Snow at Last

Weather: Snow, real snow, the kind that comes down and stays a few days. The last time that happened was January 2016. I’m sure the sky basins have better records for when they last had an adequate snow fall to sustain themselves without water filched from reservoirs converted by machines.

Last useful snow: 12/28. Week’s low: 14 degrees F. Week’s high: 54 degrees F in the shade.

What’s still green: Stems on roses; leaves on cliff roses, juniper, arborvitae, and other evergreens, yuccas, red hot pokers, sweet peas; most are covered in snow

What’s gray, gray-green, or blue green: Four-winged saltbush, fernbush, winterfat

What’s red: Stems on sandbar willow and bing cherries, new wood on peaches and apples

What’s yellow: Stems on weeping willows

Animal sightings: Rabbit came out yesterday morning, hopped across the yard and drive, then down the path beside the house to head out toward the prairie. It also came through this morning with a slightly different path.

Weekly update: Last week when I was driving through the village I noted some cottonwoods still had leaves on some lower branches that hung along side trunks. Gravity probably pulled the snow off those branches.

The trees that may have had greater problems with the snow that stuck on all horizontal surfaces are the trees of heaven that still had full canopies of seed pods.

The only shrub in my yard to have a problem is the Apache plume. Tiny branches crisscross one another to create a mesh that supported the snow. In addition, while many of the leaves had died, they hadn’t fallen. So, it’s under full mantle with a protected cave under it.

The plants that have the greatest challenge in my yard are the ones under the back porch drip line. Snow melts off the roof, and drops onto the rose and shrub branches below where it freezes. Fortunately, it’s only the stems directly in the fall line; the rest of the plants are safe from the freezing.

The indomitable sweet pea leaves have stayed green even when the rose the vines climbed was covered with snow, then ice.

Notes on photographs: Taken 30 December 2018.

Second Growth Disasters

Weather: My outdoor thermometer registers an odd pattern. While my general perception is temperatures fall until dawn, and then rise, it shows the temperatures dropping, rising, then dropping again. Since I’m not up all night, I don’t know how often it happens. The fact it occurs when I happen to look may be coincidence.

The digital thermometer is about two feet from the house. There probably is some optimal location, but the constraints on its placement precluded discovering it. Its sensor first had to be in the shade and within range of the indoor receiver. The only way to meet those requirements was putting it near the house on the north side that got shaded first in the afternoon. I finessed the min-max record by offsetting the time so that it reset itself after the sun passed in late morning.

By necessity it’s close to the house. I suspect that as the outside temperatures drop, the thermostat in the interior hall triggers the furnace to fire. It then puts out heat that seeps through doors and windows to warm the near area just slightly. So, the outside thermometer is captive to the dynamics of the interior heating system.

It doesn’t really change the recording of the low temperature, which occurs after dawn. This week it didn’t quite reach its lowest on the solstice, but it came close. The coldest morning was November 26 when it went down to 10. December 21 was 12.

Last useful snow: 12/13. Week’s low: 12 degrees F. Week’s high: 56 degrees F in the shade.

What’s still green: Stems on roses; leaves on cliff roses, juniper, arborvitae, and other evergreens, yuccas, red hot pokers, Dutch iris, grape hyacinths, blue flax, winecup mallow, beards tongues, snapdragons, pink evening primrose, vinca, sweet peas, Queen Anne’s lace, chrysanthemum, June, needle and cheat grasses

What’s gray, gray-green, or blue green: Four-winged saltbush, fernbush, buddleia, pinks, winterfat, snow-in-summer leaves

What’s red: Stems on sandbar willow and bing cherries, new wood on peaches and apples; leaves on alfilerillo

What’s yellow: Stems on weeping willows

Animal sightings: The birds are in hiding

Weekly update: The picture that has haunted me most from Hurricane Michael’s landfall on western Florida was one of relatively young trees all broken at the same height, and fallen at the same angle near Panama City.[1]

They reminded me of the damage from the Cerro Grande fire when trees of the same height ignited one another on a steep hillside.

The primary cause of the destruction was the same: clear cutting that removed all the trees at one time. It was inevitable, the first regrowth would be uniform.

The progression of forest development to different species and different sizes occurs over time measured in generations. And, very often, under different environmental conditions.

At the time Florida was logged, timber companies were harvesting longleaf yellow pine. They discovered, in areas where logging was done before the Civil War, that Pinus palustris did not come back.

Early foresters blamed feral hogs that ate the seedlings, and wildfires caused by lightening. Cecil Frost noted that in the period between the enforcement of fencing laws against free-range swine in 1880 and the introduction of modern fire suppression techniques in 1930, some regeneration occurred. It stopped in 1930.[2]

They’ve since learned the effects of fire were complex. First, longleaf pine was more fire-resistant than the invading species like loblolly pine. Second, the invading species were scrub that prevented wire grass from growing on the forest floor. Aristida stricta and Aristida beyrichiana were essential to spreading the fires [3]

There also were problems caused by the tree itself. It took thirty years to bear its first cones. The seeds in the cones took three-years to mature, and good seed crops occurred about every ten years.[4]

The other factor must have been ground and air moisture. Longleaf thrives in areas that get 43 to 69 inches of rain a year on sandy, infertile soils.[5] Many factors, natural and human, can alter that ecology. For instance, the duff left by the loblolly prevents the longleaf seeds from reaching the ground and discourages the wire grass.

