I just had to ask someone this question once. Because it has bothered me for quite some time.
I guess I might as well tell you. I was born in 1968. And it seemed when I was still a child, we always had a white Christmas in Southeastern Michigan where I live. I remember my uncle and my cousins created a ice skating rink in their backyard around that time. They just piled up banks of snow, and my uncle poured water from the hose in it. And my cousin (female) and I skated in it when we came over for Christmas. My point is, I remember that it was just a given we’d have snow and ice by Christmas, if not long before.
There was one Winter that was unseasonably warm, I remember, as a child. But just one.
Then around high school, it was a fifty-fifty chance, I seem to recall. The Christmas of 1982 was so warm in metro Detroit, people had Christmas barbecues. They only do that in California, you know.
Now we rarely get white Christmases. I’d say it’s 25-75 against.
Again, I know that these are just my personal experiences. But am I imagining things? (Even to scientists, personal observations are worth something .)
Moderating:
This doesn’t look like a great debate. It looks like a MPSIMS. If you had some debate you wanted to queue up, you need to be more explicit. Anyway, moving to MPSIMS for now.
No, you aren’t imagining things. I live in Minnesota, been here all my life and I can remember only one Christmas when I was college, where there was only a trace of snow on the ground. Now it’s probably 50/50. Storms are stronger. Spring is either earlier or later. It’s called Climate Change and it is real. I recommend planting lots of trees and prairie grasses and quit driving and flying and paving paradise.
Been living at 11,200 feet in elevation for 30 years. I’m on my second plow truck, and my second tractor/loader. I use those just for me. We are a bit remote.
A regular year of snow is between 20-30 feet. I usually need to plow by October.
We’ve had some snow, but the first time I needed to plow was this Christmas. It’s very weird, and I’m worried about fire season in the summer. Many should be worried about having enough water. A LOT of it is stored in the Rocky Mountains.
When we moved to high desert AZ 30 years ago, the monsoon storms were so predictable we could plan around them. There was an unofficial snow line where the snow stopped falling in the winter. That line has moved up the mountain.
Our well established pines are dying, our oak is suffering and cactus down the hill are dying of heat. This is because they don’t “breath” when it is too hot and wait until it cools down at night before opening their pores. It isn’t cooling down at night during the summer and the winter nights freeze their tips.
We used to get huge charms of hummingbirds but last year there were only a few in comparison.
I’m in Wisconsin, born in 1965. Grew up farther north than SE Michigan. Brown Christmases were not all that unusual at that time, I remember them. Snowfall that sticks often kicks in AROUND Christmas, not far before.
Born in Maine in 1967. The harbors used to freeze over almost every winter and there would be shanty-towns of ice fishing shacks. Lakes were mostly safe to drive on. Not too long before I was born you could DRIVE across Penobscot Bay, which is about 16 miles. Not any more. Now we’re in Montana–I discovered and attempted to put out a forest fire (lightning strike!) 10 days ago where there should have been 3’ of snow.
I think we tend to remember outstanding weather events from childhood like snowstorms, more than the usual run of dull weather. Memories are tricky.
Awhile back I collated data from a weather and gardening diary covering 20 years or so in central Ohio. I was curious about whether the date of the first autumn frost had changed any over that time. It turned out that by the end of the period, the first frost was on average occurring about 5 days later than it had starting out.
A small, localized data point tending to support the idea of a warming climate.
Born in 1961, my hometown is in Upstate New York and I now live in California. In February 2019 we went to vacation in Alaska for the annual Iditarod dog sled race, 1,000 miles across the state from Anchorage to Nome.
The Alaskan locals were saying that the temperatures were getting higher and higher in Anchorage, and in Nome.
For 22 years now I’ve heard here in Denver, “Man! The weather is NEVER like this!” So it’s hard to tell. However, this is the first year I can recall lilacs waking up in December. I am uneasy.
I occasionally listen to a popular UK radio show called Gardeners’ Question Time. The audience skews older, particularly for those actually in the audience (pre-pandemic, it was always recorded live with an audience in different locations around the country). The audience also skews small-c conservative. Basically not the sort of people who are generally major environmental activists (some will be, of course.)
Among this group of people who’ve been gardening for thirty years or more there is absolutely no doubt whatsoever that the climate has changed. They’re seeing it.
I had a few tomatoes still growing in my garden, on a completely exposed vine, in December, in London.
Growing up in Florida, I don’t really remember hurricanes in my youth. Sure, there was a hurricane season, where you’d look out for storms brewing in the ocean, but before Andrew in 1992 I don’t really recall one of any importance (I was born in ‘78).
Now, it seems like the US is hit with at least one major storm each year. And some are ending up as far north as New York!
But good news, I am given to understand the southern half of England at least is becoming good wine country. And France is fast becoming unsuitable for grapes, so I guess oranges from them?
New York has always been in danger of being hit by hurricanes moving up the coast. People still talk about the 1938 “Long Island Express.” (I just happened to be looking at some historical photos today of its damage to my area.) But it does seem like we’re getting more, stronger storms making it up here lately.
It’s still not good news. Tomatoes are easy, but for a lot of plants we can’t keep up with the amount of time it takes to grow them to before the climate is already making it harder for them to grow.
.)