BrianW

With a little taste of the dews as well.

My friend said he did some kind of purchase/bet with Jordan's furniture for free furniture if Uconn won. He apparently got like 5k in free furniture from that win.

There will definitely be some 80s though down in the NYC area.. 900mb temps are progged to reach 13-15C on Wednesday, with 850mb temps at 11-13C. This could produce highs in the lower 80s in the typically warmest spots in the NE NJ urban corridor and adjacent areas.

I agree but I think BDL pulls an 80. Every forecast high here always seems to run way higher than forecasted..

Time to change the avatar to summer. Its coming..

Looks like its coming. From WTNH New Haven. As we head into the final days of March, a big warm-up is on the way. Highs climb into the low 60s Monday, near 70 Tuesday, and widespread 70s by Wednesday. A few inland spots could even approach 80°, depending on the timing of an approaching cold front. This is record-challenging warmth, so we’ll be keeping an eye on both Windsor Locks and Bridgeport, where official records are kept for inland and shoreline locations.

This is from the guy who planted the Sabal Palm in Bridgeport which is supposedly the northern most palm tree actively growing. Looks like it survived this winter just fine. i planted this palm outside in 2009 after much research on the microclimate of that spot the bricks hold so much heat in the winter i would often see flies overwintering there in February it’s very close to Long Island sound the alcove blocks the north wind minuses Dr Franco’s mummy wrap from his book Palms won’t grow here and other myths and I think you’re right about the building leaking heat as 1.5 feet away from the foundation never freezes plus I think for years folks never really knew how resilient Sabal palmettos actually are there are examples of these bosoms growing in Tennessee zone 6 for years and years so i just took a chance we are plannng on opening up Sabal palmetto Bridgeport WED April 8th,2026 after the cold weather passes; what a winter 2025-2026

All the old Italian guys are growing figs all along the shoreline here. Haha What's more interesting is the palms people are growing here. They apparently use C9 Christmas light incandescent bulbs to keep them warm over the winter. This is a picture fom a house in Norwalk, CT on the shoreline and one in Stamford.

Can't wait for the seasons first cut and that smell of fresh cut grass tomorrow. Got some extra special ipa's ready..

+5.9 for DXR.

Yeah. 4.13 inches here this month but what a green up underway. People already mowing and lawns services are out droping fertilizer. Hoping for some sun today for the first mow of the year.

Found this little sapling growing under my deck. I am guessing its eastern red cedar? Can any of you tree guys confirm? Think I am going to try and move it out into the yard somewhere if it is.

Yeah 52 here already and sunny. What a green up underway as well. Going to pull weeds that are already coming up in the rocks under my deck today.

Not looking forward to it. The ground water level is like an inch below the surface here. Every sump pump and dehumidifer in the neighborhood has been running like crazy. How's it out that way?

Great Irish like day for the New Haven parade...

Yeah makes no sense here to be in moderate drought.. Most river and groundwater sensors are much above or extremely above in CT. Closest ground water sensor to me went from like 9ft to 2 the last year.

Pretty crazy how quick all the reservoir and ponds completely filled up here. The water table is like just below the surface and everyone is running sump pumps like crazy around here. I walk around New Havens reservoir all the time and its completely filled to the brim. Haven't seen that in many years. We have also had a ton of rain here this month.

Going to be a great spring with lots of already green lawns and flowerbeds that were preserved in snow. The amount of surface water down here is nuts. Everyone's sump pumps are running like crazy the last few days.

I have had a heat pump water heater since 2012 and love it. They are just insanely efficient and inexpensive to run. They use a 350 watt compressor to heat the water and they dehumidify your basement as well. From an energy cost perspective mine averages around 1-2 kwh in electricity consumption a day and around 600 kwh a year. Even with New Englands expensive electricity around .30 or more its still absolutely blows away oil/gas in operating cost. I have solar but if I had to pay for all the electricity it would have cost me like $180 in electricity for hot water for the year. Thats $15 a month for hot water. Yesterday my tank used 45 cents in electricity for hot water. People using the now nearly $5 heating oil will burn that equivalent money in seconds. As far as cost goes almost every New England state has like a $700+ state rebate on them and there was a federal rebate up to recently. They are like $1200 and the rebates makes them like $300 the same cost of a regular electric one. In CT right now the rebate is $900 here at https://www.energizect.com/explore-solutions/water-heaters/heat-pump-water-heaters-details I dont think many people realize oil burners run at close to 1 gallon per hour consumption when its running. With $5 heating oil your most likely burning a gallon a day minimum for hot water . With current prices thats $150 a month right now. Thats practically my entire yearly cost for my hot water for 1 month. Here is my last years usage and weekly usage from my Rheem 50 Gallon heat pump water heater.

I am fortunate that I can clear my panels really easy by just standing on my deck with a broom on an extension pole. Most of the time I just clear the bottom 2 feet and it melts or slides off. Took me quite a bit more work though in that big storm but I remove the snow regardless as I dont want ice dams. I definitely wouldnt be climbing up on a ladder or anything crazy like that to clear it. If I had a ton of land I would do a ground mount in New England. Production is really starting to ramp up with that increasing sun angle. Here is the production from my small 1.2 kwh system that really shows the increase well.

I am actually using 2 12k btu high efficiency mini splits. 1 floor console upstairs 1 wall unit downstairs. Works great for my open 1800 sqft split level that is very well insulated and air sealed. These things operate at just stunning efficiencies at low speed. They can run as low as like 100-200 watts at their minimum with the compressor on. I literally never turn them off and they just run low and slow all day. They were rated 30.5 SEER 14 HSPF which was like double any other heat pump available at the time. I have been monitoring my solar/electricty consumption including my heat pumps for almost 10 years. My average winter usage has been around 2500 kwh for Oct-Mar heating usage. Its been steadily around.5-.75 kwh per HDD. So last month BDR had 1000 HDD and it was crazy cold and I used 644 kwh for heat. So .64 kwh per HDD but often much lower in mild months. This is almost all powered from solar. Ive run short around 500-1000 kwh a few winters due to clouds. Even if I had to buy the electricity at CT's crazy high rates last month would have cost me 644 kwh x .33 it would have cost me $212 to heat my house. The one big benefit with electricity for heat pumps in the winter people often overlook is the stable electricity fuel price. Electricity in almost every market is adjusted twice a year for summer/winter. So your fuel cost doesn't skyrocket over night like the now nearly $5 a gallon heating oil. Electricity prices actually went down here at the winter rate change and doesn't adjust untill June 1st.

You forgot about solar and heat pumps. I converted my entire house to electric/solar in CT in 2017. I bought my panels in cash and it took 5 years to reach my return on investment. My electricity bill from Eversource has been the $9.62 minimum connection charge since I installed them. Here is a snapshot from a sunny day earlier in the week. You can see my 2 mini splits and entire house being directly powered from my solar panels from 930-330. I have 1 to 1 net metering so all that excess I send out in the day I can use at night. Powering heat pumps directly from solar is basically free heat that is also the cleanest form of heat probably on earth since there is no combustion. Your also getting an coefficient of performance with an effective efficiency of like 300-400% compared to burning wood/fossil fuels since your just moving heat. You can also power heat pumps from other alternative clean energy sources like wind.

I saw some posts there recently where trees were budding and some plants were flowering already. Spring is like 2 months ahead there.

18 Branford

Still 230k outages in Eastern Massachusetts. Look at those outages on the cape. Total grid failure. Surprisingly Eversource in CT is only reporting 600 outages.