tamarack

16 hours ago, powderfreak said:

It’s funny because the ski area is largely E/NE aspect of Mansfield and it’s 100% the cold side.  Like winter, felt mid-20s.

But you can’t see really any other snow on neighboring hills.  Spruce Peak across the road bare to summit.

I popped out up top and into the sunshine and SW wind and it felt mild, like the temp went from 25F on the upper east slope to 35-40F out on the SW aspect.

Its easy to see why in the 1930s to 1950s they put the ski trails where they are lol.  Like walk around the mountain and they had to be like, why does that area appear much more wintry?  There’s always snow here, while not on that side over there.

Sunday River and Sugarloaf also face in that general direction, Pleasant Mt as well.  Saddleback is the outlier, looking to the northwest; probably catches beaucoup upslope.

Slowly getting there on the Oak forest. Hopefully mainly all down over next 10 -14 days or so .

Your oaks look similar to the 2 big ones a couple hundred feet from the house.  I was sitting near those trees and also near 2 buck scrapes yesterday afternoon, hoping the wind would quit, but it continued to rustle those crispy brown things until after legal hunting time.  Other species are 99.99% sticks.

1 minute ago, UnitedWx said:

Oh believe me I understand.  Half joking here... however there's a type of fox called a fennec fox that is allowed to be kept as a pet in all of our neighboring states, except the Massachusetts

Maine can allow keeping of some species of wild animals if the keeper obtains a special permit, which I suspect is not issued lightly.  Two towns from my place, in Mount Vernon, one can visit DEW Animal Kingdom during the milder seasons, and can see everything from big cats, tropical birds, monkeys and domestic sheep.  The owners obviously have the requisite permits and also receive some roadkill deer/moose when the carcass is unfit for human consumption but not dangerous to the carnivorous critters.   
(DEW stands for domestic/exotic/wild.  Almost all of the animals and birds are either seized from unpermitted folks or otherwise unable to be rewilded.)

1 hour ago, UnitedWx said:

Why would they do that? It's just another canine. Send it home with me, we'd LOVE to have one as a pet... but Mass won't let you keep one.

No matter how tame it looks, it's still a wild animal.  Many years ago, when I was a forester in northwest Maine, the game warden posted on the border across from St.-Pamphile, PQ had obtained 2 coyote kits while their eyes had not yet opened and raised them to adulthood.  When we'd stay at the nearby Seven Islands camp, we'd often hear them howling.  They seemed utterly tame but were imprinted on the warden.  One day the warden's wife went to feed them and one slashed her for about 20 stitches, the warden thinking that it was jealousy (the warden is mine!!).  He realized that the coyotes were still wild at heart and a danger to his wife and others, so sadly, he put them down.

Dozen donuts in a culvert trap and they wouldn't even need to sedate the critter, unless they wanted to do a health check.  Drive the critter into the Berks away from birdfeeders aaand away it goes.

1 hour ago, kdxken said:

Banner year for pine cones. Not sure if it's just my trees and they're stressed or if it's region-wide. Tamarack would know.

 

 

Hit or miss around here.  There are some loaded pines in the area but the ones on our woodlot, some of which are 120 feet tall, have very few.  The mild January plus the frigid blast in early February may have killed some of the overwintering 1st-year conelets.  (We've not had much if any of the needlecast fungus here.)

Trying to outguess tree seed production can be frustrating, except for balsam fir that seems always to have a bumper crop every 2nd year.  Way back in 1980 during the spruce budworm outbreak, I prescribed a shelterwood harvest on T14R13, one town east from where the Big Black joins the St. John.  All the moth-eaten fir was to go and also the worst-looking spruce, with healthier spruce and all of the superstory pine retained.  In July I saw a couple of those pines had been cut as part of roadbuilding, and they were stiff with 1/2" conelets, a great sign.  Then came the record February thaw - CAR temps nearly 15° AN - followed by cold and a mid-month blizzard in March.  Only a handful of those conelets survived and we postponed the harvest, switching to stands with little pine.

