Fishing Opener

Courtesy of the Minnesota Climatology Working Group in Saint Paul, a few Minnesota fishing opener climate highlights:

Minnesota's fishing opener weather is typified by partly cloudy to cloudy skies. Three out of four years are free of measurable precipitation. A trace of snow has been reported in northern Minnesota on at least four of the last 56 fishing openers. On at least three occasions, some lakes were still frozen for the opener (as of this writing, this year may make that four).

Opening day temperatures have started as low as 24 degrees at International Falls (1996, 2004), with freezing temperatures possible even in Minneapolis (31 degrees in 1979).

On the warm side, Saint Cloud saw 92 degrees in 1987, and International Falls reached 88 in 1977.  This year looks quite cool with rain possible, mainly in the southern half of the state.  

Posted by: Daryl Ritchison on 5/07/2008 at 11:21 AM | Comments (0) | Permalink

Snowy April

April 2008 will go down into the record books as a snowy and cold month.  Fargo Moorhead received 16.9 inches of snow last month which was the second snowiest April on record.  Some parts of west central Minnesota had between two and three feet of snow in April, with isolated spots reporting nearly 50 inches of snow.  So it will be an April to remember for the heavy snow falling in the area.  

The moisture content of the snow in combination with a few rain showers last month contained 2.33 inches of liquid which is nearly one inch above average.  

Of course you can not get all that snow this time of year unless temperatures are below average and last month finished 2.6 degrees below the long term average.  That made April the fifth month in a row with below average temperatures. 

It was also the first April since 1997 without a 70 degree high temperature.

Posted by: Daryl Ritchison on 5/01/2008 at 8:44 AM | Comments (0) | Permalink

Snowy Spring

Our latest snow event has increased the total snow for the month to 16.9 inches which places April 2008 as the second snowiest April since snow records began in 1885. We missed the record set back in 1904 by just a half inch. 

The late season snowfall was also enough to move this spring season into third place all-time for snowfall.  Since March 1, Fargo Moorhead has received 28.1 inches of snow.  The spring snowfall record was set in 1997 with 33.6 inches falling. 

But there is even more to tell, as our snow total for the season is now up to 59.8 inches, which now places us very close to the top ten for snowiest winters.  Only another 2.6 inches of snow is need to tie us for 10th place. 

So was it a snowy winter?  The answer would have to be no, but was it a snowy spring?  Indeed.

Posted by: Daryl Ritchison on 4/28/2008 at 10:14 AM | Comments (0) | Permalink

Snow Totals April 25 & 26

Minnesota

Posted by: WDAYweather on 4/27/2008 at 4:12 PM | Comments (0) | Permalink

Spring Forecasting

During many of my recent public appearances I have been asked the same question, what is the hardest time of year to forecast the weather? 

My normal response is to say that because of our geographic location this area tends not to get a break in the weather like some parts of the country do during the course of a year, so forecasting here keeps you busy 365 days a year.  But if I had to pick a season I would say Spring.  This time of year brings us rapid changes in weather from temperatures in the 70s and 80s to the 30s with snow the very next day.  We sometimes will have thunderstorms in one part of our area to snow in the other. 

A few years back Fargo/Moorhead was under a Severe Thunderstorm Watch and a Winter Storm Watch at the same time.  So although all seasons keep meteorologist busy around here, the Spring season can bring the most interesting weather of all.

Posted by: Daryl Ritchison on 4/25/2008 at 10:18 AM | Comments (0) | Permalink

April Blizzard

Earlier this month, much of eastern South Dakota experienced blizzard conditions. April blizzards have occurred in this area as far back as settlers kept records.

I have always enjoyed reading Laura Ingalls Wilder's Little House books. One of the many things I find enjoyable about all the books is the fact that weather events are mentioned, often in great detail. The Long Winter is the most obvious book she wrote that dealt with weather during the winter of 1880-81.

