England suffered its driest spring in a century last month, leaving fields parched and many rivers at record lows, the Centre for Ecology and Hydrology (CEH) said on June 10, as government officials met experts and utilities to discuss the drought conditions prevailing in many parts of the country.

But Scotland, by contrast, had its wettest spring on record for the three-month period of March, April and May, showing the wide regional variation. Much of the south-east of England has also escaped drought.

Most reservoir stocks throughout northern Scotland and Northern Ireland were described as "healthy" by the CEH, the public sector research centre charged with collating drought data.

For England and Wales as a whole in May, stocks were within 4% of the early June average. In areas such as London, stocks are also estimated within 10% of capacity, but in the south-west, Wales and the Midlands, reservoir stocks are 10-20% below where they should be at this time of year.

Terry Marsh, senior hydrologist at the CEH, said: "Late May soils were the driest on record across large parts of eastern and central England, causing substantial agricultural stress [and] impacting on crop yields.

The drought conditions will continue even if rainfall returns in the next two months, because the soils are so dry it will take longer to recover than usual.