Snakes, climate near Rapid City (Spearfish, Sturgis: fit in, real estate, sex offenders)
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My wife and I are both born and raised in the Boston area. We have just about had it with the way things have gone here, from overgrowth and government fiascos. We are also sick of the humid summers of the east. If both of our families weren't here, we would've left already.
We're thinking about the Boise, ID area, Fort Collins, CO area, Rapid City area or possibly somewhere in New Mexico. We want to live somewhere with a drier climate, less congestion and a slower pace; just somewhere that maybe has some city amenities but still maintains a sense of community.
Which brings me to some Rapid City questions:
1) I am PETRIFIED of snakes!! We have the occasional little garter snake out here, but that's about it (and I've run screaming from them!). What I'm wondering is the how common it is to find rattlesnakes and other types in yards or garages in the areas surrounding Rapid City. If there is the odd chance of seeing one somewhere, I can learn to live with that. If it is a situation where finding a rattler on your porch or whatever is common, I'll go nuts. Please note, do not tell me about the small odds of getting bitten, that they kill rodents, etc. I know all of that, and it does not matter. I can't even see one on t.v. without shaking!
2) Would you say the Rapid City area climate really tends to be dry? I've been in 95 deg. weather in Las Vegas and haven't minded a bit. Out here in the northeast, it can be in the 80s, and if you go outside to bring in the trashcans, you can wind up soaking with sweat! We'd love to go somewhere where humidity is not an issue.
3) How are the winters, really? We get biting cold out here, and what I call an "annoying" snow. That is, in southern New England, snow storms frequently don't hit us full on, and instead we get anywhere from 3-12 inches, and it's usually wet, heavy snow. Rarely the soft powdery stuff. What's the winter usually like around Rapid City?
4) Finally, the natural disaster thing. Southern New England "blizzards" are not really much compared to the northern area of the region. We can get hurricanes, but it's been 17 or 18 years since the last one. That's really about it. Is the Rapid City area prone to tornadoes, earthquakes, whiteouts, flooding, wildfires, etc?
Thanks very much for your replies. And for some of you who are uneasy about too many people moving out your way and bringing their habits with them, we actually feel much more comfortable and at home in the areas of the west where we've been than here in the east. We just want to find a nice low-key, clean, livable area and community; big cities/suburbs are the last thing on our minds.
Oh, I forgot...if any of you have knowledge of Fort Collins, Boise, New Mexico, how do they compare to the Rapid City area? By the way, if you need any info on the northeast, I'm happy to talk about it.
Hi Doublea, Rapid City has a semi-arid climate so they basically have no humidity. The summer days can get high temps, but it generally cools down in the evening.
I also despise those crawly things you mentioned. I'm not really sure that you'd encounter a rattler unless you were actually out roaming in the Hills. I don't live in Rapid, but I've been there many times throughout my life and I've never seen one in town. I'm sure they do have a few garters though. We also have bullsnakes here, but again~it'd mostly be out in the country.
I believe the average snowfall for Rapid is about 30 inches per year. I'll provide a couple of links for you so you can check it out. It's actually the banana belt for a huge area because the winters are fairly mild.
Rapid City has very few tornadoes and one of the links will tell you the % of a chance for them there. They have beautiful thunderstorms in the summer though.
We don't mind people moving here~we don't actually "own" this state. We mainly get good and honest and hardworking people who relocate here.
Sorry, I don't really have any firsthand info on the places you mentioned. I do know that Idaho was my Mom's fave state. She said it was beautiful. AND I've also read that Idaho has been invaded by many people who have left California and other areas.
1) snakes. They're in all 50 states. South Dakota has it's share. Are the prevalent? Depends where you are and what your doing. My father lived to be 92 and most of that was in Rapid city or out in the Black Hills. He was also petrified of snakes. To my knowledge, the only rattler he ever saw was at the Reptile Gardens in a glass cage. But he kept to the beaten path, he was aware of his surroundings and he picked up and read the info packs from the fish and game. I in turn, was a little more reclass and have been bitten twice. I was always rock climbing, playing in the creek, and who wants to use the trail????
