michsnowfreak

Yup. Same here.

November is the time of year that it doesnt matter WHAT the weather/pattern is, winter lovers are sweating with the pre-winter jitters. If its a mild, boring pattern you get the complaints. But if its cold/snow, you get the "bad omen for winter" vibes, or "we are wasting the cold too early", etc.

I remember very well. It was quite warm Memorial Weekend, and people were laying in the sun on ice chunks. It was an incredible winter. Officially at Detroit it ranked as #1 snowiest & 8th coldest on record, but when combining the two it was the most severe on record. It was the 3rd coldest Dec-Mar on record. The deep snow hung around all winter, and ice stayed on the lakes til well into late April. And in northern MI it was even longer, as the article shows. Never saw such a long, relentless winter like that here. Seems like yesterday and this winter is now the 10th anniversary.

Oh and back to the weather...I will say it has been a very "Novembery" November so far this year. Only a week in, but looking back at recent years, we had several bouts of warm, Indian Summer weather (70s & sun) and also unusually early/heavy snow and cold. This year, November is really acting like November.

You want to talk 1990s? The earliest spring greenup Ive ever seen, other than 2012, was 1998. I have a pic in front of this flowering bush my mom has in full flower on Easter Sunday, 4-4-98. Today, that bush usually blossoms late April or early May.

Stuff like that is always possible. You can always see trees not native to a certain area growing if cared for properly. For instance, you see lots of white paper birch trees & balsam firs in the Detroit area even though their natural growth range is north. I have one of each myself. I just make sure they get water if its too hot/dry in summer. Likewise, trees/plants whos native areas are south of here can survive as long as they are covered in the winter (obviously this isnt feasible for big trees).

BTW you realize cromartie was lying. There is no way he was done raking by mid-October in the 1990s and now not until late-November. I guess somehow magically his leaves fell 2-3 weeks earlier in the 1990s and now fall 2-3 weeks later than they do at a similar climate here in SE MI.

You realize he is trolling? Michigan has NOT moved up 1-2 plant hardiness zones since 2000. LMAO. That would mean avg annual min temp has increase 10-20F. Detroit average annual min temp per decade 1880s: -6 1890s: -6 1900s: -5 1910s: -4 1920s: -2 1930s: -3 1940s: -1 1950s: 2 1960s: -4 1970s: -9 1980s: -10 1990s: -4 2000s: -2 2010s: -5

Even though a majority of the trees are bare now, there are still some clinging to leaves and let me tell you. Living on a tree lined street I've been fooled enough times. I just wait until they've all dropped to do any raking/blowing, otherwise it's pointless.

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Wow, that's incredible. That would mean that the average annual minimum temperature has increased 10 to 20° since the year 2000. Crazy how things like that work, seeing as how Detroit had 27 subzero days in the 1990s, 30 subzero days in the 2000s, and 50 subzero days in the 2010s.

There is a HUGE difference between a few additional days of frost free weather and supporting palms. I mean I would hope that amidst their trolling these guys have enough common sense to realize what is a legitimate goal and what is not. On a somewhat related note. A guy down the street, bless his ignorance, planted a tropical hibiscus in June in front of his house. I told him it looks nice, but he should maybe have it in a pot. He said he thinks it's supposed to survive winter lol. Nwedless to say, it is already wilted and dead after a handful of frosts and freezes before winter has even begun. Oh and Lakeshore living is always interesting because the leaves hang on so much longer in the fall and bloom so much later in the spring.

This is an excellent mantra to have ANY November.

This. Times 1000%. You can literally look up tweets of anyone knowing their biases and just see a bunch of graphs/pics to support their "forecast". And this absolutely goes for both sides.

The 1970s were in a league of their own for cold. If we were dealt the same pattern as we had in the late 70s, it would be way colder than average. Also remember, early to mid 20th century winters were much warmer than 1960s-70s ones. Below are the decades average winter temps at Detroit. The 1970s stick out like a sore, cold thumb. 1870s – 25.2 1880s – 27.6 1890s – 26.5 1900s – 24.9 1910s – 25.5 1920s – 25.8 1930s – 28.3 1940s – 27.0 1950s – 28.6 1960s – 26.2 1970s – 24.8 1980s – 25.9 1990s – 29.2 2000s – 27.7 2010s – 28.2 1874-2021 – 27.0

Admittedly, I was thinking more in terms of here in Michigan, plus I don't really know what goes into "regional" temperature averages as opposed to just individual station averages. But I cannot believe 13-14 was not a cold winter in the northeast. it was literally the most severe winter on record in Detroit and other nearby places. And Feb 2015 was the coldest month on record in some upper midwest cities.

