Rain and rain guages

[kossetx]

It has been a horrible drought. Since august 1 of '05 I recorded 10.3 inches of rain. I'm just a weekender, so there could have been a little more rain not registered due to evaporation. We finally got some rain last week, and appear to have recieved about 4" more this week at the local airport, which is 35 miles away. Last weeks rain must have been slow because my pond only went up about 6". It's still about 8' low. Everything there is green and pretty, at a time when it shouldn't.

Here's my question. I curious what type of rain guages you all use. I have 2, about 75' apart, and they always show different readings. One is the old time 1"X5" glass tube. Last week it showed 4.25" in it. The other is a graduated Accuview that has an oval hole that is smaller than the top of the guage. It showed 2.5" of rain last week. The guages are both 5" above the post they are mounted on and niether is anywhere near an obstruction. The accuview constantly shows much less rain than the glass tube. I tend to believe the older one. What do you use?

 

[JazzDad]

We use one of those inexpensive plastic (graduated) types. It seems to be pretty accurate. (At least with the neighbors, who use the same kind. )

 

[EddieWalker]

I have a cheapy plastic one from Lowes that came with a stand and a thermometer. It's easy to read from the window in the house and from what the news says we've received, it's pretty accurate. The thermometer is total junk and is off by over 20 degrees most days. Sometimes more, sometimes less. hahaha

It's funny how much difference there can be in rainfall amounts over short distances. The local news channel has people in just about every town around Tyler with rain guages, and they tell what some of them get in there towns after the official measurements. Sometimes there's several inches from one area to another.

Last year while Steph ane I were building our home, we noticed it was raining over half our pond. The side were were standing on was dry, but you culd see the rain drops hittin the water halfway out. The rain never made it to us, but just stayed on that half of the pond and everything in that direction. We were less than a hundred feet away and never felt a drop!!!!

Weather sure can be interesting.
Eddie

 

[Doc_Bob]

It's funny how much difference there can be in rainfall amounts over short distances. Eddie

Same here in Wisconsin. I can get 3 inches of rain in one day, and two miles away, 1 inch. Right now my ground is saturated. no drought this year in my little corner of the world. Ground is so wet that the soy beans will not get cut until the ground freezes.
Bob

 

[dmccarty]

It's funny how much difference there can be in rainfall amounts over short distances. The local news channel has people in just about every town around Tyler with rain guages, and they tell what some of them get in there towns after the official measurements. Sometimes there's several inches from one area to another.

I use the Weather Underground website to check local conditions. People on the site have weather stations connected to the website and you can see the weather at that particular location. I can check a couple sites within a few miles of each other and see different rain and wind conditions. Sometimes they get rain and we don't and vice versa.

One day I'm going to get the hardware and software to setup one of these weather stations. Is nice to be able to check and see what is happening at home. As well as have a year to year record of weather events.

Later,
Dan

 

[Doc_Bob]

I use the Weather Underground website to check local conditions. People on the site have weather stations connected to the website and you can see the weather at that particular location.

Good suggestion! The weatherunderground measuring site is 1 mile from my home.
Bob

 

[kossetx]

Dan, Is there something special I should be looking for? The closest it shows to my place is waco, 45 miles away.

 

[HomeBrew2]

$140 for the AmbientWeather Oregon Scientific wireless weather station ... my closest WeatherUnderground station is 20 mi away and in [yuck] the "valley". $80 more, for software, and I can publish to WU ... sure sounds interesting

 

[dmccarty]

Dan, Is there something special I should be looking for? The closest it shows to my place is waco, 45 miles away.

I just enter my zip code at the top of the home page at weatherunderground. This takes me to another page. At the bottom of the page there is a bunch of different weather stations for my zip code.

Later,
Dan

 

[kossetx]

Dan, Thanks, That helped. Unfortunatly it says there are no personal weather stations in that area. We're kinda rural.