So go to the Fish and Game and pick up the brochures. They will give you good advice and tell you what to do and what not to do. Follow their advice and you'll be fine. remember, they are more afraid of you then you are of them.
2) Weather. hahahaha The weather man can't tell you what's going to happen tomorrow and you want us to tell you how it's going to be when you move out? Just kiddin. I lived in Rapid City a lot of years and saw from blizzards 6 or 7 times in a year to a year with no blizzards, just a couple times the wind picked up and there was a whiteout for a couple hours. I've seen winters that never hit 15 below and I've seen winters that hit 45 below.
Don't let the winters scare you in the Black Hills. That area has the best climate of anywhere in the state. From Spearfish to Hot Springs is a very nice climate. 20 years ago I'd tell you that you would be a fool to not have 4 wheel drive and chains. Now, with current state, county, and city equipment, the roads are cleared continuously throughout a storm. A few side streets can get tricky a couple times a year, but even a Honda car with front wheel drive can be driven, care free, all winter long. Might have to shovel your driveway and gutter because the plow went by and gave you a nice windrow behind your car. But you can do fine with a 2 wheel drive living in the city or even out in the county.
In the 18 years I lived there, I saw 2 tornadoes. One came within 150 ft of our house and did very little damage. Trash thrown about, a couple people lost car ports, but no houses destroyed. The second one was in the hills about 15 miles out of town and it layed down pine trees for 2 miles. Neither one caused any injuries.
Hail is something to worry about but not often. It's not life threatening. But it will ding up your car if you don't quickly park under a tree or keep it in a carport or garage.
Rapid City almost always gets about a week of 100+ temps. But cools off nightly. We didn't have an air conditioner until I was 15. And then, we'd only run it about 3 or 4 hours in late afternoon. Then open the windows and let the cool evening air through.
It's a nice area and you have little to fear and a "LOT" to gain in your sanity.
I grew up in Rapid City and have lived here since I was two years old so this area's pretty much all I know. I second everything that Jammie and ElkHunter have said.
Snakes are found here but I've only encountered one once. I was 3 years old and my family decided to hike Bear Butte near Sturgis. We got to the very top and I came within a few feet of a rattler. My mom swooped me up and ran down that hill 10x faster than we came up! That was the only time I have ever seen a rattle snake. You will definitely not just wake up to one on your porch.
Rapid City is very dry. We are on the western plains and we have a high elevation. Humidity is never an issue here. It can be 105 degrees outside and I can be outside all day long without a problem. Plus it is breezy here and that helps a lot too. Winters, like Jammie and EH said, are mild and the powdery snow accumulation tends to melt within a day or two. It can be -10 with blowing snow one day, and 55 degrees with sun the next. In fact, yesterday Rapid City set a record high of 85 degrees and this morning it was snowing!!!
As far as natural disasters, I have never seen a tornado near Rapid City. The last time we had a tornado warning and we actually had to seek shelter was when I was still in elementary school. EH has a much more fascinating torando story than I do. We do not get earthquakes here. Flooding is rare and it is usually a flash flood. Rapid City had a fatal flood in 1972 that killed over 200 people, but that was because Cayon Lake Dam broke. Wildfires, unfortunatley, are not rare for the Black Hills. We had about 3-5 last year and they usually happen during our 100+ heatwaves in July-August. The last time one came close to Rapid City was in 1989. They usually happen in Meade County or way up into the Black Hills.
Fort Collins is actually very comparable to Rapid City. I think both cities look very similar and they both have an identical climate. Personally, I would not mind living in Fort Collins but I am very partial Colorado; especially the Front Range cities. I love go down there every chance I get. Fort Collins is a little bit bigger than Rapid City and it's part of the "Front Range Urban Corridor" that connects all of Colorado's major cities like Denver, Boulder, Colorado Springs, Aurora, and FoCo and it stretches from Cheyenne to Pueblo. Fort Collins is faster paced than Rapid City and has more people surrounding it. It's a little bit more expensive too. The only drawback about FoCo is that traffic is HORRIBLE while in Rapid City you can get anywhere in 10 minutes or less.