2 hours ago, dryslot said:

22.8°F was the low this morning, Back to back low 20's the last two days.

21 here, a tic above yesterday but just as frosty.

2020 and 2021 were very good Decembers from a snow standoint, but both were marred by ugly cutters ....at least 2019 did have a smaller snow event around 12/18 to give us a white Xmas.

Both well below average here.  Last December had the 1st AN snow since 2017, with 95% of the total coming in the mid-month dump.

20° this morning with nearly 1/2" on the washtub under the eaves.

October numbers"
Avg temp:   50.0   +4.7   2nd mildest here (51.1 in 2017)
Avg max:    58.8   +3.3   Warmest, 79 on 3&4.  Warmest Oct day here is 80.
Avg min:     41.1     +6.1   Coldest, 26 on the 31st.  That was the weakest for Oct coldest by 2°, and the avg min is the only 40°+.

Precip" 4.74"   -0.89"    Wettest, 1.32" on the 22nd
had some IP/SN mix on the 30th.

October had 19 cloudy days, tops by 3, and the 26% of available sun is 5% less than the 2nd gloomiest.



 

7 minutes ago, kdxken said:

Totally agree. Splitting mauls are a waste of energy.

Maybe, if one wants to split the whole pile in one day.  I've split my wood with a maul since we moved into our first house in 1977, in Fort Kent.  Most times I'd swing for 30 minutes then do something else for a while.
After 4 sunny days to start the month, we've had none since.  Can today end the CL/PC run?  (I expect some Cu this afternoon, but it's been solidly blue so far.)

Woods were fairly quiet this morning, except in open areas where it sounded like I was walking thru 6" of potato chips.  Jays and squirrels active but no recent sign of deer.

6 minutes ago, CoastalWx said:

No from an anomaly POV. Especially the SE. So based on their average temps. New England was a torch, especially NNE.

And the post from PF noting how late it was with no freeze and contrasting it with much colder temps 1500+ miles to the southwest started the angry/disgusted/whatever posts that seemed to brand we NNE folk as climate change deniers.  We just like pointing out anomalous wx phenomena, with my favorite being during our 1st December in Maine (1973) and seeing 56° at BGR while my parents in NNJ had 15° (and western CT was in a major ice storm).

Sill mid 30s RA here with occasional IP incursions.  Today will be just the 2nd with BN temps since 10/15 and the month will be 2nd mildest of 26.
My parsing of a number of Maine co-ops show warming since the 1960s-70s cooldown, with the steepest climb since 2000.  Also with increased snowfall this century, as predicted by many climate models.

3 hours ago, WinterWolf said:

Yes sir…remember both the T Giving one that year, and the Xmas day one too. Xmas day one started as rain..and changed to snow in the afternoon here. 

Double bust here, not in the good way.  I don't remember the forecast for 11/27-28/2002 (we had 0.2" here) but the Christmas night storm was progged for 8-12 here.  It verified with 1.0" while GYX, 55 miles south, recorded 18.0", at the time their biggest.  SIL in east Augusta had 15" and Belgrade Village, 12 miles to our SE, had 8".  Sharp cutoff, anyone.

That entire winter was suppression city here, with only the 7" in mid-November and 13.8" in early January being notable.  Total was nearly 2 feet BN and ranks 19th of 25 winters. 
(The DJFM period in 02-03 was our driest and 3rd coldest, with the dozen mornings in the minus 20s showing decisively than I can't grow peaches here.)

Another IP/SN burst about 11:45, put a tenth on the canoe bottom but didn't stick anywhere else.

17 minutes ago, dryslot said:

Looks like its snowing good in Jackman as well.

http://72.65.119.134/axis-cgi/mjpg/video.cgi

 

Had 15 minutes of IP ending with some fat flakes about 9:30.  Now it's back to RA with temp mid 30s.  First October frozen since 2020, makes 16 of 26 here with at least a trace, though only 7 with measurable snow.