As the stand of broken trunks in Florida demonstrated, it is far easier to destroy than nurture.

Notes on photographs: Taken 4 July 2013 on the road to Jémez Springs just after it started rising from the Los Alamos side.

End notes:
1. The photo of "A forest of broken trees in Panama City, Florida, on October 12, 2018" was taken by Brendan Smialowski for Agence France-Presse and reprinted by Alan Taylor, "More Photos of the Incredible Devastation Left by Hurricane Michael," The Atlantic website, 13 October 2018.

2. Cecil C. Frost. "Four Centuries of Changing Landscape Patterns in the Longleaf Pine Ecosystem." 17-43 in The Longleaf Pine Ecosystem: Ecology, Restoration and Management. Edited by Sharon M. Hermann. (Tallahassee, Florida: Tall Timbers Research Station, 1993). 38.

3. Frost. 22.

4. Jennifer H. Carey. "Pinus palustris." U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service Fire Effects Information System website. 1992.

5. Carey.

Lentils

Weather: More of the same, cold mornings, promised snow that materializes into thin layers in the dark, and afternoons warm enough to melt it but not warm enough for working outside without getting chilled.

Last useful snow: 12/13. Week’s low: 14 degrees F. Week’s high: 51 degrees F in the shade.

What’s still green: Stems on roses; leaves on cliff roses, juniper, arborvitae, and other evergreens, yuccas, red hot pokers, Dutch iris, grape hyacinths, blue flax, winecup mallow, beards tongues, snapdragons, pink evening primrose, vinca, sweet peas, Queen Anne’s lace, chrysanthemum, June, needle and cheat grasses

What’s gray, gray-green, or blue green: Four-winged saltbush, fernbush, buddleia, pinks, winterfat, snow-in-summer leaves

What’s red: Stems on sandbar willow and bing cherries, new wood on peaches and apples; leaves on alfilerillo

What’s yellow: Stems on weeping willows

Tasks: Some local people have been out amputating their trees, leaving no branches, only trunks and large limbs. I cut some Maximilian sunflower stems.

Animal sightings: Flock of juncos were in the Russian olive; I saw fruit in the peak of one before they flew away.

Weekly update: Two years ago lentils disappeared from the shelves of the local grocery stores. When I say disappeared, there were no bags anywhere in Espanola or Santa Fé and the generic bins had been emptied. It was more like a recall than a distribution problem.

I checked the internet. There were no recalls, and as near as I can tell no crop shortages. It was hard to tell about the latter, since crops reports are all pitched in the future, not the present.

I mentioned it to clerk in one of the stores who agreed it was odd because "It’s not Easter when you cook ‘em."

I found some on-line, but that’s an expensive way to get a legume. They’re sold by the pound, and pounds cost money to ship.

When I got them they were dirty. By that I mean, they were filled with husk debris. It was so bad, I had to put them in a colander to sift out the skins, and then had to manually pick through them.

Now, before this I had had occasional problems with stone chips, either something black or white quartz. I was never sure about the source because I cooked the lentils with rice, and I had the problem when I bought different types of lintels.

Now I knew. The stones were in the lentils, even the expensive, boutique organic ones.

Eventually, the local store that catered to Spanish-speaking customers imported some packages from Mexican suppliers. They still had to be picked through before they could be used. Then, when the legumes returned in the spring, the packages were the worst of all. They must first have cleared the bottoms of their storage units.

Only now, after two years is the quality back to what it had been. The dried seeds aren’t perfect. Some are chipped by the machines that handle them. I assume they’re picked by machines, then dried mechanically. Next, they’re put on conveyers where more machines husk, sort and package them.

The colors and sizes are not uniform. If you ever shelled string beans or peas or looked closed at the corn on the cob, you know not every seed grows to the same size. But some had dark spots that I suspect were caused by tiny insects.

And then there are the ones that are puckered. That could have come from lack of water, oddities that didn’t show up until they were dried, or who knows what else attacks plants growing in fields.

If one looks too closely, one might never eat one again. But, one also realizes those imperfections exist in all processed food, but are masked by the preservatives, sauces, and other additives that are used. Making them into soup disguises everything but the stones.

A friend reminded me not to be finicky. He said his father always told him to eat the peaches the birds had pecked, because they always found the sweetest and ripest.

Notes on photographs: Lentils (Lens culinaris) purchased in Española, 18 December 2018.

Birds’ Nest

Weather: The cold mornings, perhaps combined with the layer of snow that fell early Friday, finally killed off many of the perennial tops that had remained green.

Last useful snow: 12/7. Week’s low: 11 degrees F. Week’s high: 47 degrees F in the shade.

