Posts Tagged ‘sun angle’
Conflicting Evidence
One of the more frustrating situations in troubleshooting is the intermittent problem. Yesterday morning, we heated water and filled an insulated pitcher before heading to the barn to feed the horses. Since the waterer in the paddock had frozen up again the previous afternoon when the temperature was relatively mild, we were prepared for the worst after an overnight of extreme cold.
That wasn’t the case. Water was flowing just fine when we arrived to check. It doesn’t make sense to me.
If the water line is not freezing when it gets really cold overnight, the heat tape must be doing its job. That leaves me with the question of why the heat tape wouldn’t prevent freezing when the air temperature moderates into the teens (F) in the middle of the day.
At one point when we suspected the heat tape might be failing, I surmised the possibility that when the horses consistently drink from the waterer, there is enough flow through the line and the valve that it helps prevent freezing. If the waterer is untouched for a length of time, the static state of water in the lines could lead to freezing.
It’s hard to know if the horses are neglecting to drink from the waterer at regular intervals.
We have found the pans of the waterer empty when the line freezes up, so we know the horses eventually get around to drinking after the line is frozen and can’t refill.
With luck, the extreme cold snap we are experiencing for a few days now will be the last of the season. The forecast for a week from now indicates some days above freezing. At almost two months past the winter solstice, the increasing angle of sunshine in the middle of the days is noticeable. Even when the temperature stays below freezing, there are obvious signs of snowmelt around the grounds.
I’m looking forward to the return of warm days when we won’t have to worry about the waterer. If it gets warm enough that the freezing water line is no longer a problem, it will also mean I don’t have to bundle up in my space suit to go outside every morning.
Double bonus!
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Weather Related
Just in case you didn’t expect me to write about the weather today, I put it in the title to give you a warning. Where would I be if I didn’t have the topic of the weather to resort to when nothing fantastical happens worth telling? If you ask Cyndie, she’d say we need to get another dog. I find myself in hesitation mode about making that commitment again.
Speaking of the weather, I would like to present “exhibit A” as a photo to show how the increasing angle of the sun is having a visible impact on our snowpack even during the last few days when we experienced single-digit temperatures that felt ripped right out of January:
The right side of the driveway receives a direct blast of sunshine on blue-sky days while the left side does not.
Another phenomenon we are witnessing is the growing icy mounds where flowing meltwater, under pressure from the terrain, pushes up and re-freezes into surprising-looking high spots of particular hazard to hoofed navigation.
The area beneath the old willow tree in the small paddock has melted down to the dirt but the snowpack glacier a short distance beyond is currently getting thicker as melting occurs uphill and flows down to re-freeze right in front of a gate opening.
The horses wisely refrain from venturing out onto the icy surface.
Much less wise was Light’s decision to bolt in an unnecessary panic to get past me and away from Mix when Swings decided to walk over to the other side of the overhang. Swings had been successively switching sides as she waited for me to finish my housekeeping work before serving up feed yesterday morning. Light had made it a mission to follow along with Swings each time.
That meant I was frequently needing to work around their feet as they intruded on and then evacuated from the space where I was trying to scoop manure. On the last iteration of this dance, Light suddenly decided she needed to hurry to keep up with Swings. Light torqued to avoid me by about an inch but that put her off balance as she was passing through the narrow space of the single fence section that is opposite the swinging gates.
I watched with alarm as the weight of her body pushed against the fence boards, flexing them dramatically –I prepared for them to give way, but they held– before her leg slammed into the post at the other end, jolting her a bit as she continued beyond it. That brought her free to stop behind Swings who was by then standing idly.
It all happened so fast that there was nothing I could do but stare in shock over the spectacle. I noticed Light pick up her front leg and bend the joints in a way that I interpreted as her saying, “Damn! That hurt!”
I fully expected to find remnants of her hide stuck to the post after that but I didn’t find any visible damage on her or the post.
When the footing improves in the rest of the paddock spaces, I think the horses are going to be very happy to spend more time away from the close quarters under the overhang.
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Relative Something 