We get a lot of snow drifts here and they tend to form in very inconvenient places, like our driveways. Thus, when my husband decided a few years ago to start installing snow fences on our property to keep that from happening, I had an idea in my brain about how those were going to look. I pictured more or less a temporary wall. I did not picture this:
How on earth does a plastic fence full of holes keep snow from drifting? I’m glad you asked. I went to our friend, Wikipedia, and learned this:
“Snow fences work by causing turbulence in the wind, such that it drops much of its snow load on the lee side of the fence. Thus, snow fences actually cause snow drifts, rather than preventing them. The fences are placed so as to cause a snow drift where it is beneficial, or not harmful so that the snow does not drift onto undesired areas such as roads or among buildings.”
I’m guessing most of you knew that already, but I didn’t. The thing that is supposed to prevent snow drifts actually causes them by creating turbulence. Snow drifts are going to happen either way – it’s just a matter of where they get planted.
I think I’m going to have to remember that the next time a stiff wind is blowing and there’s turbulence all around me. If there are going to be snow drifts, I’d rather they were put in the beneficial places. And only the God of the snow, wind and turbulence knows how to do that – good to know when that “hedge of protection” looks like it’s full of holes. The wind whistling through those holes is creating a symphony with all the crescendos and rests right where they should be.
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I’ll probably be slogging through snow drifts tomorrow to delete this thing.
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