If you’ve only got that lightweight quilt on the bed, you’d better get ready to really rug up from tonight.
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And those who also sleep with a fan on when they’re buried under the blankets after summer, like Moree meteorologist Michael Glasson, can flick that one too this weekend.
Those crisper, colder autumn nights that have been late coming this season are about to cool us down considerably.
While Tamworth sisters Alex and Eva Hayes could still feel the warmth of wonderful sunny days this week and lose themselves in the rich golden drops of falling leaves – things are about to get decidedly cooler all round.
Tonight is likely to drop to about six degrees in Tamworth but that will plummet even further over the next week - and on the tablelands and highlands they’re bracing for minus minimums as a real blast from winter pasts hits us.
April was unusually warm and drier than average and the start of May yesterday pushes us into the last month of autumn with a sudden breakout of leaves turning into their autumn colours later than usual too.
According to gardening guru Doreen Goddard local gardeners wanting to plant winter bulbs should let the ground cool down a bit more over the weekend - and then dig in.
Mrs Goddard said locals would have noticed the late arrival of trees turning golden but a sudden drop in overnight temperatures in the Tamworth district last week had precipitated the sudden colour changes, evident in the Manchurian pears along Goonoo Goonoo Rd and with some of the stately old trees of East Tamworth.
The cold front, according to Moree meteorologist Michael Glasson will hit this weekend, beginning overnight tonight and comes after a very warm autumn.
“And it’s been a pretty dry month too. We’ve had an average of 26.1 for the month when normally it would be 25 degrees. Certainly we will have to get out our jumpers and jackets by the weekend.”
It was also one of the drier Aprils Tamworth has had. Where the average is 42mm, the city recorded just 5.8mm, with 2.4mm falling on the last day of the month.
Our weather records show us that the driest ever April was in 1986 when Tamworth didn’t get one single drop of the wet stuff. The wettest ever April was in 1905 when nearly 164mm was reported.