A lot of Texas residents are wondering what happened to winter, according to Austin member station KUT. While it’s true that we’ve had plenty of nice days to go outside in February, the weather has had other impacts as well. In Austin, the famous bats under the Congress Avenue Bridge have been out and about. Normally they aren’t seen until summertime.
Meanwhile, in the Hill Country town of Fredericksburg people are picking strawberries. That’s because a local farmer bet on a warmer winter, resulting in three long blocks of ten thousand plants yielding juicy red berries.
But the news isn’t all good, of course. Walking through his peach orchard, one farmer said 35 years ago he used to plant a variety of peach tree that performed better on cold winter nights. He concluded: “I would not even think about planting a variety of that kind nowadays.” The winters just don’t get cold enough for those types of trees anymore.