Caroline Zentner
lethbridge herald
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Old Man Winter may still have a few punches left even as the calendar creeps closer to spring.
Gina Ressler, a former Bow Island girl who's now a meteorologist with The Weather Network, said southern Albertans are in for a roller-coaster of temperatures, in other words a typical spring.
"Spring, especially through Alberta and southern Alberta, always has a few surprises and actually March is, on average, the snowiest month of the year for southern Alberta," she said in a telephone interview Wednesday. "The good news is it looks like these are going to be punctuated by warm spells."
There's no doubt March is a winter month in this area but with more daylight and more direct sun rays it doesn't feel quite so harsh.
"While it can be unsettled and you can get those snowstorms, you know it's not really going to stick around for too much longer," Ressler said.
The past winter has been largely typical, starting out with below-seasonal temperatures that were balanced by above-normal temperatures in February. Ressler said the El Ni–o/La Ni–a Southern Oscillation is in a neutral phase now and that's expected to continue into the summer.
Farmers in the area will be pleased to know the snowpack is within the usual range.
"We're actually in not too bad of a position even though it started off somewhat dry. It looks like, with the snowpack, we're in the near normal to just slightly below normal situation," Ressler said. "We're in a pretty good position I think going into spring in terms of both flooding and drought."