Her next book "Little Town on the Prairie" deals with events in De Smet, South Dakota during the following winter of 1881-2 which she describes as an open winter with no blizzards. No blizzard that is until April of 1882 when Pa makes the remark of how odd it was that the only blizzard of the winter occurred in April.

Many South Dakotans were probably saying the same thing in April of 2008.

Posted by: Daryl Ritchison on 4/23/2008 at 10:08 AM | Comments (0) | Permalink

Red

It was on April 18, 1997 that the Red River crested in Fargo Moorhead at 39.57 feet which was the highest crest recorded since 1897.  That year the Red River stayed above flood stage from April 3 through May 17 and, more remarkably, the Red River stayed above 30 feet from April 6 to May 4 that year. 

Since then the Red River has crested as high as 37.2 feet in 2006 and 36.7 feet back in 2001.  Even last year we had water problems as heavy rain caused the Red to crest seven times from April through June with the peak crest occurring in early June a little above 30 feet.  So far this year the Red has stayed below flood stage and very likely will remain there unless heavy rains move back into the area. 

We have had two other years in the past decade with no flooding at all.  A third such year would be nice. 

Posted by: Daryl Ritchison on 4/22/2008 at 5:54 AM | Comments (1) | Permalink

Our Snow Season

Since March 1 Fargo Moorhead has received 19 inches of snowfall, so yes, it was a snowy six week period in the area.  That extra snow brought our seasonal snowfall total up to 50.7 inches.  I have heard a few people mention to me about how snowy it was this winter, but I tried to remind them that our average snowfall is 48 inches, so it was just a very average snow season for us. 

That 48 inch average is the current 30 year average and because the 1990s were so snowy the average did jump quite a bit with the last decadal change in the averages.  Even if we use the 100 year average of around 40 inches, this winter would still fall well within the bounds of an average snowfall season. 

Since the winter of 1996-1997 our seasonal snowfall has varied from 28.8 inches in the winter of 2004-2005 to 53.8 inches in the winter of 2003-2004.

Posted by: Daryl Ritchison on 4/17/2008 at 11:20 AM | Comments (0) | Permalink

Snowy Earth

Last summer I wrote about how the southern hemisphere had some rare snow events with Buenos Aires, Argentina and Johannesburg, South Africa both receiving snow for the first time in a generation. The snowy trend then moved to the northern hemisphere, with heavy snows in south China, the Middle East and Greece.

In the United States seasonal snowfall records have been broken in parts of Colorado, Wisconsin, Michigan, Vermont and Maine. Also, many snowfall records were broken in Ontario in southern Canada. Locally, snowfall has been about average so far this winter, but many recent winters have had lighter snowfall and there was talk that heavy snow was a thing of the past.

Such talk is always silly as slow climatic shifts often occur over decades if not centuries. Plus, sometimes we need to be reminded that certain weather events do just happen just once in a lifetime

Posted by: Daryl Ritchison on 4/09/2008 at 6:51 AM | Comments (2) | Permalink

Snowy Minnesota

The Minnesota state record for daily snowfall in April is 28 inches.  This past weekends storm dumped twenty to thirty inches of snow over portions of north central Minnesota from late Saturday night into Monday morning.  The heaviest total observed was a report of 32 inches measured about five miles north of Virginia, Minnesota. 

A little bit closer to home, 28 inches of snow was measured between Park Rapids and Bemidji on Highway 71.  Because these measurements occurred over a period of 36 to 48 hours they did not break the old daily (24 hour) total, but since snow measurement records began in Minnesota this storm ranked up there as one of the heaviest snowfalls ever observed. 

As a reference, the famed Halloween Blizzard of 1991 brought about three feet of snow to Duluth, so this storm was not far behind.  The Minnesota record for a single storm is 47 inches that fell along the North Shore back in January, 1994.

Posted by: Daryl Ritchison on 4/08/2008 at 11:33 AM | Comments (1) | Permalink