By Roselyn Fauth
In South Canterbury, weather is more than small talk, Timaru weather can turn fast. Remember that day when we had both the countries high and low... I think we hit 41 degrees, and by 4pm the southerly roared in and our mercury thermometers plummeted to 14! while that was extreme, we can often start the morning thinking it is barbecue weather, then by afternoon a stiff southerly has arrived and everyone is hunting for jerseys. Crowded House had it right with "Four Seasons in One Day". That can feel very real here.
Most of us learn to read the sky a bit. We notice a nor’west arch. We watch for rain clouds. We feel the wind start to turn. We see a front coming before the forecast tells us. But reading the sky only gets you so far.
For simple tasks like hanging out the washing, and planning for some home DIY, to shipping, farming, preparing for droughts, floods, wind, snow, sweltering heat or a hard frost, better weather information matters. A forecast gives us more warning and time to plan for what might be coming.
So perhaps it should not surprise us that the Timaru Botanic Gardens has a weather station. When we recall this, we probably think its the white structure on the lane verge, the fenced-off Met station, but you probably didn't realise each time you drove through the garden gate, there was a weather reading old-looking steel tower to the West. It stands near the former caretaker’s house, tucked among trees. It is not decorative like the rotunda or gate or fountain.. this built bit of heritage was there for a practical job.
So I asked the obvious question. What was it for?
Memories pointed to sunshine recording
After having a hunt through Timaru history and local memories, I found comments from people sharing what they knew about the tower.
Several remembered it as part of the old weather-recording equipment. More than one person remembered climbing the tower, changing a card, and recording sunshine hours. Others remembered a glass ball, a special card, a scorch mark, and the daily job of replacing the paper. One memory also mentioned wind measuring equipment.
So here is my hunch... I wonder if the tower once had a glass ball on or near the top, a piece of prepared card underneath, and regular foot traffic from someone climbing up to change the card and record the hours of sunshine.
I do not yet have a plan or official record proving exactly what was mounted on the tower. So I do not want to overstate it... but the memories are important because they describe a very specific instrument and a very specific routine.
I think it is pretty plausable that the tower may have remembered sunshine, and the instrument people were describing sounds like a Campbell-Stokes sunshine recorder.
This was a clear glass sphere that acted like a strong magnifying glass. Behind it sat a curved card that would be scorched by the sun through the glass to mark the sunshine strength with the hours of the day. If cloud covered the sun, the burn stopped. At the end of the day, the card was removed and the burnt trace was measured. So rather than the tower predicting the weather, it helped us remembered it.
LEFT: George Gabriel Stokes, ante 1903 - public domain. RIGHT: Campbell-Stokes sunshine recorder (sometimes called a Stokes sphere) by Short and Mason. Science Museum Group
The instrument had a big scientific backstory
The original sunshine recorder was devised in 1853 by John Francis Campbell. Campbell was born in Edinburgh in December 1821 and spent much of his childhood on Islay in the Inner Hebrides. He was interested in natural science, photography and optics, which helps explain why he was thinking about light, lenses and the heat of the sun.
His first sunshine recorder used a glass sphere filled with water set into a wooden bowl. The sun’s rays were focused through the sphere and scorched the bowl, leaving a record of sunshine.
In 1857, Campbell replaced the water-filled lens with a solid glass sphere.
In 1880, Sir George Gabriel Stokes improved the design. He replaced the bowl with a metal semi-ring with grooves to hold daily cards behind the glass sphere. This made the recorder more practical for everyday meteorological use.
The improved design became known as the Campbell-Stokes sunshine recorder and, from the 1880s, became the most commonly used device for measuring hours of bright sunshine across much of the world.
That matters for Timaru because the memories of the tower match this instrument closely: the glass sphere, the card, the scorch mark, and the daily reading. It means this was not a quirky local gadget. It was part of an internationally recognised way of measuring sunshine.
LEFT: First sunshine recorder design (Campbell, 1857). RIGHT: Modified version including a glass sphere, with the wooden bowl used from 23 December 1882 to 21 June 1883 at Kew Observatory (© Science Museum Group, Object Number 1995-818, http://collectionsonline.nmsi.ac.uk/.)
The bigger weather story began long before anyone climbed the tower due to a run of shipwrecks in 1861.
