If the winter solstice is the longest night of the year, why does it mark the beginning of winter, rather than the very middle of it?

Question

If the winter solstice is the longest night of the year, why does it mark the beginning of winter, rather than the very middle of it?

In: Earth Science

Answer 1

The rate at which you lose heat is dependent on the current temperature. The rate at which you gain heat is dependent on the current day length, and how high the sun gets in the sky. It takes some time for the temperature to catch up to what it would be if we got this amount of sunlight every day all the time. Basically, it’s still holding some heat from the warmer parts of the year.