Microseason 32 of 72 · June 6–10
Elderflowers open in hedgerows
A five-day window of the year, read through nine North American climate regions.
Same week, nine climates
A microseason names a five-day window of the solar year. What that window actually looks like on the ground depends on where you are. Below, the same calendar window read through each of nine North American climate regions.
- NENortheast Continental
Elderflowers open in hedgerows
Common elder blooms in waste lots — lacy white clusters.
- SESoutheast Subtropical
Kudzu climbs deeper into green
Kudzu vines thicken visibly daily, swallowing fences and treelines; evening humidity settles in the bottomlands.
- PNWPacific Northwest
Oceanspray Towers
Cream-white plumes of oceanspray and Cascade azalea burst open in rocky glades, drawing long-tongued flies and early bee-eaters.
- CACalifornia Mediterranean
California poppies fade as heat rises
Spring wildflowers wilt in the strengthening sun; coastal sage and manzanita dominate the landscape.
- MWMountain West
Glacier lily carpets the snowmelt
Snowmelt reaches its rapid phase in high valleys; glacier lily and avalanche lily blanket south-facing slopes.
- MPPlains Continental
Earthworms surface after rain
Heavy June rains drive earthworms to the surface; birds and toads feast, benefiting songbirds and predators through the food chain.
- SWSouthwest Desert
Monsoon shadows gather
Humidity rises invisibly, pressure drops. High-altitude moisture begins to stream in from the Sea of Cortez. Sky stays blank until the approach.
- TRTropical / Sub-Tropical
Afternoon showers claim the ritual
Daily convective cells build over warm water. Green darkens. Mangrove crowns drink deeply. Coral polyps sense the shift.
- AKAlaska Subarctic
Salmon runs accelerate inland
King and sockeye salmon surge up the Yukon, Tanana, Kuskokwim in peak springtime migration as bears and eagles gather at productive pools.
About the 72-microseason calendar
A microseason is a five-day window of the solar year — long enough to notice something change, short enough that the change is specific. The year holds seventy-two of them, six per month, ordered by what the natural world is doing rather than what the clock says. Almanac calendars like this are an old American habit, kept by farmers, gardeners, and birders for centuries; Weather Story collects them into a single reference.
Each microseason is read through nine North American climate regions. The phenological events that mark a five-day window vary with ecology — the strawberries that open in the Northeast might coincide with the first magnolias dropping in the Southeast and the salmonberry blossoms unfurling in the Pacific Northwest. Same week, nine ecologies, nine readings.