Spring is a fickle thing

A week ago, we had bare ground showing in many places. The temperature was in the mid to upper 40's, snow and ice were disappearing at a rapid rate. What a difference a week makes in western North Dakota and eastern Montana! We had a storm predicted for early last week and it sounded like we might escape any significant amount of snow. Sick of snow, cold and wind after our long winter we did hope the weather guy was going to correct in  his forecast. However, experience has taught us two things. First, that the weather guy is not always right. Second, expect at least one snow storm in late March and April in our little corner of the world.

The storm first brought us high winds, then by morning freezing rain, then sleet and then snow. No unnecessary travel was advised for most of North Dakota, including us. This meant my husband would not be hauling gravel or scoria to oil field locations north of us, near the New Town-Watford City area. He was glad to be off the road, although it meant he had to feed cows instead!!

As for the storm missing us, not a chance. We received about 10 inches of snow. The wind went down enough that we did not have much drifting.  It has not been too cold, only down to 12F one night since the snow. Daytime temps have been in the upper 20's.
We do not start officially calving for 5 more days and luckily none of our cows felt the need to calve early during the storm. These photos were taken two days after the snow stopped,Thursday of this week. "Our creek", Knutson Creek, has not completely stopped running, it is open in a few spots and covered with slush or ice in others. Where it is open, the water is running over ice in some places yet.

It sounds like that this past week's storm will not be the last of this fickle Spring. The darn weather guy is forecasting more snow for us tonight and tomorrow. It looks like we are a little north of where the heavy snow is forecast. Maybe it will miss us completely!!! Will let you know if it does or not!