Victor Szwed
The Autumn Equinox on 20th March signified when the days and nights were equal. For the next six months, the nights will be longer than the days. The South Pole has started to tilt away from the Sun so that our Southern Hemisphere heads to shorter days and cooler temperatures.
Autumn often brings fine, sunny weather and sometimes welcome rains. (Photo: Victor Szwed)
After almost three months of exceptionally dry weather, the downpour on April Fool’s Day provided some welcome moisture. My weather station recorded 89mm from Monday afternoon into Tuesday afternoon. The bureau recorded 61mm to 9am Tuesday.
The Bureau of Meteorology (BOM) modelling predicts that minimum and maximum temperatures are likely to be above normal for most of Australia during the coming three months. Rainfall is still expected to be below average across most of the nation, although unusual events like the recent local downpour, can change things for affected areas like Daylesford and district.
Over the first three months of this year, we had around 90mm total rain compared to the 145mm long-term average. The long term average for April is 64mm but we have already reached that. It will be interesting to see if we get some follow-up autumn rains.
The mild autumn temperatures ranging from around 23 to 28 degrees during the past few weeks have been quite pleasant, however, it appears that temperatures are now easing further.
Last week we had a full moon which can be referred to as a “Harvest Moon”. Before artificial lighting supported farmers, the Harvest Moon light was welcomed to help farmers continue their harvesting well into the night in early autumn.
Victor Szwed is a Daylesford resident who contributes a monthly weather summary and forecast to The Wombat Post.
