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Frozen droplets coat the branch of a bush.

Chris Hardie/For Agri-View

Icicles form on a bush.

Chris Hardie/For Agri-View

We need to hold on tightly to the porch railing

Chris Hardie/For Agri-View

Watch your step.

Chris Hardie/For Agri-View

Residents prepare their axes, ready to start cleanup after the 1922 ice storm.

Contributed by Betty Seebecker

The aftermath of an ice storm Feb. 23, 1922, is shown by the home of W.C. Hansberry in Hillsboro, Wisconsin. There are downed power lines and ice-covered trees. -- Wisconsin postcard collection

Wisconsin Historical Society, Image #128893

A street scene is shown following an ice storm, possibly March 2, 1922, in Baraboo, Wisconsin. Utility poles are leaning and wires have been brought down by the weight of the ice. Photographer Ephraim Burt Trimpey

Wisconsin Historical Society, Image #69465

Presentation set on the great ice storm of 1922

The winter storm of Feb. 22, 1922, is captured in photographs like this of the courthouse square in Baraboo, Wisconsin, where trees were heavily weighed down and damaged by a thick coating of ice.

SAUK COUNTY HISTORICAL SOCIETY/Contributed

Trees crumple and utility lines stretch following the March 4, 1976, ice storm -- one of the epic natural disasters in Wisconsin history. Severe thunderstorms turned to freezing rain, covering southern Wisconsin with ice as much as 5 inches thick. Some 600,000 homes and businesses lost power -- some rural areas for more than 10 days -- and others went without heat or municipal water. Damage from the crippling storm was estimated at more than $50 million.

J.D. PATRICK — State Journal archives

It may be wishful thinking proclaimed by this road sign in Fitchburg, Wisconsin, because a blizzard probably would not have done as much damage as the March 1976 ice storm that downed this power pole and the electric lines it carried.

JOSEPH W. JACKSON III, STATE JOURNAL ARCHIVES

The March 1976 ice storm devastated the countryside between Cambridge and Stoughton in eastern Dane County, Wisconsin.

J.D. PATRICK, STATE JOURNAL ARCHIVES

Wires short out on a utility pole at 6209 Bridge Road in Monona, Wisconsin, during the ice storm of March 1976.

BRUCE FRITZ

Cars slide off the road during the Madison ice storm of March 1976.

BRUCE FRITZ

A fence along Wisconsin Highway 73 shows the aftermath of the ice storm of March 1976.

BRUCE FRITZ

Chris Hardie For Agri-View

Politicians and others way above my station and pay grade continue to debate, expound upon and expunge homo-sapiens influence on the stratosphere. But there’s one thing I know for sure. Winter weather has changed; we’re seeing way more rain and ice.

Chris Hardie and his wife, Sherry, raise animals and crops on his great-grandparents’ Jackson County farm. Nominated for a Pulitzer Prize in 2001, he’s a former member of the Wisconsin Freedom of Information Council and past-president of the Wisconsin Newspaper Association. Email chardie1963@gmail.com with comments.