Spring Migration 2013: Watch for periodic migration highlights. For the safety and security of the cranes, we will no longer make a real-time map of the migration.
I’ll send you some of our heat if you’ll promise to send me some snow. But we’ll accept no less than 36 inches of snow. You know how much we like to ski down here. 😀
Ha – that reminds me of when my brother and I were small and attempted to investigate a couple just like that. We found out pretty quick they can and will strike like a rattlesnake when disturbed!
This couple has chosen (for years now) a spot just by a short boardwalk by the marina and they are used to people coming very close. Sadly, we also found last year’s chick floating in the shallows not too far away, probably a victim of the harsh late winter and delayed spring this year.
Walked several miles in a spring parade this morning and my hip joints are not pleased. I’m now preparing for some serious napping the rest of the afternoon.
No picture for me here. I was just at your place and none there either. I don’t know if it’s some setting I’ve missed up or what. I’ll keep checking around to see if I can find anything though.
We had such a great weekend, I never want to go back to work. The weather here has been stellar, and we went to the sheep and wool festival in MD on Saturday. I even got yarn there…
And now today is a bit gloomy. Guess that should me heading to the office easier.
We’ve had 4 days of rain here so I can definitely sympathize on the gloomy. Woods are loving are loving it though — the green is busting out all over. 😉
We might get by without any rain today, so it’s off to see George this morning. And if I can get off my lazy back end, I’ve got a lot of cleaning up to do in this apartment.
We’re really proud of our junior high students (and teachers and parents) today. There will be a fire truck parade around town tonight to welcome them home from DC.
You should be proud of them for winning the National Championship “We the People” Junior High Division. Heck I don’t even know them and I’m proud of them.
Huge homecoming gathering and fire/police parade around town a little while ago. The kids wound up on top of one of our fire engines for a couple of slow loops around town. Pix tomorrow.
The farmers are in the fields today for the first time this spring, probably 3 weeks behind schedule.
I rototilled about 50’x50′ of garden today and hope to plant spuds tomorrow.
Highs the last couple of days have been in the 70s, so that’s been a nice change. However, wood tick season has begun and I’ve seen a few mosquitoes already, ackkk!
here in the Twin Cities I just bought my first round of plants from the nursery to decorate my patio. Latest I’ve done that in years (last year I actually planted in march, which just about as strange as this year has been).
The seasonal weather patterns have been very strange here the past three season, and I’m including ’13 in that. 2011 started late due to rains which continued throughout the season saturating the soil at all levels.
Then in 2012 planting season started early, but then we had drought conditions through until fall.
Now in 2013 we have the winter that never ends. I still have a few inches of snow on the ground at the north edge of the shelter belt (trees). And already the garden is very dry within the first six inches of soil, as we’ve had only 0.70″ of rain so far.
Looks to be another exciting growing season, that’s for sure.
I was checking out our weather predictions for the next couple of weeks and we’ll be up in the mid to high 80’s. By the end of the month full fledged summer will be here.
If I could only have the calm, cool, serene weather y’all do in N.D. 😉
The weather isn’t cooperating today to see George. But I’ll still try to go and see him today, and I’m just glad he has his dog house. Of course if it’s wet outside I know there’s no way he’ll come out because of the way he hates water. So I’ll have to see how it is later on.
I saw how you still have snow, hope that gives way for you soon.
I was just about ready to put some tender plants in the ground until I heard we were supposed to get temps in the 30s Monday night. Guess I’ll wait a bit longer.
We’re getting our rain Friday and Saturday along with tornado watches. Today it’s cloudy and hot (85F) and although it feels humid to me, the weather is saying it’s only 47%. Where’s the 95F and 85% humidity I’m used to? It’s coming and I’m not looking forward to it. Hope your day is going good.
Our storms will last until tomorrow afternoon with some breaks from time to time. I haven’t heard about any damage yet and haven’t really heard any high winds. So hopefully no damages.
You and Jim be careful driving out in the weather.
We woke up to 35 this morning and daytime highs have not surpassed 50 since last Wednesday. (Not so) young asklet finished his school on Sunday and joined me at the cabin for a few days.
No river bed. That’s just the way things erode around here — the ground is clay and below that it’s soft rock (shale, sandstone, mudstone) which doesn’t need much action from water to be worn away.
Addendum from Jim: the fracture lines in the clay and stones here tend to be parallel lines so that’s where the erosion occurs, making hump shapes very common.
