You may have noticed we have an Elevated Layer of Smoke our skies over the western Great Lakes. The smoke is coming from Canada.

The smoke in the sky the past few days is coming from western and central Canada due to wildfires there.

The Latest Forecast Guidance Continues to Suggest Cooler than Normal Temperatures and Below Normal Precipitation most of the Remainder of May for the Great Lakes Area.

Over Southwest Michigan, May has largely been drier than normal and cooler than normal Overall the next two weeks will mostly be that way.

Cool and Wet into Tuesday, than mostly dry weather and becoming warmer than normal by the weekend and that is expected to continue into the 3rd week in May.

It may be cool today and tomorrow but warmer than normal temperatures are expected from this coming weekend through the 3rd week in May.

What is the risk of freeze over the next week or so? Put another way, when will it be safe (this spring) to start planting freeze sensitive plants over the Great Lakes and Ohio Valley?

Freezing low temperatures should be expected over Lower Michigan next week (first week of May)

More On The Summer Forecast for Southwest Michigan, this time looking at both monthly anomalies and the frequency of highs in the 90s

I am expecting this summer, in Southwest Michigan to be near normal to slightly warmer than normal in the mean temperature but the frequency of very hot days, highs of 90F or more is likely to be less than normal.

After nearly 4 months of mostly warmer than normal temperatures an extended period of cooler weather is forecast for Southwest Michigan.

Cooler temperatures are expected to prevail over southwest Michigan into through the first week of May. Milder conditions are expected to follow by mid month.

Why May This Change Be Happening?

As for why this may be happening I will look at the how the water temperatures in the Tropical Pacific have recently changed. Typically this sort of change forces large scale changes in the northern hemisphere wave pattern.