Renewable Farming

El Niño outlook for Midwest winter starting Dec. 22: Warmer than normal

The persistent and powerful El Niño should lead to a 2015-16 winter which looks like those of  1982-83 and 1997-98, says the December Browning World Climate Bulletin.

The editor, Evelyn Browning Garris, anticipates northern U.S. temperatures to average above normal in early winter and midwinter, with slightly less of an anomaly by later winter.

Here in northeast Iowa, we measured four inches of rain the past 60 hours. Had our temperatures been much colder, we’d be digging out of three feet of snow right now. The extra moisture came as slow, continual rain over more than two days. Much of this soaked in. That’s moisture “in the bank” for next spring. 

Garris sums up that this is a prospective “…winter that brings warmer weather to the North, and much needed moisture to California and the southern USA.”

The Browning World Climate Bulletin is a much-enhanced update of the former Browning Newsletter, originated by Dr. Iben Browning, and continued by his daughter Evelyn.  It’s one of the very few publications or website information sources that we actually pay for, and recommend.