And a ton of tiny AR specks, like freckles, along the equator.
Today we are treated to a SunSpeck O’rama.
1 year into SC23 shows Sunspot Areas exceeding 1,000 x 10E6 regularly.
Today, we are lucky to make 70 by SWPC/NOAA roughstimate, and about 25 x 10E6 by actual measurements.

And well-distributed between hemispheres?

Thanks for some excellent composites of our sleepy neighbour.

I wonder if it’s the low magnetic field and lack of coronal holes which is more significant than the lack of sunspots?

Would be good to have better knowledge of how the sun really works – perhaps we’ll get some more clues as this, and the next cycle, unfold.

Got it, thanks. I will plod thru.

Try looking for the ‘windup’ of differential rotation (or lack thereof).
The ‘red’ is the EIT 284, and you are not seeing much of it because of the lack of large active regions.
Try also this page:http://www.robertb.darkhorizons.org/DeepSolarMin9.htm
At the bottom, you will find an image with sunspots superimposed at Solar Max (SC23) 10/28/03
and another one of SN11029 (SC24) 10/28/09.

Unfortunately, as of late, the SOHO EIT images have become very erratic in both quality and matched sets.
Likely on it’s last legs.

Verry cool. No, can’t say I know what to look for. False color red absent, green virtually gone, polar corornal holes tiny, … The appearance benign, note spots irrelevant to whole.

Another hint?

The dropout that you keep bringing up, Anthony, is haunting.
Let’s see if we can tell why:
http://www.robertb.darkhorizons.org/EITNov1996_Nov2009.JPG
See anything on a yearly basis that says “Eureka, I have found it” ?

Continuing the thought: The perturbation of the solar dynamo dropped out on or about Oct. 2005(Anthony’s AP posts) when cycle 23 was nearly complete.

The dropout seems to have occurred much early during cycle 4′s progress.

Additionally, the Schwabe cycle this time around was in a bimodal state, as it was during cycle 11 during the immediately prior ‘minimum of significance’, i.e., 12-14, say. Tallbloke, I think, sometime back, noted these two modes as discretely hemispheric.

While the strength of the perturbing influence and its secular collapse may be an important ingredient of ‘Grand Minima’, the state of the solar dynamo itself needs further elucidation.

The graphs referenced correlate very closely with the 14c and 10Be records. The period from the MWP to recent times showing a cooling as a result of reduced solar output. Its a pity they didnt have thermometers back then, because if they did and the pattern was the same we would have no argument.

But it shows the Maunder was only one part of the cooling.

Not too many have predicted a grand minimum…if it comes to pass many will have to admit the science is far from settled.

Q:
Dr. Svalgaard, What is your prediction for the solar maximum and when?

A:
F10.7 = 123
Late 2013
SSN ? because of L&P

“Read up on climate audit’s saga on SST measurement around the WWII years. Also, from my studies, it looks like the PDO positive phase ended with a huge el nino, whereas in the modern warm period, the big el nino came some years before the peak of the oceanic phases. (Unless we are gatting a nother big one soon, but I doubt it).”

You’re referring to the post bucket adjustment then? I saw a graph on CA once where it kind of filled in the low portion of the PDO phase after someone’s attempt at correction. Point taken. Interesting comment on the El Nino, makes the peak appear more pronounced in the last positive cycle.