A 73-year-old man in Colorado has been studying the snow and snowfall patterns for over 50 years. The man, Billy Barr, first started studying the snow after graduating from Rutgers University with a degree in environmental science. He tracks the snow about four miles from the Rocky Mountains, right in his front yard. Even as he gets older, now having two replaced hips, he continues to go outside to conduct his research. Primarily he uses very simplistic tools that he developed, writing down the number of inches of snow each day. He ultimately has spent the last 50 years tracking the snowfall purely for his own curiosity as he was never a part of a formal study, nor being paid by any agency to research.
However, his curiosity is now paying off as his data is being used by various scientific agencies.
Because of his tracking over many decades, he has seen a huge change in the pattern in which snow falls annually, something that is known but now has formal data to back it up. According to Barr’s research, snow arrives later in the year and leaves earlier, shortening the overall snowy period in the state. This is a clear sign of climate change, and experts are thrilled to have this definitive evidence to back it.
Barr is one of several “citizen scientists” who have helped, especially when it comes to studying climate change.
The older man lives a very quaint life in the mountains, living as sustainably as possible while conducting his own research. His age has affected his ability to live so remotely, especially with his hip issues that ultimately led him to getting replacements. He knows his lifestyle will one day change as he is forced to live somewhere more reachable, so he has been working on finding ways to study the same area remotely for whenever the day comes that he has to move. For the last five years, he has been creating tools to remotely study the snow in a similar manner to how he does now. It is still a work in progress, but he remains hopeful!
The way he studies snow now is quite simple. He goes to the same spot every day and sticks a metal ruler into the snow to measure the depth. He then uses a clear canister, sticks it into the ground to fill with snow and then weighs it to calculate the water content of the snow. Then, he adds his findings to his list and is able to compare them to any other day for the last 50 years.
