Bogieblog

First Snow of the Season

With the drought, when it has been cold enough for snow, we just haven't had any moisture. Up north is a different story, they are not in extreme drought and have had several snows, whereas my area is still at least 11" behind in moisture. When there has been moisture, we have gotten warmer temps (not complaining). At the beginning of last week, I had 3 days of drizzle and rain, which finally added up to 1/2" of moisture. Then Thursday morning, the conditions allowed us to get 2" of snow. It started about 7am and by 8:30 snow had blown onto the geraniums

White breasted nuthatch sitting on the birdfeeder. To the lower right, is an Angel Wing begonia that I don't have room for in the house (I have 3 inside, so no big deal)

At 1:30:

The geraniums and Angel Wing were fine with the snow and 28 temps. However, they weren't fine with the 20* temp Friday night into Saturday morning so it is time to get those off the back porch.

Rain and Autumn Colors

We finally got some decent rains. October 13-14 we got a nice slow rain that left close to 1.75" of precipitation.

All of it soaked in preparing the ground for the next system. October 16-17 we got another 2.25+" of rain.

Although we were in severe drought at 12-15" below normal, that will help put a dent in our needs. The new drought monitor doesn't come out until the middle of the week but I hope the whole state went to Moderate. Heck, the North Country might have gone to Abnormally Dry since they received  the edges of systems that stayed up that way. They also got snow yesterday - some places getting 8".

Last pictures of Autumn Blaze as it lost most of its leaves yesterday from the wind that appeared after the rain yesterday. Picture taken 10/15

Athough the burning bush still has most of its leaves, it was at its peak on 10/15

This big maple is next to the shed and drops its leaves later than the "junk" maples out back.

Yesterday I dropped off some cat food at the ARLNH, the rescue that I got Rita from. While driving thru Goffstown, I had to stop and get a picture of these maples.

Two weekends ago I primed the pressure treated wood that makes up the new frame for the garage door. The frame was put up in mid July, but the PT was green so I gave it 2 months to dry. Actually, the handyman was supposed to come back, but since he didn't, and hadn't contacted me at all, I figured I would do it myself since it is getting close to being too cold to paint. Last Sunday I put on two coats of paint. Next year I will repaint the concrete block so the white overrun will be covered.

We haven't had any rain in two weeks. After months of only getting abut 1" of rain per month, we are in a severe drought with parts of the state in extreme drought. With state rivers and streams down to 1% (99% of years they have been running higher at this time), and lakes down massively, I have only been watering the four new plants I put in a couple of weeks ago. All other gardens have to deal the best they can on their own. Last I heard on the local channel, at present we are at the driest month of September ever, with 0.19" of rain. The month could move down in the list if we get the much needed rain that is forecast for tomorrow.

One of the black cherry trees has decided to show a bit of nice color anyway.

It has been since the early 80's that I last had to change a car tire. Yesterday I got to test my skills as I blew a tire in the driveway; a really good place for a tire to go. It was totally my fault  as I got distracted by my garage door being open (I was returning from the store). I always close the garage door when I leave the house, and I was trying to see if everything was still in there or if anyone was inside.Well, as I was rubber-necking, I hit a sharp rock on the retaining wall and the tire let me know it was not happy. No, no part of the car hit, just the tire.

I've never used a scissor jack before, or lifted from the frame, but I got the spare donut on and drove to the local dealer. I was discussing putting on two front tires with the advisor when she told me that Thursday some good rebates are coming out if I could wait. Since I have the truck (and don't have to drive to work either), I don't need the car right now, so I told her I would wait - and possibly just go ahead and put on 4 tires. I left the car in their parking lot and they gave me a ride home.

Rain, Glorious Rain

Yesterday, my place received 1" of rain which is fantastic. That 1" equals the amount I had received in the last 5 weeks; consistently there has been 1/4" of rain each week except for about 3 weeks ago when I received none. From the UNL Drought Monitor :

Sure, we aren't as bad as some areas, but the average for the state is somewhere around 8-10" below normal (after a mild snow winter).

