Weather Predictors

I saw a woolly bear caterpillar crawling across my driveway the other day and wondered about the upcoming weather.  I remembered the old folktale that you could predict the weather by the thickness of the brown band.  “The wider the brown band compared to the black band, the milder the winter.”  Just to be sure, I looked it up on Google and found an interesting article.  You can see the web link below under the title “Woolly Bear Caterpillar”.

You can also see two photos at the left. The one on top with the leaf is from the web and the one on the bottom is from my driveway. Although the brown band is bigger than the black in both photos, there is more black in my driveway photo. Both photos would predict a milder winter but colder in the driveway photo. Is this pure science or what?

Since my curiosity was now peaked, I looked up other weather predictors and found the traditional Farmer’s Almanac, A Pig’s Spleen, Insect Movements, and Cloud Types, etc. could be used to predict the upcoming weather season.

The Farmer’s Almanac has been around for a lot of years and has about a 70% accuracy. “It predicts a colder and drier winter this season (2013-2014)”. They say that the Almanac gets its predictions from analysis of yearly weather patterns as well as a “guarded secret formula”. Similarly, the traditional folklore predictions have been passed down through the generations as farmers watched the skies and sailors watched the seas.  My favourite is “Red skies in the morning, sailors taking warning. Red skies at night sailors delight”.

You can see some other “folklore weather sayings” at the web link below …

http://www.almanac.com/content/weather-predicting-do-it-yourself   Before the fancy weather instruments of today, families would predict upcoming weather by looking at the sky. The weather patterns observed over many years seemed to be good predictors of the upcoming weather. The list below includes a few examples of the weather proverbs. (“The higher the clouds, the finer the weather - Clear Moon, frost soon -When clouds appear like towers, the Earth is refreshed by frequent showers - Rainbow in the morning gives you fair warning - Ring around the moon? Rain real soon - Rain foretold, long last. Short notice, soon will pass”.)

Another more comprehensive list of weather proverbs or rhyming forecasts can be found at the web link ….  http://tww.id.au/weather/forecast.html   The list includes weather rhymes for (clouds, wind, plants, night, seasons, etc.)  Some examples are (“Wind from the east fish bite least, wind from the west fish bite best - When Windows won't open, And the salt clogs the shaker, The weather will favour the umbrella maker!”)

Weather is a finicky thing and even with the best weather instruments, present day weather men only make predictions based on their best guess. My old favourite is to put my wet finger in the air to tell which way the wind is blowing. If it is from the west and there are low clouds, rain will be here soon.

Do you have any old time weather predictors?

Comments always welcome:  ….. markryan82@comcast.net.

Other Reference

Farmer’s Almanac

http://www.almanac.com/weather/longrange/region/us/1  - Winter will be colder and drier than normal, with below-normal snowfall. The coldest periods will be from Christmas through early January and in mid-January and early, mid-, and late February. The snowiest periods will be in mid-November, mid- to late December, mid- to late February, and early March.

Woolly Caterpillar

http://m.almanac.com/content/predicting-winter-weather-woolly-bear-caterpillars
The tiger moth caterpillar has black ends and a reddish brown middle.  Folklore has it that the larger the brown segment compared to the black is a predictor of a milder winter.
Comments to the Woolly Bear Caterpillar Article
There are mixed comments to the article from various readers.  I guess it all depends on your experience and in which part of the United States that you are located. One comment from Hardyville,Va states the following: “I have watched the Woolly Worm for years but have not gotten any answers about the weather.  I find the Quantity of Nuts and wild berries that are produced, the thickness of the shells are a better clue as to the temperature of the winter.  Also the closer to the ground that the wasps and hornets build their nests in the summer the colder it will be in the winter. I think that folks in different areas have their own special ways of determining how they think the weather is forecasted in that area.”

Predicting Weather With A Pig Spleen
http://www.almanac.com/content/predicting-weather-pig-spleen
When farmers would slaughter pigs in the fall, the shape of the spleen was used to predict the upcoming winter. The bulges and thickness of the spleen from top to bottom were a sign of colder changing weather. These folklore methods were part of the Scandinavian heritage of Midwestern farmers.