We have a lot of catching up to do in the rain department with only .39 of an inch recorded here at the station for the month and 3.54 inches since March 1st.
As I said the other day, I was digging holes for posts with the post hole diggers and the moisture in the soil was about a foot down which gives a good depiction of how dry it is. Looking at rainfall forecasts for overnight into Wednesday rainfall in southwest Michigan looks to be a quarter-inch or less. We need an all-day rain to bring back soil moisture to more normal conditions. It will be hard to get corn and soybeans to germinate in the dry soil.
By Thursday the temps will be in the mid-80s with dewpoints in the low 60s, so our first taste of heat and humidity will be made apparent… This may help fuel our first chance of storms for the season.
Forecast Discussion
-- Warm Tue-Wed with mostly light rain showers -- For perspective, normal high temperatures are trending into the lower 70s this week in many locations, with normal lows trending into the lower 50s, so this warmer-than-normal weather will be quite the change compared to the first half of the month. Sunshine early today will give way to increasing clouds from south to north as upper level moisture streams in first, then cumulus clouds bubble up during the afternoon. Dew points are not as low as they were earlier in the month, but the summer-like dewpoints (60s) look to hold off on arriving till Wednesday. In fact, today, some drier air may mix down in central to northern Michigan, increasing the fire weather concern this afternoon as winds gust up to 15-20 mph. Some convection-allowing models are showing sprinkles or brief showers developing late this afternoon from south to north in western Michigan, but this seems ambitious as they are depicting cumulus cloud tops will be capped at about -3 C with dry air above (no ice nuclei seeding). Deeper mid-level moisture won`t arrive until tonight, but most models are keeping rain amounts light, certainly not a drought buster. The better chance for heavier showers and possibly lightning would be around US-127 Wednesday afternoon as just enough surface instability builds, but models are not unanimous in this potential either. -- Relatively hot and humid late in the week -- While record high temperatures Thursday and Friday don`t seem likely at Grand Rapids, Lansing, or Kalamazoo (those are in the lower 90s), temperatures reaching the mid to upper 80s would rank in the warmest 10 percent of what`s on record for those dates. This makes sense as the 500 mb height anomalies will be about 2 standard deviations above normal. The ridge/anticyclone centered over the southeastern US will direct low level air from the Gulf of Mexico our way, and dew points around 60 degrees will give us our first taste of summer humidity. Weak shortwave troughs propagating around this anticyclonic flow could assist the development of isolated showers or a storm late Friday or during the weekend, but predictability and confidence are low at this time. -- Unsettled with slight cooling trend possible next week -- Larger scale trends in the global ensemble models suggest the upper level ridge flattens out next week as post-cold-frontal high pressure north of the Great Lakes advects colder air southward. With this front sagging south into Michigan and potentially stalling or wavering back north while upper-level waves move through, clusters of ensemble members with rain chances and convective potential are showing up in the first half of next week.
Looks like the rain is missing me. It is going north.
Bill’s Blog today talks about the anniversary of the Mt. St. Helens eruption. My grandpa was an over-the-road trucker and was in eastern Washington state when it erupted. He was stuck there for awhile until freeways were plowed. He took a photo of his rig and it was covered in ash. Speaking of which, he brought my siblings and I each a jar full of ash. I still have it….somewhere.
Look at all that glorious rain on the other side of the lake. Not fair.
Hopefully we get some of it. It sure was a beautiful day today!
Mother Nature overperformed the forecast again. Currently, 82 here.
Same here Mark. 82. Great day to be outside !
Beauty of a day outside I’m thinking the furnace can be shut off now finally Woo woo!! INDY …..
I am really not a fan of the heat (no pun intended), but I do have AC so I can’t really complain. I do enjoy the 15+ hours of sun however.
Also the grass along the road is already starting to burn out and it is only mid-May. It could definitely be a challenging year for the grass for sure.
Upper 80’s to low 90’s for mid May? Yuck. Crank the AC early this year.
Warm March, warm April… can we make it a warm May too? We have a little catching up to do, but it should be close. This weather is perfect!
Gonna be another quiet day on the blog Mookie! LOL!!
Yesterdays official high at Grand Rapids was a very pleasant 77. Here at my house the overnight low was 48. At this time it is sunny and 50. Officially Grand Rapids has reported 7.33″ of precipitation so far this year and that is now a departure of -5.90″ At Muskegon they have recorded 5.90″ and they have a departure of -6.44″ Other areas are also well below average is the total rain fall department. We shall see how this all plays out.
Slim
Sunny, pleasant, and dry
Rinse, repeat