Pollen Forecast
According to Pollen.com, pollen levels will high to medium-high levels over the next several days, which means that if you suffer from seasonal allergies, you'll want to keep taking the allergy meds for now.
Sunday, Mother's Day Outlook
High temps on Sunday will be below average with highs only warming into the 50s for early May.
Weather Outlook Through Sunday
Precipitation Potential Through Friday
Wednesday Weather Outlook
Wednesday will feature increasing clouds, but temperature will be cooler than average once again with readings in the 50s, which will be -10F to -15F below average for early May.
Wednesday Weather Outlook For Minneapolis
The weather outlook for Minneapolis on Wednesday shows sunnier skies in the morning with showers possible late in the day.
Meteograms
The meteorgrams for Minneapolis on Wednesday show temps warming from the 40s early in the day to the mid/upper 50s after the afternoon hours. Skies will generally be mostly sunny in the morning with cloudier skies late.
Extended Temperature Outlook
Here's the extended temperature and weather outlook over the next 5 to 7 days in the Twin Cities. Highs on through the rest of the week will be nearly -5F to -10F below average with highs only warming into the upper 50s and lower 60s.
Spring Leaf Index
If you look close, so of your backyard trees and bushes have actually started to show signs of spring leaves emerging. According to the NPN, this is happening nearly 2 to 3 weeks earlier than normal across Minnesota and Wisconsin.
"How do you know when spring has begun? Is it the appearance of the first tiny leaves on the trees, or the first crocus plants peeping through the snow? The First Leaf and First Bloom Indices are synthetic measures of these early season events in plants, based on recent temperature conditions. These models allow us to track the progression of spring onset across the country. April 27, 2021 - Spring leaf out has arrived in all but the most northern and highest elevation parts of the country. After arriving early in southern parts of Southwest and Southeast states, cold temperatures halted the progress of spring leaf out for several days across the northern part of the Southeast, Southern Great Plains, and mid-Atlantic. Spring leaf out arrived days to weeks early across much of the northern Great Plains, Midwest, and Northeast. Spring bloom has arrived in the southern half of the country. Spring bloom is patchy, with much of Texas days to weeks late, while parts of Kansas, Tennessee, Missouri, Illinois and Indiana are days to weeks early."
8 to 14 Day Temperature Outlook
According to NOAA's Climate Prediction Center, the 8 to 14 day temperature outlook shows cooler than average temps across the northern tier of the nation, while warmer than average temps will be found across the southeastern US.
A Vain Search for "Average Weather"
By Paul Douglas
If you have one foot in ice water and the other foot in boiling water do you feel "average"? Probably not. When meteorologists mention average highs, lows and precipitation we are referring to a running 30-year timeline of data.
The new 1991-2020 averages are out, and they show much of Minnesota trending wetter, except for drier conditions up north. Springs are wetter (and often cooler) while warmth extends deeper into the fall, with significantly less snow (and lake ice) in November.
Summer is coming, but no time soon. A slow-motion spring hangs on the next 1-2 weeks with cooler than average temperatures (daytime highs mostly in the50s and 60s). A few instability showers pop up later today, but the pattern looks fairly dry and storm-free into next week; too cool for tornadoes. Small comfort, but I'm grasping at straws here! I'm ready to sweat it out too.
USDA says 60 percent of Minnesota's corn crop is in, 2 days behind 2020 but 10 days ahead of the 5-yearaverage. Hoping farmers have a very good year.
Extended Forecast
WEDNESDAY: Cool, PM showers. Winds: N 5-10. High: 55.
WEDNESDAY NIGHT: Slight chance of rain overnight. Winds: N 5-10. Low: 38.
THURSDAY: Mix of clouds and sunshine. Winds: NW 10-15. High: 58.
FRIDAY: Plenty of cool sunshine. Winds: N 10-15. Wake-up: 39. High: 55.
SATURDAY: Partly sunny, probably dry. Winds: E 8-13. Wake-up: 37. High: 60.
SUNDAY: Plenty of sunshine, still cool. Winds: NE 8-13. Wake-up: 38. High: 61.
MONDAY: Blue sky, no weather drama. Winds: SE 5-10. Wake-up: 37. High: 62.
TUESDAY: Unsettled, a few showers late. Winds: SE 5-10. Wake-up: 43. High: 60.
This Day in Weather History
May 4th
1926: Morris goes from winter to summer temperatures in one day. The morning low was 32, followed by a high of 89.
