Thread: Hard Water Season Next

Originally Posted by no1son

And I'm shoveling - 10-14" of white stuff across the Twin Cities yesterday.

Sorry to hear you got dumped on; that makes for bad ice. :-(
We lucked out and only got 1 inch. It was 11 below this morning and hopefully it will stay below zero until we get at least 12 inches of ice.

We are not supposed to actually get down to zero. The ground isn't frozen hard under the snow either; so quite a bit of this will soak in and it is needed badly. The winds that were behind this did not develop like they were supposed to either, which is just alright by me.

Bad ice perhaps, sore backs for sure.

FWIW Minnesota is over 400 miles from north to south and so we have quite a range of variations in temperature and weather, ranging from USDA hardiness zone 5 to some parts in much more severe zone 3. At 10 degrees change in average winter minimum per zone there can be and generally is quite a bit of difference from far north to far south. This storm cut across the southern middle of the state with very little snow in the far north or extreme south and southwest.

We got well over a foot here in Elk River.

I love it.....even without a snow blower I love it.

That said, I do NOT like the traffic. My usual 35 minute drive into Golden Valley has taken me on average 2 hours both ways since Monday. A 4 wheel drive truck is nice except when it's not in 4 wheel driver and has rear wheel drive......definitely not fun when you have to pull out into traffic.

A coworker of mine was saying the same thing about the snow being bad for the ice...

Originally Posted by ekim22

We got well over a foot here in Elk River.

I love it.....even without a snow blower I love it.

That said, I do NOT like the traffic. My usual 35 minute drive into Golden Valley has taken me on average 2 hours both ways since Monday. A 4 wheel drive truck is nice except when it's not in 4 wheel driver and has rear wheel drive......definitely not fun when you have to pull out into traffic.

A coworker of mine was saying the same thing about the snow being bad for the ice...

To quote an old carpenter song....."We've only just begun...................." Once again, welcome to Minnesota!

When I scooped my back walk yesterday, I found that the ground underneath was not frozen at all. I have seen it where partially and even fully frozen ground has thawed out under a snow cover and grass has actually greened up and started to grow underneath a snow bank, even with pretty bitter air temperatures above it all.

Remember that the water under the ice is never colder than 32 degrees and generally even a little above it; so developing ice can take a real beating under a blanket of snow. That is why so many ice fishers want a good ice layer before the snow falls.

About your 4-wheel drive on ice. You start up much better, BUT you don't stop any better at all; so follow carefully. On icy roads you will need a whole lot more distance to stop safely.