ANDERSON – Get used to warmer weather, because the Old Farmer's Almanac predicts a warm and wet winter.
The centuries-old farmers' friend expects a winter with warmer than normal temperatures and below-normal snowfall, with the coldest periods hitting in mid to late December and January. Snowfall will also remain relegated to early winter.
In January, the almanac expects average temperatures of around 40 degrees, 7 degrees higher than average. The highs continue through February with temps falling 5 degrees higher than average.
Though it’s impossible to accurately predict day-to-day weather changes this far out, the Old Farmer’s Almanac boasts an 80 percent success rate in predicting monthlong regional trends.
Robert Thomas, who founded the almanac in 1792, devised a “secret formula,” to predict changes in the weather, which he attributed to sunspot activity, according to the book. In the intervening years the book has become decidedly more scientific.
“Over the years we have redefined and enhanced this formula with state-of-the-art technology and modern scientific calculations,” reads the book’s section on “how we predict the weather.”
Moving past winter, the writers predict a cool and rainy summer in 2019, and a drier-than normal autumn.