Overview

• July’s heavy precipitation saturated the upper 25–60 cm of soil in northern and eastern regions, enabling stressed vegetation to recover and build buffers against short heatwaves.
• Rainfall was highly uneven, with Schleswig-Holstein, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern and parts of Brandenburg receiving about double the normal rainfall while the Ruhrgebiet, much of Thuringia and northern Bavaria stayed unusually dry.
• Monitoring east of Berlin and in Brandenburg’s Barnim district shows clear rises in shallow groundwater and surface flows, but aquifers deeper than 10 meters have seen little or no recharge.
• Dürremonitor data indicates that fully replenishing soil moisture down to two meters requires at least three very wet months, so a single wet July cannot reverse multi-year drought impacts.
• Local water authorities report improved surface-water flows but warn that persistent deep aquifer deficits will demand infrastructure upgrades and measures like the new ‘Wassercent’ water pricing to bolster long-term resilience.