The end of last year may have brought to a close a decade of
strange weather, but it didn't bring an end to La Nina. That
cold-weather cousin of El Nino will extend her chilly fingers
into the coming haying season, predict meteorologists. And that
could give some farmers more than the usual climatic challenges.
Meteorologist Evelyn Browning Garriss, who authors a monthly
weather publication called The Browning Newsletter, says the
decade of the '90s was an unusual one, weatherwise. "We had an
El Nino for four years in a row, then a break, and then another
El Nino," she says. "That's very unusual since El Ninos usually
occur once every four to seven years." What causes these south-
of-the-border-sounding weather systems? El Nino is a warming of
the sea surface temperatures in the Pacific Ocean around the
equator due to weakened trade winds. Conversely, La Nina results
from strong trade winds and a drop in ocean temperature in the
southern Pacific. In both cases, Peru and other South American
countries feel the