Will there be a drought where I live?

If you live in the northwest of England or Yorkshire, you are already in an official state of drought, says the Environment Agency, and people living in other English regions could follow if the dry time continues.

Those of us in eastern Scotland or the Wales Pays also see low water levels, depending on the water companies.

Drought can affect different aspects of our lives and the environment. This can make farmers more difficult to grow cultures, harm nature and mean that you need to change the way you use water.

So how are your region and how close you are close to a drought? Here is an overview of what’s going on in the country, including our rain, our rivers and our tanks.

There is no unique definition of drought or water shortage – measurement in Scotland – but a long period of low precipitation is necessary.

And it rained less than normal in almost the entire United Kingdom between March and May, the driest sixth spring of the United Kingdom since the records in 1836.

There was therefore less humidity to complete our rivers, tanks and rocks under the ground.

If this lack of precipitation continues for a long time, it can fight against water supplies which serve our homes and our companies.

In June, there was a little more precipitation than the average for the United Kingdom overall, but with a large difference between the East and the West.

Certain parts of Northern Ireland, west of Scotland, Wales and South West of England have experienced more humid conditions than usual. But most of the center and eastern England and Scotland have seen dry time continue.

Long-term forecasts suggest drying conditions than average for a large part of July and perhaps also August.

This would further increase the risk of drought.

Monitors in rivers show us how they flow. At the end of May, these river flows were lower than normal for about three-quarters of the sites monitored across the United Kingdom.

About one out of five out of five “exceptionally low” flows.

The provisional data in June is not much better.

The rivers flows at the end of last month were almost the same as – or even below – years of previous drought from 1976, 2011, 2018 and 2022 for many Eastern, Central and South regions, said Lucy Barker, a hydrologist in the United Kingdom Center for Ecology and Hydrology.

Reservoirs are a crucial part of water supplies in northern England, Scotland and Wales.

At the end of May, the tanks of England were at their lowest combined levels for the period of the year in the files dating back over 30 years.

The reservoir levels in the northeast and northwest were exceptionally low-an important factor for drought declared in the Yorkshire and the North West.

The main reason is, of course, the lack of rain, but a small number of tanks can be affected by other factors.

Normally, at this time of year, Scottish tanks are 85%full. Last week, they were 79%, according to Scottish Water. They are even lower in eastern Scotland.

In Wales, most of them are almost normal, although the tanks used in the middle and south Ceredigion in the west of Wales are lower than the average, said Welsh Water.

The reservoir levels are roughly average in Northern Ireland, according to or Water.

A large part of the south-east of England depends more on the groundwater than the tanks.

The groundwater comes from precipitation and are naturally stored under the surface in pore spaces and rock fractures. The rocks that store a lot of groundwater are called aquifers.

It represents a third of the water supply of England, although this is much higher in the south and east.

This is due to the varied geology of the United Kingdom, which affects the amount of water that can be stored in the soil.

Water can circulate more quickly through certain types of rocks than others, sometimes taking years to meet current conditions.

This is the case for certain parts of the south and eastern England, which is why these regions are currently closer to normal.

These underground water stores “react more slowly to the climate changes than rivers, which is why they provide a useful stamp during periods of drought,” said Professor Alan Macdonald of the British Geological Survey.

This is why the droughts of groundwater in the South generally take more time to develop, but can be more durable if they occur.

People and nature already feel the effects.

“It is quite shocking that we are still only [in early] July, “Rachel Hallos, deputy director of the National Farmers’ Union, told BBC News.

“It’s as if it was at the end of August when you look at the ground.”

With this small rain, farmers had to put water on their harvest using irrigation.

It made things more expensive for them and means that there is even less water to do.

There is a general concern in the coming months, added Ms. Hallos.

“What am I going to have to harvest? What will I have to feed my cattle during the winter?”

And then there is the impact on wildlife.

A spokesperson for the BIRS Protection of RSPB Bird Protection said that a large challenge was to ensure that enough water is to reach the key habitats in wetlands so that birds have safe places to nest.

“We must think of making our sites more resilient to climate change, because these periods of prolonged dry time become the standard.”

And it is not only the birds that love water that find it difficult. Even in our gardens, common visitors and merles can find it difficult to find verses and insects on our dried lawns, says the RSPB.

Dreams are complex phenomena, driven by a mixture of natural and human causes.

The Met Office is expecting the United Kingdom to experience drier summers in the future on average when the world warms up, although there has been no clear trend so far.

But the increase in temperatures can play a more fundamental role by jumping the moisture from the soil by evaporation.

“A warmer atmosphere has more thirst for humidity and this can mean water in the soil, rivers and tanks are exhausted more effectively, leading to droughts, heat waves and faster forest fires,” said Richard Allan, professor of climate sciences at the University of Reading.

But there are other factors that determine if dry conditions cause water shortages, including how we use water.

As part of the plans to combat water shortages, the government provides for nine new tanks for England by 2050, in addition to one under construction in Havteet in the Hampshire.

But the Environment Agency has warned that measures to combat water leaks and control water demand – potentially including hosepipe prohibitions and smarter meters – may also be necessary in England.

Water companies in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland also said they were taking measures to obtain future supplies.

Additional Dan Wainwright and Christine Jeavans report