Posts Tagged ‘snow’
Cyndie’s Shots
Cyndie has always been incredibly generous about allowing me to post photos she has taken. Lest there ever be doubt, I add her name to the bottom right corner of images of hers that I use.
On my way home from work yesterday, I received a series of images texted from Cyndie that reflect scenes she had captured during the day.
“Why, yes, I’d love to use them!”
First off, this fascinating shot reveals that a couple of deer decided to lay down in the middle of a trail, for a long enough time that they melted the snow all the way down to the ground.
That’s a first. With all the excellent cover available, these two chose a large clearing for their naps. Must be feeling plenty safe on our property.
Notice what a difference a few days makes with regard to the snow sticking to the trees. Scroll down a couple of posts and compare this shot with the two I posted a couple of days ago.
There is still plenty of snow out in the fields. Cyndie framed up this gorgeous view of snow drifting around a culvert.
Delilah looks so stoic as an accent to the shadow and shapes below her. I love the perspective of different elevation this provides.
Finally, there is this beautiful sunset.
If you can make out the chicken coop in the distance, the low sun is shining through it such that it looks like a light is on in there.
It’s fair to say that Cyndie has probably contributed more pictures to this blog in the last year than I have.
For that, I am extremely grateful. Thank you, C!
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Revisiting Notes
All sorts of gems are hidden in the archives of Relative Something posts, and last night I uncovered a jewel to repost today. As exciting as my day yesterday was, what with my landing an appointment with a Craigslist buyer to stop by and make another decluttering purchase, and our new favorite tractor tire repairman showing up to finish the other tire (Yay!), none of it blossomed into a bigger story for me.
The single sentence above easily wrapped up the significant events of the day.
Well, I found a “Words on Images” creation from early 2014 that should fill in nicely, aligning with the oncoming bout of cold and sunny winter-like weather on tap for the next few days here.
In honor of the cat mention included in my poem below, I’m throwing in this bonus picture that Cyndie recently took of Pequenita behaving like royalty on Cyndie’s pillow.
Enjoy!
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Notes
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Words on Images
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Two Trails
Did I mention how beautiful the weekend sticky snowfall was? See for yourself.
Which trail would you choose?
Heading south?
Or heading north?
I love the extremity of contrast between scenes like these, compared to how these woods look in the summer.
We aren’t teasing when we brag about doing all four seasons of the year around these parts.
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Two Perspectives
This weekend’s snowfall was certainly a pretty one. There was an interesting combination of stickiness and blowing. The tops of the trees didn’t hold the snow, but the lower trunks and branches sure did.
If you’ve watched my photographic tendencies for a few years, you are probably familiar with my penchant for close, full-frame images, as well as my pattern of including one feature for accent.
Especially, leaves.
This little specimen was irresistible for the fabulous character of the fancy edges.
That wonderful leaf caught my attention because of the way it blew across the top of the snow and then just settled down in this spot, as if it was waiting for me to take the picture.
Thankfully, it stayed around long enough for me to capture it from a second perspective, which brings those fancy edges to life with added dimension.
I don’t think these two should ever be displayed one without the other. Two wonderful perspectives on one fancy leaf.
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Red Marks
For months now we have been walking past trees in our woods that are marked for removal with a red spot. It was more subtle when the forest was lush and green. Now that there aren’t any leaves on the trees, those red marks are impossible to miss.
When our local DNR agent responded to our invitation to walk our woods, we learned our most valuable trees are the oaks, and that they will be kept healthiest if we remove competition growing directly beneath their canopy. I mentioned it would be a challenge for me to identify what is good and what is bad.
You know how much of an aversion I have to cutting down live trees.
He was quick to volunteer to return later and mark trees for removal. Most of them are relatively small diameter and will be easy to bring down. Cyndie and I decided yesterday was a good time to start on the project.
Heck, I can’t drive the tractor anywhere yet, so we may as well create piles of branches to be chipped at a later date.
About those red marks… When you get a chainsaw in your hands, suddenly trees with red dots show up at every turn. Maybe that is because I just chose to start with the trees right below the driveway. Some of our biggest oaks are right there (hence the thick carpet of leaves that land on the yard) and that meant a lot of trees to be culled all the way around each of the large oak trunks.
I took some solace in being able to see visible evidence of just the problem our DNR forester described. Oak trees stop feeding lower limbs when other growth begins to encroach from below. That can lead to a lopsided or top-heavy oak.
