Updated 11:12am Sunday — Last week felt wintry, this weekend is warmer than average in many places and this week coming we have another cold change.

As we head through Sunday even warmer weather spreads down over New Zealand with connections to the sub-tropics and/or Australia – a real contrast to the polar airflow we had over Wednesday and Thursday in some areas.  Some places today will have highs in the early 20s.

For farmers who have been working tirelessly to protect newborn lambs here’s some good news – your overnight lows are also warming up above normal in many South Island areas and no one should be below average this weekend day or night in the South Island (a few pockets still below normal at night in the North Island though).

Daytime highs will be 4 to 8 degrees above normal this weekend with some places climbing over 20 degrees. 

But, another wintry snap is coming.

!COLD ALERT – FARMERS IN THE SOUTH ISLAND, COLD AIR RETURNS THIS WEEK:
It’s not all positive news – a heads up – another cold change is coming on Monday, peaking Tuesday, easing Wednesday with again the chance of some brief light low level snow flurries in the south. Once again our focus isn’t on precisely where the odd snow flurry goes but instead how cold it will be for newborn stock. We expect Tuesday in particular to produce miserable conditions with sub-zero wind chills overnight for a time and Wednesday may linger cold too for a time.

The cold air this coming week is mostly in the lower half of the South Island and goes from Monday to Wednesday with single digit highs in some areas. Snow flurries are possible to 100 or 200m around Northern Southland and perhaps some parts of Otago for a brief time but again whether you get a flurry or not is almost beside the point, it’s the cold + dampness that is the real issue for newborn livestock.

Remember to keep an eye on www.RuralWeather.co.nz for your local windchill extremes – we’ve designed this new weather website so you get fewer surprises with the weather.

-WeatherWatch.co.nz