tamarack

Down to 34-35 this morning. Yesterday's 61/36 was 10° BN and pulls the month down nearly to -6. Still waiting for the month's first 70+. Maybe tomorrow.

In my long-ago and unlamented year as urban forester, I learned that the best planting depth was to have the top of the root ball above the surroundings by about 1/8 the ball's diameter or 2", whichever is greater. It's especially critical in very heavy soils. It’s one of the smells of summer to me. I wouldn’t say I “like” it but it does evoke a lot of good memories. The smell of DEET brings back memories of good fishing, and of cruising the woods of northern Maine. EEE hasn't made it to there yet, but when the black flies are so abundant that the ground seems to quiver due to the swarms (and when one needs to stand relatively still for 5-10 minutes while measuring things), bug dope is nearly essential. And the smell of Old Time Woodsman, which didn't come out of some high-tech lab, is far worse than that of DEET.

That is strange. Apples are not super precocious like peaches, but all 3 of mine began flowering before the 6th year after planting. I'd guess that whatever was keeping that tree from flowering may be the cause of the leaf drop. An early call on viability might be had by scratching a twig (1/4" or larger preferred) and looking for green under the bark. If it's all brown, that twig at least is dead.

Only got to mid-80s here, but 2 weeks later for that warmth than (almost) all other years. My greatest positive anomaly came on 9/26/17 with +19 on 84/61. Except that precisely 10 years before I recorded the exact same max/min. The earlier warm spell was just 2 days, compared to 4 in 2017. 37-38 this morning, may be cooler tonight.

Highly recommend "Thirty-Eight: The Hurricane That Changed New England" by Stephen Long. Lots of details and pics. My only (very parochial) lament was that it totally ignored the considerable damage to forests in western Maine - many thousand acres in that area hold trees dating from that event.

Ice storm: December 2008. About an inch and a half of ice at 31F. Amazing event. Most people posting on here were on the forums for this one so they've seen all the pics and such even if they didn't directly experience it. Can't match January 1998 up in NNE but basically no ice storm can. Comparing just worst-to-worst, they may have been close (though the "Godzilla effect" high tension towers in Quebec are indeed unmatched.) But 1998 tore things apart from Montreal to Machias - can't recall another ice storm that covered nearly that much area.

Yesterday's 56/48 was dry but an overnight shower brought 0.03". Woodstove output feels good.

Cloudy 50s here, though dry. However, we reach 80+ in 70% of Septembers, plenty of time for some warmth.

Not a betting man, but if I were I'd offer 99-to-1 odds they were de-hulled horse chestnuts. Not only do I have a hard time believing there were any nut-bearing American chestnuts at all, much less enough to supply war materiel, but horse chestnuts look similar and are about 50% bigger. In NNJ we used red oak acorns, almost the same size as American chestnuts and so abundant in a good year that walking could be a challenge around the oaks.

Probably peaked about 10' above MHW, though I've not read anything official. That SSE wind was trying to push all of Penobscot Bay up the river. Of the 200 or so cars flooded (and totaled - BGR temp dropped from 57 to 1 that afternoon/eve), only a single car had been occupied. The woman climbed onto the roof (BDN had a dramatic pic) and a fellow swam out and made the rescue. Just like Hollywood, they got married about 6 months later. (AKAIK, they were strangers at the time of the flood.) We'd had a lesser thaw (43F, 0.20" RA) just 6 days earlier which froze up many culverts, so the ice holes on roads were challenging. Heard news that one in Baker Brook, NB, about 7 miles from Ft. Kent, was deep enough to snare a log truck. That 1st year in FK had as much wx drama as any 2 other years: 1/1: Moved to FK. 1/12: -41, welcome to the St. John Valley. (9th-13th avg minima -34) 2/2: Groundhog gale. 5/7: 1.5" snow in 45 minutes as I tilled the garden. 8/10: 6" RA from the remains of Belle, nearly washed away neighbor's house, ruins our garden. Backyard looked like river bottom stones/gravel. 11/14: (not exactly weather, but snow OG helped) 1st Maine deer. Lo-o-o-ng drag 12/26-30: 36" in 2 storms, 2nd of which accompanied the last 370 miles driving home from family Christmas in NJ. CAR going from +1C to -8C in one hour I impressive on the '76 cold front. My 5-hr drop from +7C to -21C blows away any other CF of my experience.

lol. Feb heat wave (CAR +14.7 for the month) St. John and Allagash ice runs. My top 5 (with then-current residence): Jan 1998 ice storm (Gardiner) April 1987 Kennebec flood (Gardiner) April 1982 blizzard (Fort Kent) Bob (Gardiner) Feb. 2, 1976 SE gale (Fort Kent) Temp 44 to -6 in 5 hr, CAR 957 mb, BGR 200 cars drowned as Penobscot estuary rises 15 feet in 15 minutes, Stonington gust 110+. Honorable mentions (both New Sharon): Dec 6-7, 2003 (24" blizz), Pi Day 2017 (2nd strongest blizz after 4/82)

"Early corner", a mixed species stand a bit north of the blinker light in New Sharon, is beginning to do its thing. Growing on very moist soil, these trees color (and defoliate) about 2 weeks ahead of the main color change.

