Awesome. It's already doing a good job of washing away the pollen. Looks like someone scribbled with a highlighter all over the ground.
It is a map of snowpack compared to average. The more snow you have, the longer it takes to melt, the greener the vegetation, the moister the soils, the less fire potential you have. When you have little snow, it melts quickly, vegetation (especially grasses and shrubs) cures quicker, soil becomes drier, and you have fuels available to carry fire. Arizona is troubling because their fire season typically runs from mid-April to Independence Day with large fire potential from roughly late May on. During that time, you get increasingly hot temps and lots of wind, which can dry things out quickly. The current snowpack levels in AZ forests probably translates to 2 extra weeks of large fire potential. Doesn't sound like much, but throw in a little lightning or some careless campers and it can be a game changer. Also, if you look at the snowpack map, the worst area is a belt running up from north of Phoenix to the Grand Canyon that includes Prescott and Flagstaff and a bunch of other communities. California's a pain because of the population, the vegetation types, and the terrain, as well as the length of the season. AZ and NM will start to get Pacific moisture around the first of July that will put a damper on large fires. All that does for CA is spin enough energy over the top to create a bunch of lightning. If we get a lot of fires going, we can be in CA from June-October or later. Also, anecdotally at least, it seems like we have a greater number of bad things happen on fires in California than anywhere else. We may end up getting huge levels of spring rains and have a below normal fire year, but that is what has happened the last three years (Texas excepted), so it seems we're due for a tough season. Anyway, here's the US Drought Forecast through the end of May: Spoiler The good news for the SW and SoCal is that we're expecting a switch from La Nina to El Nino, which means less winds across the area. Of course, that may also lead to more days of hot, dry, and windy in Northern Cal, the Pacific NW and the Northern Rockies.
And it's started. Crazy thunderstorm here in Nacogdoches right now. Non stop lightning. Snowing in Lubbock right now. What a change of weather. Crazy.
At 11:00am today the temperature near where I live in the DFW area was around 72 degrees. At 11:15am, it was 54. At 11:30am, it was 50. Right now, it's around 42. And this weather just screwed up the weekend! Oh well, I guess the rain is a good thing ...
finally some rain to dampen the freaking tree pollen i sneeze so much that my diaphragm hurts from just coughing
K, too much rain, stop now so I can finish my yard. Also did not enjoy my regular 20 minute commute turning into an hour and 10 minute one today thanks to flooding on the highway and stupid drivers. Now it's lightening everywhere and pouring down here by Memorial Park. Please stop and do this during the week, but only after 9am and stop at 1pm.
Allergies are gone. Yard is in heaven. Back down to in Houston for the week. Forgot just how bad the mosquitos can be in Houston. Loved the rain. Just wish the cold front would have lasted longer to keep the mosquitos at bay.
The SciGuy from the chonicle said some report was supposed to be released yesterday at noon saying that we are OFFICIALLY out of the drought, but I don't see it on his blog. He also said yesterday that we got more rain last week than we got last March, April, May, June, August, and September. COMBINED. That is unbelievable. Goodbye drought of 2011. Let's hope 2012 is not a repeat...