Average High/Low for Minneapolis
May 4th
Average High: 66F (Record: 91F set in 1952)
Average Low: 45F (Record: 22F set in 1967)
Record Rainfall: 1.01" set in 1959
Record Snowfall: 2.0" set in 1890
Sunrise/Sunset Times for Minneapolis
May 2nd
Sunrise: 5:57am
Sunset: 8:22pm
Hours of Daylight: ~14 hours & 25 minutes
Daylight GAINED since yesterday: ~ 2 minutes & 38 seconds
Daylight GAINED since Winter Solstice (December 21st): ~ 6 hours & 1 minute
Moon Phase for May 4th at Midnight
1.5 Days Since Last Quarter Moon
What's in the Night Sky?
"As the Eta Aquariid meteor shower picks up steam these next several mornings – May 3, 4 and 5, 2021 – watch for the waning moon to sweep past the ringed planet Saturn and then the giant planet Jupiter. On May 3, the moon passes due south of Saturn, to stage a conjunction, only a few hours before the moon reaches its half-illuminated last quarter phase. A little over one day after the moon-Saturn conjunction, the moon will sweep due south of the king planet Jupiter. Meanwhile, as for Neptune, although we show you its location on our chart above, it is not visible to the eye. Read more: All you need to know: Eta Aquariid meteors Here's some astronomy jargon for you. Technically speaking, the moon is said to be at dichotomy when it appears half-illuminated to us, yet at quadrature when the moon is 90 degrees from the sun on the sky's dome. The two events (dichotomy and quadrature) almost happen concurrently, at least as far as the moon is concerned, at the first or last quarter phase. A half-illuminated last quarter moon is synonymous with west quadrature, that is, with the moon being 90 degrees west of the sun. In common usage, many think of dichotomy and quadrature as synonymous. Yet did you know that a quarter moon is always a tiny bit more than 50% illuminated? It is around 50.13% illuminated at the last quarter phase, such a small amount more than 50% that the difference isn't visually discernible."
National High Temps Wednesday
The weather outlook on Wednesday shows warmer than average temps along the east coast, while folks in the Central US will be cooler than average by nearly -5F to -15F below average
Climate Stories
"The West Faces Dry Season With Its Most Widespread Drought In Decades"
"The western United States will enter the back-half of spring with its most widespread drought in almost two decades. Underwhelming winter rains and persistent warmth allowed the west's drought to dig in and grow worse through the first half of spring. The persistent lack of rain is a foreboding sign for the risk for wildfires across the region this summer and fall. This week's update of the U.S. Drought Monitor found extensive drought conditions across the country, with more than 48 percent of the contiguous United States experiencing a moderate drought or worse. Just over one-fifth of the country will end April in an extreme or exceptional drought, the two highest categories on the Drought Monitor's scale that measures the intensity and duration of impactful dryness."
"Polar Bear-Grizzly Hybrids, Aka Pizzly Bears, May Be Growing More Common Due to Climate Crisis"
"What do you get when you cross a polar bear and a grizzly bear? A fluffy reminder of how climate change is transforming our planet at an alarming rate. These hybrids, sometimes called pizzly bears or grolar bears, have been spotted in the wild as far back as 2006. But with global temperatures rising as a result of carbon pollution, the two species' habitats are overlapping more often. While the heat pushes grizzly bears north, polar bears have been traveling south in search of food as arctic sea ice continues to shrink to historic levels. And odds are the two aren't just bumping elbows—they seem to be increasingly engaging in "opportunistic mating," as Vanderbilt University's Larisa DeSantis put it in a recent video released by the institute. One study in 2017 documented at least eight pizzlies that were traced back to a single female polar bear and two separate grizzly bears."
"Then and now: When silence descended over Victoria Falls"
"In our monthly feature, Then and Now, we reveal some of the ways that planet Earth has been changing against the backdrop of a warming world. Here, we look at the effects of global heating on Victoria Falls, one of the natural wonders of the world - and how Sub-Saharan Africa is learning to cope with the climate crisis. In full flow, Victoria Falls easily qualifies as one of the natural wonders of the world. Spanning 1.7km at its widest point and with a height of more than 100m, locals refer to Africa's greatest waterfall as "the smoke that thunders". This amazing feature is formed as the Zambezi river plunges into a chasm called the First Gorge. The chasm was carved by the action of water along a natural fracture zone in the volcanic rock that makes up the landscape in this region of southern Africa. In 2019, however, Victoria Falls was silenced."