Finally got some shots of a cardinal that has been hanging around for most of the summer. He has been very skittish and bolts anytime I open the door . Since most of the summer has been extremely hot for this area, the door and shade is normally closed. However, it has been cooler and cloudy for a couple of days, so the shade has been up on the door. With the lights off in the kitchen, and moving slowly, I could keep from startling him. Although in the last picture, he must have caught a reflection off the phone, or I moved, so he played peekaboo.

I am leaning toward a color mutation for the pinkish, although it could certainly be a young male that hasn't come into it's final colors (none of the young males I have ever seen look like this though).

For the last couple of weeks I've also had a female Ruby-Throated Hummingbird hanging around the planters of flowers on the back porch railing. I finally put a feeder out for her last Monday since those flowers probably don't have much nectar (geraniums) and there aren't many other flowering plants around because of the dry conditions and the goldenrod hasn't opened yet. Haven't seen a male around though so don't know if she is a transient or what.

And that is pretty much the exciting news around here - everyone have a great week!

Hurricane Isaias Remnants

The morning prior to the hurricane remnants hitting us, I saw a dark blob in the back yard. I thought it was a turtle, but when I got the binoculars out, it was a bird. It took me a while to figure out it was a juvenile robin that had jumped, or fallen out of the nest. It was not yet at the stage it could fly (or maybe just hadn't figured it out yet). (following three pics taken about 9:30 am on 8/4/20)

After a while, I saw Mom and Dad in the area.

That afternoon, I got alerts from both my personal and work phones - tornado warning!The local channel had Hillsboro in the warning area also, just can't see it in this picture. The tornado was indicated by radar (not by sight) and at that time was in Peterborough area, but the storm was moving 50-70 mph (so they said). I let my boss know I was logging off from work, then grabbed the youngsters, put them in their pen, and rolled it into the hallway (closing all the doors around it). Then I grabbed Rita and put her in the basement (she respects the gate at the top of the stairs.

My side of town saw only about 1/4" of rain (as has been usual, 1/4" of rain per week since the 4" more than a month ago). and very little wind. However, at higher elevations there were lots of trees and electrical wires downed, although no tornado or straight line winds.

A couple hours later, I looked around and finally found two juvenile robins. Both were beside the red rhododendron at the side of the house. Before I could grab my phone for a picture, one had gone behind the rhodie or under the burning bush that is behind it, so I could only get a shot of one.

We must have gotten more wind that night, because the next day I found some large limbs had come down. Thursday evening, since the dump is open late, I gathered all the limbs and took them to the shrub pile

I haven't seen the juvenile robins around, and I've only seen one adult robin, so it is hard to say if they got taken by the neighborhood fox, a cat, or are fine and on their own (or even being taken care of by parents somewhere in the swamp). And, previously I had rarely seen both mom and dad robins at the same time, so all I have a questions.

Just looked it up and it seems that the fledglings take a couple of weeks before they fly. They are taken care of by dad while mom lays and sits on more eggs, so I'm going to go with that explanation :)

 

Tornado Warning 5-15-20

Had a tornado warning last night as radar indicated some minor rotation south of me and bow echos directly in my area. This picture was taken about 15 minutes after the warning blared on my phone - as you can see, the worst had already passed my area.

Earlier, they had predicted a low to medium chance of tornado, and winds up to 60-70 mph, along with torrential rains. So I was prepared when the warning came out. Rainey was already in the pen (at lower left, in shadows) so I only had to corral Spot and Rita. That way I could roll the pen into the hallway, keeping the cats safer, if the weather warranted it.

My area got the torrential rains, but the wind did not amount to much, not even howling as it has most days in the last couple of weeks. So after the warning expired, I opened the pen. They all came out, but 10 minutes later, the youngsters had gone back in. Rainey is now on the top, left bunk and Spot on the right.