In 1861, after a run of shipwrecks around New Zealand, the Government established a storm-warning service within the Marine Department. For many years, forecasting was closely tied to shipping. It was not about deciding whether to hang the washing out. It was about keeping ships, cargo and people safer. Three years later, in 1864, Timaru Botanic Gardens were established.
A local Gardens history book written by the late Keith Bartholomew says a climatological station was established at Timaru Park in 1909.
Later climate work appears to treat Timaru Gardens as a long-running rainfall and climate observation site from around 1910 onwards.
From measuring the daily changes, the tower is part of progress to have long weather records.
New Zealand’s Meteorological weather service was changing in the mid 1920s.
In 1926, forecasting became part of the newly formed Department of Scientific and Industrial Research. The following year, Edward Kidson was appointed Dominion Meteorologist.
At that time, the New Zealand Meteorological Service was still small, with a staff of five and a shortage of useful long-period meteorological records.
Weather records are built slowly, from repeated observations taken in places like Timaru, day after day, year after year. By the 1930s, sunshine, rainfall, temperature, wind and pressure were being treated as measurable climate information. Timaru was not just talking about the weather. It was helping measure it.
Long before scientific instruments arrived, people already observed the weather here through close attention to the sky, sea, wind, birds, plants and seasons. The meteorological station was one later system of observation, added to a landscape where careful weather knowledge already mattered.
On reading through past newspaper articles about the Gardens recording weather, I found out that in 1934 the Timaru Herald started publishing the sunshine recordings.
By January 1934, the Timaru Herald was publishing sunshine figures for Timaru. One report said 9.2 hours of sunshine had been recorded on the Monday, bringing the total for the year to 43.7 hours.
By the mid-1930s, the paper was publishing fuller weather observations from Timaru Gardens. These included barometer readings, grass minimum temperature, frost, wind, rainfall, maximum temperature and sunshine hours.
Then came the line that changed the story when a reader of the Timaru Herald of 3 October 1936 questioned rainfall figures.
The response said the Park records were “absolutely exact”. It said the curator at the Park had proper instruments, and that a new modern rain gauge and measuring glass had been installed. This news report confirmed that the Timaru Botanic Garderns was officially part of a Government Meteorological Station network with instruments in the care of the curator." Great to find this report as now I can hang my hat on this fun fact and get a bit closer to validating my hunch.
Why bother measuring sunshine?
It sounds simple, but sunshine was useful information. It mattered for gardens, glasshouses, shelter planting and frost. It mattered for farmers watching crops, pasture growth, drought and stock conditions. It mattered for understanding evaporation, soil moisture and local climate.
Sunshine also mattered because climate records only become useful when they are measured in the same way, over a long time. One sunny day is just a sunny day. But years of careful sunshine records can show patterns.
That is why the tower story is bigger than one odd structure in the Gardens. It connects Timaru to a wider effort to measure the environment properly, using instruments, routines and records that could be compared with other places.
Weather records needed people, and behind every number was a place, an instrument, a routine and a person. Someone climbed the tower, changed the sunshine card. Someone read the rain gauge. Someone checked the frost. Someone wrote the figures down.
Every weather report starts with someone doing something others may not realise is done, and the tower makes the hidden system visible.
Weather recording moved on, from 1939, at the outbreak of the Second World War, forecasting became part of the Royal New Zealand Air Force.
Later, it moved through civil aviation and transport departments. In 1992, MetService was established as a state-owned enterprise.
In 1965, the Timaru Herald reported a new weather-recording system at the Timaru Harbour Board lighthouse. That article described newer equipment and also explained a sunshine recorder using a crystal sphere and special cards.
That does not prove the Gardens station ended then. It does show that Timaru’s weather recording was changing by the 1960s, moving into a more modern phase.
Thanks to the comments in the Timaru History and Memories Facebook page, I have access to people's recolletions of climbing the Gardens tower in the late 1960s and early 1970s, changing sunshine cards and recording sunshine hours.
I would love to find out more about this tower, I think it would make a cracker Timaru Herald Civic Trust column.
- Maybe the readers out there can help me confirm when the tower was built.
- If the tower was originally built for the sunshine recorder or for more than one purpose.
