CARIBOU, Maine — As an avid gardener, Megan McLaughlin of Houlton acknowledged grumpily Wednesday that she was happy when she learned that rain was in the forecast for Aroostook County throughout the week.
“I hate it because it means we are forced to stay inside and summer in Maine is short enough as it is,” she said. “But I have heard several farmers say that we need the rain, and it will be nice not to have to water my flower garden as often.”
Rain showers this week could help compensate for a dry May in some parts of the state, according to the National Weather Service in Caribou.
The month was marked by above average temperatures and below average precipitation across northern and eastern Maine.
“It wasn’t dry everywhere,” Todd Foisy, meteorologist with the NWS, said Wednesday. “But where some places got short bursts of rain or showers throughout the month, other towns did not see much at all.”
Monthly temperatures ranged from two to five degrees above the 30-year averages, according to the NWS.
The average temperature for the month in Caribou was 53.9.
That was 2.4 degrees above normal, making it the 14th warmest May on record in the city.
The average temperature of 58.2 degrees that was noted in Bangor was 4.5 degrees above average. It was the warmest May in Bangor since 1998, and the ninth warmest May on record since 1925, Foisy said.
During the month, 2.96 inches of rain and melted snow was recorded in Caribou, which was 0.37 of an inch below average. In Bangor, a total of 2.01 inches of rain was observed, which the weather service noted was 1.63 inches below average. That made it the driest May since 2010 in the city, according to Foisy.
The month was not without snow, with a spring storm on May 16 dropping 7 inches on some parts of northern Aroostook County.
Foisy said that 4.5 inches was recorded in Caribou, the greatest snowfall ever observed so late in the season. He said the high temperature of 40 degrees on May 16 was the lowest high temperature ever observed on that date since the NWS has kept records. It broke the previous record of 42 degrees, which was recorded in 1957.
Temperatures were closer to normal for the month in southern Maine, according to the NWS office in Gray. The average temperature for Portland in May was 54.7 degrees, which was only 0.8 degrees above normal.
A total of 2.04 inches of rain fell on the city, which was 1.97 inches below normal and the driest since 2010.