Weather
"I think it's easy up here in Maine, cause everything is good. We don’t have the fires. We don’t have earthquakes. We don’t have tsunamis. We don’t have –- we have blizzards now and again, so it is easy to pooh-pooh it [be]cause all is well. We have enough water and it’s clean water. We could be the last state standing." - Jean Greenough
"Out west, the big agribusiness stuff was set back quite a bit last spring. They lost 10, 15% of their crop because of the early flooding, and too much rain, and just the weather [being] terrible.... I heard that in the Mediterranean area, they lost 10, 15, 20%. In North Africa, they lost about 20%. The weather was bad all over and that kinda thing begins to build up." - Stephanie Mattsen
"Our harvesting season seems to fluctuate and our crop growth seems to fluctuate based on the way that the weather changes and our springs grow shorter and our falls grow shorter and, that. It’s not necessarily -- obviously I’m very young, so I haven’t quite been able to observe as much of the change over time in my time growing up here. But the fact that it feels like fall happens in an instant and that all of it turns bright orange and it’s very pretty to look at -- [but] everything turns bright orange all at once and then all the leaves fall off all at once. Then it is winter. Sometimes as early as mid-October, it is winter. Then it is winter for about six months, and then sometimes [on] my birthday in May, there is still snow on the ground. We just go, well, it’s a long winter. We shrug our shoulders." - Elyse Kiehn
"But I thought that Collins Pond would at least be a little bit of a glimpse of how much the water is not freezing over as much, especially in such a mild January as we’ve been having. It feels cold, but if we look at the averages, it’s not as cold." - Elyse Kiehn
"Yes. The world's just changing in so many ways, climate, ecologically... in our lifetime, it's just happened so fast. I'm hoping in some ways, it could slow down, as change just seems to be something that's gonna happen and continue to happen.... That outhouse we built as a result of the wind and rain in October of '17. We were without power and when we have no power, we have no running water.... But with snow, you're talking about hauling water, hence, that's why we built an outhouse. So that kinda reminds me of the climate change, the weather being a little more violent maybe. I feel kind of blessed living in Maine when I see the news and see the crazy weather, and the crazy things that are going on around the world. Maine's a pretty nice place to be." - Bob Greenough
"40 years ago, at this time of the year, this was the coldest part of the winter. We would have maybe a week, 10 days, of minus 10 or lower on the Fahrenheit scale -- for that. This year is extremely unusual. This is late February type weather, late -- early March. I’m dreading February. I just have a feeling we’re gonna have a couple of nice nasty storms come through. But the last 10 years or so January has been warmer. We have had the same if not more snow, but it hasn’t had the dryness." - Orpheus Allison
"I think probably why we would get more snow [than before is] because normally this time of year it would be so cold that it is too cold to snow. The temperatures are getting higher, it’s sitting in the middle part where it’s perfect temperature for snow, so we’re getting so much of it and it takes so long to melt." - Elyse Kiehn
"I think about the last few winters we've had, how everything keeps thawing and refreezing and the impact of that. I mean, sure you can think about the climate but then there is also, you know, the impact on everyone and their daily life. So many more people probably falling on ice and getting hurt or at least that is something people have to think about now." - Isaiah Ross
"...going way back, 20, 30 years, [at] Thanksgiving sometimes the ponds would be frozen. Sometimes it'd be open water. Come Christmas they'd always be well frozen. Recent years, most years, it'd be open water on Thanksgiving and come Christmas, there might be ice but you wouldn't dare to go on it because it's not frozen well enough." - Don Nodine
"If lobsters want to move, they are going to move. They are going to walk. The shifting of the Gulf Stream is also not just influencing the temperature of the water, but also weather patterns, so it’s an economic issue for us." - Melanie Hodgdon
"November 10th. I used to plan on the last frost up to about Memorial Day in the spring, and the first frost to be September 30th. That was for the last 40 years. And now we're at November 10th before we finally got hit at our house. And again, we have been at our house for 39 years. So we have -- it's not like, oh, well, you're living in a different spot. No, we've been there for 39 years. And November 10th, it's definitely -- the seasons are shifting. I'll just leave it at that." - Melanie Hodgdon
"And, again, as Melanie was mentioning, it's not so much the wind, which is a major problem. It's the higher winds and the rain. And when you go out and look at these things, the ground is absolutely saturated, and it's saturated down for several inches. So it doesn't need even as big a wind to take them down." - Edward Hodgdon
"There's a whole bunch of leaves on the ground, which I feel like we're at the end of October, almost in November, and I feel like there should be, [the] trees should be naked, but...." - Kaitlyn Norwood
"Apparently there used to be bats [in them]. But there's something called white-nose disease. It's a fungal infection that goes through bat hibernating areas and wipes them out. So, the bat populations have dropped like 90% for that reason. Apparently, it's happened in Maine, too, because these bat boxes have been empty. Now how does that relate to climate crisis or climate change? I actually don't know specifically, but my hunch is that something has happened. Like the humidity has changed. Like the temperatures in these caves have changed. This allows this fungus which wasn't there before." - Jonathon Gold
"We haven't, even though we're [at], what, [the] 17th of December? [We] haven't had prolonged cold weather and so the ground is partially frozen in places, but not completely frozen. And any moist areas [that] have not frozen, water's seeping out, and there's no snow layer. And at one particular place, a place of the ski trail that's probably six feet in length and the full width of the trail, that's mud.... then with cold weather it freezes and is icy and not good skiing." - Don Nodine
CHRIS MAAS: In 30 years of doing this, could you take a stab at how much longer the growing season might be? In your memory, Janet?
JANET YELCH-WEATHERBEE: I would say three weeks.
CHRIS MAAS: Whoa.
LESLEY FERNOW: That’s a lot.
LOUISE RINGLE: We keep planting. We’re amazed by the potatoes, so I don’t know, it’s hard to know. We got a snowstorm November 1st last year.
JANET YELCH-WEATHERBEE: All right.
CHRIS MAAS: It was 70 [degrees] yesterday on October 21st.
About CHANGE
CHANGE is a climate change research project directed by Dr. Kati Corlew and is dedicated to reaching a better understanding of peoples' perceptions of climate change. Our research was conducted using a qualitative research method called PhotoVoice. PhotoVoice, is a method “by which people can identify, represent, and enhance their community”. (Wang & Burris, 1997, p. 369) Our participants met in focus groups to discuss the research topics, and then went out into their communities to take photographs according to their conceptualization, values, and priorities regarding the topic. They then selected photographs to present and discuss in a final focus group (Gleason & Corlew, 2019). By placing participants’ photos, stories, and conceptualizations at the center of the study, we hope to expand the exploratory nature of this research to include themes outside of current climate change conceptualizations. For more information, please visit our Main Page.