As days are getting longer this month—an extra 58 minutes of daylight over May’s 31 days—many gardeners and farmers are looking forward to planting season

WGN WEATHER HEADLINES

• WGN Weekly Climate Report: May is starting off in typical May fashion around Chicagoland with some soggy conditions. May is our soggiest month of the year with almost four and a half inches of rain. So, not too surprising that the first several days of May at O’Hare all had some amount of measurable rain.
• We finished off April with some rainfall totals that were slightly below average amount of rainfall. April was our 13th consecutive month of above normal temperatures for Chicago. Our warmest days of the year so far have all topped out at 81—which we’ve hit several times so far this year and twice this last week alone.
• Now that we’re in May—I’ll declare our snow season officially over. (Not that I have any actual authority to do so, lol.) It started with a trace of snow on Halloween 2023 and ended with three days in a row of trace amounts of snow and sleet in the first week of April. Our snow season was 157 days this year had only had a bit more than 22 inches of snow. It was similar to the previous year which had about 20 inches of snow. Typically Chicago sees about double that amount.
• With our average last frost now in the rear-view mirror—many gardeners and farmers are looking forward to planting season. Soil moisture has not been a problem so far this year. The area remains free of any soil drought conditions as tracked by the US Dept. of Agriculture.
• Days are getting longer this month too. We’ll see an extra 58 minutes of daylight over the course of the 31 days in May. By the 31st we’ll see 15 hours of daylight around here and even a bit more as we get close to summer solstice next month.

TEMPERATURE AND PRECIPITATION OUTLOOKS

Valid May 11 through May 19, 2024

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