Polar Vortex

[Foxpalms]

@UK_PalmsIt does seem that everything was perfectly aligned to be as cold as possible. We probably would have escaped frost, but then the weather decided to change from cloudy skies at night to clear skies! All I can say with them overstating how cold it's going to get is what happens usually for every freeze here. Last year's Jan 6th forecast was actually worse -3c forecasted yet the warmest parts of London didn't got below +1c, but the problem is the day time highs after the freezing nights are not very high during this freeze so I'm sure that will drop the Thames water temperature and the air will drop in temperature faster since it's already cold.

Edited December 5, 2022 by Foxpalms

[Zach K]

On 12/4/2022 at 8:03 PM, Jesse PNW said:

@Chester B this illustrates the difference between our climates, despite the mere ~2 hour difference in lattitude.  We're on our 3rd or 4th snow even this winter, can't remember.  None have been major but we've had a little accumulation with each event.  Local schools and Ft Lewis were on a 2 hour delay earlier this week, and probably should have been one more day.  

We've been into the low twenties 3 times so far, and the mid/upper twenties several times more.  Stopped counting.  And a handful of times, between 30-32.   

You know what's funny, South of you guys in Seattle @Jesse PNW, and just North of PDX @Chester B, across the Columbia river in Vancouver WA, we experienced almost zero sticking snow. My backyard was bare all day during the one day of snow flakes. 

[BeyondTheGarden]

@Zach Kmy inlaws live on top of a south-west facing slope right on lake river in Ridgefield.  They have a good view of Lake River and the Columbia and I've never been able to get metrics down there but I bet they live in a great zone-pushing spot.  I think the Portland climate continues up a little ways north of the Columbia before it starts to get wetter and cooler.   I know Chehalis has virtually the same climate as me but I'm not sure where it switches, if it's a gradual change or more of a dramatic one. 

Edited December 7, 2022 by Jesse PNW

[Banana Belt]

Brookings Oregon is getting another winter like last year, wet and cold but no freezing just a light frost on grass in open fields. 

[Banana Belt]

is there a correlation?

Edited December 7, 2022 by Banana Belt

[Zach K]

20 hours ago, Jesse PNW said:

@Zach Kmy inlaws live on top of a south-west facing slope right on lake river in Ridgefield.  They have a good view of Lake River and the Columbia and I've never been able to get metrics down there but I bet they live in a great zone-pushing spot.  I think the Portland climate continues up a little ways north of the Columbia before it starts to get wetter and cooler.   I know Chehalis has virtually the same climate as me but I'm not sure where it switches, if it's a gradual change or more of a dramatic one. 

I think its a decent zone pushing spot. I've been in that area before a few times (pretty sweet Arbutus trees around that area).

Yea I can't say where that cut off is,  although if you're like me, you're probably interested if those Washies at the Motel 6 in Kelso. Might be a good indicator.

[Zach K]

@Banana Belt You are one lucky dude that's all I'll say.  Every time I see the forecast for Vancouver WA or PDX say 'low of 29' or whatever, I immediately swipe over to Brookings to see what your balmy low is going to be. No shocker it doesn't even come close to freezing.

[Banana Belt]

1 hour ago, Zach K said:

@Banana Belt You are one lucky dude that's all I'll say.  Every time I see the forecast for Vancouver WA or PDX say 'low of 29' or whatever, I immediately swipe over to Brookings to see what your balmy low is going to be. No shocker it doesn't even come close to freezing.

Highway Sign coming into Brookings says "Home of Winter Flowers".  We have geraniums galore going wild and they flower year round.  My wife keeps buying different kinds of geraniums that spread and will take over if not whacked back, she gets angry with me saying the flowers are food for bees and humming birds all winter.  But if not controlled they take over.  Bird of paradise "Strelitizia regina" also bloom year round and spreads but slowly.  The one plant that always worries me is the Lime Tree, vary sensitive to frost.  We grow two of the Bearss Lime trees in the most protected and warmest place of our property, up close to the house on the south facing side and get most of the limes we want.  Meyers lemon trees grow like weeds anywhere around Brookings.  I have a 5 gallon batch of Meyers Lemon wine fermenting right now. 

Anyway these last three years has been rather poor weather for Brookings.  Terribly cold foggy summers and wet winters.  No snow and no freezing to speak of. 

Picture of Satsuma Mandarin with Lemon on right and Queen Palm foreground taken last summer.  Satsuma tangerines are starting to turn orange right now and will be ripe in January and February.

Edited December 8, 2022 by Banana Belt

[Banana Belt]

Good news is, the La nina is coming to an end in month or so.  Neutral conditions up to next summer with El Nino coming after that.

