Where is Spring?

That's the question I hear most the past several weeks: Where is Spring? We are already closing in on a month of climatological spring and well over a week by the calendar (which really matters little in the scheme of climate). March will go down with below normal in temperatures, averaging around one to three degrees below across Southeast lower Michigan - this coming after a slightly colder than average winter. Look for my winter and cold season /Nov-Mar/ review after the snow finally ceases, generally mid-late April.

I've posted a few times, first back in the fall in the Winter 20017-18 Outlook, that springs tended to be notably later after the winter analogue periods. Just looking at the average temperatures from those years shows a preference for a later spring, especially temperature averages in April /ave departure -1.2/. The temperature trends from March and April (gray to blue shadings show an overall trend for normal to below temperatures).

Detroit	FEB	MAR	APR	MAY
1890-91	30.6	30.8	48.3	55.7
1893-94	23.6	40.4	47.6	56.3
1898-99	19.8	29.3*	45.4	59.8
1910-11	28.8	33.7	50.5	64.7
1917-18	24.5	39.6	44.6	62.4
1950-51	27.7	36.5	46.0	59.9
1955-56	28.1	32.4	45.7	56.0
1971-72	24.6	32.6	44.6	60.3
1975-76	33.3	40.4	50.0	56.4
1984-85	23.4	38.4	51.0	60.1
1999-2000	31.9	44.0	48.0	61.8
2000-01	26.7	35.1	51.2	61.2
2008-09	28.5	38.7	49.8	59.4
2011-12	32.6	50.7*	49.4	65.3
AVE	27.4	37.9	48.0	60.0
NORM	28.1	37.2	49.2	59.7
DEP	-0.7	0.7	-1.2	0.3

The good news is that there also is a trend toward a more normal spring temperatures as we get later into spring /later April into May/ and is reflected on May's warmer departures - and hopefully that will again be the trend this year.

In the near future however; it's more of a late winter pattern than spring pattern for the Great Lakes this upcoming week as evidenced by the projected upper wind patterns. There's certainly no question as to where our main air mass projected, originated.

This is the possibility of system bringing some rain or wet snow over the area toward week and again, late week. All I can say is gardeners and spring weather enthusiast hold on, it's going to be a bumpy week!

Making weather fun while we all learn,
Bill Deedler -SEMI_WeatherHistorian