What we can say now, is that local memories strongly connect the tower with a Campbell-Stokes sunshine recorder in living memory.
- Newspaper records show that Timaru Gardens was associated with official weather observations by the 1930s.
- In 1936, the site was described as a Government Meteorological Station.
- Later climate work includes long-term observations from Timaru Gardens.
- Today, Timaru District Council’s walking-track information still refers to “The Met station” in the Gardens.
- The tower’s exact origins remain unclear, but it appears to be part of Timaru Botanic Gardens’ wider weather-recording story.
Go and look up
Next time you are in the Timaru Botanic Gardens, look for the tower. Ask, who climbed it and changed the cards to read the weather?
Sources and useful leads
Timaru Herald*, 10 January 1934, sunshine recorded in Timaru:
https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/THD19340110.2.61
Timaru Herald*, 3 October 1936, Government Meteorological Station reference:
https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/THD19361003.2.109.1
Met Office explanation of Campbell-Stokes sunshine recorder:
https://weather.metoffice.gov.uk/guides/observations/how-we-measure-sunshine
National Museum of the Royal New Zealand Navy, Campbell-Stokes sunshine recorder example:
https://navymuseum.co.nz/explore/by-collections/artefact-unpacked/sunshine-recorder/
Royal Meteorological Society article on the history of the Campbell-Stokes sunshine recorder:
https://rmets.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/wea.2130
MetService history:
https://about.metservice.com/about-us/our-history
Timaru District Council Botanic Gardens walking track, “The Met station is on the right”:
https://www.timaru.govt.nz/community/recreation/walking-and-cycling/timaru-botanic-gardens
Timaru Botanic Gardens history book reference:
https://www.timaru.govt.nz/news-and-events/latest-news/timaru-botanic-gardens-history-book
The McCaw Bros Sunshine self-propelled auto header harvesting wheat, circa 1930? Photography by John Logan McCaw. South Canterbury Museum L2014/003.204 https://timdc.pastperfectonline.com/photo/5FF12D6D-D682-4C19-A840-104643446110
Flooding of King Street, Temuka, in the 1945 flood. Taken looking along the street with a half-submerged car and men wading through the water with bicycle. South Canterbury Museum 3084. https://timdc.pastperfectonline.com/photo/E475D205-1118-45C7-A403-681418893045
In flood, Sweetwater Creek Bridge in Geraldine 1856 - Ministry of Works Photograph Christchurch - No.71: Geraldine County. Sweetwater Cr. bridge, Bourdens Rd. https://timdc.pastperfectonline.com/photo/A98D1F0C-DDA8-4FAC-BF4F-122572793606
Snow in Timaru, 1945. Snow can look magical in a photograph, but in Timaru it could quickly become serious. The heavy snowfall of 1945 disrupted power, communication, industry and transport — a reminder that weather forecasting was not just useful, but essential. Image courtesy of South Canterbury Museum. South Canterbury Museum, Snow in Timaru, 1945, photograph by Mary Baird, 1945. https://timdc.pastperfectonline.com/photo/0813F4E0-393F-48AC-AE90-566826165716
Timaru District Council employee Alistair Davey taking a rain reading at the Timaru Botanical Gardens, dated 17 September 1993. https://timdc.pastperfectonline.com/photo/E2FBEC6B-1B42-4C38-9F93-502301263500
Canterbury Regional Council Flood Contracter Philip Lees, dated 13 August 1997. South Canterbury Musuem https://timdc.pastperfectonline.com/photo/6E7058A1-4204-4FFC-AF8C-323926232344
Farmer Warren Darling, of Poplar Grove just south of Timaru, holding a rain gauge, 13 March 1995. Photography By Ron Lindsay Timaru Herald. https://timdc.pastperfectonline.com/photo/DD73206A-8D14-4306-ACC5-044286494554
Construction of the all-weather meat loader shed at Timaru Harbour, June 1965. South Canterbury Museum. https://timdc.pastperfectonline.com/photo/E39E44BB-27F3-400A-A80C-295938250834
Please refer to the individual South Canterbury Museum catalogue records for full image details, rights information and reproduction conditions.
Side quest: did Māori watch the weather?
Long before sunshine was measured with a glass ball and a burn card, Māori were watching the weather closely becasue weather shaped travel, fishing, planting, harvesting, shelter, food gathering and survival.
