DES MOINES, Iowa — If you’ve been wondering where the snow has been this winter, you’re not alone.

And central Iowa isn’t alone in not having much snow this winter. Only 25% of the United States has any snow on the ground at this point in the year. A large swath of the Plains and Midwest are snowless.

It has been a very quiet winter in central Iowa so far. Less than five inches have been picked up in Des Moines so far. Normally, over 19″ of snow would have fallen at this point in the season. Last year, a whopping 30″ of snow had fallen by late January, largely thanks to two huge snow storms in the middle of January 2024.

That total makes the 2024-2025 snow season the least snowy on record. That bests the previous least snowy amount by half an inch.

While the winter has not been snowy so far, it’s been a mixed bag in terms of total precipitation and temperatures. It started out warmer and slightly wetter than normal. So far January has been colder than normal but much drier, with nearly a once-inch precipitation deficit.

December started out somewhat chilly, but the warmth moved in for the second half of the month. Several highs were in the 50s and 60s with warm overnight lows. This caused most of the precipitation in December to fall as rain. Cooler air arrived in January, particularly around the end of the month.

So what will February, the snowiest month on average, bring? The current Climate Prediction Center outlook shows elevated probabilities for a cooler-than-normal month but also for a wetter-than-normal month. A wetter-than-normal month doesn’t necessarily mean more snow, but it does mean higher chances for additional precipitation.