The night before last around 12:30am, I noticed one or two lone frogs croaking outside, for the first time this season.  It was still chilly and foggy at the time, more like an early winter day in Eugene than just about anything else I could think of.  Then suddenly between 4:53 and 5:29am, the temperature at DLS airport jumped from 44 to 54 degrees, as a west wind kicked in at the surface.  Yesterday was partly sunny, windy and very warm, with a high of 63.  That makes it the first 60+ of the year for The Dalles, as well as many other locations across the Pacific Northwest.

Winter is clearly over and done for; the hills are now showing their subtle early-spring green and I imagine the daffodils will begin popping out within a week or two.  For all practical purposes, winter began on December 5, three days before the first big snowstorm.  And it ended after March 7, even if the 8th and 9th still felt kind of raw.  Overall I’d say both the beginning and end dates are probably two weeks later than what you would experience in an “abnormally normal” winter.  November and the first four days of December were extremely balmy, but they were offset by pretty chilly conditions in late February / early March.

The March 10 date for first 60+ temps?  That’s the latest it’s happened in 17 years.  Back in 2000 we didn’t hit 60 until March 21, and that one was a three-way tie for the latest in airport history!

We won’t see any more snow in the lowlands this season, unless something extraordinary were to line up like March 2012.  Most likely we just get cooler systems coming back in a week or two, with snow levels back down to 2,000-3,000 feet.