Archive for the ‘Weather’ Category
May 3, 2013 – Winter 2012-2013 – YOU WIN!
Now that you’ve proved your strength, you won, now go away!
It’s still snowing and already both the highest May snowfall ever and most snow ever for the month of May (and there’s still 28 days left!).
These lilac leaves didn’t have a chance.
A country road in May.
March 14, 2013 – Spring Trying to Arrive?
Even though we have had seriously below normal temperatures, running 10-20 degrees below normal all month, the maple s are beginning to show signs of life.
This was the first year a tree I planted was big enough to tap!
We’ve had precipitation 10 out of 14 days so far this month. I’m ready for some sunshine!
March 6, 2013 – By the Morning Light
It was a tough drive home last night. While the roads were perfectly dry in town, out here, it was a different story. Even though a neighbor cleared one lane last night, even the blacktop county road was down to one lane in parts, along with our road.
While it seems I’m spending all my time the last week driving on icy roads and bringing cars in for service, Emma had great news as she will join her sister in working at Wolf Ridge Environmental Center on the North Shore of Lake Superior this summer. Meanwhile, Claire is touring Hamburg and Berlin as we speak.
February 28, 2013 – I’m Voting for “Lion”
Last year at this time, we were tapping maple trees for sap. This year seems a bit more normal.
We’re on about 36 straight hors of snow after the prediction was for “occasional flurries” with some places getting up to an inch. The closest town to our west measured 14 inches and to the east 10 inches, so we probably got a bout a foot. Last week they warned us three days before about a major storm that turned out to fizzle. Now this one, they did not make any warnings until hours after the storm started. More of the same predicted for the first week of March, so I’m going with in like a lion, out like a lamb this year!
January 31, 2013 – Winter WeatherTrifecta plus One!
Our streak of miserable winter weather continues. Day 1 ice. Day 2 thunderstorms. Day 3 snow. Day 4 Howling wind and dangerous cold in the depths of the bleak midwinter.
Most of the day, the snow from 5-6 counties away blew in all day in single-digit temps. Late in the day there was a slight lessening of the wind affording the first view of the power poles a mile away.
January 28, 2013 – Fire and Ice
Here’s something we haven’t seen for a while – red on the radar.
Thunderstorms and 39 degrees.
Yesterday’s ice storm did not want to give way.
Martin thought school should have been a two hour delay – and he was right – he heard that 5 buses needed a tow – and his bus picked up kids from one of the stuck buses.
Even a common Queen Anne’s Lace looks more elegant encased in ice.
January 27, 2013 – Want a Little Icing on that Earth?
Even though I’ve got photo editing software that puts this effect on any photo, the following are real, undoctored photos.
The view out the kitchen window looking towards the doghouse and barn.
A maple tree in the front yard.
The detached garage. Everything is shut down this morning because of the ice.
I was hoping for a power blip or two as I finally broke down and bought a UPS (uninterruptible power supply) this week so the computer would work through power blinks and shut down properly during an extended outage with battery back-up.
October 3, 2012 – Fall is Here
Time for the obligatory fall shot.
Emma in her birthday chair that Martin made for her.
July 14, 2012 – So the Summer Goes
We’ve even been missing out on the scattered thunderstorms, like this one that poured down heavy rain just to our east. This one was moving due south and Marshalltown got some 1 inch hail near the center of the storm.
There’s not a day in the 10 day forecast below 90. I still remember a pleasant summer a few years back, where it only reached above 90 three days for the year.
April 12, 2012 – Cold Weather Finally Returns
After getting May weather in March, so far April has been more like March. We’ve had three nights in a row with frost, down to about 25 on our unofficial outdoor thermometer.
Some of the trees handled it better than others. This walnut got nipped – all the mulberries turned crispy. Many of the cherry and peach trees have already blossomed, so I’m hopeful the newly fertilized fruit bodies can withstand frost better than the anthers and stamens in a flowering bud, but time will tell how the fruit trees fared. It would be a bummer to have a season without apples, peaches, cherries,a nd pears!
March 30, 2012 – Procrastination Pays!
The storm last night saved me about $300. Back behind the chicken coop is a basswood tree that had three large limbs broken off in last July’s storm. Although they were still mostly upright last week, I had meant to call the tree service over the past few months because it seemed dangerous to have so many unstable limbs high up in the air.
We had a big thunderstorm wind gust last night and it put all three limbs on the ground. Now, it’s a self-service job - all I have to do is drag them to the ground with the chain and tractor and then cut them up. It must have been after we were asleep as we didn’t notice – it also blew over the gas grill on the patio.
February 24, 2012 – Snow!
The biggest storm of the year (all three inches of it) at least stuck to everything to make a fanciful landscape.
Doggy in the snow!
Snow fence.
Raspberry bushes.
Clear, blue skies and snow. A look of winter.
The chief engineer didn’t design for three inches of wet, heavy snow on the cold frame. While it didn’t open up to the outside, some of the support wires did collapse.
But of course, under the snow, the water droplets on the plastic remain fluid.
February 6, 2012 – Where’s the Snow?
Here’s an unusual sight – the white pines near the barn covered in hoarfrost without any snow on the ground!
Once the sun comes out, the hoarfrost isn’t long for the world, so I rushed out.
The needle-like frost looks nasty on this white pine. Evidently the northern edge of Des Moines had the first real snowfall of the year, about 9 inches – here only a dusting that melted quickly away.
December 31, 2011 – Endless Late October
It has indeed been an endless late October this so-called winter. Here we are at New Year’s Eve.
This afternoon, for example, it was in the upper 50′s a far cry from the common sub-zero usually on this day.
Heck, we were even able to get laundry out on the line!