Older construction hereabouts is pretty notorious for wet basements. There’s a house up the street from us that gets 2 – 3′ of water in theirs pretty quickly if there’s a power failure and their sump pump isn’t running.
When we lived out by the state forest, our road had an active spring right in the middle of a hill that would develop a large ice cap during cold winters. No choice but to go around. Life in the country;-)
Imagine my surprise when a friend called to let me know that a bunch of my personal email messages had been submitted as evidence in a domestic intranquility case between a couple of friends of mine. Fortunately for me, I try to heed the advise to never write anything in an email I wouldn’t want my mother to see on the front page of the local paper. Besides, my advice to friends with relationship difficulty consists mainly of “get over it and move on with your life” and not much else.
Henceforth I think I’ll switch to one of my favorite movie phrases in all similar cases.
“You might well think that, I couldn’t possibly comment.”
I try to follow the same advice with regards to emails (not always successfully).
Anyway, I see that the HOC quote is from the original BBC production. I like the Netflix version, but I find Urquhart to be even more sinister (and at times, charming)than Underwood.
I enjoyed the Netflix version, but between the two, the original BBC production is my favorite. Now that I’ve seen all the Netflix episodes, I want to go back and view the BBC version once more.
Hope its a bit warmer this week where you are. Finished planting most of the flower garden this morning just before a nice rain.
Looking better for the coming days, it is evening now (though still sunny), yet the temperature has risen by 4 deg since 6.30 pm (it is 7.55 now). I just posted the following FB-status:
“”There’s something happening here. What it is ain’t exactly clear.”
After days of rain and clouds I see blue skies, rays of sunlight and the thermometer is showing a distinct upward trend. Promising outlook for Constitution Day tomorrow. Sunrise tomorrow: 4.46 am – sunset at 9.50 pm, that’s a day of more than 17 hours. It doesn’t get fully dark at night anymore – white nights are here.”
It seemed a good idea when making the booking Thursday night. All cooped up inside the cabin with rain and strong winds for several days and temperatures rarely breaking 50.
Today, Constitution Day, sunny and 68, with a pretty decent long-term forecast. Well, well, planning to come back here mid-August.
Thanks NDD,
Had a good time at the cabin all by myself, young asklet left the day before. Watched the Oslo parade on TV. Mostly sunny and a (temporary) record temperature for the year, it got to just over 70 by the early evening.
But it is hard to leave when today looks like this:
Looks like we simply skipped spring this year. It is currently 78 deg, which is “extreme” here at the coast. Even in July, such days are rare, with normal temps for a sunny day at 68-72.
Good morning!
Leaving for Oslo today and then for NYC tomorrow.
This guy (or gal) set up shop next to the veranda door. Very successfully so. This morning there were about a dozen empty husks from small flies in the net.
This animal is rarely seen during daylight hours.
It passed by the farm Wednesday afternoon.
It’s only the 2nd time I’ve seen one in the wild.
Do you know what it is?
We’ve had 3″ of rain since last night and it’s still coming down. Fortunately we finished planting the garden on Friday, except for a new area tilled yesterday for corn.
We’ve not had 3″ in one shot for several years. Our coulee is running again. It usually only runs at spring melt. The rain is welcome as we’ve only had 1.10″ total previously.
on this beautiful sunny day, now with green leaves…I feel like everything has bloomed in record time this year. My sinuses feel that way too. 🙂
One more work day this week, and then a long weekend! What are you all up to?
It is beautiful here in the Hudson Valley. No rain in sight but we could actually use some.
Perfect bicycling weather here: light winds, low humidity, high temps in the low 80s. I’m taking advantage of it.
NDD, I searched for it and found this site. But no map.
http://www.learner.org/jnorth/crane/News.html
Probably it’s for good reason. A couple of years ago a couple of idiots shot a whooper in the western part of Indiana.
http://whoopingcrane.com/citizen-tip-leads-to-closure-of-whooping-crane-shooting-in-indiana/
Thanks. Those sites look pretty interesting.
Cool site!
Thirteen inches of snow fell in SE Minnesota overnight on May 1, cancelling many of my plans.
Oh well, I do still have electricity.
Ugh. A friend in Colorado posted her latest spring snow pictures yesterday, and I was horrified at the thought of more snow this year.
I hope it melts quickly.
Oh no! Sorry Alice.
Yikes! What a way to celebrate May Day. I hope it melts soon.
