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The last 8 hours rainfall at Race Rocks. Recorded by a Davis Instruments tipping bucket rain gauge. |
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| Today's Rainfall: measured in mm. |
Rainfall in the past week. Click on the above graphs for larger versions |
The three graphs above represent historical records of rainfall at different time scales These graphs are made possible by the website victoriaweather.ca |
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| In order to do further statistical analysis of these data use the following link:
Last 24 hr raw rainfall data
Week raw rainfall data:
Month raw rainfall data:
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| Drought Levels and Probability Density Functions |
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 Histograms for Drought Levels at Race Rocks:
These histograms are provided by the UVIC School- based Victoria Weather Station Network.They show consecutive days without rain at Race Rocks.. Each event is calculated by de terming the number of dry days between two days that record rain. Long periods between rain events are considered droughts. The height of each bar gives the number of events with a particular length of dry spell between days with rain as percentage of the total number of events with at least one dry day between days with rain. All events are allocated to the season in which they start.
The plots are shown for the entire year and for each season. The seasons are defined as follows:
• Winter--January, February, March
• Spring--April, May, June
• Summer--July, August, September
• Fall--October, November, December" |
 Probability Density Functions of Daily Rain at Race Rocks :
By year and by season.
These plots are provided by the UVIC School- based Victoria Weather Station Network.They show "the Probability Density Functions of daily total rain at Race Rocks. The blue bars give the histogram of daily rain values (greater than zero) with bins of 1 mm. The red curve is the best fit to the histogram using a three-parameter gamma function. The orange and green vertical lines give the 95th and 99th percentile respectively. The number of days of rain and the percent of the total number of events that this represents are given in the last line of the legend.
The plots are shown for the entire year and for each season. The seasons are defined as follows:
• Winter--January, February, March
• Spring--April, May, June
• Summer--July, August, September
• Fall--October, November, December"
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| The Adaptations and Response of Organisms to the Abiotic factor of Rainfall |
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Canada Geese are dependant on the availability of fresh water at Race Rocks. During the winter, the higher level rock pools are refreshed by rainfall. There is no other natural source of water on the island. By the time their eggs hatch in June, most of the pools have dried up, so they have to take their young off the island and over to the mainland. (Photo by PB) |
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This slide show presents some of the behaviours of juvenile bald eagles in very wet weather.( Photo by PB) |
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In this movie of the Black oystercatcher hatching, half way through the day, rain falls at Race Rocks and the oystercatcher settles down to protect the newly hatched chicks. |
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The availability of water for vegetation on Race Rocks, has major implications for the species of plants that can survive on the island. Not only do they have to survive dessication from salt spray, but abundant water in the winter months and almost a total lack of water from June to September. This file shows some of the vegetation that is resistant to the drought. |
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Go to this exercise on the Water Cycle along with other biogeochemical cycles. |
 NEWS ITEM:
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Global warming already changing rainfall... Nature , July 23 2007 |
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