After that early appearance from winter, it looks like fall has not only returned, but will stick around a while.
Monday was the earliest snow for Denver in five years, but Wednesday saw the return to 70 degree temperatures in the metro. Denver averages 4 inches of snow in October, and 2.8 inches were measured with Monday's storm at DIA.
We even spotted a few Painted Lady butterflies out in the downtown area Wednesday. They are not around in the same numbers they were last week, but a few did survive the storm, and there are even a few stragglers just arriving to the area from the north. These butterflies are on their way to Mexico for the winter.
There is also a fall color show happening with the leaves down at the lower elevations. Those colors usually peak in mid-October. There are trees in many different stages of change in the Denver area.
Some are in full color while others are just starting to change or have already dropped most of their leaves.
The weather over the next 10 days features mostly warm and sunny conditions. Average highs for Denver in mid-October is 65 degrees.
A small system will clip the northern part of Colorado on Friday night, bringing cooler temperatures and a chance for afternoon showers on Saturday. That system will not likely be cold enough for snow, but could bring an inch or two to parts of the higher mountains.
Then it's a long stretch of warm and sunny conditions next week. The next system will arrive on Thursday Oct. 19, or Friday Oct. 20.
At this point, that system looks to have little impact on the lower elevations, but could bring a few inches of snow to the northern mountains.
