DONEGAL’S FAMOUS WEATHERMAN PREDICTS SNOW BEFORE CHRISTMAS!

goat2

he is right about the birds, i was sitting outside today, and i enjoyed the sound of the birds, they are really noisy these few days, it was a pleasure,
i also have blackcurrants in garden, the bush was laden with them,
and the hedgehogs were on a feeding frenzy a few weeks back.

Chicken Run

Nabber wrote: »

Everyone will love the post man now after this prediction. Except Kerry and Cork. They'll be only counties that will see no snow this year.

and Clare

when everyone else had snow in 2010, Clare had nowt. Bit of frost.
Proper snow shield here

whatever *shrugs*

Su Campu

goat2 wrote: »

he is right about the birds, i was sitting outside today, and i enjoyed the sound of the birds, they are really noisy these few days, it was a pleasure,
i also have blackcurrants in garden, the bush was laden with them,
and the hedgehogs were on a feeding frenzy a few weeks back.

The birds are probably noisier these days as they're all staying put due to the fog. I know the feeling, had to cancel my flight to Wales tomorrow due to this muck along the east coast.

Anyway, I think maybe I was the vocal one on Vogan. The difference between the two is that somehow the postie has a pretty good success rate over the past couple of years whereas yer man Vogan waffles on about this idea and that, always hoping for, and promising, the Big One. The fact he's charging this year means he's either lost the truck driving gig or he sees the huge market potential in feeding gullible winterites the waffle they want to hear.

Chicken Run

Not wrote: »

The frogs area of expertise is storms, not snow

Spiders know when there's a storm approaching - they start frantically adding extra tie-lines to their webs.

I spend too much time looking out of the window at the cobwebs - but have definitely noticed a pattern (...and the fact that I really should clean my windows more often)

Pherekydes

Larbre34 wrote: »

Spare me. Even a broken clock is right twice a day.

Give him his due, he won 70k off PP.

And it's in the berries, don't you know?

mayfly757

Why cancel you fly Su

Su Campu

mayfly757 wrote: »

Why cancel you fly Su

I can only fly VFR so must stay clear of cloud. Kind of hard when it's only around 200 ft high!!! :mad:

mayfly757

need to get that instrument rating ! Good luck

Sponge Bob

Donegal Postmans delivery route is on the plateau that is central Donegal. IE his daily observations are made at 100m ASL and higher and a distance from the coast in the vicinity of the Blue Stacks. Lets say roughly here. > http://goo.gl/maps/WXDBw

Even Google couldn't get a satellite over that area without snow on the ground as you can clearly see here > http://goo.gl/maps/kXTGA

So if it does not snow at all between now and Christmas in Glencolumbkille ...which is here > http://goo.gl/maps/tXmpu he may still be proven 100% correct.

pauldry

Am I missing something or does the start of November not look very cold with the possibility of snow.

Probably not but theres lots of blues in the charts.

Think the next couple of weeks will be chilly and wintry.

Deep Easterly

Wolfe_IRE wrote: »

I was simply giving credit where credit was due.

Agree. One thing though, why did he feel the need to say that modern day forecasting techniques were 'inadequate'? Modern day forecasting is detailed, updated regularly and can actually save peoples lives. I know if I was a fisherman in Donegal, I'd want a regular detail forecast to see if it was safe to go out on the boat or not. I may be wrong, but I don't think the Postman provides such a service. Long ranging is all good and well, but essential short range forecasts are vital as well.

gbee

Sparks wrote: »

Doesn't that imply that plants can somehow tell the future? )

Pretty much. The berries are a well known sign as is an early short spring.

Studies on plants in the 60s suggested that they could have a level of cognisance, when connected to monitoring equipment, grasses set off needles as operators thought of cutting the plants.

Gardeners world wide and for centuries often spoke to their plants and some played music ~ many just thought this behaviour eccentric ~ maybe it was, maybe it wasn't

V1

Su Campu wrote: »

I can only fly VFR so must stay clear of cloud. Kind of hard when it's only around 200 ft high!!! :mad:

but sure its over water... 200ft should be plenty to stay clear of cloud!:D:D:D .... what could possibly go wrong

seriously though Su, (and at the risk of going off topic), As you seem to be watching cloud cover specifically, and are a whole lot more well informed on this stuff than myself, do you see any opportunity for clear skies (or at least 3500 ft) in the south in the next few days. I doesn't look likely to me, but then I regularly kick myself when I miss a window.

