I'm happy to buy into any theory as long as its predicting that this winter will bring lots of snow, and there are predictions a plenty going on at the moment.

Self confessed weather geek, J.Madden is predicting "that the UK and Northern Europe will experience at the very least a winter similar to the last, or as I expect much worse with heavy snowfall" in his blog and he's even gone to the trouble of explaining it all on youtube.

He is citing facts based on the Gulf Stream, lack of sun spots, shrinking of the thermosphere, La nina and the Icelandic volcano.

Joe Bastardi (top name) from Accuweather.com has countered this stating "My gut feeling is the core of the cold this winter... in relation to normals will run from the Alps to the Balkans. I don't think Great Britain is as cold as last year, more or less a normal winter"

Over in the USA, we have more contrasting predictions. My old favorite, the Farmers Almanac is predicting the East coast will be extremely cold and snowy, but the West coast will be pretty mild. Countering that, the weather space is predicting the exact opposite with the West coast being extremely cold.

What ever happens my favorite prediction so far has been from CairnGorm Mountain’s head of ski patrol Colin Matthew, who has conclusive proof that it will be another epic season in Scotland.

“In 2009 the snowberries in my garden appeared early, in August, and were particularly large. And then I noticed that they budded and flowered again two or three times during the season, on each occasion coinciding with the massive falls of snow we experienced last season. The berries are as big as ever this year, so if my theory is right we are in for another winter with a lot of snow.”

And you can't argue with that logic.