What’s still green: Stems on roses; leaves on cliff roses, juniper, arborvitae, and other evergreens, yuccas, red hot pokers, Dutch iris, grape hyacinths, blue flax, winecup mallow, beards tongues, snapdragons, pink evening primrose, vinca, sweet peas, Queen Anne’s lace, chrysanthemum, June, needle and cheat grasses

What’s gray, gray-green, or blue green: Four-winged saltbush, fernbush, buddleia, pinks, winterfat, snow-in-summer leaves

What’s red: Stems on sandbar willow; leaves on alfilerillo

Animal sightings: Small birds.

Weekly update: It snowed in the night, so every horizontal surface was covered with snow at dawn on Friday. The birds didn’t come out until the afternoon, after it had melted. I don’t know where they spent the morning.

I discovered an empty nest in the crook of the apricot tree Monday. It would have afforded no shelter. It was as level as it could have been made, with a rim that would have been covered with snow.

The birds that winter here don’t bother with nests. Generations of chickadees live in my neighbor’s metal building. Some used to live under my eaves until a pigeon tried to move in. I chased it out, but the small birds didn’t return. Perhaps the prowling cats kept them away.

The small birds I saw after the snow had the dark hangman’s hoods I was told characterized juncos. They flitted from my young cherry trees to the farm fence. The only place I can imagine transients would find shelter is another neighbor’s arborvitae. I know birds live there, because I hear them. All I ever see is brown bodies.

My friend who feeds birds in Santa Fé has an arborvitae near his feeders. It’s always filled with birds, and I gather different species coexist in the evergreen branches.

I have no idea what type of bird built the nest. I didn’t notice any special activity in that area.

It was something fairly large, as small birds go, or something that hatched a lot of eggs. It used some garlic chive stems and possibly winterfat twigs. It also tore pieces off a shop tower that blew into my yard from the chickadee neighbor.

Notes on photographs: Birds’ nest, 3 December 2018.

Birds and Seeds

Weather: Snow was promised a couple times, and a little did materialize today. Mostly we got the collateral weather: warm nights while the moist clouds moved overhead and raw winds in the day.

I don’t know if the ground is frozen yet or not. I never dig to find out. I do I’m having problems opening my gate. The ground there heaves a bit in the winter. A few years ago I put a narrow line of blocks under the gate wheel. My neighbor cut down some winterfat, and the bare soil blew onto my drive. So, the sum of tiny changes: the blocks probably have sunk a bit, the ground may have heaved a bit, and there’s a bid more dirt to clear - and the gate was dragging this week.

Last useful snow: 12/2. Week’s low: 10 degrees F. Week’s high: 56 degrees F in the shade.

What’s still green: Leaves on area hybrid roses, Apache plumes, cliff roses, juniper, arborvitae, and other evergreens, red hot pokers, blue flax, hollyhocks, winecup and leather leaf globe mallows, beards tongues, snapdragon, golden spur columbine, bouncing Bess, pink evening primrose, vinca, coral bells, alfilerillo, Saint John’s wort, cat mint, violets, sweet pea, Queen Anne’s lace, alfalfa, Shasta daisy, chrysanthemum, coreopsis, blanket flowers, anthemis, white yarrow, dandelion, purple asters, June, needle and cheat grasses

Some arborvitae beginning to turn brown.

What’s gray, gray-green, or blue green: Four-winged saltbush, buddleia, pinks, winterfat, snow-in-summer

What still has dead leaves: Area cottonwoods and Russian olives; trees of heaven have their full heads of seed clusters that probably catch as much snow as leaves. My cottonwood finally dropped its leaves.

Animal sightings: Small birds. My bird feeding friend told me the mysterious black hooded birds I saw a week ago may have been juncos.

Weekly update: I forced myself to go out one afternoon and start cutting down the dead Maximilian sunflower stalks. Of course, I got waylaid by all the things that blocked my way.

I began by cutting the dead stems on purple asters and leather leaf globe mallows whose seeds were constantly getting into my clothes. The aster parachutes have been especially troublesome this year.

The globe mallow stems were still green, and wouldn’t cut with my dull loppers. It’s not like I was encouraging them to sprout near my car, so tore at them anyway.

Next, without thinking, I sat on the block walk to cut shorter stems, and slash the garlic chives and hollyhocks that were growing between the blocks. As I went, I swept the blocks with a plastic whiskbroom.

After a half hour, I began to get cold. The air may have been in the mid fifties, but the ground was not. I hadn’t thought to lay a piece of cardboard for insulation.

I went out two days later and discovered some animal had kicked debris over the cleared path. I suspect it was a bird. I don’t know if it detected some residual heat in the area or was drawn by something else. I suspect it was hoping to eat whatever I had planted. Welcome to it, since all that could have been sown were globe mallow, aster, and garlic chive seeds. The last are so plentiful, there was no need to destroy my handiwork.

Notes on photographs: Water serpent and cloud painted on a local stucco wall.