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1 of 3 Premium Clicks used this month SUBSCRIBE Print + Online Subscriber Activation | Register x Forgot Password | Need an Account? subscribe | newsletter | deals Classifieds Jobs Autos Real Estate FEATURED » NEWS NOW Herb Rothschild Jr.: A delicate project ... What do you make of the street people downtown? ... Ashland stalker gets time served and probation after guilty plea for sex abuse, assault ... Herb Rothschild Jr.: A delicate project ... What do you make of the street people downtown? ... Ashland stalker gets time served and probation after guilty plea for sex abuse, assault ... WEATHER OR NOT Weather or Not: Add a fifth season to the calendar — smoke Comment By Doyle Hirsch DailyTidings.com By Doyle Hirsch Posted Oct. 21, 2015 at 7:03 PM By Doyle Hirsch Posted Oct. 21, 2015 at 7:03 PM » Social News Southern Oregon and extreme Northern California have added a fifth season to the normal four. No, we don't have more months, it's just that one has been given a new designation. We now have three months of winter, three months of spring, two months of summer, one month (or thereabouts) of smoke, and three months or less of fall. During each of the last four years (not two of the last five, as claimed by the Department of Environmental Quality in a recent article in a local paper — does anybody believe these guys any more?), the late summer has been characterized by many days of seriously compromised air quality due to out-of-control fires brought on by heat and drought. After considerable pressure, especially from KDRV's excellent meteorologist Kate McKenna, the U.S. Forest Service (not the DEQ for some reason) reluctantly installed a "temporary" monitor. For the first week or so it was pretty worthless, either down or with readings that had no bearing on reality. Towards the end of August it got better with readings consistently yellow, orange or red, which corresponded with my observations. The following is a list of the number of smoky late summer days recorded at my location over the last four years. I let my eyes, nose and lungs be the air-quality monitor. Since the smoke often bled over into September, I'm including those days as noted. I'm not including days where prescribed burns in the watershed filled the east end of the Bear Creek Valley with smoke: • 2012 — 18 days in August, 10 days in September. Total: 28. • 2013 — 5 days in July, 22 days in August. Total: 27. • 2014 —1 day in July, 17 days in August, 13 days in September. Total: 31. • 2015 — 1 day in July, 28 days in August, 5 days in September. Total: 34. Along with the summer of 2015 being the smokiest in recent years, it was also the hottest on record. The average temp for 2015 was 72.9. The next hottest summer was 2014, which averaged 70.7. In 2013, the next hottest summer, the average was 69.9. Notice a trend? June and July were records for their respective months — the records, of course, having been set the year before. August was only the seventh hottest, but the temperatures were no doubt held down by heavy smoke. I had eight days that I recorded as cloudy which were actually cloud-free on the IR satellite, since smoke doesn't show up on the infra-red photos. Overnite temperatures were consistently above normal with many record overnight high/lows. Oddly enough, we had above normal precip thanks to a couple of big thunderstorms in July which dumped a lot of precip on Ashland. But thunderstorms are spotty and some places got very little. The following are some stats for this summer. As usual, your numbers may very considerably. These are for east Ashland at an elevation of about 2,100 feet: • Highest temp — 101 degrees, July 1 and 2 (first time in five years with two consecutive days of 100 degrees or greater). • Lowest temp — 51 degrees, June 12. • Highest overnight low — 73 degrees, June 27, during a string of 12 consecutive overnight high/low records. • Number of days at or more than 100 degrees — two. • Number of days at or more than 90 degrees — 27. • Number of overnight lows at or more than 65 degrees — 13. • Most 24 hour precip — 1.59 inches, July 7/8. • Total summer precip — 2.60 inches. • Nomal summer precip — 1.54 inches. As of this writing (Oct. 19), it is still very dry, even drier than in August and September when the fire danger was extreme. There's supposedly an El Niño on the way. The last one that hit here was '97-'98. It not only produced the so-called flood but it gave me my wettest water year since I've been keeping records at this location (1985), 41.23 inches. It would be welcome. But El Niños are fickle and don't always go where they're forecast to. If we're lucky we'll get a brief reprieve from this long term dry spell. If not, well you might invest in bottled oxygen stocks. Weather or Not by Ashland weather statistician Doyle Hirsch appears periodically. By Doyle Hirsch DailyTidings.com By Doyle Hirsch Posted Oct. 21, 2015 at 7:03 PM » Comment or view comments Reader Reaction » STAY INFORMED Email NewsLetter Sign Up Today Sign up for our newsletter and have the top headlines from your community delivered right to your inbox. Southern Oregon Directory Featured Businesses Loading... 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