With autumn officially starting on Saturday, the temperatures in the Weyburn area so far this month have been decidedly un-autumn-like. The average daytime high for the month has been nearly five degrees warmer than the 30-year average.  

With El Nino, the weather phenomenon known for causing milder than average winters in the prairies, starting earlier than normal this year, there were many wondering if it would have an earlier impact on the weather for southeast Saskatchewan.  

“Typically in western Canada, we feel stronger impacts from El Nino in the winter months rather than the fall months,” explained Justin Shelley, a meteorologist with Environment and Climate Change Canada. “However, it looks like, at least to the start of meteorological fall in through most of Saskatchewan and parts of western Canada, we’ve seen temperatures of three and a half to four degrees above normal so far in September, so definitely a warm start to September and it’s forecasted to be relatively above normal for the next couple of months, at least.” 

The month has also been a lot drier than normal. Weyburn normally sees around 30 millimetres of precipitation in September, while this year there has been just over four millimetres. This trend is expected to continue right through the rest of the autumn with El Nino starting earlier than normal.  

Then, there is the temperature itself. While there is still a week to go in the month, it is shaping up to be one of the top ten warmest Septembers on record, and then it will just go from there. 

“When we look at the longer range modelling, it looks like central and southern Saskatchewan are going to be above normal or slightly above normal based on the probabilistic forecast,” Shelley continued. He explained the forecast doesn’t necessarily quantify how much above normal the temperature could be, but just whether or not it is more than likely to be above normal.  

“We’ve seen so far in September, even if the signal wasn’t necessarily as strong for those temperature anomalies like we’ve seen, it has been pretty warm.” 

The forecast through the weekend will be very fall-like, however, with temperatures struggling to get above 20°, with clouds and rain as well. After the weekend, though, temperatures are expected to be back into the mid-20s for much of next week.  

You can get all of the latest weather information on the Discover Weyburn Weather page.  

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