Great Barrington — Winter is over and it was time to give the Davis Vantage Pro 2 automated weather station a little maintenance. Between the acid rains, the high winds and birds who are not potty trained, the unit takes a beating.
Since its installation in 2014, it has recorded more than 34 feet of rain and melted snow and ice, 51 days of below zero and 82 days of 90-plus temperatures along with strong winds of 35-plus miles per hour. So, this weather instrument deserves what little cleaning I can give it. It’s proven resilient.
April 2022 recorded nearly five and a-half inches of rain, but no snow. For the 21st time since 1965 and the eight time since 2000, no measurable snow was recorded at my station in April.
So, our snow total for this winter came to just 40.7 inches, the fifth straight winter of below average snowfalls. But I have to preface this by telling you that since the turn of this century, our snow totals have greatly diminished — by almost 10 inches a season. Up until 2000, we averaged 67 inches a winter. Now it’s near 57. More local evidence of global warming. The total rainfall for the month was nearly five and a-half inches, nearly two inches above average.
The reason for the lack of snow, I’m told, is the storm track which is the Great Lakes path. That puts us on the warm side of the storms. So, while my brother gets snow in Michigan, we get mostly rain. Meteorologists have given many reasons: the La Nina effect or the jet stream, or just the luck of the draw. In recent years, my sister in Delaware has picked up some strong coastal snow storms that miss us. Snow and mixed precipitation are a lot harder to measure.
Now the temperature story. The average high/low and mean temperatures since 1965 are 58/34 and a mean of 46 degrees. Since 2000, the April mean has been up to 47.
This April, the temps read 56/36 and 46 degrees. And as with so many days now it isn’t the high temps that we are concerned with. It’s the low readings that are not as cold as they used to be.
I recorded 15 days with above average readings, 13 below and 2 even. It felt colder in April because of so many windy days, especially during the last week of the month. As I have said many times, it’s not so much the high temps, but the low readings that are not as low as they used to be.
An example, when was the last time temps dropped below 20 below zero? The answer at my station was 1994 on my 50th birthday: the reading was an unbelievable 30 below zero.
The last time the low temp went to -15 at my station was January 18 2003.
As I write this, a sure sign of spring just arrived at my backyard feeder: the first hummingbird of the season. And it was right on time.
Now, some April statistics:
The snowiest was1982, that infamous April 6th storm that dropped 17.6 inches.
The least snowy was the 21 years with no snow, I first recorded in 1968.
The coldest was 1975 with a mean of 39 degrees
The warmest mean of 52 came twice, in 1991, 2017.
April 2022 weather statistics
