Did you ever catch snowflakes on your tongue?

You may reconsider after reading this post on Yahoo! News about how snowflakes are formed: AP Science Writer Randolph E. Schmid's article notes that "scientists have long known that, under most conditions, the moisture needs something to cling to in order to condense" into raindrops or snowflakes -- but, according to Brent C. Christner, an assistant professor of biological sciences at Louisiana State University, "Bacteria are by far the most active ice nuclei in nature."

Christner and colleagues are publishing a study of these findings Friday in the journal Science. Schmid reports, "In some samples as much as 85 percent of the nuclei were bacteria." Bacteria were most common in France, but bacteria was "present to a lesser degree in Antarctica."

A particular type of bacteria, Pseudomonas syringae, was most commonly found in the samples. Pseudomonas syringae can cause disease in several types of plants including tomatoes and beans. The article speculates that it may be helpful to combat drought by planting crops that attract these bacteria -- but agriculture is far from most Chicagoans' thoughts this evening.

No, tonight the focus is on tonight's forecast for the 35th measurable snow of this seemingly interminable Winter. Tom Skilling's article on the Chicago Tribune website advises that, whether we get any more snow tonight or not, we have had "well beyond the 30 measurable snows that have occurred in the average complete season here since 1928."

It's not just your perception. It has been a long Winter. And now we find there's bacteria everywhere.