Edited December 8, 2022 by Banana Belt

[Zach K]

I read that article about the La Nina/El Nino forecast as well and while I do love hearing about how our mountains (Hood specifically) are getting a solid, deep snow pack for me to snowboard on, I'm thrilled to hear that we are FINALLY going to pull out of this 3 year La Nina pattern.

 

TL;DR the article......The waters in the East Pacific are warming up and the tides are shifting in an eastern direction, setting us up for a 2023 El Nino.

[ShadyDan]

26 minutes ago, Zach K said:

I read that article about the La Nina/El Nino forecast as well and while I do love hearing about how our mountains (Hood specifically) are getting a solid, deep snow pack for me to snowboard on, I'm thrilled to hear that we are FINALLY going to pull out of this 3 year La Nina pattern.

 

TL;DR the article......The waters in the East Pacific are warming up and the tides are shifting in an eastern direction, setting us up for a 2023 El Nino.

I saw that too. Can't come quick enough. Looks like another long stretch of below seasonal temperatures ahead of us with threats of low elevation snow. Like you though, I am happy happy that our local mountains are looking great again this year. Our local hill (Mt Washington) opens tomorrow and I plan on taking full advantage of it this year. Last time we had a El Nino winter Washington had an abysmal season and only opened for a week as even all the way up there (base is 1,050m ASL) it just rained most of the winter.

[Chester B]

Right now I am seeing a pretty cold stretch right before Christmas.  I hope the forecasts ease off again.

[southpacific73]

So far the last cold spell kinda fizzled out for us in the lower mainland except for that nasty snowmaggedon day last week! Weird but the PNW is actually in a drought according to our normal rainfall totals. We haven’t had above average rain since June. We need 170mm of rain before the month ends which is unlikely with this forecast.

[Las Palmas Norte]

3 hours ago, Chester B said:

Right now I am seeing a pretty cold stretch right before Christmas.  I hope the forecasts ease off again.

If your long term forecasts are anything like ours, you have nothing to be concerned with.

[Foxpalms]

32 In London. This is supposed to be the coldest night hopefully it stays above 30 tonight. The warmest parts of London are at 33f now.

[Zach K]

*Sigh* Another stretch of clear skies and quick dips below 30°f..... I wonder how all the PNW Washies are doing right about now?

[Las Palmas Norte]

Looks like round two with some Arctic cold starting Sunday and lingering for a few days. I believe there may be some snow associated with this too.

[Chester B]

15 hours ago, Las Palmas Norte said:

Looks like round two with some Arctic cold starting Sunday and lingering for a few days. I believe there may be some snow associated with this too.

I’ve seen that. Looks like it’s going to miss west of the Cascades, at least that’s what the local meteorologist was predicting last night. 

[Las Palmas Norte]

50 minutes ago, Chester B said:

I’ve seen that. Looks like it’s going to miss west of the Cascades, at least that’s what the local meteorologist was predicting last night. 

Well it doesn't look like we'll miss the polar blast here.  The forecast is getting more dire each time I check 😒Tuesday night looks exceptionally bad. I'm hoping there will be a revised and more favorable outlook closer to that date.

[steve617]

Got my Trachycarpus fortunei protected. It's outgrew it's tarp. 

[Las Palmas Norte]

I got my Cordyline ready for the worst if it comes. Normally it doesn't need protection in typical cold spells, but better safe than sorry.

 

 

Pics won't load correctly regardless of what I do prior. 

[southpacific73]

Tuesday and Wednesday are  the two days of nasty temps for me. Hoping the forecasts gets better for me and for everyone else all the way to the gulf coast!

[Las Palmas Norte]

I'll try loading these from my smart phone 

[UK_Palms]

@Las Palmas Norte Good protection there! Much better than what I managed here. All I did was wrap my Queens and bananas with a thin layer of frost cloth and draped a bit of tarpaulin over the Phoenix and Washingtonia, hoping for the best. But I have now endured my coldest start to a winter in 300+ years here since the 1700's. I doubt my protection was sufficient for most things. I am going to have losses here, but we are almost out of the woods now, just as most of North America plunges into the winter abyss. Good luck is all I can say! 

[Chester B]

7 hours ago, Las Palmas Norte said:

Well it doesn't look like we'll miss the polar blast here.  The forecast is getting more dire each time I check 😒Tuesday night looks exceptionally bad. I'm hoping there will be a revised and more favorable outlook closer to that date.

That’s looking pretty bad, hopefully it backs off. Thursday looks to be our coldest day but the models are all over the place. Local meteorologist is showing 38/28 as my worst day/night. I sure hope he’s right. 
 

Good luck everyone. 

[Banana Belt]

Sorry to hear about all the cold weather up north, good luck.  40 years ago we used to cover and protect our palms and plants, but last 20 plus years the real cold seems to stay inland.

