South West Water has repeated the message that the district and region should escape drought restrictions this summer despite the record-breaking dry start to the year.

The company said reservoirs might look depleted but were only marginally lower than this time last year. Those at Kennick, Tottiford and Trenchford were 74.8 per cent full, it said, compared to 78.8 per cent last May.

'We are in a good position and expect this to be our 15th consecutive summer without water restrictions,' a spokesman told this newspaper.

Weather watchers in the district have echoed what the Met Office has been saying, that spring 2011 has been the second driest for more than a century.

Across England and Wales less than half the expected rain fell, the worst hit being the south east and East Anglia.

Kingsteignton amateur meteorologist Mark Rowe recorded just 12.01 ins of rain at Sandygate between December and May compared to the long term average of 22.59 ins

In the last three months only 2.015 ins fell, the average is 8.99 ins.

'This has been the driest May since I commenced readings back in 1994,' he said.

'This month was not brilliantly sunny, however, in fact, it was cooler than in April and there were many cloudy, dry and breezy days.

'The total rainfall for 2011 now stands at 10.37 ins, we would normally expect 17.74 ins during this period.'

Nearby at Rydon fellow weather watcher Dave Bellamy has recorded an ever drier picture with 0.6 ins of rain falling in May, bringing his 2011 total to just 7.8 ins.

Although some farmers are warning of ruined crops some growers are enjoying the dry weather.

Paul Smith at Old Walls Vineyard, Bishopsteignton, said: 'We've got a good number of flowers on the vines and we're just waiting for them to set now.

'As long as we don't get heavy rain when that happens it looks like being a very good crop although we don't want to count our chickens before they hatch.'