Hi Alice,
I’ll send you some of our heat if you’ll promise to send me some snow. But we’ll accept no less than 36 inches of snow. You know how much we like to ski down here. 😀
Whit
Hi FM. It’s a deal!
You’ll need to stock up on food for the starving animals.
After seeing how bad a drought can be, I feel guilty complaining about any precipitation.
Yikes! I hope the power holds for you.
Giant rubber duck in Hong Kong harbor.
Good morning!
Out for a walk in my sister’s home town yesterday.
Nesting has started
Ha – that reminds me of when my brother and I were small and attempted to investigate a couple just like that. We found out pretty quick they can and will strike like a rattlesnake when disturbed!
Heh – the hissing is pretty snakelike.
This couple has chosen (for years now) a spot just by a short boardwalk by the marina and they are used to people coming very close. Sadly, we also found last year’s chick floating in the shallows not too far away, probably a victim of the harsh late winter and delayed spring this year.
Good very early morning everyone!
I don’t know how Saturday just sneaked up on me, but it’s just here.
It mostly rained yesterday and last night. We’ve got a 30% chance today, but that doesn’t mean to much either. So I’ll just hold back and see.
Hope everybody is doing good and that your w/e is coming along fine.
Whit
Walked several miles in a spring parade this morning and my hip joints are not pleased. I’m now preparing for some serious napping the rest of the afternoon.
Me too. After 2 miles on the treadmill, I cut a quarter acre of lawn.
I’ve never seen two people in more need of slack time than you and ID. Read a book, do gardening work, march in a parade or here’s one – paint! 🙂
I was wondering if today was the day for the parade. If it was then you fairy god mother better come down and zap you back to bed!
I hope you do get some serious nap time today.
Take care,
Whit
Slept like the dead for 3 hours;-)
I could sleep like that, and I wasn’t even in a parade today!
No nap time for me. Too much to do.
Glad the rain held off until after the parade so you didn’t end up with aching hips and a cold.
Thanks, I’m pretty happy about that too.
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Morning Andi,
No picture for me here. I was just at your place and none there either. I don’t know if it’s some setting I’ve missed up or what. I’ll keep checking around to see if I can find anything though.
Hope everyone is fine and take care
Whit
The long and winding road to Saturday? 🙂
We had such a great weekend, I never want to go back to work. The weather here has been stellar, and we went to the sheep and wool festival in MD on Saturday. I even got yarn there…
And now today is a bit gloomy. Guess that should me heading to the office easier.
We’ve had 4 days of rain here so I can definitely sympathize on the gloomy. Woods are loving are loving it though — the green is busting out all over. 😉
Good morning.
Blossoms on the half shell.
(The shell is 36″ across)
Sweet — both the photo and hearing from you. 🙂
And speaking of flowers, that’s the theme of BobX’s photo flog this Friday.
Morning Andi!
We might get by without any rain today, so it’s off to see George this morning. And if I can get off my lazy back end, I’ve got a lot of cleaning up to do in this apartment.
Hope you have a good day.
Whit
Ugh, don’t bring up cleaning — I hate even thinking about it (today is cleaning day for Jim and me).
Well, let this be the official announcement.
Next Theme: Friday, May 10, 2013: April Showers Bring May Flowers
Bring whatever you got!
Hey everyone! <waves>
That’s a very pretty close-up of that flower Bob. I’m looking forward to Friday.
Whit
Thanks Whit, see you there.
Helloooooooo KH,
I’ve been gone for awhile, but I see you have too. Since I don’t know what it is, I hope whatever is going on with you isn’t too serious.
(The shell is 36″ across) The first thing I have to ask is that shell real? Being the non-coaster not near oceans and so on, I’m not sure.
Anyway I’ll say I hope you’re feeling better and take care.
FM (Whit)
Hay Knucklehead! Good to see you here.
We’re really proud of our junior high students (and teachers and parents) today. There will be a fire truck parade around town tonight to welcome them home from DC.
You should be proud of them for winning the National Championship “We the People” Junior High Division. Heck I don’t even know them and I’m proud of them.
Remember pictures please. 🙂
Whit
Huge homecoming gathering and fire/police parade around town a little while ago. The kids wound up on top of one of our fire engines for a couple of slow loops around town. Pix tomorrow.
From the homecoming last night.
Safely home
Victory lap around town on a fire engine
The Champs and their coach
The farmers are in the fields today for the first time this spring, probably 3 weeks behind schedule.
I rototilled about 50’x50′ of garden today and hope to plant spuds tomorrow.
