Warm, dry weather leads to early start to allergy season

Pollen counts expected to increase first of February

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – Are itchy, watery eyes and runny noises already hitting you hard this year? Well get ready allergy season is already here and the Weather Authority says its starting earlier this years due to low number of freezes this winter.

"We haven't had the number of freezes as we normally have, so the pollen tends to come out little bit earlier," Dr. Sunil Joshi, Family Allergy and Asthma Consultants.

Joshi says allergy suffers have flooded his office since early January.

According to Pollen.com, over the past 30 days pollen counts have been in the low to medium range, but jumped to the medium to high category during the first week of February.

With such an early start to the season, it can be difficult to tell if you're dealing with a common cold or suffering from seasonal allergies.

Joshi says most allergy sufferers will typically have clear mucus and itchy or watery eyes.  He adds while allergy symptoms don't usually get worse over time, they do tend to last longer than the common cold.

"But sometimes they can be very, very similar, so if you are dealing with issues for more than a week or ten days please go see your healthcare provider," says Joshi.