Rothamsted Meteorological Station

Datasets Key information Site and Design Media Bibliography
  • Experiment Code: RMS
  • Experiment Site: Rothamsted
  • Objectives:
  • Date Start: 1843
  • Establisment Period End: 1951
  • Date End: Ongoing
  • Key Contacts: Andy Macdonald, (Principal Investigator), Sarah Perryman, (Data Manager), Margaret Glendining, (Data Manager), https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6466-4629 ,

Description

    • Sir John Lawes, the founder of Rothamsted, realized that to understand crop growth, it was important to have records of the weather. Weather records also help us to understand the spread of crop diseases and insect behaviour. Rainfall and wind direction have been measured at Rothamsted every day since 1853, temperature since 1878 and sunshine since 1890, making this one of the longest sets of meteorological (weather) data available in the UK.

Funding

  • The e-RA database, including the published datasets generated from it, is part of the Rothamsted Long-Term Experiments - National Bioscience Research Infrastructure (RLTE-NBRI) , which also includes the Long-Term Experiments, the Sample Archive and Rothamsted's environmental monitoring activities including the weather stations and its role in the UK Environmental Change Network.
  • The RLTE-NBRI is supported by the Lawes Agricultural Trust and the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (Grants BBS/E/C/00005189 (2012-2017); BBS/E/C/000J0300 (2017-2022); BBS/E/RH/23NB0007 (2023-2028)).

Keywords

  • experiments, long term experiments, agriculture, datasets, research, fields, yields, weather

Datasets available

Title (hover for a longer description) Year of Publication Identifier Version

Weather Data

Mean Seasonal Air Temperature and Total Seasonal Rain at Rothamsted 1968-2022 2023 https://doi.org/10.23637/rms-RothSeasonTotRainMeanTemp1968-2022
01

Weather Data - Sun

Total Monthly and Annual Sunshine Hours at Rothamsted 1893-2023 2024 https://doi.org/10.23637/rmsTMASunHours1893-2023-01
01
Total Monthly and Annual Sunshine Hours at Rothamsted 1891-2024 2025 https://doi.org/10.23637/rmsTMASunHours1891-2024-01
01

Weather data - 30 year means

Rothamsted 30-year mean meteorological data 1961-1990 2019 https://doi.org/10.23637/OARES30YrMeans6190
01
Rothamsted 30-year mean meteorological data 1971-2000 2019 https://doi.org/10.23637/OARES30YrMeans7100
01
Rothamsted 30-year mean meteorological data 1981-2010 2019 https://doi.org/10.23637/OARES30YrMeans8180
01
Rothamsted 30-year mean meteorological data 1991-2020 2021 https://doi.org/10.23637/OARES30YrMeans9120
01

Weather data - Rainfall

Total Monthly Rainfall at Rothamsted March 1853 - July 2018 2018 https://doi.org/10.23637/RMMRAIN5318
01
Total Annual Rainfall at Rothamsted 1853-2023 2024 https://doi.org/10.23637/rmsTARain1853-2023-01
01
Total Monthly and Annual Rain at Rothamsted 1853-2024 2025 https://doi.org/10.23637/rmsTMArain1853-2024-01
01
Mean monthly rainfall at Rothamsted October 1985-September 2017 2020 https://doi.org/10.23637/rmsMMRain10850917
01

Weather data - Temperature

Annual Mean Air Temperature at Rothamsted 1878-2023 2024 https://doi.org/10.23637/rms-RMAAtemp-03
03
Annual Mean Air Temperature Anomaly at Rothamsted 1878-2019 2020 https://doi.org/10.23637/rms-RMAAtempanomaly-1
01
Mean monthly temperature at Rothamsted October 1985-September 2017 2020 https://doi.org/10.23637/rmsmmtemp10850917
01
Monthly Mean Average Air Temperature at Rothamsted 1878-2023 2024 https://doi.org/10.23637/rmsMMAirTemp1878-2023-01
01
Monthly and Annual Air Temperature (Max, Mean, Min) at Rothamsted 1878-2024 2025 https://doi.org/10.23637/rmsMAAirTemp1878-2024-01
01
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Key Information

30 years mean data

Extreme weather recordings

History of the Rothamsted Weather Station

Site: Rothamsted Met station - Rothamsted

  • Experiment Site: Rothamsted
  • Description: Description of the Met Station
  • Management: More desctiption of met station / related to managment
  • Visit Permitted?: Yes
  • Visiting Arrangments: Contact Andy Macdonald
  • Elevation: 130 Metres
  • Geolocation:    51.806876, -0.360137

Experiment Design

    Use the arrows to navigate between periods

    License

    Creative Commons License These media (images and videos) are available under a Creative Commons Attribution Licence (4.0) with attribution to Rothamsted Research.

    Images

    Key References

    2021

    • - Addy, J. W. G., Ellis, R. H., Macdonald, A. J., Semenov, M. A. and Mead, A. (2021) "The impact of weather and increased atmospheric CO2 from 1892 to 2016 on simulated yields of UK wheat", J. R. Soc. Interface, 18, 20210250 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1098/rsif.2021.0250

    2020

    • - Addy, J. W. G., Ellis, R. H., Macdonald, A. J., Semenov, M. A. and Mead, A. (2020) "Investigating the effects of inter-annual weather variation (1968-2016) on the functional response of cereal grain yield to applied nitrogen, using data from the Rothamsted Long-Term Experiments", Agricultural and Forest Meteorology, 284, 107898 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.agrformet.2019.107898

    2018

    2015

    1974

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    For further information and assistance, please contact the e-RA curators, Sarah Perryman and Margaret Glendining using the e-RA email address: era@rothamsted.ac.uk