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Here are some photos of my back garden. I tried to photograph the fungi but the shrubs were in the way. This is the second time I have had fungi grow in my garden. I have been living in flat since May 2004 and there have never been fungi growing in my garden. This is the first time, that I have seen them growing in my back garden. The first one was that appeared was a big creamy white toadstool that appeared next to the high wooden fence but when I next checked it the day after, it was gone.

We went for a walk today in Seven Sisters Country Park, and encountered some rather extensive flooding... It’s the first time I’ve ever witnessed real flooding of this magnitude. It certainly highlights how wet is has been recently down here! (Click on the images for a better resolution)

North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) The NAO is a very important teleconnection for UK and European winter prospects. Recent Seasonal Model forecasts point to a positive NAO (+NAO), suggesting the winter outlook for our part of the World is looking to be dominated by cyclonic mild, wet and windy weather. This post centres on the Met Office paper titled Skillful long‐range prediction of European and North American winters and the four key oceanic and atmospheric teleconnections shown to drive or influence the wintertime NAO. You can find the full paper here. Using the Met Office’s own findings about teleconnection impact I will look at each of them in turn to try and gauge whether their current and forecast state (or phase) supports the recent seasonal forecasts of a positive NAO. Here’s a key passage from the paper: “The single most important factor for year to year fluctuations in the seasonal climate around the Atlantic Basin is the state of the North Atlantic Oscillation and its hemispheric equivalent, the Arctic Oscillation. Year to year variability in the NAO describes the state of the Atlantic jet stream and is directly related to near‐surface winds and hence winter temperatures (through advection) across North America, Europe, and other regions around the Atlantic Basin. We present estimates of the predictability of the surface NAO and winter climate from the Met Office seasonal forecast system Global Seasonal forecast System 5 (GloSea5) which has high ocean resolution, a comprehensive representation of the stratosphere, and interactive sea ice physics, all of which mediate predictable teleconnections to the North Atlantic.” For those wishing to learn more about the NAO there's a link to an informative Met Office overview here. There are also a number of other scientific papers relating to the NAO and they can be found in the Learning Area here. Before looking at the current status of each teleconnection in turn, for reference here’s the latest (Oct 2019) 3-month winter forecast from the Met Office Glosea5 model showing a +NAO: So which are the four teleconnections used in the Met Office study and which Glosea5 uses when producing its seasonal forecast? (Note: You can find a full list of variables used by Glosea5 here). They are: El Nino Southern Oscillation (ENSO), North Atlantic Ocean temperatures particularly in the sub-polar gyre, Sea-ice levels particularly the Kara Sea, Quasi-Biennial Oscillation (QBO). Focussing in on each: 1. ENSO: The ENSO state is based on the Oceanic Nino Index (ONI) which measures the departure from normal Sea Surface Temperatures (SSTs) in the ENSO 3.4 Region. El Niño is characterised by a positive ONI greater than or equal to +0.5ºC and La Nina a negative ONI less than or equal to -0.5ºC. To be classified as a full-fledged El Niño or La Niña episode, these thresholds must be exceeded for a period of at least 5 consecutive overlapping 3-month seasons. The Met Office paper states: “One source of predictability originates in the tropical Pacific. Previous studies have shown that the El Niño–Southern Oscillation [based on 3.4 Region] can drive interannual variations in the NAO and hence Atlantic and European winter climate via the stratosphere. …… this teleconnection to the tropical Pacific is active in our experiments, with forecasts initialized in El Niño/La Niña conditions in November tending to be followed by negative/positive NAO conditions in winter.” The latest 16th October ENSO update from NOAA confirms that ENSO is currently neutral, as defined above, but interestingly that over the next month will be close to the El Nino threshold and that their multi-model forecasts also keeping ENSO close to the threshold over the winter: Source: https://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/analysis_monitoring/lanina/enso_evolution-status-fcsts-web.pdf In their analysis NOAA say: “Many dynamical forecast models, including the NCEP CFSv2, suggest Niño-3.4 SST index values will remain near +0.5°C during the next month or so before decreasing, but remaining above zero.” And over the winter months: “…….with multi-model [forecast] averages of Niño-3.4 values remaining close to El Niño thresholds (+0.5ºC).” Source: https://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/analysis_monitoring/lanina/enso_evolution-status-fcsts-web.pdf My conclusion: Current and forecast ENSO conditions, whilst neutral (based on official classification), are closer to El Nino than La Nina and do not appear to be in support of the Glosea5 forecast. It could be argued they appear more favourable to supporting