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Zheng, J., Ding, L., Hao, Z. & Ge, Q. 2012 (January): Extreme cold winter events in southern China during AD 1650-2000. Boreas, Vol. 41, pp. 1-12. 10.1111/j.1502-3885.2011.00225.x. ISSN 0300-9483. We defined extreme cold winter events as those with occurrence probabilities lower than the 10th percentile of the probability density function, based on observed winter temperatures in southern China since 1951. Subsequently, we constructed impact severity levels using documentary evidence for those events during 1951-2000, considering three indexes for the freezing of rivers/lakes, widespread snow/ice storms, and cold damage to subtropical/tropical crops. Using these criteria we identified 50 extreme cold winters for the period AD 1650-1949 based on ∼4000 pieces of comparable information extracted from local gazettes in southern China, after verification using data from three weather stations with long records. It was found that the frequencies of the extreme cold winter events since 1650 varied over time. The most frequent occurrences were found during AD 1650-1699 and in the first and second halves of the 19th century, with frequencies twice as high as in the second half of the 20th century. In contrast, the frequencies of extreme winters during the 18th century were close to that in the second half of the 20th century. High frequencies of extreme cold winters in AD 1650-1720 and AD 1795-1835 occurred during the sunspot Maunder and Dalton Minima. The intensities of some historical cold events, such as those during 1653-1654, 1670, 1690, 1861, 1892 and 1929, exceeded those of the coldest winter events since 1951. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Modern meteorological observations in South China from 1960 to 2009 show a strong correlation between winter temperatures and two snowfall parameters, the southern boundary of the snow and the number of snowy days. Based on this relationship, the variation in annual winter mean temperature in South China from 1736 to 2009 was reconstructed using data acquired from Chinese historical documents dating from the Qing dynasty, such as memos and local gazettes. The reconstructed time series were used to analyse variations in winter temperature in South China. Significant interannual and interdecadal changes were found. The maximum temperature difference between neighbouring years was 3.1 °C for 1958-2009 and 3.0 °C for 1736-1957, whereas the maximum temperature difference between adjacent decades was 0.8 °C for the 1960s-2000s and 0.6 °C for the 1740s-1950s. The 2000s was the warmest decade; the mean temperature was 1.6 °C higher than that of the 1870s, which was the coldest decade between the 1740s and the 2000s. The mean winter temperature was warmer in the 18th and 20th centuries and coldest in the 19th century. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]