I do not know too much about Boise. A buddy of mine is from there and he says that Boise is much more humid than Rapid City, but it is also more wooded. Idaho is a very beautiful state.
New Mexico is probably the most different from South Dakota because, after all, it is desert instead of high plains. I heard that it was already 95 degrees down there last week! Nice!!!
Good luck on your decision!!!
Last edited by ElkHunter; 04-17-2008 at 09:18 PM..
doublea1269,
I could give you a long answer to all your questions but they have been thoroughly answered already. I will say this reference to rattlers. I am a rock hunter. I make all kinds of items out of rock. I rock hunt in a total snake area 90% of my free time. I have came across 2 baby rattlers in the last 15 years. They were babies(3" long). I knew mother had to be close, but I never seen her so I just moved further away from the area. The Black Hills supposedly have them also but you couldnt proove it by me.
The winters are calm as far as I am concerned. The Black Hills Range more or less protects Rapid. The weather blows over the hills and starts again out in the flats. I think you would love it here! Sweat, only if you are working your tail off in 90 degree weather. What more can I say. This is Gods Country!!! Good luck in whereever you land but will be among friends in the Hills area.
I haven't lived in Rapid City, but my Dad's family was from the Dakotas, so I know something about it. I've also lived in Colorado, Wyoming, and spent a fair amount of time in the last 40 years or so in New Mexico.
Rattlesnakes: Yes, they are in the Rocky Mountain West and plains states. They tend to be smaller than rattlesnakes found in Texas, a lot of the Midwest, and the Southern states, but they are here. Many people think that they are most common in desert areas, but that isn't really true. In fact, there are areas of the Rocky Mountain West where it is actually TOO arid for them to be very common. The shortgrass prairie areas of the region (which includes just about everything from the 100th Meridian west to, and including the Rocky Mountain foothills) is some of the best rattlesnake habitat. My parents had a ranch in the Front Range foothills of Colorado, and we would find rattlers on the porch, in my Mom's flower beds, under the pickups, etc. on a regular basis during summer. Most rattlesnakes really don't want a confrontation with a human, but to say you would never see one is not realistic. On my "worry list," I worry a lot more about our 2-legged predators (humans), West Nile-carrying mosquitoes, ticks, and mice carrying hantavirus than I do about rattlesnakes.
Climate and weather: Rapid City is considered the "Banana Belt" of South Dakota, but that does not mean that it can't get some mean winter weather. Blizzards can be a most unpleasant, albeit infrequent occurrence. In summer, Rapid (along with a strip all the way south through Colorado's Front Range) is part of "Hail Alley," an area with the highest incidence of damaging hail in the US. The house I lived in when I was residing in SE Wyoming had to be re-roofed three times in four years due to hail damage. Hail to grapefruit-size has occurred in the region; golfball-size hail occurs somewhere in the "Alley" several times every summer.
New Mexico generally does not suffer from some of the weather extremes that occur in South Dakota, Wyoming, or Colorado, but the aridity can be a real shock to those from wetter climates.
Culture: Southern Colorado and New Mexico (northern New Mexico, in particular) are completely culturally different than South Dakota or Wyoming. South Dakota and Wyoming are predominantly Anglo, with a sizable but still minority Native American population. Southern Colorado and New Mexico are heavily Hispanic, with Hispanics being the majority in many rural counties. Many of those folks can trace their roots back to before that area became part of the United States in 1848. In New Mexico, there are numerous areas that are predominantly Native American--New Mexico has one of the highest Native American populations in the US.
I can't recommend the Front Range of Colorado, though I grew up there way back when. It has become just another badly planned, auto-dependent urban/suburban polyglot of cracker-box houses, sprawl, and characterless big-boxes. It has also taken on more and more of the character of the people who have transplanted there, and does not represent the character of what the region really was like at one time. For that, places like rural Wyoming, New Mexico, South Dakota, and the few "undiscovered" areas (and there are damned few of those) of Colorado are the places to see if you want to find the "Real West." Otherwise, you're just seeing the Las Vegas/Phoenix/Hollywood/Aspen cartoon version of it. I would really suggest that you plan to visit several areas in the region before you make any decisions--and not just in the resorts or the cities.
