The month of May brought warmer conditions, but more importantly no major frost impacts. Northern California and the Sierra Nevada’s, northward and west of the Cascades in Oregon and Washington were warmer than normal for the month (1-3°F) (Figure 1). Areas from central to southern California and eastern Washington and Oregon were close to normal in terms of temperatures while the Rockies and desert southwest were cooler than normal for the month (Figure 1). The warm up along with plenty of soil moisture has brought a flush of growth with most regions reporting average to slightly ahead of average vine growth, but still behind the past few years. Again, the western US was fortunate to not have the frost impacts like in Europe, where they are still assessing the damage to this year’s crop. For the rest of the United States, the southeast was the only other region with above normal temperatures while Texas to the Great Plains and Great Lakes were near normal to cooler than normal (not shown).
Leave a comment