Lots of rowan berries: does that really mean a snowy winter?
Your rowan’s clusters are clearly full, but they tell us more about this year’s flowering and fruit set than about the coming winter in Hartungviken. Here is why the old saying persists despite being an unreliable forecast.
This is a rowan carrying plenty of berries. The link with snow is an old saying rather than a reliable rule. A heavy berry crop mainly reflects good flowering, successful pollination and summer conditions that allowed the berries to develop.
An area can therefore have abundant rowan berries without a particularly snowy winter following. In late August, as here, it is normal to begin seeing how large the crop is, but the clusters still cannot tell us how much snow is coming.
The saying probably survives because years with conspicuous berry crops stick in the memory, especially when a snowy winter happens to follow. It is a charming piece of nature folklore, but too uncertain to rely on as a forecast.
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