Which part was denial? The part where I pointed out that cold/snowy November's recently have been seen as a bad omen for winter, or the part where I scoffed at the idea that palms will naturally grow in winter climates that currently average about 30°+ too cold for this?

14-15, 13-14, 10-11, 08-09 etc would certainly not need warmer normals to look cold.

Lmao. The Great Lakes will never be able to support palms naturally. Jokes aside though, I said it in passing last month and without fail it's true every year. November is the month where regardless of the weather, Winter weenies fear. We've had quite a few colder & snowier than average November's recently, and the take is always that it's bad luck for the winter. But then, if you have a mild November, that's also bad luck.

Feb 6, 2008 was ice here, ending as 2.6" snow. The scenery of ice coated trees topped with a fresh blanket of snow was beautiful, but naturally I was jealous of the deep heavy snow just to my north. What a winter that was. This was the second storm that really missed my area with good snow totals (the other one being January 1) and I still ended up with 78.2".

I was going to mention 1874-75 in my original post but didnt. So it's weird. Snowfall records technically date to the beginning of the climate record, which is November 1, 1870. (Happy 153rd birthday of weather records, Detroit ). However, due to some inconsistencies, including some missing data as well as some erroneous snow listed, even though MOST of the 1870-79 record is complete, since there are multiple missing data & errors scattered throughout the 1870s, DTX elects to consider snowfall officially as starting in 1880. It's kind of annoying since so much of the data is there and seems reliable, especially when you compare it to newspapers of the time, but have to stay consistent for records purposes so I quote snow data as starting in 1880.

A lot of it is weather superstition, of which we have plenty of lol. It doesnt help that we had a stretch of snowy, cold Novembers followed by mild Decembers the past decade. But in reality, it is no predicator of what winter will bring. Detroit Halloween-Winter Snowfall: 2023: 0.2" - Winter 2023-24: ? 2019: T - Winter 2019-20: 43.7" (mild) 2017: T - Winter 2017-18: 61.0" (avg/slightly cold) 2014: T - Winter 2014-15: 47.5" (cold) 1993: 0.1" - Winter 1993-94: 45.8" (cold) 1955: T - Winter 1955-56: 45.2" (avg/slightly cold) 1917: T - Winter 1917-18: 38.4" (cold)

26° and a dusting of snow opens November. Plenty of leaves yet to rake. But nevertheless I turned on Christmas music!

Had light snow falling during most of trick or treating hours, and it was fun passing out candy in a winter coat with flakes floating down. But at the time heavy snow squalls were splitting me from Flint to Toledo. I thought, did I REALLY just go from Fall-mode to "jealous bc a nearby city got more snow" mode in like 2 days, in October? But later in the evening a nice beautiful burst of snow coated the ground in white...winter is coming fast! Snow totals for Oct 31 were: DTW 0.2", FNT 1.1", MBS 0.5", TOL 0.7", all daily records for Oct 31. The high/low of 41°/27° (mean temp 34°) made it the 5th coldest Halloween on record at Detroit, but coldest since 1923. The real interesting stat tho, since snow records began in 1880, this was only the 7th Halloween to see snow, but 4 of the 7 years have been the last decade (1917, 1955, 1993, 2014, 2017, 2019, 2023)! With the last flakes of last season May 2nd and the first flakes Oct 31, in 2023 (barring something unprecedented in Nov-Dec), only 4 calendar months (JJAS) will have had no snow.

Everything's relative. A terrible winter in Detroit is colder/snowier than a great winter in Albuquerque. Most people do tend to have biases but I'll still read any outlook with reasoning over NOAAs cookie cutter nino climo "forecast" maps with zero explanation. You are correct about the above mentioned winters being good. 2013-14 was the most severe winter on record here, & those other winters were all good as well. There have also been some impressive record cold snaps even in winters where the overall departure ends up average to somewhat above average. No winter is without ups and downs and surprises (good and bad).