frostfern

Very small cell just ripped hail for about 5 minutes. It was a little bit bigger than pea sized, but not quite dime size. Nice hour long period of gentle rain and occasional rolling thunder earlier this morning too. Saw some decent anvil crawlers.

EML is different from a typical cap in that it features steep lapse rates in the 700-500 hPa layer. 8C/km or greater in this layer usually evidence of an EML. It's good for severe weather because it gives the CAPE a low center of gravity, so parcels accelerate early.

Problem is it's the ECMWF too. I wouldn't call it "arctic", just snooze-fest crap where the warm front is close enough to cause clouds, but pushed south by easterlies from Canada.

GFS has gone back to the backdoor cold front BS in the long range... like the Euro. Elevated convection with the WAA will probably happen at some point, but who knows if the real warm sector ever makes it here.

It looks like the warm front will be north of most of us, so probably plenty of sunshine. The GL backdoor sag idea is gone for now at least, which I like. It's just a matter of coverage. Something has to break the cap at the right time. GFS is now showing a pretty good system coming in from the west later but that's so far out still.

At some point there will be an E-W boundary wiggling north and south. Sucks when you're stuck on the north side by 300 miles or less. GFS has trended more towards the euro with a weaker front, so hopefully it hangs up north of the majority of the forum. It's weird how that zonal pattern hasn't really occurred yet this spring though. The longwave ridges and troughs span massive range of latitude, but have at least been moving. Wavy but progressive is nice. Cold fronts tend to be dry up north in this kind of pattern though. Big sprawling high's don't allow quick moisture return in their wake.

I don't understand why there isn't an alternate bare-bones radar site. I know they can't use flash anymore, but the layered GIS stuff is just too much until they upgrade to a faster server network. It works nice for climatological data like snow depth and rainfall, but its beyond useless for looping. The new radar color scheme is terrible too. I'd volunteer to fix it if they'd let me.

Euro looks thundery for Michigan next week. Something similar to what happened on the 7th last year would be cool.

Will be happy to see some green grass and growing buds now.

This second system will have way more juice to work with... and the GFS has finally fallen in line with a stronger system. These deepening systems with moisture are always dangerous this time of year. Would prefer if it was February and this was a snowstorm as the track is perfect for MBY.

The snow melt line in eastern Canada is farther north than 2012 at this time. It's not nearly as warm, but the lack of snow is concerning. Kinda worried this will be a hot dry summer with smoky cold fronts from fires in Canada. 2018 was very warm on average, but didn't have a lot of triple-digit stuff due to blocky pattern. This year could have more classic heat wave stuff that hasn't happened for a while.

Normally not excited about a cold windy rain, but this is very needed right now.

Snow depth is WAY below normal in Canada. Get ready for all of northern Ontario to burn.

What I really need is a high-end event that can be predicted with 48 hour notice. Driving south around both Lake Michigan AND Chicago traffic to reach rural Illinois in a single day is just impossible. I tried on 6/22/2016 but just couldn't get to the action in time. Don't know if there was even an actual tornado that day. As for local stuff, 4/7/2020 was an interesting day here in terms of storm structure and lightning, but it was all after dark. Most other times when there have been supercells around here, they were the HP blobs on an a slow moving W-E boundary... in like late August when the lake is warm. Those are pretty cool for their crazy after-dark lightning shows, but not much else. Actual tornados are mostly unpredictable land-spouts on days with visually uninspiring storm structures. They do damage, but you can't really chase them at all. Summer derecho season has been mostly dead since 2011.

The models are kinda all over the place with the next wave train after this dry stretch. The first low is occluding way northwest, but the southern stream stuff after that is just unpredictable. Waiting for the GFS to give me a snowstorm. lol. Does anyone think the warmup in the long range is real? Early April torch signals have been persistent despite the last week of March having a lot of spread.

I think lack of moisture is the thing holding back the earliest stuff now. The bulbs are ready to open as soon as afternoon temps reach the middle 50s and nights stay above freezing, but the stalks will need a little water to actually grow. Snow melt mud is already crusty. It only took a few days to dry out. Soil is so sandy here that as soon as the frost is gone all the water soaks down into the ground.

Last year was very odd in that the very first trees and shrubs leafed out early due to a warm period in the first week of April. Most of the spring flowers were out slightly early too. But then mid-April through mid-May was so cold and rainy that the typically late trees weren't even full yet by the end of May. It was nice for taking nature walks in the woods as there was a lot of greenery but not a thick canopy yet... so nice sun shining through.

This is the most weenie-unfavorable pattern ever. Tired of the constant chilly east wind and northern fringe clouds. I like rain and I like full sun. Hate this stuck-in-between crap.

Green grass, green shrubs, or green oak leaves? It's usually a 2 month span here. Then by the time the oak leaves are full green... around June 1st, the grass is already entering it's first summer brown phase. Would prefer an early spring for once this year.

Need rain for them to start coming here. Frost is out of the ground but it's just too damn dry.

Yea. What really stinks is getting cloudy skies and brisk easterly winds with temps in the mid-upper 30s... yet zero beneficial precip. If it's going to be boring I prefer sunny skies at least. Though we did have a pretty sunny stretch earlier in the month. It's just annoying being stuck on the northern fringe of the southern stream track... and then not even getting any precip. Chilly easterly winds and clouds are so depressing this time of year.

There was right around 2.0" of water in the snowpack here before it all melted. This winter has had a distinct lack of rain though. What moisture we did get was mostly snow and mostly in the month of February. Overall it has been a dry winter. December-February had lots of days with measurable precip, but very light amounts most of the time. Now March has been downright dry.

I think the dry high to the northeast will eat away the northern edge up here in Michigan... again. Would prefer either precip or sunshine and real warmth. Can't get either. Marginal cold + cloudy + dry = zzzzzzz. February was the only marginally interesting weather month in ages.

Single digit dewpoints blowing in from the east wrecked it. Hope we can at least get a warm rain soon. It's dry as a bone already.

Still virga. Looking forward to the drought.