Doyle Rice

USA TODAY

It may have been good for frolicking in the leaves, but not for folks who wanted to take a few brisk walks in the woods: You just experienced the warmest autumn ever recorded in the United States.

The average temperature across the USA this fall was 57.6 degrees — a whopping 4.1 degrees above average, according to scientists from NOAA’s National Centers for Environmental Information. That's a huge number in climate science where records are typically broken by a few tenths to a few hundredths of a degree.

The new measure tops last fall, defined as the months of September, October and November, as the warmest since climate records began in 1895. The unusual warmth this year exacerbated the drought in the Southeast, helping fuel deadly and devastating wildfires there.

Eight states were record warm — Colorado, Iowa, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, New Mexico, Texas and Wisconsin — while 27 others experienced an average autumn temperature that was either second or third warmest on record, NOAA said.

As for last month, it was the second-warmest November on record for the U.S., with an average temperature of 48 degrees, a massive 6.3 degrees above average. That was only behind November 1999. Every state except Hawaii tallied an unusually warm November.

For the year-to-date, while the U.S. is seeing its second-warmest year on record, trailing only 2012, the Earth as a whole is having its warmest year since records began in 1880.