Highs the last couple of days have been in the 70s, so that’s been a nice change. However, wood tick season has begun and I’ve seen a few mosquitoes already, ackkk!
here in the Twin Cities I just bought my first round of plants from the nursery to decorate my patio. Latest I’ve done that in years (last year I actually planted in march, which just about as strange as this year has been).
The seasonal weather patterns have been very strange here the past three season, and I’m including ’13 in that. 2011 started late due to rains which continued throughout the season saturating the soil at all levels.
Then in 2012 planting season started early, but then we had drought conditions through until fall.
Now in 2013 we have the winter that never ends. I still have a few inches of snow on the ground at the north edge of the shelter belt (trees). And already the garden is very dry within the first six inches of soil, as we’ve had only 0.70″ of rain so far.
Looks to be another exciting growing season, that’s for sure.
Hiya NDD,
I was checking out our weather predictions for the next couple of weeks and we’ll be up in the mid to high 80’s. By the end of the month full fledged summer will be here.
If I could only have the calm, cool, serene weather y’all do in N.D. 😉
Good luck with the planting.
Whit
Hey there FM,
We do have calm and serene weather once in a while, but ND is not known for “calm and serene”. But then it’s definitely not boring either.
Sure hope the weather is cooperating with the visits to see your pup.
Morning NDD,
The weather isn’t cooperating today to see George. But I’ll still try to go and see him today, and I’m just glad he has his dog house. Of course if it’s wet outside I know there’s no way he’ll come out because of the way he hates water. So I’ll have to see how it is later on.
I saw how you still have snow, hope that gives way for you soon.
Didn’t you just finish with the snow? That is an amazing fluctuation.
No, not quite finished with the snow as there’s still some on the ground in shaded areas, or where there were exceptionally deep snowbanks.
It really seems like we missed a couple of months of spring this year, if you figure late April was winter’s end and early May starts the summer.
I was just about ready to put some tender plants in the ground until I heard we were supposed to get temps in the 30s Monday night. Guess I’ll wait a bit longer.
We’ve been getting a few freezing overnights here too. So the garden won’t be getting any starter plants until we get warmer lows more consistently.
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Glad spring has finally come your way.
I get the feeling its just teasing us.
If so, it’s a great tease — it’s seriously green out in the woods.
Oh it has been green down here most of the time. But where I live we do have mostly pine and cedar trees.
Good day to everyone!
we’re always open.
Much rain here and gray skies, but we are several inches short of normal. Looks like a weekend washout.
Hiya Boran,
We’re getting our rain Friday and Saturday along with tornado watches. Today it’s cloudy and hot (85F) and although it feels humid to me, the weather is saying it’s only 47%. Where’s the 95F and 85% humidity I’m used to? It’s coming and I’m not looking forward to it. Hope your day is going good.
Whit
Hay FM! I hope that the humidity stays low for a while longer.
Morning everyone,
Raining, lighting and thunder here this morning. Boran I think I can say with some authority that the humidity has gotten worse. 🙂
Hope everyone has a good day ahead.
Whit
We had storms last night but there’s more on the way. Poor dogs will have to literally weather it out as we are going to visit Jim’s mom today.
Hope your storms pass quickly and without doing any damage.
Our storms will last until tomorrow afternoon with some breaks from time to time. I haven’t heard about any damage yet and haven’t really heard any high winds. So hopefully no damages.
You and Jim be careful driving out in the weather.
Whit
Thankfully, it’s beautiful here but the storms will come back tomorrow. 🙁
Have any of you Philly froggies seen the Ratmobile around town?
Happy Mother’s Day. First one without my mom.
For every Mom.
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C-c-cold here. 30s-40s overnight and still not exactly warm.
We woke up to 35 this morning and daytime highs have not surpassed 50 since last Wednesday. (Not so) young asklet finished his school on Sunday and joined me at the cabin for a few days.
We had 36 yesterday morning, now its 81 – go figure. I’m traveling to upper Michigan in a few weeks so I can experience spring x 2.
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It looks great here too! 🙂
Great flog everyone.
We geezers sometimes get a little lost. 🙂
It was a great flog. Thanks again for continuing it.
LOL
I’m happy to.
Very nice! What are the two low areas? They look like dry river beds.4
No river bed. That’s just the way things erode around here — the ground is clay and below that it’s soft rock (shale, sandstone, mudstone) which doesn’t need much action from water to be worn away.
