Groundhog be darned: It hasn’t looked much like winter yet around here

The goofy old groundhog may have seen his shadow Thursday, forecasting six more weeks of winter, according to legend, but the winter of 2016-17 hasn’t created much discontent around here to begin with.

In fact, Indiana just closed the book on its least snowy January in 19 years with only 1.7 inches of snowfall recorded by the National Weather Service at Indianapolis.

Closer to home, weather watcher Diana Foust of Fillmore observed even less, with just 0.2 inches of snow on Jan. 27 and a trace of new snow the next day.

The typical January sees 8.6 inches of snowfall in central Indiana. The 1.7 inches for 2017 is the least recorded since the strong El Nino year of 1997-98.

Last Friday’s morning’s snowfall was Indiana’s first white stuff in three weeks as virtually no snow had been recorded in the Hoosier State during the period Jan. 10-25.

Overall, the winter of 2016-17 has seen 6.6 inches of snow officially at Indianapolis, and even less than that overall in Putnam County, with Faust recording 5 inches. That amounts to about 20 percent of the normal winter total of 25.9 inches.

At this point in the season, central Indiana is running about 10 inches of snow behind its normal snowfall totals.

However, there are still the sectional snow and March madness to come. February typically brings 6.5 inches of snow, while another 2.6 inches usually falls in March with even a trace possible in April.