Stress Degree Days (SDD) is an index comparing the daily high temperature to some base temperature. Accumulated over time, it can be an effective measure of how much stress was experienced due to really hot temperatures. A common base temperature used with plants like corn is 86F. The featured chart looks at the daily climatology of SDDs along with the actual daily values for Ames so far this year. The red line shows the simple daily average based on period of record data. It is kind of interesting to see the flatness of that line during August and into September. Elevated levels of humidity during this period is likely the explanation as it acts to suppress really hot temperatures.

Voting:
Good = 12
Bad = 0

Tags:   sdd