Weather Notes (10/16/26)

It occurs to me that the date format used in the title can be ambiguous. It’s certainly a local format. The longer form used for Friday Notes, (e.g. Oct 16, 2026), is specific but makes post titles longer than I like. I use the ambiguous form for brevity.

But for the record, throughout this blog, when used, I do mean month/day/year. Which I’ve long thought is an awful format because it doesn’t sort naturally, especially with no leading zeros on single digits. The sortable form is yyyy–mm–dd (with leading zeros on single digits).

But I digress (already!), so without further ado, here’s the local weather:

I mentioned last time that we’ve had a fairly dry summer. I’ve been in my own little world and hadn’t realized it goes beyond having a “fairly dry summer” — Minnesota is in a drought. Along with many other states in the country.

Which explains something else I mentioned last time about the tree leaves not putting on their fall color display. Especially weird was the wild sumac, which is often the first to go, switching from green to almost blood-red, often in late August.

[It’s one of the more striking autumn leaf changes. Do an image search for “wild sumac tree” for a lot of very pretty pictures.]

This year, some of it still hasn’t turned, although I have seen more and more red lately. And the other trees are finally turning, too. Here’s the mock apple tree behind the mailboxes for (part of) the condo complex:

I took this a week ago today (on the 9th). It’s further along now, but you can see how much green there is in the trees (and grass). It’s definitely a late autumn.

A few trees in my neighborhood made a nice show of turning their leaves bright yellow and dropping them in large numbers to create a yellow carpet:

It looks especially nice when the sun is shining, but (as we’ll get to below) the weather shifted for chilly and cloudy, and I figured I’d better get the picture before all the leaves fell.

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September saw a drop in daily temperatures:

Not surprising. It’s officially Autumn as of September 22, so a cooling off is only to be expected. There is a big dip down to a high just over 60° on the 14th. We got a small warm-ish bump for a few days after, but it was cool after that. Sweather weather!

Compared to recent years:

That dip, and even the temps that followed, is a bit cooler than past years. That dip of the daily high down to just over 60° on the 14th is a new minimum since 2013. The low that day wasn’t a record-breaker, but it was on the low side of average.

In a 30-year timeframe, this September was actually warmer than average:

Except for the 14th, which was seven degrees cooler than normal. So was a span of days starting on the 18th. Kinda cute that the 15th was exactly average.

Given the above, the Heating and Cooling Degree Days chart makes sense:

I had my windows open through most of September, but I could hear a lot of my neighbors’ A/C compressors running, so a lot of people were indeed cooling. I had Bentley staying with me from the 19th to the 29th, so I had the furnace on to keep her warm (the big baby). If it was just me, I would have had open windows throughout the month. I like overnight temps in the 50s — good sleeping weather!

As far as what we not so lovingly call “the damned dew point”, along with the drought condition and it being fall, September was reasonably dry:

Very rarely, and only in the early part of the month, did the dew point rise above 70°. Starting on the 10th, it never rose above 65°, though it steadily increased over the last third of the month.

All-in-all, September was a pretty good month. Not unusual, it often is. That’s why fall is my favorite season (made bittersweet by impending winter).

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October had a little trick up its sleeve:

A deuce of back-to-back 90° days October 10th and 11th. A last blast of summer before a sharp drop-off to much cooler temps. Those two days broke recent records:

They are considerably above any high temperatures those days since 2013. Even the low temps those days broke recent records. The departure from the 30-year average is impressive:

I had to adjust the vertical scale to fit it in. October 11th was over 25° warmer than the 30-year average. Resulting in last summer fun for everyone because those days happened to be Saturday and Sunday!

The only downside is a lot of people had to turn on their A/C:

Kinda funny. A pair of cooling days in the middle of days mostly needing the furnace. Maybe it’s just the contrast, but even I now have closed windows and a running furnace. (Or at least my portable electric heater.)

Me, I had my windows open because:

The dew points were all in the comfortable 50s. So, it was hot but dry, and I’m fine with that (perhaps from living for almost 20 years in the American Southwest desert).

A semi-record low in September and a definite record-breaking high pair of days in October. Perhaps another indicator of weather chaos due to global warming. The generally warmer temps certainly are.

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And that’s the weather. Just for fun, here’s a nice picture of the aforementioned Big Baby from her stay here last month:

Just the cutest thing on four paws (two not shown).

Stay weathered, my friends! Go forth and spread beauty and light.

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