Thanks

Su Campu

V1 wrote: »

but sure its over water... 200ft should be plenty to stay clear of cloud!:D:D:D .... what could possibly go wrong

seriously though Su, (and at the risk of going off topic), As you seem to be watching cloud cover specifically, and are a whole lot more well informed on this stuff than myself, do you see any opportunity for clear skies (or at least 3500 ft) in the south in the next few days. I doesn't look likely to me, but then I regularly kick myself when I miss a window.

Thanks

Later tomorrow and Friday should be a much clearer as we get a change in airmass. I've rescheduled for tomorow so it better be!

V1

Thanks

Cul a cnoic

Must say that the postman was close with his predictions in the past.

But you should have a look at Donegal Dollop, they have ran a great story earlier, worth reading. Here it is. Enjoy

M.T. Cranium

Fair play to the Donegal postman as far as I'm concerned, his outlooks for the past summer and winter were better than most. The story about Paddy Power could be partly conflated as there was also a big discussion going on here on this forum about bets that one might make in Dec 2010. Some of us made a bit off that temperature spread they offered by going low.

Also, I don't have any criticism to offer for his methodology as stated, in fact if one could gather all the required evidence and make that method scientific even without knowing the cause and effect, it would be very useful and I say that for the same reason that a knowledge of the effects of gravity long before Isaac Newton was born would no doubt have saved the lives of many who might otherwise think of testing out a theory of the human being trying to fly like a bird (something you would not do if you recognized the existence of a relationship between height above ground and immediate consequences, regardless of whether you knew the physics or not).

Natural signs might be expected to work for several unconnected reasons. One is that there are embedded cycles at play, meaning that one cycle followed by another would imply a sequence of observable signs like more berries then a cold winter. Another reason might be inherent instinctual or if you prefer God-given recognitions by living creatures of patterns through some kind of signal that could be related to geomagnetism (since migration of birds is known to be related to that). There's a class of scientists who would scoff at such postulates but I don't see any reason to do so, and I would be first to admit that I don't know much about the reasons why natural signs might be reliable indicators of future weather patterns.

My own approach is perhaps similar in one way, that I believe we can eventually decode these complex patterns by finding all of (or enough of) the various signals that are embedded in the apparent chaos of weather data and then use these signals to construct a scientific theory of how the atmosphere will respond to them in the near future (by near future I mean up to a year, or even several years, thinking that the signals might be hitting a slowly shifting global grid created by factors such as a shifting magnetic field and therefore the extension of signals might fade out if you go too long into that future -- this is also a good reason to be cautious about how to use distant past analogues, perhaps those signals will now be displaced away from where they were recorded).

Where I would want to see a bit more reasoning about the natural signs approach is on timing. For example, let's say I buy into the concept that natural signs say that nature is preparing for a harsh winter. If I were an animal or plant, the timing of that harsh winter would not matter so much as whether or not it happened at all, in other words, I would be preparing for the onset of a period of harsh weather, not necessarily for the exact time it would show up. So what was there about this year's natural signs that might isolate December as a time for colder or snowier weather, or was it just that the reporter asked about Christmas weather and forced the answer into this timing paradigm. The reason I say that is my belief that February might be quite cold this winter and I'm not that confident of snow coming in December from the trends I am seeing, although there could be some. It would not be that big a deal if one snowfall came and went over the northwest in December but it sounds like a bit more than that is expected. FWIW my own research suggests a stormy episode just around Christmas with rain the more likely precip and the possibility of strong winds then. My best estimate for snowfall timing (besides perhaps once in mid-December) would be end of January into first half of February.

But I'm keen to learn whatever there is to learn about natural signs and we do have them in our own context on this side of the Atlantic -- in eastern North America, people swear by the "woolly worm caterpillar" which makes an appearance in the late summer or autumn, the more of those that are seen crawling about or perhaps the larger they are, the colder the winter is supposed to be. We also have the folklore about berries, I believe, but you have to factor in that in Canada, our population in the 19th century especially in rural areas was largely derived from Scotland and Ireland so that our folklore may have been transplanted rather than developed here by observation. I wonder if those who came with the folklore thought that it worked as well in the new world, after adjusting it because any given winter, even the milder ones, in Ontario would seem harsh to a newcomer even from the north or outer Hebrides.

I think this is one area where we may have forgotten more than we have learned over a long period of time and certainly there's no valid reason to be skeptical of natural signs, it's probably a case of needing a lot more study with better data.

planetX

the amount of berries on a tree is related to the amount of flowers produced in spring, the availability of pollinators, the weather conditions over the summer and autumn, and how quickly animals are eating the berries in autumn. It tells you about the past weather, not the future. The only way I believe there could be any 'signs' about the future is if there is some unrecognised pattern of cold winters following mild springs etc.

clanpiper

Weathercheck wrote: »

It's obvious that all this lad does is crawl the internet forums and takes the consensus seasonal forecast.

