Current Weather Conditions            Area Weather Characteristics        Statistics

Current Weather Conditions and Weather Forcast	Time and Temp
Local Regional Doplar Radar

Year Around Weather Characteristics- South Central Zone

     Sweet Grass County is in the South Central Zone of Montana.  This zone is bordered by the Beartooth Mountains, the highest mountains range in Montana, in the Absoraka/Beartooth Wilderness areas south of Sweet Grass County.  The mountainous terrain of the southern and western sections of this zone provides upslope left for Pacific weather systems, causing them to release significant amounts of their precipitation.  However, the lift on the northeasterly winds, the flow so often involved in spring storms as well as the rainy season pattern, is much more important in giving the zone an annual normal of 15.87 inches, second only to the Northwest Montana Zone.  It is exceeded only by our Southeast Zone in availability of sub-tropical moisture from the Gulf of Mexico.  The zone exhibits a pronounced rainy season pattern from May to June.  Thunderstorms frequently cause wildfires as lightning hits the ground.  

     In winter the winds will switch to the southwest or west, the velocity increases rapidly, the temperature jumps from below zero to well above zero, and the humidity drops.  This is a phenomenon called Chinook winds, and will melt the snow at a rapid rate. Also in the winter, artic outbreaks often lose momentum after crossing the Central Zone and move into the South Central Zone much weaker and shallower.  At times the artic front will become stationary west of Sweet Grass County and never reach here.  Thus Sweet Grass County can have relatively mild Montana weather conditions. 
      The prevailing winds in the late fall and winter months is southwesterly  and is one of the strongest observed- with days where the wind blows 50 to 60 mph.

Weather Statistics and Preparing for Sweet Grass County Weather

     Preparing for Sweet Grass County weather involves taking into account the wide range of temperatures that we experience.  Within any given day the temperature can vary 50 degrees, or 30 degrees from the average monthly temperature seen in the graph below. 

     Sweet Grass County Home Page