From what I could find out online, Māori read the sky, the wind, the sea, birds, plants, stars, clouds and seasonal patterns. These were known as tohu — signs. A change in cloud colour, the direction of the wind, the behaviour of birds, the look of the sea, or the timing of a plant flowering could all help people judge what was coming. It would be facinating to learn more from our mana whenua.
So while the Campbell-Stokes recorder tells one story (how Victorian scientists tried to measure sunshine in hours) Māori weather knowledge can tell us another. It reminds us that people had already been reading the weather for centuries, not just with instruments, but with attention, memory and relationship to place. Weather history is not only about what was measured. It is also about who was watching, what they noticed, and how that knowledge helped people live well in their place.
Side quest: looking for the women
The official story of the Campbell-Stokes sunshine recorder names the men who invented, tested and improved it — John Francis Campbell, James Glaisher, Robert Scott, William Ellis, George Airy and George Gabriel Stokes.
But it does not name any women.
That does not mean women were absent. It means this account does not put them in the foreground.
The closest connection is indirect, but important. Campbell’s early sunshine measurements were linked to public health after the 1854 London cholera outbreak, when weather, sunshine and urban conditions were being studied in relation to human health. Cholera affected whole communities — including women and children — so this was not just scientific curiosity. It was about understanding the conditions people lived in.
So the side quest is this: who did the quiet daily work? Who changed the cards, copied the records, filed the observations, or helped keep observatory routines going?
The article does not give us their names. But the question is still worth asking, because weather history is not only about instruments and inventors. It is also about the people and communities those measurements were meant to serve.
Side quest: climate change and old records
The Campbell-Stokes sunshine recorder still matters. Campbell designed his first sunshine recorder in 1853, and 160 years later, the article notes that the instrument was still in use. Since the 1880s, it became one of the most commonly used ways to measure hours of bright sunshine across much of the world.
While one sunshine card tells us about one day, thousands of sunshine cards, gathered over decades, help scientists see long-term patterns — not just one hot summer, one gloomy winter, or one strange season.
Historic sunshine records can help researchers understand climate variability and climate change. They are especially useful for studying changes in solar radiation, including “global dimming and brightening” — periods when less or more sunlight reaches the Earth’s surface. They can also help scientists understand aerosols, the tiny particles in the atmosphere that affect how much sunlight gets through.
Today, many Campbell-Stokes recorders have been replaced by automatic sensors. That makes sense for modern weather stations, especially in remote places. But the old records still need to be protected, because changing instruments can create breaks or inconsistencies in long-term data.
A glass ball, a strip of card, and a daily routine became part of a much bigger story — how humans measure change, remember weather, and try to understand what is happening to the planet.
20 fun facts about the Campbell-Stokes sunshine recorder
1. John Francis Campbell was born in Edinburgh in December 1821.
2. Campbell spent his childhood on Islay, in the Inner Hebrides.
3. As a child, Campbell became interested in optics after learning that a glass ball could focus sunlight strongly enough to burn.
4. Campbell later studied law at the University of Edinburgh, but his real interest was natural science.
5. In the late 1840s, his father’s bankruptcy forced the family to sell their estates, including Islay.
6. In the early 1850s, Campbell moved to London and worked in secretarial roles, including for the Board of Health and the Lighthouse Commission.
7. In 1853, Campbell designed his first sunshine recorder.
8. The first design used a glass sphere filled with water, set into a wooden bowl.
9. The sun’s rays were focused through the sphere, burning a track into the bowl.
10. The wooden bowl was intended to be replaced every six months.
11. In 1854, Campbell’s work became connected with meteorology during the London cholera outbreak.
12. After the outbreak, new meteorological stations were set up in London to study weather conditions.
13. Campbell helped make weather observations at the Board of Health building in Whitehall.
14. In September and October 1854, Campbell used black ribbon placed in the focus of the glass sphere to record sunshine.
15. When the sun shone, it burnt a line or holes into the ribbon, creating a visible sunshine record.
16. By the winter of 1854, systematic sunshine measurements had begun.
17. In 1857, Campbell replaced the water-filled lens with a solid glass sphere.
18. Campbell’s recorder remained in use at Whitehall for about two decades, until the winter solstice of 1874.
19. After Whitehall, Campbell’s original instrument was transferred to Kew Observatory, where staff worked on improving daily sunshine records.