Edited December 18, 2022 by Banana Belt

[Las Palmas Norte]

5 hours ago, Chester B said:

That’s looking pretty bad, hopefully it backs off. Thursday looks to be our coldest day but the models are all over the place. Local meteorologist is showing 38/28 as my worst day/night. I sure hope he’s right. 
 

Good luck everyone. 

That previous forecast seemed, and has in the past, been a little over zealous.  No two are identical but this own is more in line with others I've seen. I suppose I'll know by next Friday. 

 

[Las Palmas Norte]

19 hours ago, UK_Palms said:

@Las Palmas Norte But I have now endured my coldest start to a winter in 300+ years here since the 1700's. 

I'm not absolutely certain, but temperature records here have be kept for less that 100 years. We've been locked into a la Nina winter for an unprecedented 3 consecutive years. That coincides with 3 years living in a new and reportedly slightly colder region. This has made not only establishing an exotic garden difficult, but finding the enthusiasm to do so.

[southpacific73]

I don’t think I could handle a 4th La Niña winter also. It’s like fighting a losing battle every winter with more plant casualties. 5cm of  snow already on the ground and more falling. Snow came with lots of thunder which was interesting! Wishing everyone a better forecast!

[Keys6505]

Slightly off topic but not really.. are all incandescent mini Xmas lights 40w or are there hotter sets?  I know C9's get hot, just talking about the mini

[Chester B]

1 hour ago, southpacific73 said:

I don’t think I could handle a 4th La Niña winter also. It’s like fighting a losing battle every winter with more plant casualties. 5cm of  snow already on the ground and more falling. Snow came with lots of thunder which was interesting! Wishing everyone a better forecast!

I’ve experienced thundersnow it’s a wild experience. We had a severe snowstorm approaching a blizzard with almost zero visibility back in London, Ontario. You couldn’t see the actual lightning due to heavy snow so it was whole sections of the sky lighting up white and the snow muffled the thunder making it sound like far away explosions. 
 

I know my parents had some this year in Niagara Falls too. Definitely not a common thing, it’s a real trip. 

[Banana Belt]

Looks like the cold is over, at least I hope so.

[Las Palmas Norte]

7 hours ago, southpacific73 said:

I don’t think I could handle a 4th La Niña winter also. It’s like fighting a losing battle every winter with more plant casualties. 5cm of  snow already on the ground and more falling. Snow came with lots of thunder which was interesting! Wishing everyone a better forecast!

I saw that on the Vancouver newscast. I experienced snow accompanied with lighting. It was well into April early one morning as I drove thru Nanaimo on my way to work. Very strange event.

We had just a trace of fine snow, not even an ⅛" accumulation which melted during the day. 

[Las Palmas Norte]

3 hours ago, Banana Belt said:

Looks like the cold is over, at least I hope so.

I hope the NOAA are right.

[Foxpalms]

4 hours ago, Las Palmas Norte said:

I saw that on the Vancouver newscast. I experienced snow accompanied with lighting. It was well into April early one morning as I drove thru Nanaimo on my way to work. Very strange event.

We had just a trace of fine snow, not even an ⅛" accumulation which melted during the day. 

Some places in the UK further north had snow yesterday, then lightning, which was weird. Since the cold air was mixing with a subtropical air mass from the canary Islands

[Zach K]

Wanna have fun? Take a look at Houston TX forecast for Thursday. Showing a High of 70 and a low of 19..... What.....?

[Chester B]

Bad ice storm heading my way, very cold temps and high winds.  I had the whole day available to protect plants on Sunday and everything was fine in the forecasts midday, then last night they did a complete 180 and said we're going to be hit.  So frustrating.

[Allen]

11 minutes ago, Chester B said:

Bad ice storm heading my way, very cold temps and high winds.  I had the whole day available to protect plants on Sunday and everything was fine in the forecasts midday, then last night they did a complete 180 and said we're going to be hit.  So frustrating.

Ice sucks

[jwitt]

56 minutes ago, Zach K said:

Wanna have fun? Take a look at Houston TX forecast for Thursday. Showing a High of 70 and a low of 19..... What.....?

Dallas had nearly a zone 10a heading into the Feb 2021 palmageddon. Warmest winter(daily lows) on record until that event. Hardly talked about.

Kind of explains the Washingtonia trunk damage and ultimate damage.  Were, or are the palms still growing?

Wish them well. 

[Las Palmas Norte]

1 hour ago, Chester B said:

Bad ice storm heading my way, very cold temps and high winds.  I had the whole day available to protect plants on Sunday and everything was fine in the forecasts midday, then last night they did a complete 180 and said we're going to be hit.  So frustrating.

I've noticed that on forecasts for the Portland region over the years. I wonder why that is? Best of luck and keep us posted.