diff --git a/.stickler.yml b/.stickler.yml
index d708ec10ec1..db8f5f254e9 100644
--- a/.stickler.yml
+++ b/.stickler.yml
@@ -3,6 +3,10 @@ linters:
     max-line-length: 79
     fixer: false
     ignore: I002
-    exclude:
-      - doc/*
+    # stickler doesn't support 'exclude' for flake8 properly, so we disable it
+    # below with files.ignore:
+    # https://github.com/markstory/lint-review/issues/184
   py3k:
+files:
+  ignore:
+    - doc/**/*.py
diff --git a/doc/examples/_code/weather_data_setup.py b/doc/examples/_code/weather_data_setup.py
index b370aea00f2..e07c6a865bb 100644
--- a/doc/examples/_code/weather_data_setup.py
+++ b/doc/examples/_code/weather_data_setup.py
@@ -1,6 +1,7 @@
 import xarray as xr
 import numpy as np
 import pandas as pd
+import seaborn as sns  # pandas aware plotting library
 
 np.random.seed(123)