The winter storm track has been pushed north since the 1970s, creating hotter, drier springs in an already thirsty region, according to researchers at the University of Arizona.

An earlier spring is likely to decrease mountain snowpack, whose runoff many Southwest residents depend on for late summer water supply, said Stephanie McAfee, one of the study's authors.

"We're used to thinking about climate change as happening sometime in the future to someone else, but this is right here and affects us now. The future is here," said co-author Joellen Russell.

McAfee now plans to investigate whether the changing wind patterns have affected western vegetation.