a negative rather than a positive NAO. 2. North Atlantic Ocean temperatures particularly in the sub-polar gyre Next a look at the second teleconnection of importance. The Met Office paper states: “……by selecting forecasts in years with a warm or cold north Atlantic subpolar gyre in November, we can examine the resulting winter signal in the atmospheric circulation. Forecasts starting from cold/warm North Atlantic states also result in winter predictions with more positive/negative NAO.” The Met Office use the North Atlantic ocean heat content (OHC) averaged over 90W-0E, 50-60N and the upper 500m of the ocean and use one of their internal models to obtain this data. I’ve not been able to obtain publicly available information that exactly matches their criteria, but instead have used the current SSTs for the area and a sub-set of the area that does have Argo OHC data averaged down to 800m. SSTs with Met Office area marked in red: Source: https://www.esrl.noaa.gov/psd/map/clim/sst.shtml Sub-set of OHC for area (data is only available for the following area shown on this map as the Northern Branch of the Gulf Stream): And here’s the latest available data for March 2019 with my estimate of the likely trend, based on previous years fluctuations, marked in red: Source: http://www.climate4you.com/SeaTemperatures.htm#North Atlantic 59 degrees north transect to 1900 m depth My conclusion: Using the above substitutes in the absence of Met Office figures is inclusive. SSTs are neutral whilst the average of the 0-800m temps of a sub-set of the area ‘might’ be trending colder which if so would be supportive of a positive NAO. 3. Arctic Sea-Ice (Kara Sea) The third teleconnection influencing the NAO is the level of Arctic sea ice, particularly in the Kara Sea to the north of Europe. The Met Office paper states: “Interannual variability of sea ice and hence surface temperature is large here and has previously been connected to the generation of large‐scale circulation anomalies. [The research shows] the association between sea ice anomalies in this region [45-75E, 67-80N] in November and the subsequent winter circulation in forecasts and observations. As identified….. low/high sea ice concentrations in the Kara Sea in November precede negative/positive NAO anomalies, with anomalous pressure gradients over northernmost Europe and the East Atlantic.” Here are the current SST conditions in the area on the 12th October. The Kara Sea is circled in red and SSTs are 2C to 3C above the long-term average for the time of year: Source: http://ocean.dmi.dk/satellite/index.uk.php A look at current sea ice cover in the Arctic also shows that extent is well short of the 1981-2010 long-term average: Source: https://nsidc.org/data/search/#keywords=sea+ice/sortKeys=score,,desc/facetFilters=%7B%7D/pageNumber=1/itemsPerPage=25 My conclusion: If these conditions were to persist into November, this teleconnection would be supportive of a negative NAO. Clearly an update on the status of this teleconnection is required as we move into November. 4. Quasi-biennial Oscillation (QBO) Our final teleconnection influencing the NAO arises from the phase of the quasi‐biennial oscillation (QBO) in the tropical lower stratosphere. Basic info on the QBO can be found here. The Met Office paper states: “Interannual variability between westerly and easterly phases of the QBO [at 30hPa] has long been known to influence the troposphere in the Atlantic sector….. with westerly QBO being associated with a stronger extratropical jet, particularly in early winter.” At the moment the easterly QBO zonal winds are slowly descending but for the last several weeks have stalled somewhat at 20hPa. This is illustrated on the latest chart from the NASA website with the small circle in red. For interest I have circled the unique eQBO of 2016 that failed to descend and reverted to wQBO. Source: https://acd-ext.gsfc.nasa.gov/Data_services/met/qbo/qbo.html#intro Extrapolating the latest NOAA 30mb QBO data from Jan to Sept 2019 suggests the QBO at 30mb won’t turn easterly until Feb 2020. Monthly data: 9.02 9.25 11.82 13.36 14.59 14.36 10.96 9.97 8.25 However, in a June 2018 paper titled: Surface impacts of the Quasi Biennial Oscillation (full paper here) it was found that “…..in early winter (December), responses to the QBO show maximum sensitivity at ∼20 hPa, but are relatively insensitive to the QBO winds below this until late winter. The impact is that Atlantic/European response is shifted eastward compared with the normal +NAO pattern.” My conclusion: The influence of the present westerly QBO will be waning as the easterly zonal winds descend. But possibly more important, if the research mentioned above is taken literally, then the early winter surface response to the QBO shows maximum sensitivity to what’s happening in the stratosphere at around 20hPa, which is already easterly. It could therefore be argued that this teleconnection is supportive of a negative NAO. Summary Whilst the publicly available data used in my analysis is clearly going to be somewhat unsophisticated when compared with the comprehensive input data that Glosea5 would use, I nevertheless find it interesting that the current and forecast state of key teleconnections may not be completely in agreement with forecasts of a positive NAO as we go into winter. I’ll revisit the status of the four teleconnections again in November to check for any developments. Comments welcomed.

