Earlier this week I met my girls at the bus stop after school. I had just taken our dog on a thirty minute walk after a long day of work meetings, and the fresh air and warm sunshine were rejuvenating. I wore a winter hat, but I wasn’t wearing gloves, winter boots, or jacket – just a warm flannel shirt and my regular hiking shoes.
My youngest launched off the bus, winter jacket in hand and a huge smile on her face. “Momma, it’s SUMMER!”
January 29th, 2024. Zero snow. 48 degrees Fahrenheit at 3:45 pm. In Minnesota.
For reference, 5 degrees Fahrenheit was the temperature exactly a year ago. And we had at least 8 inches of snow on the ground.
This winter has been bizarre, especially compared to last years extreme snowfalls and cold fest. I definitely don’t miss having to bundle up my kids in their snow pants and neck muffs everyday or trying to remember to put wet gloves on the heat register to dry overnight. Nor do I miss shoveling the driveway or leaving 20 minutes earlier to drive somewhere because the roads might be a mess. Navigating a Minnesota winter takes a lot of time and effort, and I will be the first to admit, it’s been nice having a break from that.
Still, there are not-so-great impacts, too. Most people would agree that not having much snow through the holiday season was a drag. Sledding and outdoor ice skating have been a bust unless you’re somewhere that can MAKE snow and ice. The community debates on social media about lake ice depth and safety are rigorous and heated.
And of course, I can’t help but think of the environmental implications of such a warm winter as well. On my walk, my dog and I unsuccessfully dodged numerous puddles of mud – MUD – no more frozen ground! This weekend I learned a new term – ‘snirt’ – where soil is being blown from brown, tilled ag fields into adjacent ditches, covering the remaining snow drifts. A farmer’s greatest resource is soil, so having such a visual of it leaving a field at this time of year is a bit heartbreaking (and is completely a selling point for cover crops and no-till farming!)
Arborists have expressed concerns about the potential impact on trees if we undergo an extended period of cold weather without the insulating effect of snow covering the ground and protecting shallow roots. Native plant seeds need one to three months of cold stratification – could such warm conditions reduce germination rates or confuse plants so they germinate before frost season is over?
Another cold winter benefit is mitigating the spread of invasive species. Minnesota’s cold winters act as a natural barrier to invaders who can’t handle such climate extremes. Prime example is the emerald ash borer (EAB) that has wreaked havoc on ash tree populations across the state. If we don’t get as cold during our winters, those invasive species are able to gain an even stronger foothold here.
So seriously, what happened this year? Is this a fluke? Is it the continuing beat of climate change and a sign of a new normal? Answering those questions are beyond my expertise and comfort zone, but there has been one phenomenon that’s played an outsized role this year.
Last fall, many meteorologists were predicting a milder winter season in Minnesota, given the exceptionally warm temperatures observed in the equatorial Pacific Ocean.
Say what? How can temperature conditions in an ocean thousands of miles away influence our Minnesota winter? Welcome to El Niño.
El Niño, in the simplest terms, is a climate phenomenon that typically occurs every two to seven years and can influence extreme weather around the world. In a normal year, trade winds in the equatorial Pacific Ocean push warmer ocean water to the east (toward Australia and Indonesia), leading to upwelling of cooler water near the coasts of south and central America. In an El Niño year, those trade winds weaken, and that warm water hangs around, shifting global atmospheric climate patterns and leading to intense weather extremes across the globe.
For instance in El Niño seasons, Australia sees extreme droughts, South America gets heavy rainfall and flooding, and wildfires are more common in Indonesia.
But here in Minnesota, El Niño is generally characterized by warmer temperatures and less snow. The Pacific jet stream, which blows east to west and is responsible for bringing Minnesota colder, wetter weather, shifts south during El Niño years, bringing wetter conditions to the southern United States. Back in late October 2023, Paul Huttner, Chief Meteorologist for Minnesota Public Radio, wrote a great article that presented El Niño impacts since the 1950s. What I learned after reading that article is that El Niño can have different intensities – different flavors, if you will. It largely depends on how warm the ocean temperatures are in that particular year – if they are significantly warmer than average, we’ll have a ‘stronger’ El Niño event. Huttner was actually arguing that the 2023-2024 winter season could be a ‘Super’ El Niño, given the fact that scientists are seeing sea surface temperatures at least 36 degrees F above normal.
Given that it is currently 49 degrees F outside at the moment, I’m going say Huttner is on to something there. So…regardless if you are loving or hating our winter this year, you simply have to say, “Thanks, El Niño.”
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