Look how 'wet' Seattle compares with other cities. It's not as wet as a many believe. Plus we have dry summers. Our winters are cool and wet, not cold.
Mike

Here is a link that might be useful: Precipitation Maps from the Oregon Climate Service at Oregon State University

Here is a link that might be useful: US Drought Monitor Maps

I can't imagine living anywhere that gets less than 30" of precip per year on average...

While it's true that Seattle itself is not particularly wet, areas very nearby receive much more precip on average. The mountains exert a range of effects in this regard, with higher ground and ocean-facing slopes causing much orographic lift, hence heavy rain and snowfall. Conversely, sea level areas and locations in rain shadows caused by the mountains can be drier. There's places in WA state receiving 80 inches plus on average, I believe.

+oM

My parents' in New Jersey (near Trenton) measured 66.52" of rain.

Here in the northern Nevada desert, I measured 8.48".

Yes, +om, we have a varied landscape with a lot of different elevations, therefore, different amounts of annual precipitation. The town of Sequim, NW of Seattle, is the driest place on the west coast north of Los Angeles. It's in the Olympic rain shadow.
Twenty miles east of me, they get about 100 inches of rain a year. Seattle is about twenty miles west of me, and a little north, at about 37 inches a year. I figure it's about halfway between the two here. I'm happy with it.
Mike

our "normal" is around 54 inches a year here in the TN valley.

we got around 60 inches in my local area in 2011.

record "lowest" was around 29 inches in 07.

record "highest" was up in the mid 70 inch range.

some places around here came close to that this year.

our 2012 outlook puts us on the edge of significantly wetter than normal, but we'll probably not get soaked like the guys to our north.

much of our rainfall this past year seems to have come in voilent storms, heavy downpours. that's a sad sight in my subdivision since only a few of us have planted trees since moving in (it's about 4-5 year old development).

rain just hits the clay soil (under the mushy, nitrogen laden sod) and runs like hell to the lowest point.

of course, in another 10 years or so, my lot will be a young forest, so i'll keep my rain -- :-)

San Juan, PR finished the year with 88.15 inches or rainfall... 31.80 inches above normal... They also had only 2 days when the high temp failed to reach 80F (79F both days)... Low temp for the year was 69F and that happened about a half dozen times.

Think of the growth on a tree in that climate!

Total annual rainfall was 56.15" for 2011. That is 10" above the annual average of 46". That was not the problem. The problem was nearly half (over 48%) came in a 5-6 week period, followed immediately with no rain for almost 3 months during which temps climbed to as high as 110F.

I'm with you John, can't live anywhere it's too dry, but I put the number closer to 40" depending upon temps in climate. 35 inches in Seattle is allot wetter than 35 inches in South Texas. Former is lush and green for most of the year, the later is probable brown hot grass for much of the year.

Arktrees

Someone already elluded to this but you can't draw any conclusions (at least from plants getting enough precipitation) from these numbers.

I'm playing captain obvious here but there is a huge difference between thirty 1" rainfalls and six 5" rainfalls.

I recall this past year (as usual) we get large amounts of rain during storms which becomes runoff and then we go through a dry spell for almost a month. Its rare that we get a nice slow soaker...at least since I've watched it like a hawk the last 6 years while trying to establish three seperate landscapes at three seperate homes.

The one that jumps out at me is Lubbock, TX, which got less than 6" of precip. Those folks must be hurting. I'm not familiar with that part of the country, but I've got to believe the '11 drought is causing some major problems for them.

@basic: Weren't you watching the news a few months ago when it seemed like half of Texas was on fire?

I don't know how I'll go on after this year's record setting precip. I've grown addicted to all of this juicy rain, and seeing everything lush and green. We did have a dry period from mid June to late July, and it was starting to look brown, but then it started to rain again.

A normal year will be a letdown after this.

A major point for any location is effective precip -- precip minus evaporation. So Seattle at a relatively cool, maritime location has less evaporation & its 35-40" yrly avg is far more effective than Texas w/the same precip. Note that boreal forests grow in N Canada/Alaska w/less than 10" yr. 30" produces rich forests in Minn, but mostly prairie in Texas (except along waterways).

Another point, as demonstrated in my own stream/floodplain lot is the local geography. Mountains cause a rain-shadow to nearby lowlands, but can compensate by supplying those areas w/streamflow & groundwater. Seattle is a good example.

