Feeling like spring
Posted Mar 7, 2012 03:00:00 AM.
This article is more than 5 years old.
We haven’t had much winter weather this season and it’s already feeling like spring, with the temperature expected to rise into the positive double digits today.
Enjoy it while it lasts. Environment Canada Senior Climatologist Dave Phillips says winter likely isn’t through yet. “In the Kitchener area, about 20%, about 35 centimetres of your annual snowfall, normally occurs after the first of March,” Phillips explains.
After today, the temperature is expected to dip back down to more seasonable levels for a couple of days before heading back up over the weekend. Phillips says the up and down temperatures aren’t uncommon this time of year.
This winter has been warmer and dryer than normal and Phillips says their early models show that the trend is expected to continue into the summer season. He says even the animals have noticed the warmer winter. “Bears have not hibernated. There are many, many sighting of birds that should have gone south,” he says. “So, nature seems confused.”
Phillips admits that Environment Canada’s forecast for this winter was a little off, at least for some parts of the country. He says they were expecting a colder, snowier season in western Canada but, “they ended up with the second warmest and the driest winter on record.”
