Siberian March

I have been collecting daily weather data for nearly 30 years now: high/low/average temperature, precipitation, etc. At the completion of each month and year I play with all my data, computing things like total precipitation, average temperatures, heating and cooling degree days per month and season, the winter's amount of wood burned, monthly electrical usage, snowfall, number of days of temperature extremes, first and last days of frost, drought and heavy rain spells, and a few other eccentric calculations.

That's why I know that March 2013 set a 30-year record for the coldest March, here on the old homestead. When a month's average temperature is 3-4 degrees above or below the long-term average, we can subjectively feel it. When it's 7-8 degrees different, we really feel it! All month long this March felt very chilly to us and the month's end statistics confirmed our impressions: the average daily high temperature was 10^o below normal! The days of March simply refused to warm up.

March may metaphorically come in like a lion and exit like a lamb, but this one stayed Siberian the whole time. Those normal, warm, late-March afternoons induce plants to bud and bloom, as they prepare themselves for a showy April. But not this March! Wisely, the buds kept themselves tightly rolled up from the cold, and the daffodils hunkered down close to the ground, leery of poking their delicate heads into the frigid air.

We stayed mostly inside, stoking the wood stove far more than usual, as we chomped at the bit to get outside and prepare the garden for another summer's bounty. Warm up, dammit!

In stark contrast, last year brought an unusually warm March—the days' high temperatures were 18^o higher than this year. Eighteen degrees! That's the equivalent of having last year's March be as warm as April, while this year's March was more like February! Now, that two-month spread has got to be confusing to Mother nature's flora and fauna. Yet they've dealt with it, rolling with the hot or cold punches.

Climate doubters will scorn any thoughts of global warming, in the face of an unusually cold month like this March. They simply misunderstand the difference between climate and temperature. As the climate gradually warms, cold spells will still visit us. In fact, colder temperatures at our latitude can be directly chalked down to a warming arctic region, because the warmer weather up there disturbs and forces the jet stream farther south, bringing that chill down here.

I don't mind a cool early spring period, however, because it keeps those delicate blossoms under wraps longer than usual, so they are less likely to be damaged by a late April frosty night. After last year's warm March, we lost all of our fruit crop, because the warmth had made all the blossoms open too early. They all got zapped by that April night's chill. Maybe this year the fruit trees will bear a bounty!