Not Just Us: Winter Keeps Trying To Crash Spring's Party

The weather pattern is switching to a chilly, potentially
frosty one for the next two weeks at least, so our early
spring looks like it will go on hold, or worse, actually
suffer some damage. We'll see.

 Most of the last of this past week's snow is melting from New England high country today, as spring tries to battle back from that last wintry setback. 

Despite an early spring over much of the nation, winter in the past few days has increasingly tried to crash the party more and more aggressively.  That state of affairs will continue for the next week at least.  

So while spring will continue to try and assert itself, winter is going to win some last chance battles.  The weather pattern has really switched to a cold one for most of the nation east of the Rockies. 

By the way, those at risk for some stinging, damaging frosts and freezes include us here in Vermont, at least eventually. More on that further down in this post. 

Winter's echo began at the end of last week, as we well know. While we were getting our spring snowstorm in Vermont and the rest of New England, parts of Colorado, Wyoming and Nebraska were dealing with their own winter blast. 

Several thousand people lost power around Denver as several inches of wet snow collapsed some trees and wires.  Like here in New England, Colorado has had some pretty good warm spells this spring, so trees were beginning to leaf out. That's bad when there's snow, as the slush accumulates heavily on the leaves, forcing branches to break.

About seven inches of snow accumulated around Denver. That's not even close to their biggest April snow on record, but it was a set back. Wyoming and Nebraska also dealt with snow and slick roads Friday. 

More snow is likely in the Denver metro area Monday as a colder weather pattern settles into the eastern two thirds of the nation.

Believe it or not, a typhoon way out in the western Pacific Ocean near the Philippines is contributing to this weather pattern.  It was a Category 5 as of this weekend, the strongest you can get. As it heads north, it will help disrupt the weather pattern in a way that makes cold snaps more likely in the eastern and central United States. 

In the northern Plains, where temperatures were at record breaking readings as high as 90 degrees or so earlier this month, the early spring buds have been getting nipped by frost in the past few days. 

On Monday and Tuesday, temperatures are forecast to sink into the teens in North Dakota and 20s in South Dakota. A winter storm warning is up for tonight and Monday in South Dakota's Black Hills for more than six inches of snow. 

There will no doubt be frost and freeze warnings in the central and southern Plains and parts of the Midwest in the coming days. 

Freeze watches are already in effect for Monday night as far down as northern Texas and Oklahoma Monday night.  There could even be a little snow and freezing rain in the Texas Panhandle Monday night. 

VERMONT EFFECTS

For us in Vermont, a series of storms and cold fronts will eventually threaten crops and gardens around here. Possible worst case scenario: You know how the trees are starting to green up?  It could possibly get cold enough to wreck those tender new leaves, meaning trees would have to start over, turning a record early spring into a remarkably late one. 

That bad scenario is not cast in stone and probably isn't even likely, but it could definitely happen in the upcoming weather pattern. It's one that will last awhile, too.

The first cold snap will come later Wednesday and Thursday, but this first one doesn't look frigid enough to cause any damage. A nice rainfall looks likely Wednesday. That's a good thing, because despite all the rain and snow in recent days, we still need more. 

Thursday and to a lesser extent Friday look blustery and chilly in Vermont.  Thursday would feature highs not getting out of the 40s with rain and snow showers. Wednesday night through Friday night would get into the low to mid 30s. Most of us will probably touch the freezing mark, but it won't be cold enough long enough to cause any trouble with plants. 

I'm more worried about a second cold front next Sunday.  At this point, that one looks like it could drive some very chilly air into the North Country. It's way too soon to say exactly how cold it would get, but it's possible we could see temperatures fall well into the 20s at night, possibly near 20.

Normally in late April, such temperatures are not that big a deal, because fruit trees, gardens and decorative flowering shrubs aren't usually far enough along by now to be affected by that kind of weather.   

But the warm spring means everything is as far along as they normally are in mid-May.  If the forecast holds, we could see some real agricultural losses, and a disappointing absence this spring of leaves and flowers.

Some weather models overdo anticipated cold snaps this far in advance and that could well be the case here. So what I outlined above is a worst case scenario.  Chances are it won't be that bad. Time will tell. 

The weather pattern does not look like it will turn warm again for the foreseeable future. Those days upon days of temperatures in the 60s ad 70s we experienced aren't coming back through at least early May, I'm afraid.