More patience required for snowmobilers in early 2025

Mother Nature is once again making things tough on the snowmobile industry in the North Bay area. 

The cold has arrived but that is after a holiday snowfall was melted away due to mild conditions into the start of 2025.  

Shawn Flindall, communications director with the North Bay Snowmobile Club, says it has been a frustrating start to 2025 for their business. 

"Obviously number one is the lack of snow so we can't groom trails because there is not enough snow to do so due to the mild weather through the holidays," Flindall said. 

He says a forecast without much snow will not help the cause. 

"It does not look like things will be improving in our area anyway over the next couple of weeks," he admitted. 

Flindall says the cold is helping but he says that mild weather during the holidays has made most waterways still unsafe for sledders. 

"Because of that mild weather through the holidays nothing is properly and safely frozen," he said.  

"At this point, lakes have just skimmed over, ponds and swamps and running waterways are not frozen yet but this cold weather is going to help that so the only positive on that one is that we really do need the cold weather to firm things up before we get the snow so we are happy to see the cold weather."

The cold is good but Flindall says not good enough to support sleds just yet. 

"So we obviously don't want to see people out on the lakes right now, we don't want to see people on trails right now," he said.  

"Nothing is safe and nothing is appropriate in our area to ride so we just need people to be cautious and make smart decisions."

Flindall is hoping the weather forecast will improve and add some snow to the forecast so the area avoids the threat of another very short snowmobile season in 2025.