michsnowfreak

Thats what id say. A week early. I usually think of peak as Oct 24-30, this year thinking Oct 18-25

Color continues to seem ahead of schedule. Next weekend may he peak here. Im planning to do some weekend leaf peeping.

Ill worry about a mid season flip after Christmas. The initial thing of interest will be during the assumably more hostile beginning part of winter, how much snow can we squeak out in the more northern locations. Will also be interesting to see if the Lakes can crank some goods in November. Its been over a decade since we have NOT seen a good November cold shot with snow. And in fact, several Novembers have been snowier than December in that time.

1990s winters here were warmer than 2000s or 2010s winters. Weather always ebbs and flows regardless of the earth's overall warming, and warming is not evenly distributed. I agree 1980s winters were largely cold, especially the first half of the decade. But it was coming off the brutally cold 1970s winters, just decades removed from the much, much milder winters of the 1930s-50s. Weather is not going to stop being weather, so i really disagree with too much of trying to take a previous warm enso event at face value and then just assuming we need to add x amount of additional warmth to every locations weather because its years or decades later. Its pointlessly trying to be too meticulous.

I absolutely think we see some fun winter storms this year. It just wont be the constant white, frozen landscape of last winter.

Pretty big ranges. But the low end of the range seems ridiculous for Chicago. They've had 4 winters on record with less than 15", most recently 1949. They did however have a sub-20" winter a few years ago. Detroit has not had a sub-20" winter since 1969 (came close in 1983). And Buffalo is always a wildcard depending if lake bands set up over the airport or elsewhere. Boston, Philadelphia and NYC will likely be too low if indeed a huge noreaster occurs.

Absolutely all relative. I love arctic cold. Last winter was great even without heavy total snowfall. It was cold, frozen and white. Often times the "warm" spells in strong ninos here is damp overcast with highs 37-40°, which is more uncomfortable imo than dry cold at 0°. An active pattern should hopefully promote a temp rollercoaster even though it ends up mild in the mean.

This is the actual anomaly map.

This is another excellent point. I sometimes think some get too wrapped up in the reds and blues of a temp anomaly map. Dark red in Winnipeg and blue in Atlanta? Means it's only going to be 30F colder in Winnipeg than Atlanta instead of the normal 40F colder lol.

I wish it was the Tigers...but enjoy!!!

Oh for sure. This is something a shocking number of people cant seem to grasp- that a mild seasonal mean doesnt mean no cold blasts or below avg days, it just means fewer.

41F at DTW this morning but 30s with the first frost in the rural and outlying areas.

The core of the most impressive anomalies in 1877-78 were in the far upper midwest and into Canada. It was and still is known as Minnesota's infamous "year without a winter". The temp departures, even against the current milder averages, are astounding, especially in northern Minnesota. Further east, it was a torch December here but only run-of-the-mill mild Jan/Feb, with quite a snowy stretch from late Jan to mid Feb. Detroit finished with 43.4", right around avg for snowfall, but snowfall was heavily confined to Jan-Feb, with only 1.0" in Nov, 1.9" Dec, T Mar and 0 Apr. It was certainly a mild winter in the east, but nothing like Minnesota.

Climate change autism on here is worse than snow autism. Any discussion of snow/cold (not in this thread, on any thread) hits a button with those who have cc autism. Last winter was especially brutal. There are only a small handful of posters on this board who only post about one thing and one thing only, and its not the snow crowd.