Anticyclonic weather prevailed throughout Ukraine throughout October. It was dry and sunny, only at the beginning of the ten-day period, as a result of the movement of the cold atmospheric front, light precipitation or their traces were noted in some areas of the northern, western and southern regions.
The average monthly average regional air temperature in the predominant part of the territory turned out to be slightly lower (by 0.3-0.8 °C). In the Odesa, Mykolaiv, Vinnytsya, Ivano-Frankivsk and Zakarpattya regions – by 1.1-1.5 °C below the norm and ranged from 6.6 °C in the north to 10.3 °C in the south of the country. The maximum air temperature in October increased to 19-23 °C, in the south of the Odesa region – up to 25-26 °C. The minimum air temperature in October on cold nights dropped to minus 3-7 °С, in the Kharkiv, Donetsk and Dnipropetrovsk regions – to minus 8 °С, in the Luhansk region – to minus 9-12 °С.
The average regional October rainfall in the predominant part of the country ranged from 3 to 23% of the monthly norm (1-9 mm), in the Chernihiv, Sumy, Poltava, Cherkasy and Odesa regions – from 30 to 53% of the norm (20-21 mm), in the Kirovograd – 63% of the norm (26 mm). In the Mykolayiv region it was close to the monthly norm (34 mm).
In terms of rainfall, October was one of the driest in the last 20 years.
As of October 31, the reserves of productive moisture of the tilth-top under winter crops in the eastern, southern, Transcarpathian, Ivano-Frankivsk, and in most areas of the central, Kyiv, in certain areas of the Sumy, Chernihiv, Zhytomyr, Rivne, Volyn and Lviv regions were insufficient ( 11-20 mm) and unsatisfactory (less than 10 mm of productive moisture). In some places in the Luhansk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhya and Odesa regions, the tilth-top soil was completely dry. Sufficient soil moisture (21-30 mm of productive moisture and more) was noted in the Khmelnitsky, Ternopil, Chernivtsi, in most areas of Kirovograd, Cherkasy, Poltava, Sumy, Chernihiv, Lviv, in some areas of the Kharkiv, Kyiv, Zhytomyr, Rivne, Volyn and Vinnytsya areas.
Depending on the timing of sowing, winter crops were in different phases of development: early sowing – in the phases of deployment of the 3rd leaf, the formation of nodal roots and the beginning of tillering. On late sowings, grain germination and seedling formation were noted. The condition of the emerging plants is good and satisfactory, in some places – excellent. The density of winter crops was formed in the range of 280-500 plants per 1 m2, the bushiness of normally developed plants was 1.5-2.0 stems per plant. In some areas of the eastern and Kherson regions, wilting of plants and liquefaction of crops due to drought were noted. In some areas of 11 Dnipropetrovsk, Vinnytsya and Lviv regions, due to arid conditions, winter wheat grain did not germinate for 22-23 days. In winter rapeseed, the formation of a leaf rosette continued. The condition of the plants is good and satisfactory.