When does spring really begin in Scotland?

Winter can feel like one of the longest seasons, especially after months of cold rain and very little daylight.

But fear not, the snowdrops are out, the daffodils are starting to poke through the soil, and spring is just around the corner, but when does it begin?

The official start of spring

Meteorologically we say it’s the March 1, but this is just to make it easier for keeping stats tidy and to complete months.

Officially, spring only begins in Scotland once the sun crosses the equator and the northern hemisphere starts to see more daylight than the southern hemisphere as places like Brazil, South Africa and Australia head into their autumn.

This year, the sun will cross the equator on March 20.

Big changes to daylight

February and March are the months with the fastest growth in daylight, with Scotland gaining about 4-5 minutes of extra daylight each day.

This means we gain just over four hours of daylight between the start of February and the end of March.

Plus, the clocks change in March, which means it won’t get properly dark until after 8pm as we enter April.

Does spring come earlier than it used to?

Yes, in a warming climate, the seasons are changing, and there’s some research which suggests that spring is coming earlier than it did in the 1980s.

Some birds are nesting earlier, and bulbs are bursting into life earlier than would have been the case when we were younger.

We now have longer growing seasons in Scotland due to the warming seasons with less frosts and snow, although even though this might look like a benefit to Scotland, there’s more volatility in our weather.

So we might see a warm start to spring, which brings on farmers’ crops earlier than ever before, but a quick but brief swing to cold weather and snow could decimate the crop, leading to a shortage of certain foods.

So the “longer growing season” headline masks the short-term changes and volatility that exist more in our current day-to-day weather.

Are springs warmer than they used to be?

Again, yes. The temperature records for Scotland in March, April and May have all occurred since 2003.

March hit 24C on 27 March, 2012, 27C on 17 April, 2003, and 31C on 25 May, 2012.

Most towns, village and cities have recorded their highest spring temperatures within the last 25 years.

The average temperature has Increased for all areas of Scotland by about a degree since the 1970s, which may not sound like a lot, but It’s a major shift in the time frame of about 50 years.

This Increase In the average now means big spikes in temperature are much more likely nowadays than they were when we were kids and that’s evident with all the records which have been broken in recent years.

Is it safe to dig out the patio set?

Not yet.

Even though we’re on the path to spring and hopefully better weather, you know as well as I do that it’s never a straightforward shift.

There will be bumps along the way with storms still likely during the transition from winter to spring and most will remember the big snowfalls we had from the Beast from the East in early March 2018 and the major snowfall of March 2013 in Arran and Kintyre – so big snow can still happen – even in April.