Was this Manatee County’s driest year ever? Here’s what weather experts say

As 2025 comes to an end, it’s shaping up to be one of the driest and warmest years on record for Manatee County.

As of this week, it’s the eighth-driest year on record for Manatee, with about 11 inches of rainfall less than normal, according to the U.S. Drought Monitor. A drought impacting much of Florida recently worsened from moderate to severe for most parts of Manatee, Sarasota and the Tampa Bay area.

Meteorologist Paul Close, who monitors climate data for the region at the National Weather Service of Tampa Bay in Ruskin, said 2025’s quiet hurricane season was a welcome break, but it also meant less rainfall.

“We didn’t have any tropical systems that tend to bring us widespread rain once or twice a year,” Close told the Bradenton Herald. “We had our basic daily thunderstorms through the summer. But we didn’t have widespread rain, or even just tropical moisture, and then the fall was really dry.”

“This whole area, from Tampa on down through Bradenton and Sarasota, has had one of the driest autumns since records started,” Close added.

This year’s dry spell follows an unusually wet 2024, which brought record-breaking rainfall amounts to the Bradenton area. Overall, 2024 ranked as Manatee County’s third-wettest year since local rainfall record keeping began in 1911.

Here’s a look at some other significant weather trends for Manatee County in 2025.

Quiet hurricane season for Florida

In addition to much less rain, 2025 was also an unusually quiet year for hurricanes. After 2024 battered Florida’s Gulf Coast with major wind, flooding and storm surge events, the Bradenton area got a much-needed reprieve from hurricane damage this year.

Manatee County, along with the rest of Florida and the continental U.S., was entirely spared from hurricane landfalls. Tropical Storm Chantal was the only tropical storm to make landfall in the continental U.S. this year, hitting South Carolina in early July.

In a closing note on the Atlantic hurricane season, which ended Nov. 30, officials and hurricane experts stressed that this year’s lack of U.S. landfalls was a lucky exception.

“For the first time in a decade, not a single hurricane struck the U.S. this season, and that was a much-needed break,” NOAA administrator Neil Jacobs said in a news release. “Still, a tropical storm caused damage and casualties in the Carolinas, distant hurricanes created rough ocean waters that caused property damage along the East Coast, and neighboring countries experienced direct hits from hurricanes.”

NOAA officials also noted that the 2025 season produced a near-normal level of storms, including three Category 5 hurricanes — the second-highest number on record.

“Fortunately, short-term weather patterns largely steered tropical systems away from the United States,” said National Weather Service Director Ken Graham in the news release.

Will 2025 be one of Manatee’s hottest years?

Manatee County saw a mix of above-normal and below-normal monthly average temperatures this year, according to NWS data collected at the Sarasota-Bradenton International Airport weather station.

February, March, April, May, July and October were hotter than average, while January, June, August, September and November were cooler than average.

But the hotter than average months departed farther from normal temperatures than the cooler months, pushing Manatee County toward a hotter than average year, overall.

Several months approached record heat:

• February was the seventh-warmest on record, with an average temperature 4.5 degrees above normal
• April was the fourth-warmest on record with an average temperature 2.8 degrees above normal
• May was the fourth-warmest on record, with an average temperature 2.3 degrees above normal
• July was the 12th warmest on record, with an average temperature 0.1 degrees above normal
• October was the 13th warmest on record, with an average temperature 4.5 degrees above normal

As of this week, the average annual temperature for the Bradenton area is at 75.4 degrees — 1.3 degrees above normal.

“It’ll come down a little more than that, but in general, it looks like it’s going to be above normal for the year,” Close said. “Unless it really cools off a bunch and stays cool, 2025 will probably end up in the top 10 warmest years on record.”

Record high temperatures

The Bradenton area also broke several daily high temperature records this year, according to weather data collected at the Bradenton East Southeast station in inland Manatee County:

• April: Three record high temperature days
• May: Four record high temperature days
• July: Three record high temperature days
• August: Four record high temperature days
• October: One record high temperature day

That total compares to nine record high temperature days in 2024 and 20 in 2023.

How does climate change factor in?

Close said daily and average temperatures for the region are growing increasingly warm over time, reflecting global climate change trends.

“It’s slow, but there’s a gradual increase in average temperatures. We’re also seeing fewer record lows and more record highs,” Close said.

He also noted that the spiking heat is especially noticeable in urban areas, which trap heat and experience bigger departures from normal temperatures than undeveloped areas.

“Some of that is from more cities, roads and buildings,” Close said. “But to some degree, it’s happening everywhere.”

Will Manatee County drought continue?

Meteorologists expect drought conditions to continue for the Bradenton area as a La Niña climate pattern kicks Florida’s typical winter dry season into overdrive.

“We’re in (a La Niña climate pattern), so that’s generally even drier than normal,” Close said. “So we’re expecting this pattern of drier conditions to continue.”

The La Niña pattern also affects temperature, Close said.

“Usually with (a La Niña year), December and January are near normal, maybe cooler than normal, and then February ends up being warm,” Close said.

Close said locals may also notice bigger daily temperature swings than usual.

“La Niña can have big variations of temperatures, because it’s drier air,” Close said.

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