Posts Tagged ‘melting snow’
Rehoming Horses
In less than a week, they will be gone. Our three horses are returning to the home from which they traveled when they came to us back in the fall of 2013. There is an invisible gloom darkening the energy around here of late. It feels eerily similar to the dreadful grief we endured after Legacy’s death in January of last year.
Happiness still exists, we just aren’t feeling it much these days.
Cyndie spent hours grooming the horses yesterday. I found myself incapable of going near them. It’s as if I’m preparing myself in advance for their absence. This place just won’t be the same without them.
For now, we still have the chickens. With the snow cover receding, and hours of daylight increasing, they are expanding their range again, scouring the grounds for scrumptious things to eat from the earth. It is my hope that they are getting an early start on decimating the tick population around here.
After Cyndie said she picked seven eggs yesterday, I asked if we were getting ahead of our rate of consumption yet. Almost three dozen, she reported!
Spring has definitely sprung.
I walked the grounds yesterday to survey the flow of water draining from the melting snow. We are benefiting greatly from overnight freezes that have slowed the process enough that no single place is being inundated now. It was the heavy rain falling on the deep snow that led to the barn flood last week. We’ve had little precipitation since, and that has helped a lot.
There are a couple of spots where the flow has meandered beyond the modest constraints in place to facilitate orderly transfer, mainly due to the dense snow that still plugs up the ditches and culverts.
Water definitely chooses to flow the path of least resistance.
I can relate to that. It feels like our life here is changing course in search of a new outlet for our energy to flow. Part of me feels like there should be a rehoming of ourselves, except we have no home to which we would return.
In a strange way, it’s as if I am experiencing a similar avoidance of being with myself, like the way I couldn’t bring myself to stand among the horses yesterday.
If this is not the place where I belong, then I already don’t want to be here any more. Unfortunately, there is nowhere I’d rather be right now.
When buds pop, and leaves sprout, I will breathe in our forest air. That will help.
But it won’t be the same without our horses.
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Not Surprising
I received another weather warning on my phone last night. This time, it wasn’t about another round of plowable snow, but it comes as no surprise that they’ve issued a flood watch for our county. So, it’s out of the frying pan snow machine and into the fire hip waders for us this week.
Oh, joy.
We’ve got so much snow that our 3-board fence looks short enough in some spots that the horses could high-step their way over it. I think the only thing dissuading them from trying is the deepness of the snow on the other side.
We are due to get significant rain tomorrow and Thursday, without anywhere for it to soak in. There are bound to be a number of new rivers and lakes formed in the days ahead.
We’ll probably have the horses in the barn while it is raining, and the chickens will be given the option of venturing out at their own peril, but I’m not confident either of their structures will stay dry.
At least the coop is on stilts. The wood is shrunk from the dry winter air, so there are some gaps in places, I suspect, but it swells up nicely when it gets wet, so that just leaves drips from a few leaky screws in the roof panels.
The barn, on the other hand, is already suffering from areas that were once standing water that subsequently froze and rendered the two big sliding doors inoperable. More water on top of the old ice will not only make that situation worse, it will inevitably start flowing toward the lower ground available inside.
Thank goodness our house is at the top of a hill.
It is not surprising that they chose this spot on which to build.
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Melty Mess
Two days of consecutive hours above freezing have turned our snow cover to a goopy mess. It’s a real mental challenge to reconcile the dramatic difference between the polar vortex deep freeze last week and the balmy meltdown that occurred over the weekend.
This is how the surface of the snow looks now:
It’s a lot more like April than a day in February.
On the bright side, we haven’t had a single snowmobile buzzing down the trail that runs along our neighbor’s property on our southern border this year. Makes for a much more serene outdoor experience, despite all the other hazards we’ve faced.
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Quick Melt
Yesterday was a day of blue sky and above freezing temperatures. The world around us responded emphatically.
It seems only fair. The winter storm that rolled over us last weekend came with its own significant emphasis. When I got to work on Monday, I was greeted by a three-foot drift that filled the sidewalk to our front door.
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I needed to shovel my way into work.
Yesterday’s swift melting was spring’s perfect response to the double-digit blast of snow.
The metal roof of the shop-garage is always a source of creative snow-melt. Before the large icicles had a chance to break off the edge of the roof, the entire mass of snow lost grip with the roof and slid down, curling as it rolled over the lip.
