The Hubby swears that the weather has changed since he was a kid growing up in this area. He says the summers are drier, hotter and longer than he remembers.

What about your area? Do you think the weather has changed at all ... more snow, less snow, rainier, drier, hotter, colder?

I'm only a few hours north of you Copago but I'll second the hubs thoughts.

10 years ago you could set your watch by the afternoon thunderstorm, now we go 4 months and not a cloud. The srpings and autums barely exist - it's really summer and winter with a few mild nights thrown in as a transition.

I guess in recent years the 'El Nino conditions in the southern pacific can explain some erratic weather but I often wonder what global damage greenhouse emmisions, deforesting and the likes have on the overall weather effect. Add shrinking ice caps into the equasion. I know there are a million scientists measuring this, but how much do they really know now compared to what we will know in 50 years?

Ben Elton said in a routine once that it takes 40 years for artic moss to recover from someone walking on it.. how do they know this? Someone had to walk on it in the first place!

I think it is all just cyclical. I remember in the '70s it was the coming Ice Age that everyone was fearing. Now it is global warming. Weather patterns such as El Nino and El Nina are just beginning to be understood and I think in the end all these weather patterns balance out.

There isn't as much snow where I live (Minnesota) as there used to be, and what little snow we do get only stays on the ground for two or three days before it melts. This really bugs me because I can't make a decent snow fort.

There's always a trip up to Thunder Bay for your snow fort Geek!
I think that man has been trying to screw up the environment since he discovered fire, and the best he has been able to do is to make Mother Nature hiccup a little. Except maybe when She got really mad and iced everything up for a few thousand years. But that was the aliens fault, wasn't it?

The weather was different here this year, for sure. Our town is parphrased from the Haisla "People of the Snow", and from the 50's to the 70's this was evidenced by tons of snow, most winters. Snow could reach the roof levels of two storey houses and there would be tunnels to get to the street! There was a danger of children playing on the snow mounds and having to be warned not to touch the utility wires that ran from pole to pole! From the 80's til now, we still get horrendous dumps of snow from time to time (3 feet overnight), but it comes in fits and starts. This year I have only had to get out the boots once to go to work. In the meantime I am reading of my unfortunate eastern Canadians who have been getting terrible snowstorms and record breaking low temperatures.

As for "moss", we still have folks who pay quite a bit for perparations to get it OUT of their grass and off the rooftops! It rains here all the time, too!I guess we're just sub-arctic!

Afew years ago here in East Africa, we could tell the time by looking at the sun, now the sun is out and shiny from 6.00 am to 7 pm. Believe me that is Strange.

I back tellywellies in the snow/Britain thing, you could have put money on it snowing heavily around 6th - 8th January every year - literally a day or so after the schools went back, it used to stay on the ground too. Winters don't seem anywhere near as cold in recent years. Summers used to be long and sunny, now we seem to get wet ones, or droughts - no half measures.

Hotter summers.
Colder winters.
Much more snow.
Record weather patterns.
I do believe that global warming is a big problem with all this greenhouse gases and the ozone layer becoming thinner.