Today
Has it rained enough in Washington DC?
The last rain heavy enough to soak in fell over a week ago. What has fallen since wet the leaves and no more.
Washington DC has had 36.6mm of rain in the last 30 days. A normal October here brings 91.4mm, so that is about 40% of what the ground usually gets — and the driest October in 30 years was 3.5mm.
Rain reaching the roots · 14 days
17 OctToday
Thirty years
Rain in Washington DC through a normal year
Across a normal year Washington DC gets about 1148.7mm of rain, most of it in September (118.9mm) and least in February (75.1mm).
A normal October in Washington DC has rain on 10 days. Only 7 of them bring enough to reach a root.
That makes Washington DC one of the wetter places this site covers in the United States in October — 14th of 30, against Seattle at the wet end (131.5mm) and Las Vegas at the dry end (8.4mm).
JFebMAMJJASepOND
Average rainfall by month, 1995–2024
What it means
What that means for what you grow
- Pots and hanging basketsWorst hit, and first to suffer. Very little soil, fully exposed, and nothing to fall back on — in this weather they can empty in a day.
- Salad and leafy vegShallow-rooted and quick to bolt once they run dry. First priority of anything in the ground.
- Beds and bordersA long soak that reaches the roots is worth more than a daily sprinkle, which only wets the surface and is gone by lunchtime.
- Established shrubs and treesFine as they are. They draw from far deeper than a dry spell reaches.