Weather watch: Where's winter?

The top half of the North Island may miss out on winter this year. Sounds crazy, but the pattern we have at the moment isn't exactly wintry and time is running out for winter to really take hold. Daytime highs are well above normal with many centres this week hitting 16s and 17s even 18. It's a far cry from Central Otago. Alexandra had a high of -1 on Tuesday and many days over the past week have been between 0 and 3.

But the upper North Island is stuck in this warm pattern. Even with southerlies it's been warm. The southerlies are not true southerlies. They are coming around lows that are pulling down warm, moist, sub-tropical air - it just happens that the centre of these lows are at an angle that turns them into southerlies. So northern New Zealand rocks on as if it's Spring or Autumn....not winter.

A friend of mine thought I was crazy when I said it's been warm this winter so far in Auckland. But compared to other years - and compared to average temperatures - it has been. Auckland has been frost free. Overnight lows have hovered between 7 and 10 for many nights.

The weather pattern does look like it might change a bit next week with a low roaring out of the southern Tasman Sea, but even though this low may well be aggressive (heavy rain, strong winds, thunderstorms) it still may not be significant enough to pull up a big winter chill.

Even the South island isn't seeing a "typical" winter. For the past few weeks it's been dry and sunny for many. Where are the snow storms? Where's the hail? Where's the -15 wind chill? So far winter is proving very tame this year - cold and snow wise.

If you want to get into rain, well, that's a whole other blog as there has been a huge amount of rain for northern and eastern parts of New Zealand - especially the North Island which has been affected by several large low pressure systems this winter.

The low next week will surge up the Tasman Sea on Wednesday and bring strengthening northerlies going into Thursday. Rain is likely to be heavy in the west, but again, mild. The good news is that the winds may well bring some drying out weather to the east. Fingers crossed for that. It's also going to bring an end to the stunning weather that Southland has enjoyed lately.

In the mean time, for those who hate the cold, you only have to wait another 4 or 5 weeks before the temperatures slightly (and only slightly) should start to lift a bit (or perhaps remain as they are considering we're above normal at the moment) as the sun sloooowly starts to spend more time shining over the Southern Hemisphere. That doesn't mean we won't get cold snaps... but perhaps the chance of a month of frosty, bitterly cold weather is now looking less likely for those in the upper North Island.

Follow me on twitter - Twitter.com/philipduncan