Submitted by Bill Caulfeild-Browne
There were virtually no cloudy days in June. There were a few cloudy periods, but most days gave us bright sunshine from dawn until dusk. Nonetheless, the first half of the month was uncomfortably cool. We flirted with frost on the 1st with a low of just 2.9C. I suspect there were below-freezing temperatures on higher ground south of the Peninsula.
It wasn’t until the middle of the month that Mother Nature pushed the button labelled “Summer” and we began to get consistent warmth. Even the lows got into double digits and on the 20th we got our highest temperature of the year to date, 29.9C. Ever since then it has been truly warm. The month ended up nearly a degree Celsius above normal.
All that sunshine also raised the water temperature at the gap to 19C, likely a record for this time of year.
Precipitation was not such a pleasant story. While we got 67mm against a norm of 61mm, nearly all of it fell on the 10th with only a couple of millimetres since then. We badly need rain because as I write this on July 8th, there has been nothing of consequence since that June 10th storm.
But we shouldn’t complain too loudly. That storm spawned seven tornadoes across Ontario, Muskoka being particularly badly hit. We should be thankful for the stabilizing effect that the cool waters of Lake Turn has on storm fronts.
July looks to be a scorcher, well above normal so far. More on that next month!
