Unusual weather patterns last month are a taste of what's to come as the climate changes

Last May, was the warmest on record in New Zealand, as well as one of the wettest in many places.

NIWA meteorologist Seth Carrier says this is down to changing weather patterns as the climate cycle transitions from a cooler wetter climate to a warmer, drier one.

However, he warns as the global climate continues to change, New Zealand will experience more intense weather anomalies.

Carrier says extreme rainfall events are probably going to be more extreme and the dry periods and the droughts are going to be more extreme as well over the next few decades.