Dartmoor Society member, Mike Sampson, has been monitoring the weather on Dartmoor for over 50 years. Each year, he kindly sends us his round up of the previous year’s weather.
DARTMOOR RAIN 2025
Whilst the year of 2025 will be remembered as a record dry and warm year it was not
the case for high Dartmoor, indeed 1976 was drier and the data from the river gauging
stations on the moor clearly shows this.
1976 was also the year when I started the rain gauge on Cut Hill. As this is an official
met office site and at the highest altitude of any Dartmoor rain gauge I am using the
readings from it as its a good representative for the high north moor, backed up by
other nearby gauges.
Whilst dry spells of weather often prevailed rain was never far away and 2025 got of
to a wet start with 430mm (16.9 inches) in January and Black hill to the north had
440mm (17.3ins) and down at Sandyhole 476mm (18.7ins ). February continued this
wet theme with 254mm (10 ins) at Cut hill.
Then the weather changed completely with the driest March since records started 48
years ago with just 18mm @ Cut hill (0.71ins ) 21mm at Black hill(0.83 ins ) and
15mm (0.59 ins ) at Sandyhole and Varacombe.
With sun and dry winds the moor certainly dried out but then 182mm (7.2ins ) fell in
April soon wetting the moor again. May began dramatically with no rain at all for the
first ten days so quickly drying the moorland surface out. So when the infamous
wildfire broke out in the Cut hill area it quickly spread on the surface.
Rain soon returned with 104mm (4.09 ins) by end of May. This wet and cold weather
continued until 16th June (the worst possible time for nesting birds) Observations by
RSPB and others showed that rare wading birds just abandoned their nests.
The second half of June saw an improvement with 29mm (1.1ins ) at Cut hill making
the June total there of 205mm (8.1 ). July continued dry with 19mm (0.7ins) in the
first half then 74mm (2.9ins) in the second half of July.
August then recorded 125mm ( 4.9ins ) and September 240mm ( 9.4ins) It was then
'wet' for much of the rest of the year as Dartmoor residents will know.
At Cut hill 280mm ( 11.02ins) fell in October, 390mm ( 15.3ins ) in November.
December was really very wet with 498mm ( 19.6ins ) nearby Black hill measured
548mm ( 21.6ins) and 456mm (17.9ins) at Tor Royal hill and 440 (17.3ins) at East
Bovey Head.
Even so since 1976 ie 48 years of records show that there have been 10 years all
wetter in December with the most at Cut hill being 564mm (22.2ins) in December
2013.
So the total rainfall at Cut hill for 2025 was 2816mm (110.98 ins) this is the 11th
wettest year there since 1976. Nearby Black hill 2 miles north recorded 3039mm
(119.65ins) the 5th wettest in10 years (Black hill only started in Dec 2015)
Sandyhole 2 miles south east of Cut hill 2860mm (112.62ins) and Varacombe under
Whitehorse hill measured 2515mm (99.02ins) the 8th wettest in a longer record of 29
years.
Down at Willsworthy west of Cut hill another location with 48 years of records
2077mm (81.57ins) was recorded in 2025 and in this case 11 years have been wetter.
Meanwhile the South moor which was not going to be outdone measured even more
with 3104mm (122.20 ins) @ Green hill, this was my wettest place in 2025 and in
this case there have been 6 years wetter over a 32 year period. Plym head recorded
3018mm (118.82ins) the 5th most in a longer period of 38 years and Langcombe just
North of Yealm head measured 2896mm ( 114.0 ins)-7th most in 31 years.
Tor Royal hill recorded 2849mm(112.17 ins) 7th wettest in 33 years.
Corndon hill in the mid part of Dartmoor measured 2174mm (85.59ins) 5th wettest in
22 years and at East Bovey head 2422mm (95.35ins) fell the 5th most in 18 years.
It would have been nice to have been able to include all the other official gauges but
the data just not available at this stage.
Mike Sampson ISM
NOTE
This data is the best available that we have at present. It is not an exact copy of either
data as read or Met Office quality-controlled data, and may undergo changes through
further data quality control. This data is not admissible to support legal proceedings.