the state of our environment | June 2014

Any day you can wear shorts and a t-shirt during winter without looking like an idiot is a bonus and we had a few in June. Both daytime and night temperatures were over a degree warmer than usual. Also above normal was the region’s rainfall, which surprised me, but it was mostly thanks to some dismal days around the middle of the month and little more than a smattering otherwise. Northern Hawke’s Bay went out on a limb though and recorded well below its normal rainfall – for the second month running. Some rivers there are looking a little low as a result but in the main our river, groundwater and soil moisture levels look as expected for the time of year. Air quality is also looking about normal… which isn’t good news. We had five days in Hastings when levels of particulates exceeded national standards and one each in Napier and Awatoto. A salty easterly blowing over heavy surf spiked levels in Awatoto but as for the others, until winter equates to frolicking in the surf in bikinis and speedos, it seems we’ll continue to light those fires.

20140704_HBRC_SOE_June2014.pdf

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