Juan destroyed plenty of NS forest. Mills as far a way as Maine had trouble with wood supply in the months following the storm, because so many NB loggers were cleaning up the mess. And since I don't think Maine hasn't recorded anything stronger than Cat 1 since 1900, hitting 100 mph is really impressive for a place nearly as close to the pole as to the equator. Being so much closer than Maine to the Gulf Stream helps (or hurts.)

Near 40 this morning, even with a few cirro-cum overhead. GYX now pointing to Tuesday morning as the coolest.

Been thru the one at Bear Mt, NY when I was in Scouting. Mahoosuc Notch in Maine has loads of "lemon squeezers" - fun scramble among car-size rocks when pack-free but a major pain when carrying one. Often would need to slide the pack thru and crawl after it. I've read where it was called the AT's toughest mile.

Back when I lived in Gardiner I made the mistake of putting one of those bite-size Hershey bars on the dash of the carbureted 1983 Escort before driving home from my deer hunting area, and the candy slipped down the heater hole. Smelled nice on the trip, but we then parked the car over winter. In the spring there was a foul odor in the car and when I ran the heater fan pieces of insulation flew out. Obviously a mouse/vole had smelled the riches and then probably nested in the shelter but succumbed during the cold. We were giving the car to our daughter for college in SC so I had to drive it around for quite a while with the heater on high (windows open because it was warmer that day than today) to get the stench down to a bearable level. Unrestrictive sun today and cool. That CAA map of PF's is impressive. If things were to relax and go calm just after nightfall, I might be scraping the windshield Monday morning.

No, though I've read snippets about that year. Used to have (lost in a move?) a "disasters" book that included the fires at Hinckley (MN) and Peshtigo, and still have "The Week Maine Burned" about the fires of 1947. (Which burned through a couple entire downtowns in SW Maine along with the "cottages" at Bar Harbor. Caused 15 fatalities, but thankfully nothing like the above pair, 500+ at Hinckley and more than 1500 at Peshtigo where the flames rode the same winds that spread the Chicago fire.)

Perhaps get a firm ID on the bugs, then look for the appropriate variety of BT, the biological insecticide which has been adapted for numerous insect families, each working only on that family (BT for Diptera [flies and mosquitos], as an example, won't harm bees.)

Cannot argue with that. Though I like "interesting" wx, I'm also happy to live in the land of little hurricanes, tornados, earthquakes and big snowstorms.

Probably fall webworm, aka uglynest caterpillar. Looks messy, has little/no effect on the trees as the leaves being eaten have done nearly all their work already. This is the season when the yellowjackets in particular get both dumb and aggressive. Maybe they sense that the end is near and want to enjoy their last meals, so they become less wary (easier to swat) but more pestiferous than ever. No 80s last month, waiting for 1st 70s this month. (Will undoubtedly come - 15 of 21 Septembers here have reached the 80s and the lowest monthly max is 76.)

Somewhat related, I've always found ice storms exciting and beautiful (the NNJ event in 1953 probably triggered my interest in both wx and trees), but that excitement is tempered by foreboding since I entered the forestry profession.

Our first house in Fort Kent had town sewer and well water (which had objectionable iron levels among other problems.) Of course, Taunton is a bit closer to centers of civilization. (And the sewer had its problems too - would back up during the summer. We would close the cleanout "Y" where the soil line went thru the floor, but one time our neighbors neglected to do that, came back from a weekend away and found 9" sewage in their basement. They'd just put 6 cords of firewood down there, and had to toss it all out thru the little window - no Bilko Door or other outside entry. )

Despite driving thru Kinsman Notch dozens of times when my parents lived 15 miles to the west in Woodsville, we never stopped at Lost River. Have had some excitement in the corkscrew turns heading west from the notch.

At my place it has both the highest proportion of available sunlight and the lowest median precipitation. (Average is 4th lowest, behind JFM.) September only very rarely has good severe. While that's accurate - in 46 Maine Septembers I've yet to experience a TS remotely close to severe - the largest TS-related blowdown I've seen in those years occurred in September, on the 30th no less. 600 acres got flattened east of the town of Eagle Lake, in a 4-mile-long swath that started a bit north of the Eagle-Square thoroughfare and finished by tossing spruce trees into the west end of Square Lake. In a delicious bit of irony, that area got 3-5" snow on the same date 5 years later.

Where's this My guess is somewhere in the Sierras, judging by the trees. 18 hours of autumnal rain produced 0.54" with temps in the 50s - high was 58. First time running the woodstove this season.