I have always liked the Native American poet/philosopher M. Scot Momaday's comment about the true landscape of the West:
Quote:
It is a landscape that has to be seen to be believed, and may have to be believed in order to be seen.
I'm a western PA native, but lived in Rapid City for 2 years (2003-2005) as a graduate student at SDSM&T. Here are some pro's/con's about Rapid City from the perspective of a person that grew up "back east", although in a more rural area:
Pro's:
1) Very beautiful scenery!
2) No traffic
3) No summer humidity
4) Not much crime
5) More to do than in most cities its size, since it's a regional "hub" so to speak
6) No income tax in SD
7) reasonable cost of living
8) winters are actually sunny!
Con's
1) extreme temperature swings. Can be frost in the morning and in the 70's in the afternoon. Can have a high of 30 one day and a high of 70 the next, and visa versa. It takes some getting used to.
2) possible feeling of isolation. Once you leave the Black Hills area, there is literally NOTHING for several hours in every direction. With gasoline prises going up and up, you may feel like you are stuck on an island
3) Be preprared for car trouble if you leave the city, because there may not be any help available. The locals are friendly and helpful, but there aren't very many towns or people outside of the Black Hills. A flat tire out on some deserted roadway could be a real problem...especially if weather is bad. Have a survival kit! Carry plenty of water / food/ blankets with you if you leave town. Replace that little spare tire with a full-sized one. I learned that lesson the hard way! Don't be scared...just prepared!
4) winter mornings are often very cold due to the lack of clouds.
Other: the area is generally conservative politically/socially. This could be either a "pro" or "con" depending on the person. I am conservative, so I "fit in" pretty well there. However, if you are coming from a very liberal area like Boston, be aware that people in Rapid City will probably seem much more conservative.
Kpoeppel- great list of the pros and cons of Rapid City! One thing though, most people who are traveling in and out of Rapid City use I-90. There are plenty of passerbys on the Interstate so you are actually not completely isolated. But if you are driving to Denver through Wyoming... BE PREPARED!!!
Wow, that's a lot of great information; very helpful! It sounds like the Rapid City area could be very promising, and we're already talking about when we can make a trip out there to visit. We were in Fort Collins, Denver & Colorado Springs in October, and liked the FC area quite a bit. We'll be heading to Boise in June, and we'll start planning for a trip to RC! We won't likely move until next Spring, but it is almost certain that we'll be leaving here.
In response to one of the posters, we actually are looking for a more conservative area, as far as politics go. I'm not a religious conservative, but definitely lean in the conservative direction as far as most of my politics. Yes, I am one of a rather small number of folks out here that usually votes Republican!
In fact, it's the liberal spending and constant tax increases out here that is one of the reasons we've about had it with the area. Not just that, but the cities and towns and roadways are rather old and heavily populated, so you don't find a great deal of town parks and such. In addition, there are WAY too many drivers for the roadways. Traffic out here can be a real nightmare.
For example, take a look at Massachusetts on a map. Then realize there are about 6.5 million people in the state, more than Colorado, and more than Wyoming, Idaho and the Dakotas combined. Then look at Rhode Island, where I grew up. There are about 1.1 million people there, more than in Wyoming, and almost as many as in Idaho, and almost as many in the Dakotas combined!
So, to put it mildly, we are looking for a nice lifestyle change!
Thanks again to everybody, and if you have any more to add, please do. And again, if I can answer any New England/northeast questions, I'm happy to do so.
I just realized that I meant to ask if there are any particular areas in Rapid City that would be good for house-hunting, as well as any surrounding towns within 15 minutes or so of the city.
Thanks again!
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We mainly get good and honest and hardworking people who relocate here.
One thing I forgot...
