Does A Warm October Indicate A Snowy Winter?

The snowy view out of our St. Albans, living room windows
in March, 2018. The previous October was the warmest
 on record, but the subsequent winter proved snowy,
which is a trend I'venoticed after warm autumns.

As you know, it's been a warm autumn here in Vermont.  Outside my St. Albans, Vermont house, we're on the second week of November and a few brightly colored leaves still cling to the trees.

October was the fourth warmest on record.  

Does such a balmy fall mean anything for the following winter?

Actually, I did find a bit of a correlation between warm Octobers and snowy winters.

Now, before I go further, some caveats. This is NOT a winter forecast. As I talked about in a previous post, I'm not a great believer in long range forecasts going a few months down the road.

Also, anything can happen after a warm October. There's been cold winters, warm winters, snowy winters and dry winters after toasty autumns.

But, because the weather is quiet at the moment, I decided to play a little parlor game of sorts by looking at the top ten lists of coldest and warmest Octobers in Burlington, Vermont, then looking at snowfall in the subsequent winters.

In the winters following the top ten warmest Octobers, the snowfall those years averaged out at 82.2 inches, which is just a little more than normal. In the winters following the coldest Octobers, the average snowfall was 66.1 inches, which is below normal.

So, in general, warm Octobers yield snowier winters.

There is no real reason for this. Maybe a coincidence?  Correlation is not causation, after all. I don't have any information in front of me that would say why warm Octobers often, but not always lead to relatively snowy winters.

Probably a real meteorologist, somebody smarter than me, can give a good explanation. 

The warm October/snowy winter doesn't always work. It's pretty inconsistent. I found four winters after warm Octobers with below average snowfall. And I found a couple snowy winters after cold Octobers.

Still, two of the winters that followed warm Octobers were among the top ten list of snowiest winters.

I also found no consistency on when it snows in these heavier winters.  For instance, some of the snowy winters found the state buried in snow in November, other years, practically nothing.  I don't know what's going to go on later this month, but I see no signs of any heavy snow here for awhile yet.

This little exercise is just reading tea leaves, of course. Anybody who's lived in Vermont even a short time knows the weather here is full of surprises. 

As I always say, I'll give you a very accurate reading of how this winter's weather will play out in Vermont. But you'll have to wait until next spring for me to tell you. By then, winter will be history and we'll all know if we had a bunch of sweet powder days, or brown, muddy cold season.