April was sunny, cold, and mainly dry, according to boffins at Rothamsted Research.

There was 1.6mm of rainfall, which is 52.40mm below the 30-year average, and we had four days with 0.2mm or more of rain.

The wettest day was April 9 which saw 1.0mm.

This April was the driest on record since records began in 1853.

Sunshine was above average with 215.8 hours (+43.79 hours); the most was 12.9 hours on April 22 and there was only one day without sunshine.

The average maximum and minimum temperatures were below average at 11.5 ºC (-1.84 °C) and 1.1 °C (-3.36 °C). The warmest day was the 19th which reached 16.2 ºC, and the coldest night was on the 7th when it dropped to -3.0 ºC.

We had 11 air frosts and 22 ground frosts over the course of the month.