 51 | 55 | 58 | 60 | 66 | 56 | 54 |
Extreme Weather (January 1959 to December 2007)
Sunshine
The month which received the greatest amount of sunshine was July 1989 with a total of 263.1 hours (273.6 hrs in 31 day period over July/August 1989). The sunniest year was 1995 with 1666.9 hours and our sunniest day was the 25th May 1988 with 15.7 hour. In contrast our dullest year was 1983 with only 1230.8 hours sunshine and our dullest month was December with 16.8 hrs in 1978!
Temperatures
Our highest maximum temperature was recorded on the 5th August 1975 with 30ºC and the lowest minimum temperature was -15.5ºC on the 11th Jan 1982. The warmest 12 month period ended in February 1998 (10.21ºC average air temperature) and the coolest in October 1986 (7.74ºC).
Precipitation
On the 26th July 1985 we recorded 82.1mm of rain over a 24hr period. The wettest year on record at the RBGE was 1985 with a total of 822.2mm (933.6mm in 12 months in 2007/2008) and the wettest month has been August 2008 194mm with a week still to go! Watch this space for the end of month update. (203.3mm in 31 day period in July/August 1985).
Our driest year was in 1959 when we only had 436.2mm of rain, and the driest month was February 1993 when we only had 3.7mm (1.2mm in 31 day period in July/August 1995).
Some further weather curiosities, such as occurrences of fog or drought can be seen here.