This year was a weird year climate and weather wise everyone is correct about the temps. Areas in the pine barrens are rated a USDA zone 6b which means that in a normal winter the absolute low temp for the year will be between -5 and 0. The inner and outer coastal plain bordering the pine barrens is a USDA zone 7a with normal winter absolute lows between 0 and 5 degrees F. And lastly for South Jersey our coastal areas like Cape May and Atlantic city are rated as a USDA zone 7b with normal winter absolute lows between 5 and 10 degrees F.
So now that I have laid the precedent of what you can expect in a normal winter in South Jersey lets talk about this year.... This year cities in the Pine Barrens which is actually the "ice box" of South Jersey had a zone 7a/b winter with lows not dipping much below 10f... areas not in the pine barrens but still in South Jersey like my house 15 mins from Philadelphia had a solid USDA 8a winter with absolute lows at my house of 12F (for a sense of scale Virginia Beach, Virginia the southernmost point in that state is a zone 8a during a normal winter) and our coastal areas came in around an 8a/b where many areas in Cape May didnt see below 15F.
As far as low temps were concerned we had a well above average winter, in a normal winter negative temps are rare to begin with in South Jersey and are usually only regulated in South Jersey to the pine barrens with their sandy soil that doesnt hold much heat at night, but this winter they were nonexistant.
But in a very weird contrast every single winter month was below average for the high temps with February being a very weak 9F below average for the highs! This is the reason we got so much snow, in a normal winter with much of South Jersey averaging 41f for highs in January and 45 in February, 2 out of 3 times those big nor'easters we get will be all rain events but since we couldnt seem to really warm up during the day this winter we got slammed with a mind bogglingly 79 inches of snow, a full 64 inches above avg!
So in conclusion, this winters lows were very mild but our highs were below avg every month of the winter.... So our lows were very warm but as a whole it was a harsh winter as far as precipitation and high temps were concerned. But the ticks were probably more worried about night time temps which were very warm.
Am planning to do my first permethrin treatment of my outdoor clothes this weekend though....