1989 there was a biggie around Thanks Giving, but that one may have been a more full latitude type of storm genesis

That was a good event for SNE while we had only flurries in Gardiner.  Our turn had come 2 days earlier with 8.5" and winds gusting 50+ along with thunder.

1 hour ago, kdxken said:

Where does the carbon go when these magic trees die?

I think you know the answer.  
Trees cycle carbon, with some entering the atmosphere as dead wood decays, and some is added to the duff layer that helps to grow the next generation of trees that then remove atmospheric carbon.  In very old forests - several hundred years - carbon sequestering is near zero but by then the total carbon storage is huge, both above and below the ground.  Using wood to replace fossil fuel, for domestic heat or for replacing heavy carbon footprint building materials, are benefits from managed forests.  No magic trees, just the many good things from forests.

42 minutes ago, Typhoon Tip said:

Not sure what Forky’s motivation is for that resentment… but snow making has become immoral. No sympathy from me.   It’s a particularly bad look when you consider how little of the population actually skis. Much to the possible chagrin of the people that are involved in the discussion you are a minority.  The problem is it’s a gigantic expenditure of energy and a massive carbon footprint to appease a very very small segment of the population, when it does not benefit anything but an ephemeral entertainment pleasure, yet will cost tremendous to the ecology. Here,

Phys.org: “The first-ever national study to assess the impact of developing artificial snow shows the pressure the process is putting on the climate, with the equivalent of nearly 17,000 homes' worth of annual energy needed to produce snow for yearly ski operations in just Canada alone.

Publishing their findings in the journal Current Issues in Tourism, experts from the University of Waterloo, in Canada, and the University of Innsbruck, Austria, found 130,095 tons CO2e are needed to produce the estimated 42 million cubic meters of machine-made snow in Canada in an average winter. For context, this is comparable to 155,141 acres of forest for one year sequestering the comparable amount of carbon.”

 

How about the carbon footprint of golf in the US.  (If you've done that calculation in the golf thread, which I never peruse, please let me know.)

1 hour ago, Lava Rock said:

81.2F. Busted high

Sent from my SM-G981U1 using Tapatalk
 

Low 70s here, as clouds announcing the approaching CF cut off the sun about 1 PM, with W/NW breezes following.

On 10/27/2023 at 4:41 PM, TauntonBlizzard2013 said:

5 minutes? My buddy is a cop and he said he may have had like a half hour head start on them, combined with him potentially having an escape plan.

A day late, but an LEO on one of the pressers said that police reached the bowling alley 90 seconds after the first 911, and 5 minutes after the first 911 from the bar.  (Probably the time it took to drive the 4 miles on city streets between sites.)

48 minutes ago, tunafish said:

81/57

roofers and pavers rejoicing 

The high of 70 here would be better for laying asphalt shingles, mild enough for comfort but not softening the black stuff such that head-down nailing might be required to avoid damaging the tabs.  With the low of 47, today will be 17+ degrees AN, a top-5 departure in October #26.  Depending on whether tomorrow's late cool down cancels the morning low, the day may challenge the +20.5° of 10/15/14.  (71/51 would do it.)

Finally read (CNN) some of the info on the letter found in the Subaru.  It said that Card did not think he would be found alive and included directions on who would get what of his possessions.  Suicide note?  Huge misdirection attempt?
Also read that the weapon found in the car was a tactical rifle in .308; crime lab will test it against the bullets found at the crime scenes.  That cartridge is far more powerful than the more common .223 found in such rifles, and it's a very common hunting cartridge, nearly as powerful as my .30-06 and its shorter length means faster chambering in a bolt-action rifle.

