Environment Canada is predicting a warm, dry summer. City folks like long, hot summers but as rural folks know, we need a good balance of sunshine and rain. Some parts of the province experienced drought conditions last year, maybe not as bad as 1988 when we saw extreme drought conditions with plus 40 temperatures and half the normal rainfall, but bad enough. Environment Canada’s senior climatologist says they can’t predict exactly how much rain will fall but the forecast is that it will be warmer and drier than normal, and when temperatures are warmer than normal more precipitation is needed, not less. He does say that when it comes to precipitation forecasts, they aren’t always right, and they do change their minds, so it’s not necessarily a bad situation yet. I don’t know if it’s global warming or what, but the weather patterns seem to be different than they were years ago. Or maybe it’s just a perception I have in my memory bank. For example, didn’t we skip spring this year and overnight go straight from a long, cold winter directly to what feels like summer? Needless to say, the weather always gives us something to talk about and we’ll see what Mother Nature has in store for us this summer.

That’s Coffeetalk. I’m Vic Dubois.