The sideways icicle made for a spectacular visual.
As the sun headed for the horizon, I spotted the withering snow mass covering the deck. I have no idea why the snow melted the way it did, but it became a blanket of patterned bumps that I have never seen before. Turn the image upside down and it could be a mammatus cloud formation.
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It didn’t feel possible last weekend, but I do believe spring is going to finally respond to the earth tilt that is lengthening our hours of sunlight.
Yep, we are finally getting a quick melt to this very long, slow winter. At this point, I’ll gladly take it.
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Melt Art
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When life gives you snow, make portraits!
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The good news, yesterday’s blue sky and high sun melted a lot of the snow that fell overnight on Friday, even though the air temperature stayed cold.
The bad news, more snow and continued cold air is what lies ahead this week.
The silver lining, plenty of new photo opportunities!
Flowing Water
Our drainage swales are finally flowing!
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The largest ditch along our southern border was a babbling brook yesterday.
Eventually, the ditch narrows and meanders away from our property, wandering its way through our neighbor’s cow pasture.
The snow is leaving, and it will travel to rivers that travel to the Mississippi that flows to the Gulf of Mexico.
B’ bye.
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Slow Fade
Lately, my return trips from the day-job have been providing a mystery surprise ending. Each day, I get to discover how much change there has been in the snow-melt, or whether there are signs of water flowing in the drainage ditches. The big white blanket has been making a slow retreat from our hills and valleys this year.
The good result of that slow fade is a distinct lack of flooding problems. The less desirable result is the prolonged chill radiating off the snow base, not to mention the bothersome, sometimes hazardous footing on our trails.
Even though there is a lot of ground finally exposed, there is still a lot of snow cover remaining.
It’ll take a couple of days of real sunshine to finish off this lingering snowpack. It’s possible that today and tomorrow could do the trick, if the skies clear as predicted, but I won’t be surprised if that doesn’t pan out.
Of course, then we have new snow forecast for the weekend, so it’s not like there’s any expectation of being completely done with the white stuff yet. We’ve learned not to claim that possibility until some time in June.
At least the new snows of spring are much quicker to fade away when the sun comes out after a storm.
It’s almost time to rearrange the storage areas to put the shovels to the rear and bring up the rakes and lawn mowers.
Aaahhh, spring. So close, we can feel it.
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Snow Going
We dodged a spring snow storm overnight. That’s what it feels like, anyway. Obviously, we didn’t do any dodging. We stayed right where we are and didn’t flinch, while the white stuff slid past a little bit to the south of our region. Too bad for those folks.
I guess we all get a turn at weather adventure.
This leaves us with the adventures of watching snow melt. I am fascinated by the way anything of color absorbs the solar energy and melts a perfect pattern into the otherwise reflective snow.
Meanwhile, that reflective snow mass is radiating an amazing chill that offsets some of the best efforts of warm air to tip the balance. Taking a walk across the crusty surface in our open fields feels like a trip down the frozen foods aisle in the grocery store. The sun is shining warmth, but, brrrr, there’s a cold draft wafting up from everywhere!
We can now see where my winter plowing has torn great gouges of turf from the edges of the driveway and sprayed rocks in a wide array across the grass. New cracks in the old asphalt of our neglected driveway look another significant degree decayed.
I’m amazed anything survives unscathed. The concrete apron in front of the house garage looks to have moved its slope another degree in the wrong direction, inviting the snowmelt and rain runoff to drain toward the foundation instead of away.
And in terms of heaving earth, the waterer for the horses in the paddock has shifted dramatically off-kilter so that one side overflows and the high side holds inches less water.
Where is all the hope and renewal of spring?
It’s waiting. Biding its time beneath the surface. We must be patient. It will come.
The trillium we have transplanted will bloom again. Volunteer maple trees will sprout in mind-boggling numbers everywhere we turn.
The snow is going.
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Just Grillin’
Not much happening here. The beginning of March is arriving with a dose of warm temperatures melting our snow. Cyndie took advantage of the thaw last night and prepared a pork roast on the grill for dinner.
I’m just chillin’ in the between of significant projects at home.
We are in a period of relative quiet around the house. The kind where books get read and naps get napped.
When grilling is the big excitement for the day, it’s a pretty good sign things are generally going well.
That is all. Carry on.
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Relative Something 