We've had 100 chilling hours for the month of November, the lowest in seven years. I'm not worried about the chilling hours itself, it is only November, and deciduous plants that are mature will always bloom even if the models calculate below average chilling hours. We've been worse than this November.

What gives me the shivers running down my spine is that this low chilling hours are balanced out by a vengeance of record breaking cold spells or weird weather events like the Arctic blasts come January or February. Although a chance of snow is a welcome sight, just like 7 years ago, provided, it won't stay below the mid 20's. I hope I am wrong on this.

We are in the same boat. We have below normal for the last month or so.

Our weather down here has been quite strange and weird for the month of November. Many days were up into the 80's during the day and down into the 40's at night. We should have been only in the low 70's high 60's. My Satsuma is covered in small fruit now after booming the past month. Other plants have been pushing out new growth like my mango and avocados. I sure hope we don't get a cold snap too fast or else I'm in trouble.

I think in general, the Pacific and western regions have been milder this fall. We've had about 60% of our normal rainfall and temps where above average for the same period. All the local ski areas are hoping for snow, which in my opinion, is where it should be, not down at sea level. :lol:

Cheers, Barrie.

Night temperatures here in Colorado have been in the 20's every night since the middle of November. It has been snowing all day today, this is our third snow storm this fall. Another snow storm is expected next Monday. Tonight's low is forecast to be 12F and tomorrow night's temperature to drop to 7F. Many of Colorado's ski area already have a 6-foot snow base. Looks to be a nice winter this year. What ever happened to global warming?. - Millet

Last night the temperature fell to five below zero (-5F = -20C). Needless to say the greenhouse heater ran all night. - Millet

On the other hand, here in Florida we're getting a lot more cool weather than we normally do. We had frosts past our average last frost date last spring. It never got as hot as we normally experience it during the summer. We had a week of downright cool weather the last week of September when we are normally at the height of hurricane season. We got our first frost on October 30th in my area, a full month earlier than we normally experience them then two more after that before December first which is our average first frost date for my area.

That last front dropped a nice rain, but other than that it's been unusually dry around here.

Climate is what you expect, weather is what you get.

.....Alan.

Excellent statement on weather and climate Alan!

Anyway, this year, it is very interesting weather, and these are reflected in the way fruits were ripening. It started from a very orderly almost simultaneous blooms from drier winter with a lot of chilling hours early this season. We've had prolonged dry but cooler late winter to mid spring, few daytime temperatures going beyond 100's when normally we've had 15. But we've had many 80's to 90's that extended well into mid-fall. I haven't computed if it is warmer overall this year than normal but I guess, overall it balanced out to be the same average seasonal temperature.

What happened was tupsy-turvy ordering of the ripening of my stone and pome fruits. There was a compressing of the various harvest dates due to cool early season and prolonged warm days during the summer, but no hot days.

Due to the late arrival of warm summer temperatures, all of my early season stone fruits were harvested later, around end of June to early July instead of late May. And my late season fruits were bombarded with consecutive warm summer days that extended into early fall. I used to harvest my last chance peach usually in mid-November, and my Fuji and Pink Lady apples in mid to late December. But come early October this year, they all ripened and had to harvest them! They're excellent tasting, as can be expected, and am not complaining.

And now the winter is very mild, and I can just feel it that very cold air mass will come to visit us again this coming late winter to make-up for the mild early winter. That means, I'd better prepare for the cold blast like I did a couple of years back.

Well, the lowest chilling hours of November has been cancelled by the coolest December ever. We've racked up additional 501 chilling hours for the month of December for a total accumulation of 601 chilling hours that is the biggest in seven years. We averaged about 16 chilling hours per day in December. And it is the month of December that the chilling hours will matter the most.

Let's hope that this cool December is enough to ward off the evil spirits of late season Arctic Blasts in January to March.