Snow in March in Jackson County, after none in February

During the weekend of March 2nd and 3rd, the town of Ashland, Oregon, found itself transformed into a snow filled town as an unexpected blanket of snow, nearly a foot deep, covered all of Ashland. The random snowfall was strange, as February had largely shown no snowfall, leaving residents of Ashland confused by the sudden wintry conditions as March arrived. Throughout February, the town experienced fluctuating temperatures, with some days below freezing, leaving people wanting to stay inside. On other days, there was spring-like weather in Ashland leading to people wanting to be outside and enjoy this warm weather while they could. This unpredictable weather pattern left many questioning if this was normal Ashland weather and what to even expect for months to come.

After doing some research on the weather in the past years in Ashland I came across a post on Chronicle Contributor by Stacker, the post was titled “The Coldest February in Jackson County History — and the Warmest!!”. This post talked about Jackson County, Oregon warmest February's and it’s coldest February's throughout the years.

To find out, they used Stacker data from the National Centers for Environmental Information to identify the 15 February’s with the highest and lowest average temperatures since 1895. Also included is how that year’s temperature compared to the 1901–2000 average. The average February temperature in Jackson County, Oregon from 1901–2000 was 38.1 degrees. It hasn’t come out with this year’s average temperature yet, but it’s pretty cool to see how it has changed over time and there seems to be no theme to it. The coldest February Jackson county has ever experienced is 1911 when the average temperature was 31.3 F, 6.8 F below 1901–2000 average. The most recent cold year that made the top fifteen was 2019 when the Average temperature was 32.4 F, 5.7 F below 1901–2000 average. While the warmest February in Jackson County history was 1995 when the Average temperature was 45.2 F, 7.1 F above 1901–2000 average.