Even when the weather is quiet, there is almost always something to see in the sky! WBRZ Weather viewers can be counted on to do just that, and send in their beautiful pictures.

On Thursday, Catherine Chachere spotted rainbow clouds in Denham Springs. These are caused by cloud iridescence. It usually happens in high clouds, like cirrus, because of diffraction – a phenomenon that occurs when small water droplets or small ice crystals scatter the sun's light. Cloud iridescence is relatively rare. The cloud must be thin and have lots of water droplets or ice crystals of about the same size. When that happens, the sun's rays encounter just a few droplets at at time.

Alisa Ransome saw a similar process happening with a halo around the afternoon sun. These too are noticed in very thin clouds made up of tiny droplets or crystals. The halos are caused by both refraction, or splitting of light, and also by reflection of light. You can also see a halo around the moon sometimes, but they are less colorful, simply because moonlight is not as bright as sunlight.

What Catherine and Alisa may not have known when sending in these pictures, is that they were helping out with the weather forecast! High, thin clouds such as cirrus are often the first type of cloud that appears before a storm system or front moves into an area. Humidity, thicker clouds and even a few showers are all expected to return on Friday. CLICK HERE for the detailed WBRZ Weather forecast blog.

If you see interesting weather happening, send a picture to weather@wbrz.com or tweet @WBRZweather. You can also submit directly to us through the free WBRZ WX App on your Apple or Android device.