20. In 1880, George Gabriel Stokes proposed improvements using a metal semi-ring and seasonal cards, creating the design that became widely known as the Campbell-Stokes sunshine recorder.
From Watching the Sky to Forecasting the Weather: A Short Timeline
3000 BC — Some of the earliest written discussions of weather and cloud formations appear in ancient Indian writings. Long before modern instruments, people everywhere were watching the sky, wind, clouds, rain and seasons to make sense of what might happen next.
650 BC — Babylonians use cloud observations to help predict the weather.
600 BC — In Greece, public weather forecasts are issued to help people plan seasonal cropping. The study of weather becomes known as meteorology.
400 BC — Ancient Greeks and people in India keep some of the earliest known rainfall records using simple rain gauges.
350 BC — Aristotle writes Meteorology, gathering ideas about weather and climate known at the time.
206 BC — Hygrometers are used in China to measure humidity and support crop planning.
100–48 BC — Windsocks and weather vanes help people read wind direction and strength.
10 AD — Hero of Alexandria invents the thermoscope, an early step towards the thermometer.
c. 950 — In Aotearoa, Māori develop local weather knowledge through close observation of environmental signs. This mātauranga is strongly connected to place, season, fishing, growing, travel and kaitiakitanga.
1441 — Korea develops the Cheugugi, the first standardised rain gauge. Standardised instruments make it easier to compare weather records between places and over time.
1450 — Early anemometers and hygrometers are developed, helping people measure wind and humidity more systematically.
1593–1744 — Thermometers and temperature scales are developed. Fahrenheit creates a reliable mercury thermometer, and the Celsius scale eventually becomes the everyday standard in much of the world.
1643 — Evangelista Torricelli invents the barometer. Measuring air pressure becomes one of the key tools for forecasting weather.
1774 — The Royal Society in England begins twice-daily barometric readings, helping build long-term weather records.
1802 — Clouds are given Latin names, making it easier for observers and scientists to describe the same sky in a shared language.
1806 — Francis Beaufort creates the Beaufort scale, a practical way to describe wind strength by observing its effects.
1830s–1840s — Telegraphs allow weather observations to be shared quickly across long distances. Forecasting becomes more powerful when information from different places can be connected.
1844–1846 — The aneroid barometer and cup anemometer improve the measurement of air pressure and wind speed.
1860 — Robert FitzRoy helps pioneer modern weather forecasting by combining observations and instrument readings to make predictions for the public.
1861 — The New Zealand Government begins regular weather observations and buys the first state-owned thermometers.
1874 — New Zealand’s Marine Department begins issuing storm warnings to ships and harbours, helping reduce the risk of shipwrecks.
1882 — New Zealand newspapers begin regularly publishing weather maps, bringing weather information to the wider public.
1893–1896 — Pyranometers measure solar radiation, and weather balloons begin gathering information from higher in the atmosphere.
1905 — Radio allows ships and shore stations to exchange weather reports, improving forecasting at sea.
1940s — Radar is increasingly used to observe weather systems and improve storm warnings.
1960 — TIROS-1, the first successful weather satellite, sends thousands of weather images back to Earth.
1970s–1980s — Weather radar and satellite systems expand, allowing weather to be monitored on a national and global scale.
1989 — New Zealand begins systematically installing weather radar, starting with Mount Tamahunga near Auckland.
1992 — MetService and NIWA are established, strengthening New Zealand’s weather forecasting, climate research and public weather services.
1999 — NIWA sets up New Zealand’s first high-performance computing facility to process large amounts of weather and climate data.
2000 onwards — Automatic weather stations make it possible to record weather data frequently and share observations almost instantly. Weather knowledge has moved from watching clouds by eye to combining instruments, satellites, radar, computers and local knowledge.
Source acknowledgement: Adapted from Measuring the weather – a timeline, Science Learning Hub – Pokapū Akoranga Pūtaiao, The University of Waikato Te Whare Wānanga o Waikato.
