Hey! I thought it was spring...?

Hey!  I thought it was spring…?

When I woke this morning and looked outside, I wondered if I had only dreamed of spring.  Here it is March 26^th and I am watching lazy fat snowflakes dancing past the window as if to say “We are holding Lady Spring hostage until April can rescue her!”

Everyone is so tired of the dark doldrums of winter weather.

As usual Kentucky and the calendar refuse to play nice this spring. We can’t help but wonder…is the soil ever going to get dry enough to work it?  Will we see the sun and feel warm spring breezes and most important, when can I get back out in the garden?!

Taken from an article by Aimee Nelson*:

Well, Tom Priddy, UK agricultural meteorologist does shed some light on the problem, “Simply put, the eastern half of the country is stuck in a negative Arctic weather pattern, that’s a big part of the reason for the lingering cold and wet weather we have been experiencing.”

Priddy said it means a blocking pattern has kept an enhanced trough of low pressure over the Eastern United States, which results in cooler temperatures.

“Kentucky is very susceptible to Canadian or even Arctic outbreaks,” UK agricultural meteorologist Matthew Dixon added. “Fortunately, the pattern is going to break, but not before April.”

Priddy said outlooks are trending toward above-normal temperatures in both April and the three-month outlook into June.

“That’s a welcome sign for sure as Kentucky farmers and gardeners get further into the planting season,” he said. “Some horticultural crops have already been delayed.”

Priddy summarized based on the current outlooks, the upcoming planting season looks to resemble years in the recent past.

“In typical Ohio Valley fashion, the weather pattern will throw another curveball at the planting season,” he said. “While well below-normal temperatures and wet conditions will continue to postpone field operations through the end of March, we will get a warm-up going into early April and ‘spring’ will finally arrive.”

           

 

            This is welcome news as we wait for Spring to escape the icy clutches of Old Man

            Winter and bring us fair sunny skies for both our gardens and our souls.

           

           UK Agricultural Weather Center: http://weather.uky.edu/ukawc.shtml.

           Forecasts: http://weather.uky.edu/outlooks.html.

           Interested in our weather?  Check this out:

           http://www2.ucar.edu/news/backgrounders/weather-maker-patterns-interactive-map#map .

*Taken in part from an article by Aimee Nielson

http://news.ca.uky.edu/article/spring-will-have-wait-pattern-holding-wet-cold-weather-over-bluegrass