Along with my previous post on trends in seasonal precipitation, here is one on trends in seasons. I read a blog post this week by Brian Brettschneider, who is a whiz at analyzing climate data to find look for new insights into changes that are happening in our climate. Not a big surprise, since he lives in Alaska where the changes are more pronounced than anything going on here in the Southeast. His blog post shows that the length of time that we are in “summer” in the Southeast has grown by several days over time. Of course here we are not talking about the meteorology definition of summer (June through August) which always stays the same, or astronomical summer from the June solstice to the autumnal equinox. To see how this paper defines it, you will have to read it at https://us-climate.blogspot.com/2020/04/is-summer-longer.html.
For those who don’t want to delve into the calculations, in brief it shows that on the average in the Southeast, the length of summer-like temperatures has increased by several days over the last few decades. The biggest increase has occurred in south Florida (which is currently experiencing 90 degree days regularly, pretty rare for so early in the year). There is a minimum in the increase in southwest Georgia, which makes me scratch my head. Winters have gotten shorter by about the same amounts here, although it is quite different in Alaska. In addition, the warmest 90-day period has shifted ahead in the calendar by a few days, as has the coldest 90-day period in winter.
