The Strangest Month

 February is the strangest month.

In the year I was born, my birth was on the coldest day of that winter season in New York City, according to my mother. MH looked it up and it is true.

Backyard, 8 am, Feb. 18, 2018 (Margo D. Beller)

Today, a week after my most recent birthday and after several days when it was warm enough to take a walk in a light jacket rather than a parka, I awoke to five inches or so of light, powdery snow. A cold front had swept through and clashed with the rain from the day before. Now, with the temperature above 40 degrees, snow has already been coming down from the trees and my plowed driveway is dry thanks to the abundant sunshine.

According to weather.com, this coming week in New York City the temperature will gradually rise from 47 degrees Fahrenheit today (Sunday) to 70 degrees on Wednesday before cooling to 47 degrees Friday and then rising slightly (with rain) over the weekend.

Oh boy, Mud Season!

This is not so unusual for February, even at a time of increasing global warming. Last year, at around this time, MH and I traveled down the Jersey shore to Island Beach State Park on a 70 degree day. Two years ago, the ground was frozen and I was seeking signs of life in the garden. Many years ago, when our nieces and nephew were much younger, we took them to New York's Museum of Natural History on what turned out to be a February day of record warmth, 72 degrees. Even longer ago, on my birthday in 1979, the man who became MH and I met in NYC for supper and it was so windy and so painfully cold we could not go more than a couple of storefronts down the street before ducking inside to get warm. We had supper in the first open restaurant we could find.

Apple tree, Feb. 18, 2018 (Margo D. Beller)

What is it about February?

About a year ago, writers for NorthJersey.com asked the same question. In what seems oddly prophetic they wrote:

Blame the jet stream for the wild gyrations in the weather.

“Most of this winter so far we’ve fallen into this progressive pattern where nothing has stayed more than a few days,” said David Robinson, the state climatologist and a Rutgers University professor. For much of the time, a steady west-to-east flow of upper winds has trapped colder air to the north. January was the 12th-warmest on record for New Jersey, dating to 1895.

But occasionally, because of an array of variables that affects atmospheric patterns, the jet stream bulges to the south, letting colder air down from Canada.

The Old Farmer's Almanac for 2018 has this prediction for the mid-Atlantic region that includes New York and New Jersey:

Winter temperatures will be above normal, on average, with the coldest periods in early to mid-December, late December, early January and early February. Precipitation will be above normal with below-normal snowfall.

The snowiest periods, it says, will be mid-December and mid-January. Most of the prediction has been correct but not the part about the snowfall. The snow on the ground today in mid-February is the most we've had this winter season.

Feeders and baffle with snow helmets. (Margo D. Beller)

February is the tail end of winter. By the meteorological calendar, spring starts on March 1. (The vernal equinox is March 21.) The days are already noticeably longer, with darkness at around 5:30 p.m. EST, about an hour later than in the dead of winter. As I was shoveling out a path to the bird feeders I was hearing cardinals singing out territorial songs. House finches and a tufted titmouse was singing, a flicker called and a downy woodpecker drummed against a tree. Overhead there were a couple dozen grackles flying by, angrily chucking. Just a few days ago an equally large flock of robins were all over my thawed front lawn, scrounging for worms and other food. Maybe they knew what was coming.

My indoor plants have also noticed the increase in light and have started sending out new shoots. It is far from warm enough to put them on my back porch but you can see they are ready to go, especially on the damper, milder days when I can turn off the heat and open some windows. Several plants are flowering, showing some welcome color.  

Before the snow fell I was already seeing some of the earliest weeds growing in one of my garden beds, a reminder of all the work I will have to do once spring - meteorological, vernal, whatever - becomes a reality. I can wait.