Winter loosens its grip a little but not entirely

Temperatures, with the help of lots of sunshine, have been allowed to warm above the freezing mark during the day time hours but fall well below that at night. I am told that is excellent for the maple syrup folks although I am hardly the expert. This general trend will continue for the next several days and temperatures will be allowed to reach the 40 degree mark across the low lying areas Saturday with the help of more sunshine. A few clouds and perhaps a few snow showers may mitigate the temperature rise Sunday and Monday but it will for the most part stay dry and we should see some sunshine Monday and more on Tuesday

One of our readers, "Cowbells" pointed out a few days ago that the middle of the month might not be the sea of tranquility I had indicated in the last post. It was the American GFS model then and continues to be the American GFS model now which indicates a rather interesting finish to next week including snow from a juicy looking storm system followed by terrain induced for the weekend. The European model is showing much of what its ensemble members showed a few days ago. More storminess to our south and dry weather across the Adirondacks and interior New England. The differences are derived from the handling of the jet stream blocking across Canada. The GFS and its ensembles allows the blocking to shift to the west, opening the door for storm systems to move up the Atlantic Coast as opposed to out to sea. The European maintains that much of this blocking remains across the central part of Canada and this forces much of the available jet energy to remain well to our south much like it has for much of the winter. This one is a very close call however and although the weather could turn out just as benign as I would have indicated in the last post, it was right of Cowbells to widen the possibility spectrum a bit. At this point we certainly have at least a chance at getting in on the action late next week and into the weekend and it will be worth watching over the weekend since I know telefest is St Patty's day weekend and plenty will be keeping an eye on the weather.

Moving beyond the weekend, no spring thaws are evident although the major ensembles are arguing about the extent to the wintry weather. The GFS ensembles produce a rather cold week in the wake of telefest that would certainly include a few powder days. The European would indicate that temperatures are on the below side of normal but with a more stable pattern. With the 50-60 inches of snow over the past 10 days, the weather should allow for the MRG season to continue strong through the official start of Spring and beyond.