Will We Get Good Snowfall This Season?
by Scott A. Sumner
As we are fast approaching November, many avid snowmobilers will start to think about the upcoming season. I remember some years ago the golf season would end at the end of October and one week later I would be out riding snowmobile's because we could have early snow in November that tended to stay for the season.The weather would remain consistently cool and snowfall was quite good.
Those days seem to have gone and last year was an exceptionally challenging year for snow here in the Thunder Bay - Northwestern Ontario area. Many snowmobilers that I talk to did not ride their sleds at all last year. The snowmobile trail system adjacent to Thunder Bay never opened throughout the whole season, which is extremely unusual.
However, there was some snow that came shortly after New Year's, and was ridable for at least to early February. It was basically low snow conditions but for me ridable. Then there also was some snow that came in March with storms then, which if you had the time to get out, you could ride for several days in a row and get on some kilometers. Last year I was able to get about 300 kms on my snowmobile, which in the old days would be more like 5000 km. We are not able to predict the weather, but I am hoping that this year we will get a more consistent snow fall for Thunder Bay and Northwestern Ontario. Timing is extremely important for snow as I remember times last season when rain came as the temperature was just above zero. If it was below zero we would have had a ton of snow then.
I know the snowmobile dealers have a good inventory of sleds available to buy. If the snow comes fairly early and the weather remains cooler, I'm sure they'll sell their sleds very quickly. The low snowfall was really a phenomenon throughout North America as I know that most areas had a little snow except perhaps mountain terrain. I believe snowmobile manufacturers have drastically cut their production this year in order to allow dealers to clear out their current inventories.
Global warming probably had some effect on this and it also could be a cyclical type thing. I guess only time will tell but I'm hoping for a great snow season as for me my two main sports are snowmobiling and golf and I hope to be able to do both in fairly rapid transition again this year.
