Not everyone loves warmer winters
It’s hard times in the Highlands for pond hockey players, ice sailors, snowplow operators, ice fishers, cross-country skiers and winter sports retailers.
Outdoors enthusiasts and business owners who rely on snowfall and cold weather report that the lack of it in recent years has cut into their fun and revenues.
“It’s been a dramatic change,” said Steve Ives of Garrison, who is one of the three dozen hockey players who converge on local ponds when conditions allow. As recently as 10 years ago, the most dedicated skaters could play 30 or more times a year on solid ice, he said.
Now, to play even 20 times, “we’ve had to seek out ponds in higher elevations and schedule games at 8 a.m., before the sun starts to warm the ice up.” Even then, the ice isn’t always great, he said. “There are games where we play with water on all sides.”
Ice sailors were “skunked” this year, said John Sperr of Rhinebeck, the “unofficial meteorologist” of the Hudson River Ice Yacht Club. He said that there was no sailable ice this winter on Orange Lake, Tivoli Bay or the Hudson River. From 1980 to 1995, he said, the club typically enjoyed six to eight weeks of sailing. “Global warming has killed that,” he said.
The rising winter temperatures are well-documented. Since 1901, temperatures in New York have risen 2.6 degrees and are expected to increase by as much as 11 degrees by the end of the century, according to a study by the state Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA).
Myron Tice of Cold Spring has seen the effect of rising temperatures on ice fishing. Growing up in Buchanan 50 years ago, he would fish in local ponds, including Lake Meahagh. “The ice was thicker,” he recalled. “You’d have 2 feet of ice.”
He still fishes locally but must drive to Lake Champlain, Lake Ontario, Lake George or Saratoga to find reliable ice. “It’s also now later in the year when you find it,” he said.
Canopus Lake in Fahnestock State Park on Route 301 has long been a popular site for fishing but hasn’t been open for winter sports for two years because it needs 6 inches of ice to be safe, said Declan Hennelly, the park manager.
He added that the park’s cross-country ski center was only open five days this year and four days last winter. The center was open for 46 days in 2014 and 39 days in 2020 but has been trending downward, he said.
For winter sports, “you need consistently cold weather and a moderate amount of snow throughout the winter,” he said. Ski areas such as Victor Constant at West Point typically have snowmaking machines; it didn’t close for the season until Monday (March 11).
Businesses that rely on snow also suffer without it. When Nick Lisikatos started plowing in Philipstown in the 1980s, the first snow usually arrived in late November. Now, he said, “plowable” storms usually don’t hit before Christmas.
He said on-demand plowing is still vital in Philipstown because of the hilly and dirt roads and the growing number of delivery trucks that must navigate them.
Katy Behney, who owns Mountain Tops Outfitters in Beacon, said she has stopped stocking snow pants and while the store still offers snowshoes and boots, “when we get a winter like this, those things don’t move.”
She plans to stock fewer heavy winter clothes next year in favor of lighter wraps. “Thank God I didn’t go heavy on parkas this year,” she said.
