Record warm and snowless winter disrupts life in Minnesota – “People are bored”

By Melanie Evans
1 January 2024

(The Wall Street Journal) – For Minnesotan Tara Young, the perfect beach conditions are when the water is, well, extra stimulating. She prefers the middle of winter, when most mornings she treks off to soak in a nearby frigid lake.

The 38-year-old enjoys her chilly pastime so much she volunteers to clear and maintain an opening to the water through inches of ice, so bathers may plunge.

“I love the sawing and the clearing,” says Young, a mom and retail worker. “It warms you up a bit before you get in.”

That hasn’t been needed lately. There was thin or no ice on many Minnesota lakes in December, and the state’s average temperature for the month appears to be the warmest on record. One can hope this all turns around soon.

“Maybe we’ll get lucky and have a polar vortex,” says Young, referring to a weather pattern that can draw arctic air from the North Pole.

That is not a sentiment uttered in most of the U.S., but Minnesotans have an unusually close kinship with winter. For them, it is a season to escape, endure or embrace. The embracers go big. Towns compete for the title of the state’s coldest spot, thrillseekers surf the big waves off Duluth, and bars pop up in the middle of frozen lakes to cater to ice fishermen.

Now, relatively balmy temperatures and scarce snow have upended life as Minnesotans know it, disrupting routines, canceling wintry events and leaving many anxiously hoping for a return to bone-chilling normal.

“Pray for cold weather so we can go fishing!” wrote Garrison Sports Bait & Tackle in a post on its Facebook page.

The shop on Mille Lacs Lake is about 100 miles north of Minneapolis, not normally a region where the locals need divine intervention to make ice in the winter.

In colder years, owners Ashley Schmaltz and her husband, Wayne Schmaltz, use a heavy-duty diesel truck to plow snow from the ice for fishing. As many as 200 ice houses might dot the lake along their property.

As of Saturday morning, Schmaltz could see open water. Her family’s portable ice house remains folded in their backyard, and everybody she knows is itching to get out ice fishing. “People are bored.”

The local economy also counts on wintertime tourism, so on Facebook Garrison Sports Bait & Tackle is urging anglers who typically take their boats off the water in late fall, to put them back in. “Word is the bite is awesome. We are still offering 20% off bait until the lake freezes!”

December ended with a brief light snow in the Twin Cities, and while things were trending colder, the National Weather Service was forecasting above-normal low temperatures for the start of the year.

The unusual season is, in part, because air currents that deliver freezing temperatures to the state have shifted north this year with the El Niño weather system, a natural warming condition in the Pacific Ocean. Climate change has also contributed, says Pete Boulay, a climatologist with the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources.

Minnesota’s lack of snow is compounding the problem, since snow reflects solar radiation, Boulay says. Maps updated weekly show snow cover in a pocket of northwestern counties disappearing. The rest of Minnesota is largely bare.

“Having no snow on the ground is a big factor,” Boulay says. It is also eerie in a state where blizzards can strike as early as Halloween. One epic 1940 storm stranded hunters who froze to death. Heavy snowfall in 2010 accumulated on the inflated covering of the Minnesota Vikings stadium, which couldn’t bear the weight. It collapsed.

Just last winter, Minnesota snowfall set or neared record amounts in cities including Duluth, Minneapolis and St. Paul. “It’s almost like we had two winters last year, and that’s making up for this one,” says Boulay.

Unseasonable weather has canceled events that depend on brisk air and snow-packed trails, including kicksledding and cross-country skiing classes at Battle Creek Regional Park in St. Paul.

Also put on ice was the Minnesota Ice Festival, which noted in a cancellation announcement that “the weather hasn’t cooperated.” [more]

Minnesota Nice Wants Minnesota Ice: Locals Crave Bone-Chilling Normal