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Metro Vancouver is in for a stretch of warm days with blue skies that will set off magnolias and flowering cherries.
Starting Wednesday, skies across the south coast of B.C. will be clear as warm air from California, Arizona and New Mexico moves into the region.
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“Great for gardening,” said meteorologist Michael Kuss.
The weather on the south coast of B.C. will begin drying out on Tuesday and be dry by Wednesday. Temperatures are expected to be a couple of degrees above normal by the end of the week and into the weekend, ranging from highs of 14 to 17 Celsius.
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Kuss said a high-pressure system off the coast of B.C. will move into the Lower Mainland and sit in place, drawing warmer weather from the south.
“The big story is that after three or four days of warmer temperatures, looking longer range, we could be into a pattern where we may not see precipitation for 12 days. This pattern becomes really dry as it locks in and becomes stagnant,” Kuss said.
“This is the type of weather we see in the summer where a big dome of high pressure settles in with the jet stream to the north.”
Kuss said the past two weeks of precipitation and lower than average temperatures were good news for the coming wildfire season.
“What was looking like a potentially disastrous snow pack for the forest fire season has moderated over the past two weeks,” he said. “It will improve the outlook.”
Hunters Garden Centre Vancouver branch store manager Laura Doheny said gardeners had been in a holding pattern over the past two weeks waiting for the weather to warm up.
“Once we see a couple of good warming days in a row everything is going to explode for us,” Doheny said.
“A lot of the trees like the magnolias and the flowering cherries, you can see the buds, we know they’re right there, and if we can get three or four warm days they are going to open all at once.”
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Doheny said that the soil will warm up by Monday, at which point lawns will begin to recover.
“This is a great time to start your lawn care,” she said. “People are starting to aerate their lawns. They are putting lime down, they are doing some fertilizing.”
On average, it is wet for half of the days in March.
dcarrigg@postmedia.com
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