Bruce Westover of Maple City didn't measure a woolly caterpillar's brown fur before sending in his guess for the 2008-07 Leelanau Enterprise Snowfall Contest.

NOW THAT Bruce Westover has
won the Snowfall Contest, he’s
turning his attention to spring-
related matters – like tending
to his daffodils.

“How did I come up with my guess? A wing and a prayer, throwin’ darts at a dartboard,” he said with a laugh after learning that he has been crowned as the contest champion this year.

Westover and 14 others correctly guessed that 138 inches of snow would be recorded at the county Road Commission’s Suttons Bay garage between 7 a.m. Oct. 20, 2007 and 7 a.m. April 19, 2008 so the contest came down to a tiebreaker, settled by the total points scored in the 2008 NCAA men’s basketball championship game.

Westover’s 143-point just missed the game total of 144, and was closer than any of the other finalists.

Taking a close second was Leland Public School seventh grader Dylan Jolliffe, who guessed 141 points for the tiebreaker. Jolliffe said he also made a wild guess.

“It was 143 inches last year and I thought it would be less than that this year because of global warming,” he said.

Third place went to Mel Basch of Traverse City. Basch was a longtime resident of Port Oneida where his parents, Milton and Mildred Basch, owned a 200-acre farm. It was his first time entering the snowfall contest, and like Westover and Jolliffe, he used the “just a guess” method. “There is no rhyme or reason, I just liked 138 inches,” Basch said.

Westover will receive $200 for first place, while Jolliffe earns $100 for second and Basch $50 for third.

Westover said he was surprised to win because he’s usually off by 20 to 30 inches.

“I’m always thinking we’re going to get more snow than we do. I’d like to say my guesses are more scientific, but … ,” he said.

While this season’s snowfall total is down seven inches from last year, the winter of 2007-08 was notable in at least one way. Most people commented they thought it was the coldest winter Leelanau has experienced in some time.

The nearly 12 feet in snowfall didn’t come close to what was recorded this winter at the Jackson Hole (Wyo.) Mountain Resort, where 605 inches of snow were counted.

While Leland teacher Jody Yoder didn’t have any special insight on snowfall totals, she was looking for ways to make the subject of geography more enjoyable for her seventh grade class, which included Joliffe.

DYLAN JOLIFFE, who finished second
in Snowfall Contest, is shown at his desk
in the seventh-grade geography class at
Leland.

“I wanted to make geography relevant to the students, so we all entered the snowfall contest,” Yoder said. The students kept track of snowfall total each week and discussed how geography, especially Leelanau’s topography, can impact weather.

“It gave them a reason to look at the newspaper each week and was a lot of fun,” Yoder said.

Jolliffe said determining his tiebreaker guess was a little easier.

“I like watching basketball, so coming up with the total score was kind of easy,” he said. Jolliffe watched the snowfall mount up each week and he said he didn’t really think too much about it until the last couple of weeks. “I knew I was right there and I thought I had won, but getting second place is pretty cool,” he said.

There were 603 official entries for the 2007-08 contest. Five other entries either came in too late or were photocopied and were not eligible. The lowest guess was 57 inches and the highest was 283. The 130 to 139.5 inch range received the most guess with 133 entries; 140-149 had the second most at 117; and the 120-129.6 range received 89 entries.