Bjørn Frang has for many years predicted the weather by looking at perch dorsal fins in the border forest between Norway and Sweden in the Finnskogen district of eastern Norway. The 12 fins on the back of a fish match with a year’s months. The August and September fins are light so suggest a good August and September, Frang suggests.
However, in October his perch fins turn very dark. “Then there will be snow. Perch fin is perfectly black. It's a bit boring, but it could be a hard winter,” says Frang.
Svein Sparby, in Solør in southern Norway, agrees. Sparby uses birch twigs to divine the weather’s intentions and he’s also certain Norway will endure an early winter. “I think winter begins in October. I think it will be a real, old-fashioned winter with lots of snow,” says Sparby.
Sparby is also not so sure that a warm August and September are on the cards. “It is unstable. It looks like it will continue that way. There will be some sunny days but not many consecutive days.”
Mind you, back in March, Sparby told Ostlendingen newspaper that he expected a dry summer.
He clearly didn’t twig that Norway would have a sodden summer.
One Norwegian village, Ogndal, north of Trondheim, recently endured an estimated 102mm of rain in a single hour, followed by heavy hail which left a layer of ice across the area.
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