Searching for Card is worse than looking for the proverbial needle in a haystack, because that needle isn't moving, and Maine has loads of "haystacks".  LEOs have received 500+ tips as of noon, and if it looks like authorities are chasing their tails, they have to run down all the ones that seem somewhat solid.  The one they don't chase may be the one that was valid.

12 minutes ago, Ginx snewx said:

Jeff is such a cool guy. We met at GYX back in 2014 with Eckster. We hit it off right away. Has a great feel for his climo as well as his states snowmobiling climo spots. We bust balls on here but every single New England forum member I have met these decades are cool to talk to. Our common love of weather creates a family atmosphere in here. We don't hold back but we all are peaceful loving people who just are consumed by mother nature. Good stuff 

This, a thousand times.  Since Cool Spruce had the stroke (can it be a dozen years?) I've had more conversations here with Jeff than anyone else, and it's not close.  Now he's dealing with yet another personal tragedy while in shock for what happened a few miles to his north.  Stay strong, Jeff; others in your family need you.

10 hours ago, mreaves said:

That’s what I was thinking. Head north towards the Allagash or somewhere in Baxter. 

He would have to bluff his way past the North Maine Woods or Baxter Park gates.  I hope those folks were alerted to that possibility.  Once in those places he'd be impossible to find as long as he could feed and shelter himself.  However, winters there would be challenging and there's not dozens of nearby camps/houses to raid, as did the North Pond hermit for 27 years.

Edit:  Posted this before seeing Jeff's link to the Downeast article.

2 hours ago, Lava Rock said:

73.8F for the high. Impressive. 

Don't think it reached 65 here, as except for some brief sun before 8 AM it's been all gray skies.  (Of course, the average max here for today is 51, so even a mere 65 is noteworthy.)

The nonsense is a society where a machine gun is at the beck and call of every warped, troubled soul.

This is false.  Since the mid 1980s it has been extremely difficult to acquire a legal full-auto weapon.  I'm not familiar with all the red tape but it includes a deep-dive character check and a stiff fee to ATF, among other things.  That said:

1.  I've no idea whether this shooter's weapon was full-auto or semi-auto.  It looks like a tactical rifle (a.k.a. "assault weapon"), one on which various attachments - telescopic scope, night-vision scope, laser aim point, rangefinder, etc - can be quickly installed/removed.
2.  A semi-auto with a 30-shot clip might be more deadly than a full-auto, though this trained former military man may have sufficient work with full-auto to hold the barrel down.  A friend used to own, legally, a full-auto mini-14 and a 40-shot clip.  I got to fire a full clip once, and on 3-shot burst I was unable to hold the muzzle down, such that shots 2,3 were off-target high.
3.  My Remington Model 76 pump in .30-06 is probably far more powerful than what the killer was shooting, but my rifle's max is 5 cartridges not 30, and the small but fast .223 that's most common on his kind of weapon is plenty deadly and likely able to penetrate the Kevlar safety vest.

36 minutes ago, dryslot said:

It makes hunting much easier brown on white backdrop.

Many Maine deer would be transplanted to freezers if that were to verify.

54 minutes ago, HoarfrostHubb said:

It is probably top 3 for me (1978, April Fools 1997 are my top 2)   While it (March 2023) had a lot of snow it was sorta dull since it was limited to a small area.  Few others could enjoy it.

I don't have good records for 3/2001 or a few others near 30"     I wasn't in my current spot for Dec 1992 which was probably 3 feet

Top "5" for me:

26.5",  3/14-15/1984 in Fort kent
24.5",  2/22-23/2009  in New Sharon
     24.0" (5x)
3/18-19/1956 in NNJ
3/20-21/1958 in NNJ
2/3-4/1961 in NNJ  (May be an underestimate, thanks to howling winds)
12/26-27/1976 in Fort Kent
12/6-7/2003 in New Sharon

(Between 3/56 and 2/61 there were 3 storms of 18" and one of 20".  That was by far the greatest big snow period I've seen.)