Soaking up our Indian summer (From Thisisdorset)

Soaking up our Indian summer

7:00pm Monday 8th October 2007

• Print
• Email
• Share

DON'T pack those T-shirts and shorts away just yet as our Indian summer is set to continue - for at least another week.

After the wettest summer on record, relieved hoteliers and guesthouse owners are benefiting from a late surge in business.

Last-minute bookings are flooding in as visitors take advantage of the unseasonally warm weather.

"The last weekend was very busy for this time of the year," said a spokesman for the Bournemouth Tourism department.

"There's no doubt that people are swayed by good forecasts and will book accommodation on the spur of the moment.

"The recent spell of fine weather has been very good news for the tourist trade and has made the holiday season even longer than normal.

"After the £15 million generated by the Labour Party conference this is very good news for both the accommodation sector and tourist attractions."

Bournemouth-based weather expert Dr Richard Wild said: "I would describe current conditions as an Indian summer.

"Temperatures are only two or three degrees warmer than normal but, because of the terrible summer we've just had, people think it is exceptional.

"The summer weather was due to the jet stream being much further south than normal. Now high pressure is bringing in some warm air off the continent and pushing up temperatures. It is pleasant but it isn't hot or unprecedented."

He added: "The most exceptional feature of the year was that the highest temperature was recorded in April.

"Because the weather was so good early in the year people expected an exceptionally hot summer.

"But research has shown that isn't normally the case. It was actually the wettest summer for about a century."

The WeatherNet senior meteorologist added: "It is going to stay mild and mainly dry for the next week. It's difficult to predict further but I think it will probably become more changeable, with the prospect of very chilly nights and even ground frosts."

In Bournemouth's award-winning gardens some summer plants are still in bloom. And council gardeners say trees are showing little sign of shedding their leaves.

A spokesman said: "The colours are changing but it's a slower process this year. Red Admiral butterflies were recently spotted; normally they hibernate at this time of the year but they have been drawn out by the warm weather.

"And a honey buzzard, which would normally have migrated by now, was spotted yesterday over Kings Park nursery."

While weather experts are reluctant to predict long-term conditions, signs from Mother Nature indicate we are heading for a cold winter.

Folklore suggests that if trees are still green in October and there has been a large crop of berries, a severe winter is in store.

• Print
• Email
• Share