Another point is that soil conditions also play a part. Runoff, at least here in the naturally-forested east US, is mostly a man-made effect. Forests & the forestfloor-duff break up heavy rain & absorb it like a sponge. Crew-cut lawns not nearly so much. With typical recent construction methods, lots are compacted/smoothed & the soil becomes rock-hard. Runoff then is the rule & effective precip can be greatly reduced.

My favorite example of these points was the grove of 80-90' cottonwoods in the desert near Fallon, NV w/5" precip a yr. There was only scattered sagebrush around. Turned out there was water deep underground in the sandy soil there, allowing the trees to flourish. But along the Blue-Ridge Parkway at high-elevation not far from Ashville, NC, there were steep slopes that prb'ly got 65"+ a yr, but only stunted (& visually very old) 30' Chestnut oaks could survive on the excessively drained, thin, rocky "soil".

Adding mulch to the root-zones of trees can increase the effective precip & water-retention of the root-zone. Aerating lawn-soil can help too, if it's been compacted.

Normal precip is around 48 inches. This year we got nearly 73 inches but short of the record of just over 80 inches. Over 15 inches just for August which was a complete washout this year.

Sixty inches at my house here in Virginia. This is a record breaker for the last 10 years that I have kept records. Also, areas of Virginia broke some records set many years ago. Our average is about 42 inches a year. This beats 2010's drought followed by a cold December/January going into 2011 where many trees were stressed, causing death to many.

@njoasis - August wasn't nearly a "complete washout". Yes, a ridiculous amount of rain fell (15.69" at Trenton). However, about 75% of it fell on just 4 days. About 92% fell on just 8 days.

Denver area normal is 13 inches. We got between 16 - 17 inches this year. While that sounds like a blessing, we were bone dry last winter, virtually no snow or precip for 4 months or so. I think we got 4 inches of rain in a 2 week period in April. The result was the parched clay couldn't absorb much and most ran off. It was a tough year to start my conifer collecting!
The snow models I saw in December showed Colorado as one of the few states with snow cover. I'll take it as I hate winter watering! We also get 300 days of sunshine a year, a big plus.

Barb

This was a good rain year for my yard but I remember when I was a kid we had some droughts (70's) and things can change. Veggie gardens can be watered by hose, the trees can too but it's more of a pain in the booty. Hopefully things will be better for everybody in spring/summer 2012.

Nearly 16 inches of rain in one month is a washout regardless of the distribution in my book.

"Washout" to me implies that its raining more often than not. That certainly wasn't the case.

famartin, one yr when I was in VA, I did some "clocking" of rain events. In July there was 7" rain -- pretty good. But the total time it rained was a mere 5 hrs (3" came in a mere 55 min). That's 5/744 or only 0.007 of the total time! 'Course, I didn't count the time when it looked threatening.

We have been in a drought for 3 years here. My water table is at least 17 feet down. I missed rain after rain all summer. Now, our "dry season" begins!

As a gardener, I have a special fondness for rain. It truly is the giver of life. It's great to live in a climate that gets precipitation that is fairly evenly distributed throughout the year, and where drought is rarely a worry. Also, it's not too hot so the summers are nice.

You just have to suffer through the winter. Which was TERRIBLE last year, but this year, it's been easy peasy so far. (knock on wood :)

Just found out that Texas had the driest recorded year ever in 2011 with only 14.88 inches. Ouch... It is horrible in east Texas including HOuston with so many dead pine trees. Things sure have improved some over the past 2 months though but the damage is done...

Where I live, the average is a mere 32 inches or so. This year, we ended up with 42 inches. Plus, it's cooler here than say, Oklahoma, although it can get hot.

The weirdest thing is how dry this winter has been so far. By this time last year, and the year before for that matter, we were running out of places to pile snow.

One of my kids moved to Olympia, WA recently. That locale seems to be getting plenty of moisture lately!

I think 'effective precipitation' is really the key, as others have already pointed out. Overall, I think we're seeing fewer "three day rains", where it comes down slowly but for a long time. It's all big downpours now, with the accompanying runoff. But with this current drought, gotta wonder where we're headed for the next growing season.

+oM

Forgot to mention...watched a show about volcanos. They said that if Mt. Rainier were to experience a major eruption, the resulting lahar (Sp?), a mixture of lava and melted snow/mud would cause flooding all the way up to near Seattle. That's just crazy to think about. Rainier has a lot of snowpack!

+oM