When we pulled down the smaller trees, it was easy to see the number of bottom oak branches that had already been left for dead.
Unfortunately, we grew weary after just a couple of hours of cutting up and piling branches of the easiest trees felled. Several substantial sized red-marked trees remain. That will be a project for another day.
I may just move on further into the woods where I know there are a lot of small (easy) red-marked trees, before returning to take down the larger diameter encroachers by the driveway.
That project will be delayed a little bit now, though, as the more immediate pressing need is for plowing and shoveling snow. We received a decent amount of sticky flakes yesterday afternoon and overnight.
So much for easily spotting those red marked trees…
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Growing Crystals
It is wet, and the temperature drops below freezing at night, so morning walks offer views of the overnight ice crystal growth. Photo op!
We are enjoying a couple of days with daytime temps climbing above freezing, so our snow cover is dwindling. Walking Delilah along the perimeter trails yesterday, I discovered tire tracks that revealed someone had left the road and driven into the ditch by our property.
Roads in the area are still slippery.
Delilah made a surprise discovery while we were making our way through our woods after I got home from work yesterday. (Interesting coincidence: Ward and I were just exchanging comments related to this subject on my Tuesday post, Feeling Wintery.)
Like she almost always does, she was paying frequent attention toward the center of our woods, obviously picking up the scent of something that interested her. She generally walks a short distance, then stops to look left and sniff at the air, before continuing on for a ways and stopping again.
Sometimes, she picks up a scent on the ground and tries to follow it a few steps off the trail. I tend to pull her back quickly to get her back on task of walking our regular patrol around the property.
All of a sudden yesterday, she bolted to the left as if she was immediately on the tail of some critter, circling around a large tree trunk beside the trail before I could put the brake on her leash. I spotted the pile of fur just as she struck it with a massive bite.
She then let go just about as fast as she had attacked. Uncharacteristically, she didn’t resist one bit when I put tension on her leash to bring her back to the trail.
We walked a short distance and I hooked her to a tree so I could go back alone to see what it was that she had bitten. It was an opossum. I didn’t bother to check for any other detail, choosing to let nature take its course, and us to finish our walk.
If that had been one of our chickens, they wouldn’t have stood a chance.
Even though we keep Delilah on a leash, we also need to pay attention to her at all times.
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Feeling Wintery
We did not get much of a chance to ease our way into winter this month. This morning’s single-digit low temperature is the second time already in November that we have faced such surprisingly cold air. The average high and low for this area in November is 40°/25°(F).
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My favorite weather blog is predicting a brown Thanksgiving next week, so we are looking forward to a return to more normal high temperatures in the days ahead, to melt away the remnants of last week’s snowfall.
The horses have been quick to develop their thicker winter coats and appear to be adapting to the cold without difficulty. Delilah loves the snow and romps with visible excitement, frequently burying her snout in the powder and coming up with a wonderfully frosty nose.
The chickens are already over most of their apprehension about walking in the snow, so we aren’t too concerned about them. I noticed recently that the size of one roost (there are actually two) seems to best accommodate 8 hens, based on how our current brood situate themselves.
Unfortunately, we currently have 9 birds.
Last one in tends to set off a chain reaction of chickens wrangling for position, with one dropping down when a 9th barges in line. Occasionally, a Wyandotte will choose to hurdle them all and perch against the wall on a stud above the window.
Last winter, we only had three hens and they didn’t have any problem fitting. You’d think they would split up and use both roosts, but I haven’t seen that yet.
For the first time in the two years we’ve had chickens, we think we may have a sick hen. Her change in behavior started about the same time the snow arrived, so it wasn’t clear at first that there was any issue beyond not wanting to walk in the snow. Now that the other eight have returned to normal behavior, the malaise of the ninth has become more conspicuous.
She doesn’t want to leave the coop. It is hard to track her eating and drinking, so we are not sure if this is a serious illness or something minor that will resolve itself over time. We’ll start observing her with increased scrutiny to see if we learn anything more.
We have been so intent on tracking the potential predators that threaten the hens, it would be a shame to instead lose one to illness. We hope to do everything we can to prevent that from happening.
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Totally Busted
My ruse of relying on snow cover to distract Cyndie from noticing the grass was still carpeted by leaves when she returned home from Guatemala has already been dispelled.
