El Niño expected later this year

[Walt 985]

22 hours ago, PalmTreeDude said:

Yeah it was weird. It was not a killing frost though, all of the tender plants at my house and around the neighborhood are completely fine. Last year we got our first light (but killing) frost on November 4th. 

My buddy who lives in Waldorf, Maryland, told me he had frost yesterday (Friday, 19th Oct.) morning on his car. I told him it was lows in the lower 70s and highs in the lower 90s down my way.

[PalmTreeDude 1,080]

The day has come...  Exactly 32 degrees F this morning. The first picture of the Elephant Ears by the driveway was the only picture I took during the morning, all the others were when I got home.

 

One more frost and these Elephant Ears are done. 

The bananas only got burn on some leaves, but continues to grow. The reason they look all battered is because they got a lot of wind damage when (what at the time was) Tropical Storm Micheal hit us. 

 

The Cayanne Pepper plants are surprisingly all ok, while the basil was badly burned and the tomatoes have burn.

 

 

 

Edited October 22, 2018 by PalmTreeDude
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[PalmTreeDude 1,080]

Not surprising, but of course all palms are ok. Here is my Butia. 

 

This Elephant Ear had canopy and faces South of my Leyland Cypress trees (a great tree for creating little microclimates due to its fast and dense growth). It has no damage at all, so this should survive until we get a hard frost. 

 

I would still consider this a bit early, but we are in the danger zone now. The peninsual that goes into the reservoir near me did not get frost yet. 

Edited October 22, 2018 by PalmTreeDude
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[mdsonofthesouth 352]

I'm seriously thinking of completing the Leyland cypress wall my neighbor started. They grow like weeds here and create walls FAST! Neighbors trees were planted at like 3ft in mid 2016 and they are like 15ft or so high now. Would wall out the western winds down low for sure!

[PalmTreeDude 1,080]

1 hour ago, mdsonofthesouth said:

I'm seriously thinking of completing the Leyland cypress wall my neighbor started. They grow like weeds here and create walls FAST! Neighbors trees were planted at like 3ft in mid 2016 and they are like 15ft or so high now. Would wall out the western winds down low for sure!

One of my neighbors planted like 30 of them in their yard, but they blocked the South side! But they still look nice and are crazy fast. 

[tropicbreeze 302]

Looks like El Niño is just about off the radar, for the moment. BOM weekly tropical climate note 22 January 2019:

ENSO Outlook lowered to El Niño WATCH

Recent observations and climate model outlooks suggest the immediate risk of El Niño has passed. However, there remains an increased likelihood that El Niño will develop later in 2019. The Bureau's ENSO Outlook has therefore moved to El Niño WATCH, meaning there is approximately a 50% chance of El Niño developing during the southern hemisphere autumn or winter.

Tropical Pacific sea surface and sub-surface temperatures remain warmer than average, but since late 2018 they have cooled from El Niño-like values towards ENSO-neutral values. Atmospheric indicators such as cloudiness, trade winds and the Southern Oscillation Index all continue to generally remain within the ENSO-neutral range. Three of eight climate models suggest that El Niño may establish by mid- 2019.

[Dypsisdean 666]

5 hours ago, tropicbreeze said:

Looks like El Niño is just about off the radar, for the moment. BOM weekly tropical climate note 22 January 2019:

ENSO Outlook lowered to El Niño WATCH

Recent observations and climate model outlooks suggest the immediate risk of El Niño has passed. However, there remains an increased likelihood that El Niño will develop later in 2019. The Bureau's ENSO Outlook has therefore moved to El Niño WATCH, meaning there is approximately a 50% chance of El Niño developing during the southern hemisphere autumn or winter.

Tropical Pacific sea surface and sub-surface temperatures remain warmer than average, but since late 2018 they have cooled from El Niño-like values towards ENSO-neutral values. Atmospheric indicators such as cloudiness, trade winds and the Southern Oscillation Index all continue to generally remain within the ENSO-neutral range. Three of eight climate models suggest that El Niño may establish by mid- 2019.

I wish someone was keeping an accurate scorecard. But to me, it seems as if these El Niño predictions/forecasts may be no better than a coin toss.

[Silas_Sancona 1,148]

16 minutes ago, Dypsisdean said:

I wish someone was keeping an accurate scorecard. But to me, it seems as if these El Niño predictions/forecasts may be no better than a coin toss.

Dean, check out Stormsurf.com.. Particularly the long range portion of the "Pacific forecast" section on their site.. Of all the Wx sites that monitor the various *ingredients*  that point towards..or away from an El nino ( or La Nina) Storm surf's seems most accurate and up to date, imo, esp. since they normally update 2-3X's per week.  Last update was this afternoon. 

Yea, there's a lot of science jargon to read over and, to some degree, one might have to do a little research to grasp some of the discussion sections fully,  but one can get a basic idea of whats happening by reading the 3 month CFS Model section in the overall discussion. The CFSV2 graph ( lower down on the page ) is updated daily so you can also follow any particular trends in the model's thinking.. Blue lines = latest data,  Red.. 'couple days older,  Gray,  oldest data.. (NOAA updates their ENSO discussion only on Mondays)

This year, it seems as though while conditions in the ocean were building toward another El Nino,  the atmosphere and ocean didn't link up as they should have,  thus the "backing off" of suggested forecast earlier on this past Fall.  Stormsurf's  ENSO discussions saw this starting to occur back in November. That said, things could get interesting as we head into the spring /summer since ..at least in the CFSV2 model's current thinking,..  ENSO conditions remain in positive territory as we head forward, and might even re-strengthen later on.. vs.  heading south toward Negative / La Nina territory, which often happens as El Nino conditions fade.  Something worth casually checking in on at least..  We'll see what actually happens.  

Me myself, the current "look" to the forecast thinking looks very 1990's-ish..  a few years of hanging somewhere north of warm neutral, not really experiencing any significant La Nina episodes,  possibly building up to another big El Nino, like what occurred in '97 at some point.. The PDO, which also can influence ENSO, is looking to be entering it's positive phase, which would tilt the odds more in favor of El Nino conditions in the years ahead.. 

First  couple things i'll be watching this spring is how the building of another possible Kelvin Wave in the West Pacific evolves, and how early we start seeing tropical systems in the East Pacific,  And, of course, how the Atlantic Hurricane season starts off..