Phil Orbe continued a spring ritual on Sunday. The Montville High School baseball coach brought his snow blower over to the school's baseball field in order to clear it off before the first practice.

Orbe gave up after an hour.

"Yeah, it's not working," Orbe said. "The field has about three inches of ice on it, atop about six inches of snow.

"I weigh about 235 pounds, and I'm on top of (the ice) with a snow blower, and I wasn't sinking or anything. It was crazy."

High school teams everywhere will have to get creative. The winter of our discontent won't go away as months' worth of snow still coat athletic fields, never mind the temperature taking a wicked dip on Monday, the official start of practice for the high school spring season.

"We went out on the turf (athletic field) at about 7 o'clock working on defensive drills," Orbe said. "It was pretty cold, but the kids were alright."

What about the adults?

"My assistants didn't complain to my face," Orbe said. "So that's a good thing."

Adjusting to bad weather is a part of spring sports due to the amount of rain. Players and coaches have become acclimated to being outside in cold weather through at least part of April, too.

This year's spring practices will be a little more difficult than usual.

"We were out on the turf, and it was about 15-20 degrees tonight," Waterford boys' lacrosse coach Chris Landry said.

Fitch softball coach Kate Prpich said, "Yeah, we definitely won't be outdoors any time soon."

Monday's first day of practice had a little extra significance for Prpich, who took last season off to give birth to her first child. The Falcons won the CIAC Class L title.

Prpich got cozy with her team right away.

"We practice in the small gym," Prpich said. "I'd say it's a little more than half the size of the basketball gym. … We had about 36 girls today, so 36 girls in that kind of space, you have to be a glutton for punishment."

Prpich has become flexible when it comes to practicing. The Falcons go to North Stonington and hit at the Grand Slam Batting Cages. They can condition at Groton's CrossFit Inguz, which Kate and husband, Andrew, are part owners.

"We can go throw in the parking lot," Kate Prpich said. "It's a lot safer than 36 girls in the gym. There's a little bit more room; a little more space. The lacrosse and baseball teams have done it. You just go to where there's space."

Waterford is lucky that it has have a turf athletic field to practice on. The school got creative when getting it cleared off - it had its boys' and girls' lacrosse teams compete over who could shovel the most snow off it last week.

"We just didn't think it was ever going to melt," Landry said. "We're very fortunate to be outside and be able to compete right away on turf. We had some snow spots left over, so we used some of our sticks to get rid of some today."

The Montville baseball team has used the athletic field for several years now for defensive drills.

"Usually our field is very soft, and we don't want the kids to get bad habits," Orbe said. "The track and lacrosse teams have been very good to us and given us a bit of time to use it."

The Indians are scheduled to scrimmage on the turf Saturday, too.

"We can set it up that we actually have a baseball field," Orbe said. "You won't play a right fielder, but you make do with what you have."

n.griffen@theday.com

Twitter: @MetalNED