On Saturday, the sun came out for a little while and began to shrink the 3-to-4 inches of snow we received, down to about half that depth. Yesterday, she and Delilah were playing a little leashed version of “fetch the stick” out front and the truth was sadly revealed.
It was interesting. The leaves so thoroughly covered the ground that the grass and soil beneath look unaffected by the snow. I think, if we raked up the leaves today, we’d have an amazing visual of a completely snow-free green lawn, while everywhere else would be snowy.
The chickens would sure appreciate that. This was the first significant snowfall in their lives and they were not at all interested in venturing out from the coop Saturday morning to walk in it.
By yesterday, they were already overcoming their hesitancy to tread on the white stuff and revisiting some of their usual favorite spaces. They do so at their own risk.
While we were out walking Delilah in the afternoon, I spotted an unidentified bird of prey circling the tree tops around the coop. It didn’t have the classic white tail of the previous eagle that swooped through our trees, but it could simply have been a youngster or even a golden, let alone any other variety of larger hawk.
We split up and Cyndie circled back to directly check on the chickens, while I continued around the perimeter with Delilah. The hunting predator glided up and away almost immediately.
I’m so pleased to have remembered to tell Cyndie that I had turned the electric fence back on while she was away. The horses were growing too comfortable with nibbling on parts of the wire insulation and nearby wood. If the fence had still been off, Cyndie would have ducked between wires and been able to walk straight toward the coop.
While I was cleaning up under the overhang a day or two after turning the electricity back on again, Cayenne took a startling snap to the nose. Mission accomplished. The horses were lolling around idly while I worked and she stretched toward one of the very spots I wanted to stop them from biting.
The horses generally notice from a distance that the fence is energized, so they very rarely get shocked. Maybe we left it off for too much of the summer, and they had grown complacent. I’m willing to bet they have already re-learned the necessary respect that will break any habit of chewing on the wires.
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Problem Solved
Look! No leaves!
Just in time for Cyndie’s return from Guatemala, 3 or 4 inches of snow have covered up the leaves in the front yard.
She flew to Atlanta last night and texted me from there to bring her a jacket. I grabbed a scarf and mittens, too. The flight from Atlanta left over an hour later than scheduled. It was a middle of the night drive to the Minneapolis airport and back.
Small price to pay to have my baby home again!
Despite a few scares, I kept all the animals alive while she was away. I must say, that’s a welcome relief.
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Looking Brown
When I got home from work yesterday, I looked at the thermometer outside to find the high and low temperatures for the day. It ranged from the warmest being 32.9°(F) and the coldest, 32.0°. Yummy.
It’s going to be a struggle sweeping up the wet leaves from the grass if the winter weather that showed up this week decides to stay.
Most of the ground is still too warm for the snow to last. The image of our woods below provides a clear demonstration of the difference between the relative warmth of the ground, compared to the above-ground branches that are cold enough the snow doesn’t melt.
Supposedly, the ground will have a chance to freeze in the days ahead, as the forecast predicts a number of days in a row with high temperatures not making it above the freezing point.
Other than the disaster this will present for me with regard to leaves in the yard, it will be a welcome change from the current swampy conditions on our trails. We’ve got standing water in multiple places. The lime-screenings around the barn overhang are starting to become a mud fest from heavy hoof traffic.
I am ready for it all to become rock hard. The squishing is becoming tiresome.
Look at the color palette of these three pictures. Does anyone else associate November with the color brown?
Last night, I was listening to music on the radio in the house and more than once, Delilah reacted as if she heard something outside. At one point, she barked, like someone was here.
I shut off the radio and let her hear the quiet.
We went to the front door so I could show her there was nobody around. She then ran around to the door to the garage. I’ve seen this routine many times. She was looking for Cyndie to arrive home.
I opened the door to the garage to show her it was dark in there. I made the mistake of turning on the light, which allowed Delilah to see Cyndie’s car and get revved up over what that usually means.
How do I explain to Delilah that Cyndie got a ride to the airport and her car has been parked in the garage for the last eight days?
I guess enough days have passed since Delilah last saw Cyndie that she is beginning to figure mom must be coming home soon.
Just two more days!
That might be all the time needed for enough snow to fall that Cyndie will never know I didn’t get around to removing all the leaves.
Well, never, until next spring, that is.
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Relative Something 