Climate and Weather Information
For this dive into climate and weather data I stuck with government websites since I believe they offer more robust data sets for looking at general climate trends.
- NOAA’s www.weather.gov/wrh/climate page is a great starting point if you want to get a tidy snapshot of an area’s climate history. The data sets most relevant to my study area are the temperature (min, max, monthly avg.) and the precipitation.
- NOAA’s “The Climate Explorer” offers a more high-tech experience than the weather.gov tables and graphs. There are several different data sets, such as average temperatures and precipitation, that are paired with interactive maps.
- I also found a lot of helpful and interesting information while browsing the EPA’s Climate Change Indicators page ( https://www.epa.gov/climate-indicators/view-indicators ). See below for some of the maps that I found to be most interesting and pertinent to my study area.
- USGS Water Data ( https://waterdata.usgs.gov/monitoring-location/02037500 ) – I use this page for work when I’m out sampling central Virginia’s tidal rivers. It allows you to graph out either the river level (ft) or the river discharge (cub. ft/sec) over whatever period you want to investigate. This will be a helpful tool to use for my study area since the James River is an important ecosystem for a variety of species and will be a good indicator for the numerous streams that feed into it.
- Another NOAA page that I want to spend more time digging through is their Understanding Climate section. They have a ton of information ranging from broad factsheets to in-depth investigations into a variety of different climatic phenomena and trends. Here are a few wide-ranging climate events that may have an impact on my study area:
· Future Research (expect updates as new ideas pop up)
- Average precipitation and temperature ranges to sustain wetlands
- Water temperatures needed for native fish species
- Impact of frost trends on native plant species (as well as pollinators)
- Impact of climate events such as El Nino and NAO on my study area
Precipitation – NOAA - https://www.weather.gov/wrh/Climate
Temperature – Max, Min, Monthly Avg.
Spring and Fall Frost Trends - https://www.epa.gov/climate-indicators/climate-change-indicators-length-growing-season
“This map shows
the change in water temperature at 129 stream gauges across the Chesapeake Bay
region from 1960 to 2014. Red circles show locations where temperatures have
increased; blue circles show locations where temperatures have decreased.
Filled circles represent sites where the change was statistically significant.”
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