March: Comfortable Weekend Weather & Warming Trend

[Ptarmigan]

March is the month of expectation.
-Emily Dickinson, March is the Month of Expectation

We are entering the third month of 2014. March is the start of the meteorological spring as we bid farewell to winter. However, it can get cold in March like in 1932, 1978, 1980, 1989, and 2002. March looks to be on a wet start as it could be rainy on Saturday.

Ash Wednesday is on March 5. We spring one hour ahead on March 9. March Madness starts on March 18.

[Texaspirate11]

Rodeo too!

[srainhoutx]

Both the GEFS and Euro Ensembles do suggest that below to much below normal temperature anomalies are possible near the March 6th time frame, I doubt that the operational GFS was correct in suggesting wintry mischief along and S of the I-10 Corridor. That said March does appear to come in like a Lion and may well offer a rather stormy and unsettled pattern across our Region. We will see.

[wxman57]

March just sounds much warmer than February! I can just about taste those 80F+ afternoon highs.

[Portastorm]

Heh, the 12z Euro run shows snow for Houston next week.

[Kingwood31]

Heh, the 12z Euro run shows snow for Houston next week.

I laugh at the idea....but...it would be cool lol

[srainhoutx]

Ugh...amazing flip flop of the 12Z Euro from its 00Z run. That said it looks cold...sigh.

[cristina6871]

well I was going to post that I listened to Brooks at 4 and he mentioned some abnormal temps for the 3/6-3/10 time frame - prolonged cold I believe is what he said.....but I see there is already some chatter. Right now, I am listening to the sound of a nice moderate rain shower...

[jasons2k]

I really don't want another cold snap. I was looking forward to cutting away all the dead from my beds this weekend. I may wait another week if it looks like another freeze. The dead leaves provide a nice protection for my recovering ginger, cannas, ti plants, etc. At least I have a few days before I have to make the call - I hope the models/forecast trend warmer. We'll see...for now I'll enjoy this much-needed rain to green things up.

Somehow the last Majesty Palm and Pgymy date survived the big freezes. I had to get up on ladders and hack off all the fronds, and completely wrap the trunks and crowns in lights and covers. It was drastic measures that took hours, especially the first time when I had to cut the fronds off. The majesty palm is getting up there - I had to use my 14' ladder, so it's probably on its own from now on. Some day, it will be gone too. I dread the day I have to remove that stump.

For now, it looks like I have two big Q-tips in my back yard but at least the tops are green and not brown! All-in-all it wasn't as bad as 2011 when I Iost 3 out of 4 majesty palms, and every Pygmy date in town got toasted.

[srainhoutx]

The 12Z GFS continues to advertise a rather potent storm system crossing the Southern tier of the US and a very cold 1050mb Arctic High settling S from Canada into the Plains. The GFS continues to flirt with the idea of some potential wintry mischief across our Region as well as the storm tracks E. We will see.