Beneficial Downpours For All Of Vermont Except For Part That Most Needs It

My St. Albans, Vermont gardens looked nice and wet this
morning, but looks are deceiving. Areas near the Canadian
border missed out on most of the beneficial rains. Run your
hands under the thickest foliage, and the soil is still
 dusty. Just 0.1 inches of rain as of 8 a.m. compared to 
1.2 inches just 30 miles south in Burlington.

 Everyone in Vermont was lucky enough overnight to get a soaking, long lasting drenching rain to ease the drought.  

Everyone, that is, except the one part of the state that needed the rain - areas closest to the Canadian border. From my perch in St. Albans - pretty much within sight of Canada - it feels like the drought is permanent. 

As of 7 a.m., Burlington had so far received a nice 1.22 inches of rain. Montpelier was close behind at 1.16 inches.  

I don't have widespread precipitation data yet, but Plattsburgh, New York had received just .0.34 inches of rain and it rapidly tapered off as you head into Franklin County, Vermont.

As of 8 a.m, my very unofficial rain gauge had collected just 0.1 inches of rain.  A little more might fall today, but not much. 

For those of you who want a classic mid-summer hot Sunday, you will be disappointed. Anybody that's still getting a soaking rain this morning will see it diminish into occasional light rain and showers.  A thick overcast, low clouds and fog will linger all day, and temperatures will be well below normal for the season. We'll be lucky to hit 70 degrees.

Plus, a little more rain is due through Wednesday, but really, not all that much. 

I'm not sure why this is happening, why there is such a block on rain along the Canadian border.

I can better explain why most of the Northeast has had such heavy rain this month.  A trough of low pressure seems to have persisted in the Midwest/Great Lakes region.  That, and the Bermuda High off the East Coast, keeps pumping tropical air northward.

That air interacts with weak, nearly stalled weather fronts, and the downpours roar on.

On paper, this weather pattern should have hit the areas of Vermont north of Route 2, too. We should have had plenty of rain.  

As I mentioned a few days ago, there always seems to be a reason why the rain avoids that part of the state. But there's no consistent explanation I can think of.  Maybe somebody smarter than me can provide a Grand Unifying Theory as to why it no longer really rains near the Canadian border?

The weather pattern that brought the record rain to the Northeast shows signs of shifting to a cool, but dry one.  That means the drought will go on, and probably worsen in far northern Vermont, while the rest of the Green Mountain State enjoys the fruits of a wet first half of July. 

At least we didn't get all the flooding that southern New England and the Mid-Atlantic states endure.