Temperatures Colder Than Normal Across North Dakota

"Brrr, it’s cold!" seems to be a very popular exclamation this winter. But is this winter colder than last year or the average?

"You bet," says John Enz, NDSU agriculture climatologist. "We still have a few days left in December but as of now we are 9.2 degrees below average and 21.2 degrees colder than December of last year. It’s a lot more than I expected."

The season didn’t start out that way. The September average was a degree above normal and October was 3.2 degrees above normal. Things have changed since then with November averaging 1.5 degrees below normal and December 9.2 degrees below the average.

If you live in western North Dakota you may have a slight advantage as far as December temperatures are concerned. "Temperatures are 6 to 10 degrees below normal across the state with the warmer values, if you can call it that, in the south central and southwestern parts of the state," says Enz. The eastern portion of the state is 9 to 10 degrees below the normal December average. The central region is 7 to 10 degrees below normal and the western area is 6 to 10 degrees below average.

Enz compiles the weather figures using the North Dakota Agriculture Weather Network (NDAWN). It’s a system of 52 automated weather stations in North Dakota, Minnesota, Montana and South Dakota. Forty four of the stations are located in North Dakota, 5 in northwestern Minnesota, 2 in Montana and 1 in South Dakota.

NDAWN stations monitor such conditions as temperature, degree days (growing, heating, cooling, insect), potential evapotranspiration and crop water use, rainfall, humidity, soil temperature, solar radiation and wind speed and direction. The system provides weather conditions on a hourly basis along with a daily summary.

NDAWN is operated in cooperation with the Department of Soil Science and Extension Service at NDSU, the Department of Atmospheric Sciences at UND, the High Plains Climate Center at the University of Nebraska in Lincoln and private and public cooperating landowners and commodity organizations.

"We have just received approval from the North Dakota Board of Higher Education to make NDAWN a Center," notes Enz. "Our aim with the center is to combine data from various sources along with NDAWN and make it easier for people on and off campus to find the information they need."

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Source: John Enz, (701) 231-8567, john_enz@ndsu.nodak.edu
Editor: Rich Mattern, (701) 231-6136, Richard_Mattern@ndsu.nodak.edu