Addendum from Jim: the fracture lines in the clay and stones here tend to be parallel lines so that’s where the erosion occurs, making hump shapes very common.
That’s interesting. I suppose that builders must know what underlies their construction.
Older construction hereabouts is pretty notorious for wet basements. There’s a house up the street from us that gets 2 – 3′ of water in theirs pretty quickly if there’s a power failure and their sump pump isn’t running.
When we lived out by the state forest, our road had an active spring right in the middle of a hill that would develop a large ice cap during cold winters. No choice but to go around. Life in the country;-)
I’m guessing that’s almost all the houses are on ridgetops or in valleys.
When we built our house, we hit rock less than a foot down.
Imagine my surprise when a friend called to let me know that a bunch of my personal email messages had been submitted as evidence in a domestic intranquility case between a couple of friends of mine. Fortunately for me, I try to heed the advise to never write anything in an email I wouldn’t want my mother to see on the front page of the local paper. Besides, my advice to friends with relationship difficulty consists mainly of “get over it and move on with your life” and not much else.
Henceforth I think I’ll switch to one of my favorite movie phrases in all similar cases.
I try to follow the same advice with regards to emails (not always successfully).
Anyway, I see that the HOC quote is from the original BBC production. I like the Netflix version, but I find Urquhart to be even more sinister (and at times, charming)than Underwood.
I enjoyed the Netflix version, but between the two, the original BBC production is my favorite. Now that I’ve seen all the Netflix episodes, I want to go back and view the BBC version once more.
Hope its a bit warmer this week where you are. Finished planting most of the flower garden this morning just before a nice rain.
Looking better for the coming days, it is evening now (though still sunny), yet the temperature has risen by 4 deg since 6.30 pm (it is 7.55 now). I just posted the following FB-status:
“”There’s something happening here. What it is ain’t exactly clear.”
After days of rain and clouds I see blue skies, rays of sunlight and the thermometer is showing a distinct upward trend. Promising outlook for Constitution Day tomorrow. Sunrise tomorrow: 4.46 am – sunset at 9.50 pm, that’s a day of more than 17 hours. It doesn’t get fully dark at night anymore – white nights are here.”
Moved the return to the US forward by a week. Back in NYC on Sunday.
It must be hard to leave such a gorgeous place.
Hope you have a safe and easy trip back.
It seemed a good idea when making the booking Thursday night. All cooped up inside the cabin with rain and strong winds for several days and temperatures rarely breaking 50.
Today, Constitution Day, sunny and 68, with a pretty decent long-term forecast. Well, well, planning to come back here mid-August.
Hope you had a great Syttende Mai celebration Ask!
Thanks NDD,
Had a good time at the cabin all by myself, young asklet left the day before. Watched the Oslo parade on TV. Mostly sunny and a (temporary) record temperature for the year, it got to just over 70 by the early evening.
But it is hard to leave when today looks like this:
Looks like we simply skipped spring this year. It is currently 78 deg, which is “extreme” here at the coast. Even in July, such days are rare, with normal temps for a sunny day at 68-72.
That scene would be a hard one to part from.
We skipped spring here too.
So far only a grand sum total of 1.10″ of rain,
but t-storms predicted for tonight, Sun, and Mon.
Have a good flight!
Good morning!
Leaving for Oslo today and then for NYC tomorrow.
This guy (or gal) set up shop next to the veranda door. Very successfully so. This morning there were about a dozen empty husks from small flies in the net.
Have a great homecoming!
This animal is rarely seen during daylight hours.
It passed by the farm Wednesday afternoon.
It’s only the 2nd time I’ve seen one in the wild.
Do you know what it is?
Soon it will be chow time for the youngsters!
Is that a black-footed ferret with a prairie dog dinner?
I don’t think we have either one in eastern ND. That’d be a good guess for western ND though.
Is it a mink?
And the winner is BobX.
Is it Newt Gingrich?
Well, I have heard they’re rather stinky… so that would fit!
Hiding out?
Nice close-up shot ya got there.
We have several of them around here. They enjoy entertaining the pup.
We’ve had 3″ of rain since last night and it’s still coming down. Fortunately we finished planting the garden on Friday, except for a new area tilled yesterday for corn.
We’ve not had 3″ in one shot for several years. Our coulee is running again. It usually only runs at spring melt. The rain is welcome as we’ve only had 1.10″ total previously.
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Good morning!
Damned jet lag, up since 3.30 – I need a nap.