Morris tribune. [volume] (Morris, Minn.) 1880-2000, 1881-03-31

MEAN WINTER FALL OF SNOW REDUCED TO WATER.
Inches
Fort Smelling. Minnesota ota...... 1872
Portland, Maine. e...................... III. 93
Eastport. Maine. ne....................... 10 81
Montreal Canada. Observation-Disclosures. 1885
Burlington, Vermont. NEUTRALITY-SUSPICIOUS.. 500
Hanover, New Hampshire. 9.1O
Portsmouth, New Hampshire. 80. 8 3S
Albany, New York rk................. S.35
1t requires nearly one foot of snow to
make one inch of water. So that the figures
in the above table. which express in inches
the mean winter precipitation reduced to
water of the places named, express approx
imately in feet the mean annual snowfall.
1t will be seen that the Minnesota snowfall
is on the average less than sixth that of
Maine, and only from one fourth to one
northern New York. Taking the three win
ter months, the mean winter precipitation of
each for period of nineteen years at Fort
Smelling, was as follows:
Inches
January ..................... ...O.Io
February. NEUTRALITY-SUSPICIOUS.. u. 81
Total for winter. 1. 80
This is an average of little over six
tenths of an inch of water, or less than six
inches of snow, for each of the winter
months.
From the records of signal service at St.
Paul, it appears that, in nine years, from
1912 to 1879 80, the average snowfall was
fifty per cent. greater than in the
nineteen years preceding and including
1856, but to understand what an exception
al and extraordinary winter that of 18S0-81
has been in depth of it's snowfall, compare
the figures of the signal service bureau for
this winter with the above official record of
the snowfall of the previous periods en-
braced in official observations. We give
the total mean water precipitation for the
winter months, December, January, and
February:
For the 10 years ending 1867. 90
For the years ending 1S79-SO. 40
For the winter of 1SsO-S1. ..9.6S
So that the snowfall this winter has been
four times the average of the past nine
years, and six times the average of the nine
teen years embraced in the official reports
of the war department. No such depth of
snow has been known in this part of Min
nesota since its earliest settlement, or at
least we have no record of any similar snow
fall
Without being severely cold, the winter
has been just cold enough to preserve an
unusual proportion of the snow which fell
in such unprecedented volume, and to keep
each successive layer in such light, vola-
tile condition that it was swept like thistle
down before the winds for hundreds
of miles across the naked plains of
Minnesota and Dakota, and was only stopped
by some ravine or grove or the trough of
some river or railroad cut, or other gap or
obstruction, where it was piled up by the
winds in drifts of enormous depth. More
over, the winter began month earlier than
usual. 1t tset in in early November with
the features that have distinguished it from
all its known predecessors, with heavy
snowstorms. The snow is gradually but
slowly melting away, and perhaps the slow
ness of the process, though it taxes the
patience after winter of such extraordinary
length and storminess, will save the nu-
merous river valleys from the disastrous
floods which have been anticipated as one
of the consequences of the great depth of
snow, if it passed off with it's usual rapidity
which marks the transition from cold to
warm weather in this region.