[6] Across California, 68 percent of weather station located between 2,000 and 5,000 feet registered a lower percentage of winter precipitation falling as snow, according to 65 years of
winter precipitation data.
Winter precipitation data for the past millennium were obtained from the Community Earth System Model's Last Millennium Ensemble Project (CESM LME)[43].
Inset: Comparison of measured winter precipitation observed during the historical Beaver Creek watershed experiments [20] from 1958 — 1982 versus modeled
winter precipitation data shown in main figure.
A Climate Central analysis of 65 years of
winter precipitation data from more than 2,000 weather stations in 42 states, found a decrease in the percent of precipitation falling as snow in winter months for every region of the country.
Not exact matches
In virtually all states with stations below 2,000 feet, the
data show a trend toward a higher percentage of rain during the
winter precipitation season.
We calculated mean
winter precipitation across 15 -, 25 -, and 35 - year periods from this modeled
data and used this information to select droughts and pluvials.
To test the accuracy of these modeled
data, we compared values from the Verde ponderosa pine PRISM modeled
data to measurements of total
winter precipitation recorded during the original Beaver Creek experiments [31].
However, studies that stratify
winters into La Niña, neutral, and El Niño phases have found that
precipitation extremes in neutral / La Niña
winters respond differently than in El Niño
winters, whereas studies that stratify ENSO
data into cold / warm conditions have not found evidence for a coherent nonlinear response.
While derived from sea surface temperature
data, the PDO index is well correlated with many records of North Pacific and Pacific Northwest climate and ecology, including sea level pressure,
winter land — surface temperature and
precipitation, and stream flow.
According to
data from the Salekhard weather station the recent mean air summer temperature was 0.9 °C higher and
winter was 1.2 °C higher than between 1883 and 1919; and the amount of
precipitation also increased by 32 mm in summer and by 46 mm in
winter.
One
datum that would help a lot would be the amount of
precipitation, snow and rain combined, over those snowy
winters.