Nature ‘sages’ can’t tell weather future

THE other day I heard somebody observing that some deciduous trees were starting to change colour and drop their leaves early this year and suggesting that this was a sign that we were in for a bad winter.

In Ireland and all over the world, there are dozens of ways in which events in nature are used for long-range weather forecasting. And this traditional lore is still widely believed, despite the fact that it’s practically all nonsense.

Long range weather forecasting is not something human beings can do, not yet anyway, despite the fact that a huge amount of effort, ingenuity and computer time has been devoted to it since people became aware of the dangers of climate change.