However, this wasn’t a dry heat, the kind that significantly affects the forests instead, it was combined with consistent humidity, which limited cooling overnight and pushed average daily temperatures over the record mark. July set records as the hottest single month ever in many locations across the region. Summer has been hot and humid, with adequate rainfall from frequent thunderstorms. This June 1 photo shows some bare trees in New Hampshire’s White Mountains. Lingering snowpack led to a late leaf-out in northern New England. The cool, cloudy weather delayed leaf-out in southern New England even as lingering snowpack was doing the same in northern New England. Portland, Maine, saw rainfall on 25 days between April 1 and May 15, the most ever during that period. Spring was consistently wet and cool across New England. Suburban landscapes were hit the hardest, with damage ranging from loss of branches to dormancy and even death in young oaks and maples and, notably, old rhododendrons.
When a last cold snap moved through in March, trees and shrubs were particularly vulnerable. (Here in southern New Hampshire, my kids were actually able to ice skate on our lawn on five different weekends.) As very cold air moved in between storms, the uninsulated ground froze deeply - but it thawed quickly in the spring. In the White Mountains of New Hampshire and the Green Mountains of Vermont, snow lingered on trails into May, and trees on hillsides didn’t start budding out until June, significantly later than historical averages.įarther south, though, snowpack was abnormally thin, as storms that began as snow ended as rain. Caribou, Maine, had snow on the ground for 163 straight days, a week longer than any other winter in recorded history. Northern zones never experienced a thaw all season, and a deep, record-setting snowpack blanketed the forests. The remainder of winter was fairly consistent in its stormtrack, with a distinct line forming across New England between epic winter and a sloppy, icy mess. Deep snowpack covered northern New England well into spring this year.