The wall to wall sunshine on Tuesday, and especially the change in wind direction from north to southwest, gave us the warmest day since 22nd February with a maximum of 13.4C logged at 14.42, being 2.6C above my long-term average. The wind was for most parts light with a peak gust of 13mph, the highest for ten days. The thermometer was much slower to fall away in the late afternoon and evening, not reaching freezing point (-0.1) until 23.24, at least two hours later than the previous five evenings. The minimum of -2.6C, logged at 06.02 early Wednesday, was 5.0C below average but the least cold night since 27th February.
After the ground had thawed under the rising sun and a light breeze on Tuesday, the loss of equivalent rainfall due to evaporation from ground sources and plant life was 1.70mm, which was the highest loss since 5th October. The first four days of March have seen the equivalent of 6.4mm of rainfall lost through evaporation as the ground slowly begins to dry a little after the very wet end to February.
The recent anticyclone is easing eastwards with its two centres today over Italy and Turkey. This modest change in position will see the light breeze come from the south-southwest today before backing further into the south in the late afternoon. It is still acting as a blocking high to the advancing weather fronts and showers from the next depression that will see more cloud on Thursday`afternoon with the possibility of light showers early Friday. The barometric pressure has now dropped to 1023.0mb at 08.00, some 12mb below its peak on Sunday.