Weatherwatch: August, the new fall not yet born, the odd uneven time*

Barbecue summer or washout? Drought or floods? Shivering with cold or sweltering in the heat? August can be a fickle month, and over recent years the full gamut of weather conditions has been seen in this month.

Some Augusts are baking hot: during the 20th century, those of 1911, 1932, 1975 and the long hot summer of 1976, all had temperature records broken at least somewhere in the UK.