Yet more rain here in west London, quite heavy, too. We did need some and I like heavy rain from time to time but it’s starting to get very monotonous. Would be good to get a period of high pressure soon, as Autumn sunshine, frosts, mists and fogs are beautiful.

I must admit I got a bit carried away yesterday and the models have again pulled the rug from under me. There is still some cold potential within the GEFS 0z but less so than yesterday and currently there is more chance of a mild or indeed warm late october and start to november..apologies if my excitable comments / tone misled anyone.

The North Atlantic 500mb and surface analysis for midnight Apart from some showers in western and southern regions it has been a dry and clear night and this essentially remains the picture through today. Showers in the west will spread east and pep up through the day as the occlusion edges closer and a band of showers will also effect the south east courtesy of a trough running around within the circulation of the low to the west The occlusion continues to track east over night and an area of heavy showers will move north east across southern and central England whilst it also becomes very windy in the south By midday tomorrow the low is centred over south west Ireland and bands of heavy showers will continue to run around within the circulation, mainly effecting England and Wales, but more persistent rain may well effect north east Scotland later courtesy of the old occlusion. Windy in the south with possible gales along the coast. The low continues to move east and fill on Saturday so another day of sunshine and showers.But the much discussed amplification is taking place in the west The evolution continues apace to the west on Sunday which effects the structure and orientation of the upper trough over the UK resulting in brighter and cooler weather in the north whilst remaining unsettled with showers and perhaps longer periods of rain in the south The cooler and brighter weather spreads to all parts of the country on Monday as the subtropical high now ridges north east but further troughs are tracking east across the Atlantic.

Stunning non edible fungi in Esher common this morning .... I know everybody knows it but my goodness what another wet day across Surrey into central London !

I am not concerned with people's preferences, merely that brief subjective comments mean different things to people; that is if they mean anything at all. And in any case it is always possible that there are people out there who are not familiar with your preferences. albeit they probably reside in the upper reaches of the Amazon/

Hi Feb. For the benefit of those wishing to learn, could you expand on your reasoning please. Thks.

A stonking Greenland/Iceland high on the gfs 6z with a chilly easterly . That’ll do for starters .

No need to apologise Karl, the models make mugs of the best of us!! In fairness you have regularly stated that there are a fair few ensembles running quite warm. This is still one of my concerns with the new GFS model, that it will be sending us up the garden path again, by constantly overplaying cold sypnotics! Some of us are perhaps a little guilty of overstating incoming cold snaps, when in reality it's still a little on the early side just yet! Perhaps it's the coldie in us that gets us a little overly excited. Looking at the extended ECM mean out till November, shows the mean around 1C for the Birmingham area, so it's nudging down a little..... Problem is there are a good 60% of runs going above this, the SLP is around 1016mb,so perhaps drier conditions still the order of the day..... And let's remind ourselves.... It will still be Autumn..... Plenty of time for things to change..... For better of for worse I may add!

So nice to feel cold again -3.5C in Braemar this morning!

Yes, i meant long term for bringing in cold, regulars on here will know my preferences are always for as cold as possible, and rain whilst when its heavy can be irritating when you have to have a shower as soon as you get back from shopping because you are soaked, it certainly does not phase me at all, i would rather have that than oppressive heat and would rather have violent storms and interesting weather than just sun all the time.

Massive downpour here, with hail and gusty winds. Rain rate of 128mm/hr at 23:06 And now a long deep roll of thunder!

Wonderful photos on here today. Really enjoyed them! Here's my effort - fungi on a tree stump near me. At least the fungi are enjoying the very wet weather!

Friday looks like a wet day for many, as a low pressure system crosses to the NW of the British Isles. Friday morning also looks like quite a wet start for many, with places of England and Wales waking up to some heavy, blustery showers - with perhaps the odd rumble of thunder heard in one of these showers. Northern England looks like the driest of England, with a cloudy start to the morning and perhaps a few mist or fog patches, although there still is the risk of catching some showers. Scotland also has the chance of catching a few showers in the morning and perhaps a few fog or mist patches too. Northern Ireland and western Scotland also looks dry for the morning, with the risk of catching a shower being relatively low. As the day progresses, and we head into the afternoon, parts of England and Wales will have the risk of seeing showers all day, becoming heavy and blustery. The same goes for Scotland and northern England, and once again, where these showers occur, they could be heavy and blustery. Northern Ireland once again seeing the driest of weather, with a moderate risk of a shower. Some places in Northern Ireland and western Scotland could stay dry all day. As we head into the evening, once again, it will remain wet for most parts of the British Isles. A band of more heavy and persistent rain has the chance of edging its way into eastern parts of Scotland into the evening and overnight. Parts of England and Wales will still have some heavy showers to end the day, but there is the chance of catching some late evening sunshine inbetween these showers. Speaking of sunshine, Northern Ireland and western Scotland once again looks like they will have the best of the sunshine tomorrow, with still, the risk of a few showers. The peak temperatures in the south should range from 9-15c, and in the north it should range from 7-13c. This will be my last post on this thread for about a week or so as I'm going to Mallorca - interesting week there as it looks!

