By Joe Crain
With the pre-camp crew in the lake setting up the docks in 70-degree weather it is really hard to fathom that only ten days earlier, on May 19th, we had six inches of wet heavy snow on the ground! Crazier still is the fact that the storm of the 19th was the second storm of the month. The first was a two-day snow storm on the 8th and 9th of May that left us with a little over 10 inches! Thankfully we had warm weather between the storms and the totals were not added together, as a matter of ironic fact both storms were preceded by beautiful weather that reached 70 degrees.
Caretaker Joe splits wood in the snow
The two-day storm of the 8th-9th was a monster that shattered several area records. The single snowiest day in May was 8.3 inches, breaking the previous record of 5.5 inches that had held since May 10th, 1902 (A 117 year old record!). The snow fall on the date May 8th, at 8.3 inches, broke the previous record of five inches set on the same date back in 1924. The most snow fall on the date May 9th, at 2.3 inches, broke the previous record of .2 inches set on the same date back in 1990. And finally, the May 8th-9th storm broke the most snow total in the month of May record at 10.9 inches, easily passing the previous record of 8.1 inches set in the May of 1954. Of course, that last record was broken again with the storm of the 19th. That second storm raised the record snow fall for the whole month of May to 18 inches! The second storm also grabbed the record snowiest date record for May 19th at 7.3 inches, all recorded just down the road from camp in Poplar, WI.
And if that wasn’t enough precipitation for the area, the month also dropped several inches of rain before and after the snow events, leaving the lake in a very high “over its banks” condition and all of the area rivers close to flood stage. Luckily things have started to go down slowly and only minor damage has occurred in our immediate area. Camp has had some minor beach erosion and the pre-camp crew has had to set the docks quite a bit farther in land than usual. The lower bike trail Joe’s Jaunt and the Spitting Springs Trail are both very soggy and may be impassable for the first week of camp or so, but if the current trends hold things should be drying up soon. All of the other bike trails are in good riding shape.
Blowing the brush out of the Axeman Village
We had a couple of other firsts with the wacky early spring snows. You may recall from previous articles this off season that the first snow (about 10 inches) took place on November 11th, about a month ahead of normal. Of course, that snow stopped the annual fall leaf blowing. Well the spring storm of May 8th-9th also happened during the annual spring blowing! It was the very first time in my 24 years as a caretaker that the blowing chore was stopped both in the fall and the spring. Last fall’s snow stayed with us and was also responsible for keeping us from splitting the CNOC wood supply – a chore that takes about a week to accomplish every fall. Well we thought that we would finally be able to get the wood after the first snow of May had melted. But as it happened we were in the middle of splitting when the second snow of May arrived, stopping that chore again, which was also the first time in my 24 year history with camp that wood splitting was delayed both in the spring and the fall by snow! It’s funny to talk to the old timers from the area about this year’s early spring snow. They all seem to say the same thing, “You know I was here when we had snow in June that time…”
Hoping that the tide has turned and we will not see any flakes of snow in June, it’s Caretaker Joe at camp.
The tide sure turned… Up onto the point!