Rita was up on the couch with me begging for pets

Pretty anticlimactic, but I'm not complaining.

One of my clusters of creeping phlox is blooming. The other clusters, in the tiers above, are different colors and get more shade so they are only now setting flower buds.

Yesterday was cold, raw, very windy and snowy. The high was 42 - and like most of May so far (except 1 day), the high temp was way below average. The ground was warm enough that the snow pretty much melted as it fell, but there were some spots it tried to accumulate. I looked out at the side window and at first thought the invasive roses over in the swamp were blooming. I thought it was rather early in the season. Then I realized that the "blooms" were clumps of snow sticking.

Next weekend it will probably be time for the first mowing for some areas of the lawn.

Brightening a Gloomy April

We didn't have much of a winter with no major low temps (I think our lowest was -6 or -8), no extended cold temps and not many good snow falls. Most snow that did fall was very heavy and wet. I March we were all thinking early spring/summer.

But, Mother Nature laughed and laughed as April has been cold, dark, gloomy and wet. The few days it has been sunny (or even partly so), have mostly been very windy with 25-40 mph winds. We did get two nice days to tease us, Saturday of last week and yesterday where it was sunny, around 60* and calm winds. In between the two warm days it snowed twice. I have not been able to do any yard work because it is so wet out. To indicate the amount of yucky weather we have had, the only time I have gotten anything done for yard work was on March 29. And the daffodils that were showing greens on March 22 haven't yet produced flowers. And hey more rain today and unless the storm track moves, we will have measurable snow tomorrow (the amount keeps moving for my area from a dusting" to 4"-8").

On 4/22, I took some picture of thing that are starting to emerge. The first two pictures are of daffodil greens - yes even in the roadside garden that I thought the squirrels had ravaged

Burgundy Bell maple is flowering - it starts earlier than the other maples

One lonely English Primrose

Nicky tall Phlox

Autumn Joy Sedum

Lily greens are shooting up around the yard

Purple Hyacinth flower buds

And yesterday, 4/25, three days after the previous picture, the purple Hyacinths were beginning their bloom

And the dappled Willow, Sauce Hakuro Nishiki is starting its leaf buds

I got to rake some more leaves and spread them out in the yard to dry for future mowing/mulching yesterday afternoon. And added bonus, I sat out in the back yard sitting area to read in the sun and warm weather.

Snow on 4-18-20

It snowed for about 8 hours yesterday - first picture about 5 am

3 hours later was about the apex of the accumulation. After this the snow was melting faster than it was falling. Love how the snow is starting to droop off the fence from meltage.

Roof was just starting to dump for the first time - only because it was so wet.

Spotty Planting

As I mentioned last week in the Cleaning Up post, last weekend I picked up a couple of plants while I was getting birdseed. Sunday I potted up Rosemary, Lavender and a start off my older Angel Wind Begonia (left to right). Spot was a HUGE help - LOL

It was too cold to pot everything outside, in the 30's and raining, so I used an extra cat food mat to help contain any errant soil.

I did pot up this Nanking Cherry outside, then promptly put it in the garage since it was so cold, and there were several evern colder mornings coming up.

Spot has been helpful in other ways than just during potting. One day she was a speed bump, ya know, to slow me down as I went running around the house :)  (following pictures taken 3/26/20)

As you can tell, it was sunny out. However, NH has not enjoyed much sun since then. If you recall, last Sunday I mentioned that it was heavily overcast on Saturday. Sunday it rained, and that lasted thru Wednesday morning. Oh, that got broken up by the light snow we received early Monday and Tuesday mornings. Wednesday there were 2-3 hours of sun in the morning, and then the clouds took over and it rained / drizzled until early yesterday morning. Once again we were treated to some sun that morning, then it became heavily overcast again - but no rain. Even after at least 24 hours of no rain, the pond that had developed in the backyard hasn't completely drained yet (picture taken this morning).

Hopefully we'll get some sun this coming week.