Maybe you should concentrate on moderating the forum rather than commenting in it.
Thats a pathetic post.
You say "Its obvious..." Can you prove this statement, are you prepared to back it up with links?

As moderator would you have knowledge of weather forecasting? If so, what is your prediction and on what is it based?
I would expect a troll to come on and post that type of comment. Anyone else would post their objection and their reasons as to why they object based on FACTS.

Lastly, I think the term you are looking for is "TRAWL the internet forums"

Su Campu

clanpiper wrote: »

Maybe you should concentrate on moderating the forum rather than commenting in it.
Thats a pathetic post.
You say "Its obvious..." Can you prove this statement, are you prepared to back it up with links?

As moderator would you have knowledge of weather forecasting? If so, what is your prediction and on what is it based?
I would expect a troll to come on and post that type of comment. Anyone else would post their objection and their reasons as to why they object based on FACTS.

Lastly, I think the term you are looking for is "TRAWL the internet forums"

Cheeerio

Jostef

For what it's worth clanpiper, I'm in total agreement with you. As far as I know, he was the only one NOT forecasting snow last winter. Doesn't seem so obvious to me that he is just regurgitating what everybody else is saying on the net.

Speak Now

Jostef wrote: »

For what it's worth clanpiper, I'm in total agreement with you. As far as I know, he was the only one NOT forecasting snow last winter. Doesn't seem so obvious to me that he is just regurgitating what everybody else is saying on the net.

Sponge Bob

Michael has had a very good record the past 2 years. Fact.

Gambas

Wolfe_IRE wrote: »

Whether I agree with his forecasting techniques or not, people need to be clear about his recent track record.

Report in Irish Examiner from May 2012:
Michael Gallagher, Postman, Donegal


"I believe thunder will dominate the summer and I would advise people to make the most of any good weather we get.

"The signs are not good for a warm sunny summer.

So he predicted that Ireland would not have a warm sunny summer and people to make the most of any good weather they get. He predicted a typical Irish summer.

The one feature he did mention as being abnormal - thunder, did not dominate.

Winter 2011, from Donegal Daily

Ireland’s most famous amateur weatherman has said there is ‘SNOW WAY’ Donegal is going to be plunged into artic-like conditions this winter.



But Michael, from Glenfin, says he simply can’t understand why everyone is saying the country is going to be covered in snow and freezing conditions for months on end.

“We might have a little snow but I don’t think it’s going to be as bad as the past couple of years.

“I can see us getting plenty of rain and frost but I can’t see the huge falls of snow and freezing temperatures which everyone seems to be predicting,” he said.

Plenty of rain and frost but no huge falls of snow and freezing temperatures. A typical Irish winter.

There wasn't plenty of frost. It was exceptionally mild.

They guy takes some highly unlikely extreme position (hot sunny summer, arctic winter) and predicts that it won't happen.

Jostef

Jerry Seinfeld wrote: »

Wolfe_IRE

Gambas wrote: »

The one feature he did mention as being abnormal - thunder, did not dominate.
.

I thought it was quite a busy season when it came to thunderstorms.

Thunderstorm/Convective Watch - Spring/Summer 2012 (stats)
2,683 Replies 129,993 Views
and
http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=81362947&postcount=171

As for everything else you said, you make a valid point. Although you could take the opposing view and that he was forecasting a 'normal' winter and summer etc. and that he wasn't taking the easy route considering other seasonal forecasts were going for a 'warm, sunny summer'. Ultimately, his forecast is just another to add to the myriad of seasonal forecasts out there. I'll take his and all the others and try and create my own view. To scrutinise one forecast without taking into account other forecasts is probably not the best way to go, which is why I am looking forward to MT's (the Canadian postman's) forecast.

Speak Now

Jostef wrote: »

As far as I know, he was the only one NOT forecasting snow last winter

I didnt forecast snow either :pac:

Jostef

I didnt forecast snow either :pac:[/QUOTE]

Fair enough. I stand corrected and apologize for the slight exaggeration :rolleyes:

stooge

I predict that this winter will not be extremely cold, there will be no extreme snowfall but possibly a little bit of snow around the middle of winter. There will be a few dry days of sunshine but more days of rain/drizzle. There will be cold snaps as well as some fog in the midlands. Coastal areas may be slightly warmer than inner areas.

I know I'm sticking my neck on the chopping board but I'm confident in my prediction. :rolleyes:

Gambas

Wolfe_IRE wrote: »

I thought it was quite a busy season when it came to thunderstorms.

August was busy, bulk of the summer wasn't AFAIK. Certainly couldn't describe it as dominating the summer weather.