Heavy cells just passed up the West side of Brum and up into Staffordshire

Nice Northerly on the icon..

The GEFS 6z certainly isn't without wintry interest both later next week and into early November, however, it could just as easily be unseasonably mild during the same period, there's very conflicting chaotic signals with arctic air to the north and plenty of warmth to the south so it's not easy to say what's going to transpire..nothing of interest if the latest update is anything to go by..pretty much the same as yesterday but of course that doesn't preclude some early interest for coldies! sorry about the charts not being in the right order.

Maybe this year's thunderstorm season is still not quite over: But, the GEFS 00Z ensembles are so 'messy', it's not easy to see what, if anything, has much support, either way? Och well...back to the Guess Chamber?

It looked to me like it might have pulled down some cold air from the North, the GFS looked much more likely to stall, while the ECM did not end up pulling that cold air down in the end, it was still an improvement on the GFS, as the GFS stalled the trough out West, when this happens it means mild South Westerlies usually, as it happens the GFS right at the end, looks like it might go on to deliver an Easterly as a Scandi high develops and looks like disrupting troughs might be undercut, if this did happen it could deliver genuine proper cold and widespread snow chances but there is little support for this solution and far too far away so all in all, not as much to get excited about, where as 36 hours ago, that aforementioned Atlantic trough was looking like digging quite far South and clearing Eastwards and not stalling and that could have delivered at least sharp frosts for many and even snow for Northern Britain possibly.

Beneficial rains? Infrequent storminess? Load of rubbish, there forecast has not been upto scratch for years. Think Inaccuweather would be a more realistic name.

Something certainly worth noting is the ongoing -NAO The models keep trying to remove it however it keeps bouncing back- The models at the start of last week ( both UKMO & GFS ) painted an increased strat > trop coupling feature at the close of October pictured below- However this is the near time reality- Note the anomalous +VE heights in the troposphere.... But the icing on the cake is a November start warming beginning to develop in the models - Remember historical Decembers with peak negative AOs have generally all been driven by a warming in November / December. Examples being 09 / 1981 So watch this space carefully as these would be the ingredients to propose a forecast thats opposite to the Met office / ECM seasonal runs... S

Well, looking at the Ecm 12z operational / mean regarding later next week there is some potential interest for coldies, it all depends on the position / alignment of that trigger low, as it is, the far north gets an early taste of winter on the operational but as Matt pointed out there is also some wintry Gfs ensemble members so it could still become very fascinating in around a week's time!

Arome showing pretty big rainfall accumulations for South East England in the next couple of days with lines of heavy downpours and more general showery rain quite consistently effecting the far southeast lots of showers elsewhere too across England and Wales whether this verifies as wet as this in the next couple of days we'll have to see but didn't do too bad at picking up today's showers but most other models aren't showing rainfall anywhere near as much so arome out on its own with this tbh but worth keeping an eye on the radar I think.. Arome.. Met office radar looking lively for later tonight and tomorrow too.. But apart from perhaps a lot of showers tomorrow there should be a reasonable amount of sunshine at times though windy especially tonight and in showers. Next week does according to the gfs bring much more settled conditions particularly to the south but not exclusively so perhaps even warm by day for a time..

I went in search of Arctic cold but as you can see, I wasn't very successful..I found an Indian summer though, several actually!!

Nice thunder and lightning here atm. Earlier this evening we had sun shinning through the showers producing a beautiful rainbow

As I said: a colder outlook looks more likely!

Some fantastic charts appearing from ecm and gfs!!cannot wait for these frosty cold evening in a week or 2 whilst am on my deliveroo rounds!!and also those crisp morning runs!!am so excited!!the blocking around greenland and iceland is now showing up quite frequently on the gfs!!time to take it seriously!!

