Northern Colorado Plateau Network climate monitoring report: 2005

Garman, Steven

The 2005 climate monitoring vital signs report contains the following information for NCPN parks: 1) a monthly summary of reported climatic parameters (max., min. and avg. air temperatures and inches of precipitation of snow and rain); 2) an annual summary of these parameters; 3) assessments of annual, monthly, and daily measures in the context of historical trends (i.e., climatic extreme assessments); and 4) a comparison of climatic conditions among the NCPN park units. Data are taken from 31 weather stations in the NCPN network, from seven climate monitoring programs. Major conclusions for 2005 were 1) average annual minimum temperature and annual rainfall tended to be above average in 2005; nine of the 16 NCPN Coop stations showed a record high average monthly minimum temperature in Jan. or Feb; 2) for the NCPN weather stations examined, differences between 2005 average annual maximum temperature and long-term means tended to follow an elevation gradient, with difference from the long-term average decreasing with increasing elevation; 3) 2005 snowfall at all but one weather station tended to be well below average; and 4) a general increase in annual mean minimum temperature over the past 25-45 years is evident for most of the NCPN Coop weather stations. Conversely, these records show evidence of a declining trend in snowfall over the past 20-25 years. Historical records for NCPN Coop weather stations indicate that annual rainfall has been highly variable, and that a strong unidirectional trend over the observation periods is not evident.