Sources
Timaru Herald, 10 January 1934, “The Weather” / sunshine recorded in Timaru:
https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/THD19340110.2.61
Timaru Herald, 3 October 1936, letter/response confirming Timaru Park as a “Government Meteorological Station”:
https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/THD19361003.2.109.1
Met Office, “How we measure sunshine”, Campbell-Stokes sunshine recorder explanation:
https://weather.metoffice.gov.uk/guides/observations/how-we-measure-sunshine
National Museum of the Royal New Zealand Navy, “Sunshine Recorder”, Campbell-Stokes example:
https://navymuseum.co.nz/explore/by-collections/artefact-unpacked/sunshine-recorder/
Sánchez-Lorenzo et al., “New insights into the history of the Campbell-Stokes sunshine recorder”, Weather, Royal Meteorological Society, 2013. Uploaded text used for Campbell, Stokes, dates and recorder development.
https://rmets.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/wea.2130
MetService, “Our history”, national weather service timeline:
https://about.metservice.com/about-us/our-history
Timaru District Council, Timaru Botanic Gardens walking and cycling route, reference to “The Met station”:
https://www.timaru.govt.nz/community/recreation/walking-and-cycling/timaru-botanic-gardens
Timaru District Council, Timaru Botanic Gardens History Book reference:
https://www.timaru.govt.nz/news-and-events/latest-news/timaru-botanic-gardens-history-book
WuHoo Timaru / earlier Gardens history note mentioning 1909 climatological station, still needs original source checked:
https://wuhoo.nz/blog/1245-how-the-park-became-the-timaru-botanic-gardens
11 Dec 1965 The Timaru Herald New Weather Recording System To Be Introduced on Monday (11 Dec 1965). Aoraki Heritage Collection, https://aorakiheritage.recollect.co.nz/nodes/view/6025
This 1965 article does not prove that the Botanic Gardens tower itself was built in 1965. What it does show is that Timaru’s weather recording was being modernised in 1965. At the port, new German-made recording instruments were installed at the Harbour Board’s lighthouse on The Terrace. The lighthouse itself was much older, dating from the 1870s. If the Botanic Gardens weather tower/station was established in the same year, it may belong to this 1965 modernisation of Timaru’s weather reporting — but the structure would need a separate source to confirm whether it was newly built then or adapted from an older garden feature.
- Before the new system, The Timaru Herald published weather records for the period ending at 9.30 a.m. the previous day.
- The Timaru Herald and the Timaru Harbour Board worked together to establish new European weather recording equipment at the Harbour Board’s “lighthouse” on The Terrace.
- The new system was designed to give readers a more complete picture of Timaru’s weather through until midnight each day.
- The equipment was German-made.
- The system recorded temperature, humidity, rainfall, wind direction, wind velocity and sunshine.
- The new equipment allowed readings to be taken for specific times or periods during the day or night.
- A thermo-hydrograph recorded temperature and humidity continuously on a graph.
- The thermo-hydrograph used the Centigrade scale, with readings converted to Fahrenheit for newspaper publication.
- A mechanical wind recorder produced a graph of wind direction and wind velocity.
- The wind recorder registered in kilometres per hour or metres per second, with readings converted to miles per hour for publication.
- Individual gusts of wind could not be separated on the graph, but average wind speed over a period of minutes could be read.
- The new rain gauge replaced the older method of measuring rainwater collected in a graduated container.
- The rain recorder showed when each shower of rain fell, giving a more accurate picture of rainfall patterns in Timaru.
- The sunshine recorder used a solid crystal sphere to focus sunlight onto a graduated cardboard strip.
- Sunshine was recorded by the sun burning a path onto the strip.
- Different sunshine recording cards were used depending on the seasonal movement of the sun.
- The wind gauge and sunshine recorder were positioned on top of the lighthouse shown in the photograph.
- Captain O. B. Embleton, deputy-dredgemaster and third pilot for the Timaru Harbour Board, is shown inspecting the thermo-hydrograph.
- Captain C. Barwell, the Harbour Board’s pilot launch master, helped erect the equipment.
- Mr P. H. M. Van Tilburg, the Harbour Board’s assistant chief engineer, also helped erect the equipment.
- Mr Van Tilburg prepared the conversion tables needed for the metric readings from the instruments.
- The new weather recording system was due to begin on the following Monday morning.