Barwon Heads and Ocean Grove enjoy good in-gauge-ment with record rain

THE soft ground, big puddles and full wetlands tell it anecdotally, and a rain gauge at a local golf club tells it specifically.

The last two months in Barwon Heads and Ocean Grove have been close to the wettest May-June period since the Barwon Heads Golf Club started keeping records for the Bureau of Meteorology in 2002.

Localised rainfall from Wednesday to Friday last week saw the club’s gauge record 36mls over the three days, taking the rainfall so far for June to 96mls, not far off the 2012 record of 102mls for the month.

Falls were heaviest to 9am Thursday and Friday when the club recorded 20mls and 12mls, respectively.

Bureau of Meteorology (BOM) senior forecaster Christie Johnson said the 20mls recorded on Thursday was the highest total in the state for the day, reflecting a localised event that may have seen even more significant falls just to the east in Ocean Grove and Point Lonsdale.

“Basically, there was an unstable south-to-southwesterly airflow and we saw a bit of a convergence line where southerlies over Barwon Heads converged with south westerlies from the Surf Coast,” Ms Johnson said.

“We call it a cold-air field, which is basically cold air flow behind a cold front.

“Satellite pictures show a convergence line over the Bellarine.”

She said rainfall fields data extrapolated from radar images showed that Ocean Grove and Point Lonsdale could have received 40-50mls, but BOM relies on ground proofs to test those figures and it didn’t have weather stations east of the Barwon Heads Golf Club on the Bellarine.

“But given the golf course figure was the highest in the state for Thursday, it’s picking up on that convergence.”

With more rain forecast for the end of June it’s likely a monthly rainfall record at the Barwon Heads Golf Club will be broken for the second month running.

The 119mls that filled the gauge in during May was a record for that month. The mean rainfall for May and June is 49mls and 52mls, respectively.

The wet weather has been welcome in the region, which, along with the rest of the state, suffered through one of the driest starts to the year on record.

Locally, this was illustrated by the browning off of coastal beard-heath and ti-tree in Barwon Coastmanaged land, the drying of the Begola Wetlands in Collendina and local homes and cars coated in dust for months on end.

A spokesperson for the Barwon Heads Golf Club said the rainfall in May and June has largely been catch-up falls for the year to date.

“It’s interesting to note that while rainfall in May was the highest recorded at the club since BOM records were submitted in 2002 (and it looks like June will be a record also) – that it’s really catch-up rainfall.

The January-June average over the years is 244.3mls and so far this year we’ve recorded 260.6mls.”