Photo by Jenny Kirk

Mother Nature can be stubborn when it comes to spring arriving in Minnesota.

The National Weather Service observing program manager in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, Brad Adams, is forecasting a fairly mild March for the rest of the month. He predicts the same in April for southwest Minnesota.

“Looks like we will have average temperatures for the area. Nothing too extraordinary as far as cold or warm,” Adams said earlier this week.

Early March snowfalls have put the area closer to the yearly average snow level of 41 inches. Adams said the region currently sits at 32.2 inches, thanks to the 8 inches of snow that fell more than a week ago.

But Adams warns not to rule out more snow in April or even in May. Yes, May.

“We got a few flurries on the First of May last year,” Adams said. “Snow in Marshall in May is not uncommon.”

Snow in May is exactly what occurred in 2013. In fact, a series of snowstorms shut down area schools and made travel treacherous in early April of that year, according to Independent accounts that year.

“Basically, there’s a pretty intense storm out of the southwest across the plains bringing round two of snowfall,” Meteorologist Todd Krause was quoted in the April 11, 2013, Independent.

Forecasts called for even more snow from Storm Yogi after the region was dealing with as much as 12 inches just days before.

“Snowfall amounts at this time vary depending on what the thermometer says,” Adams said back in 2013.“Fluctuating temperatures enhance the possibility of the dreaded “wintry” mix so common in March. “Typically by this time of year warm air from the south has already settled in the Midwest,” but Adams said “the persistence of an easterly air flow, combined with a snow-covered landscape, has kept much of the area’s precipitation in the form of snow instead of rain.”

The Independent even published a photo of a barn with a collapsed roof just south of Marshall. Dennis Wild told the Independent that he looked out his kitchen window to see the roof that had collapsed under the snow load onto his 1993 Corvette convertible.

On May 1, 2013, according to the Independent account, residents of southwest Minnesota woke up to one-half inch of wet snow, which tapered off by mid-morning. The snow made for wet roads in areas of south of Marshall, and some slush accumulated on the roads.

But by next week, temperatures were back to the upper 60s.

Welcome to Minnesota in the spring time.