It would have been better to have thinned the trees over several winters rather than all at one time.
当初要是分几个冬天来疏剪树木，会比一次性疏剪要更好些。
《柯林斯英汉双解大词典》
2
Over a period of about 100,000 years, while the seas pulled back, climates around the world became dramatically more extreme: warmer days, cooler nights; hotter summers, colder winters.
Unusually cold temperatures, such as those the Eastern us has experienced over the past two winters, merely reflect natural variations that are superimposed on the much-longer-term warming trend.