Old farmer rule for dormouse day - What is really?

"It rains on the dormouse day, it may rain for seven weeks" or "The weather on dormouse day may stay seven weeks": Such and similar statements are made repeatedly on the occasion of the dormouse day on June 27. What's wrong with the old farmers rule?

Weather on the dormouse day determines the weather for the coming seven weeks?
An old farmer's rule on the dormouse day on June 27 says that the weather that then prevails will be maintained for the next seven weeks. "Meteorological nonsense!", Andreas Friedrich from the German Weather Service (DWD) said according to a report from "bz-berlin.de". However, wisdom is not quite out of thin air. The meteorologist explained in the "BZ", what is really behind it. Thus, not a single day is decisive for the weather in the coming weeks, but a period of about ten to 14 days. This extends from the 27th of June until around the 7th or 10th of July. "That means, now we have to wait and see what happens in the next 10 to 14 days," says Friedrich.

Old folk wisdom: What's up on dormouse? Picture: sine wave - fotolia

Farmer rule with high hit accuracy
"It should be warmer in the coming week, in Berlin up to 30 degrees. The decisive factor is whether it lasts beyond 5 July. Then there is a better chance that it will stay that way. "According to the data, meteorologists can predict sunshine or rain only about ten days relatively safely. Although the weather that occurs between the 27th of June and the 10th of July prevails, usually until the beginning of August, but not always. "Based on meteorological data, scientists have found that in the weeks to early August, there is often a similar weather situation as in the post-dormouse," explained Friedrich. In southern Germany, the frequency of this weather phenomenon is about 60 percent and in northern Germany about 70 percent.

Health effects
"If the dormouse phase gets hot, that does not mean that heat wave will follow after seven weeks," said Friedrich. "But then there will probably be quite stable, warm, dry weather." While there is no well-founded explanation for the weather phenomenon, it is believed that there is a similar sequence of weather patterns in early summer. The sheep's cold that we have just behind us also plays a role here. "By the end of May, the European continent is already warming, even though the sea is still cool," explained Friedrich. "Through the interplay of various factors, such as temperatures, it comes to sheep's cold." In the weeks after that, so decide how the weather stays, that is, it settles down. For health reasons, it would be better if it gets warm, because according to a study, cold weather harms health more than hot. Researchers at the Hygiene and Tropical Institute in London found in the study that not high heat is responsible for most deaths, but cool temperatures. While the cardiovascular system is particularly affected by heat, the risk of respiratory problems and weakened immune systems increases with cold temperatures. (Ad)