Models flip flopping around at the moment - all a sign there is major uncertainty in the forecast as we move through next week. Heights set to build strongly towards Greenland, and the longwave trough is set to split and sit partly to our west and also our NE, whilst at the same time heights are forecast to build out to our south. What it leaves the UK in is a bit of a battleground, with no clarity which feature will be the dominant one. I think we will have to wait until Sunday at the earliest before we have any certainty - and consequently expect more flip flopping from the models in the runs ahead, from balmy southerlies, back to arctic northerlies, high pressure sat over the UK, and cyclonic low. The GFS run is quite an off one, with a closed deep low pressure system sat out to our West detached from the main trough - a cut off low of sorts. There could be quite marked variations in conditions from north to south next week, boundary of cold/mild air quite possibly through the centre of the UK.

Och we'ell, the ensembles seem to have reverted to their normal less-than-exciting selves: Macaroni cheese, without the cheese, anyone?

Yes Feb, good points... I would say if we can get a similar pattern to what we was experiencing for much of the summer, it would most definitely be a game on. I've got a feeling in me water that this time around we may be having more luck with heights towards Greenland and let's not forget Scandinavia, another favourable position for us to import much colder Conditions out of Russia. Heres hoping.

Yet again some impressive heights setting up shop towards Greenland.... Could this be the year of the Greenland anticyclone! Or will it all go Pete tong come the time it really matters.... Time to place ya bets folks.

Lots of beefy showers incoming here but apart from the odd dramatic sky/torrential downpour...no thunder/lightning as yet. (Gourock, Scotland)

Just to add -- the ensembles lend some support: a colder outlook looks more likely...?

Nae bad, for November 2nd: chances of snow, frost and freezing fog!

Wait until you meet his brother.

Accuweather forecasts are not the greatest This is their autumn forecast. "The greatest risk for these storms will be during the months of September and October." It's mid October and the there hasn't be a named storm as far as I'm aware apart Lorenzo and that ended up being largely a bust! This was last winter, where were the frequent gales?

We still managed to have a wet morning - but was a sunny afternoon with fabulous golden light in London

Great satellite image of the swirling low off the NW of the UK with its associated showers. And you can see the blob of cloud (with rain) already into the south of the Region and which will spoil the current sunshine here too.

I like the WAA being to the west of Greenland, and not to the east; it's better than seeing a quasi-stationary intense depression sitting there...isn't it? And, who knows what part the residual heat, over mainland Europe'll, will play as we approach winter...? That's a tasty patch of cold air developing to our NE!

Ah...the infamous Solar Sausage?!

Piers Corbyn? He blocked me from his blog/website because I signed up to call him a "batty boi"

Rather depends on how you define improvement

The ecm follows a similar theme to the gfs in the latter period of the run but once the Atlantic trough has phased with the TPV/trough it then develops further intro quite vigorous separate low in the vicinity of the UK. This would portend more wet and windy weather. And the environment to the south west is primed for some cyclogenesis

These protests are all very well intentioned but the actions available to individuals like you and me to combat climate change are trivial in the global sense and utterly futile when we are talking about turning the central heating down or even buying an electric car (all that electricity still has to be generated somewhere). What is needed is world-wide intergovernmental action of a kind which is well-nigh impossible to agree let alone implement. Take air travel, for instance - a serious polluter and greenhouse gas creator. We can't even begin to imagine mass air travel being halved or even reduced - it's increasing year by year. So what about a token gesture - why don't we ban all take-offs and landings of private jets in this country? I don't think I need to give the reason why even this would never be contemplated - those that make the decisions like to travel in private jets - don't they...... Despite the protests and any other voices of reason trying to get the necessary changes made, I am convinced that people in power around the world will not act until the rising sea water is lapping at their own front doors.

Not bad.

According to the gfs the key features for the rest of the week and into the weekend are the continued amplification of the subtropical high in the western Atlantic, leading eventually to a high cell over northern Canada, and the interplay between the TPV over northern Russia/the European ridge and troughs tracking east across the Atlantic. Encapsulated by the 5-10 anomaly and some surface charts indicating a trend towards a N/S split The detail is of course not definitive

The ideas for trying to solve the problem although they might help I cannot see many giving up what they have or aspire to. Basically selfish until the the end? There will always be those, who for one reason or another need extra help which would skew any attempt to alter their lifestyle. Looking back difficult to see how things could have been handled differently. Do we condemn the first person to light a fire? It all seems to keep coming back to the mainly ignored point that there are too many of us seeking too much stuff.

What a spiffing start to November this could be -- possible inversions permitting! But, not to worry, snow lovers...it's only tail-end flapping syndrome? Here today, gone tomorrow!