It falls on field and tree. It rains on my umbrella here and on the ships at sea.
A Child’s Garden of Verses–Robert Louis Stevenson
I always liked these little verses as a child and memorized several of them. They are comforting to me when I think of them, little rafts in an uncertain river of time.
Almost 3 inches of rain
Mother’s Day Snow
The spring weather in Arvada was wetter than normal. Most of the plains states got more rain than usual, in fact most of the country did except for drought-ridden California. They are suffering from a several year reduction in normal rainfall. Similar to the early 70’s when we lived there but they say it is worse–well more people using the water now and more fields being planted to feed us.
I thought Colorado had a state-wide average for rainfall, but I was wrong. In Arvada, just 30 minutes from Denver we have 19 instead of 14 annual inches of precipitation and another 30 minutes further north in Boulder the annual precipitation is 24 inches. That seems like quite a difference.
Here are the Arvada averages for precipitation.
The number of days of rain or snow averages about 6 for the month of May. In 2015 we have had 20.
The average number of inches of precipitation in May is less than 3. We had nearly 7.
This map shows the total precipitation in Colorado for May 2015. The location of Arvada is marked. It is a little North West of the center of the state.
Colorado May Rainfall Totals 2015
The Community Collaborative Rain Snow and Hail Community keeps detailed records in several states and have a goal of collecting data for each square mile. Volunteers purchase official rain gauges and hail recording devices and send their data to the website. Automatic collection is not allowed. Our closest station is about a half mile away and the data shows 6.95 inches of rain in May, plus 10 days over .10 inches and 20 with measurable amounts. Two other close stations reported 7.85 and 6.35 inches respectively. June has been rainy too with 3.58 inches through June 21st and 3.46 for the second reporting station with 9 rainy days over .10 inch and 13 days with measurable precipitation.
Denver numbers were similar. Denver Airport only had 3.72 inches of rain in May with 19 rainy days. The National Weather Service Weather Forecast Office published these figures for Denver in May.
WEATHER CONDITIONS. NUMBER OF DAYS WITH
THUNDERSTORM 0
MIXED PRECIP 0
RAIN 9
FREEZING RAIN 0
HAIL 0
SNOW 1
SLEET 0
FOG W/VIS <= 1/4 MILE 7
HEAVY RAIN 2
LIGHT RAIN 23
LT FREEZING RAIN 0
HEAVY SNOW 1
LIGHT SNOW 2
FOG 14
HAZE 3
Denver’s rain amount did not even make the top ten.
TEN WETTEST MAY`S IN DENVER WEATHER HISTORY SINCE 1872:
8.57 INCHES 1876
7.31 INCHES 1957
6.12 INCHES 1969
5.06 INCHES 1973
4.95 INCHES 1935
4.88 INCHES 1938
4.88 INCHES 1898
4.79 INCHES 2011
4.77 INCHES 1967
4.67 INCHES 1995
But it was significantly higher than the driest years.
10 DRIEST MAY`S IN DENVER WEATHER HISTORY SINCE 1872:
0.06 INCHES 1974
0.09 INCHES 1886
0.15 INCHES 1899
0.22 INCHES 1919
0.34 INCHES 1977
0.34 INCHES 1966
0.43 INCHES 1925
0.49 INCHES 1972
0.52 INCHES 1911
0.53 INCHES 1900
Bottom Line? We have not been able to dig out the space for the cement slab to place the spa. The rain has just let up this week and we are getting to it now.