Storm Damage in Olympia

Mountaineer-approved footwear? I think not. 

   Without power for a second day, I set off for downtown Olympia yesterday under they gray and over the slush. I found a free electrical outlet at Traditions Cafe and worked on my laptop for about twenty minutes before the power went out downtown and my battery blipped out. So I headed back home along Capitol Way. What a mess. 

  It looked like a tornado had hit. The ten inches of heavy, wet snow combined with freezing rain had split  trees down the middle, ripped off branches left and right, and felled quite a few.  

  I thought about hopping on a bus, but wanted the exercise and adventure of seeing the damage from the storm first-hand. I walked mostly--on and off the sidewalks--and listened carefully for cracking branches.

Walkers near Sylvester Park--not quite safe on the street or sidewalk. 

Misty rain, low clouds, and air pollution from wood-burning stoves cast a pall over the city. 

Trees along Capitol Way will likely not survive this kind of damage.

Many of the large old trees on the Capitol Campus won't either.

Thick ice coated every twig and leaf bud.

Footpaths around downed trees put pedestrians onto the street.

A bit of color in a bleak landscape.

Downed power lines lay across the sidewalk.

This beautiful weeping cherry off Carlyon Rd. is--was--a local landmark in spring.

Neighborhood roads were deep in slush and fallen limbs.

Air quality was poor. 

Sagging power-lines under the weight of this snow-laden tree.

Home again, safe and sound, to feed the birds. I wonder how their nests fared the storm.

Sublime Snowmen

    What  a delightful afternoon of skiing through my neighborhood. Thanks to the ten inches of snow we got in Olympia, I was able to step into my skis at my front door and schuss down the middle of the road, across main thoroughfares, on the sidewalks, and across playing fields and front yards. I never had to take my skis off to portage over pavement.
   There were quite a few Nordic skiers out today as well as one Alpine skier (what a workout!), several snow-shoers, many sledders, one man cutting big square chunks of snow out of his front yard. I asked him if it was an igloo. No, he said. It's an addition. I'm putting in a half-bath.
   My ski-tour brought me past several snowmen--each adhering to the time-honored form of two or three large balls of snow for the body, twigs for arms, and faces made out of whatever material is available. Thought the classic snowman features carrot nose, a "corn cob pipe and a button nose and two eyes made out of coal," I found some very creative variations on this theme.   

The SnowVegan: Eyes of broccoli, nose of carrot, mouth of cucumber.

This classic snowman would look foolish with a snow blower.

Deciduous leaves give this snowman's eyes an unusually human expression.  

Tootsie rolls give this one a slightly demonic look. 

  Speaking of sublime, let's talk about sublimation. Our ten inches of snow will be gone soon, due to basic melting as our temperatures rise above freezing. In this scenario, water in its solid form (ice/snow) changes to its liquid form (liquid water) and soaks into the ground, trickles into streams, flows into our storm sewers. But some of the snow will not melt. When the temperature is below freezing, the snow may change from a solid directly into gas or vapor without first melting. This process is called sublimation.
  What is happening at the molecular level is this: in its solid state, the H20 molecules are locked into specific positions that create a hexagonal-shaped crystal. While the "frozen" molecules are unable to move about freely, they do vibrate. In the case of sublimation, some ice molecules gain enough energy (usually from the sun) to break away from neighboring ice molecules and change directly into an invisible vapor molecule.
  

Snow Clouds in Olympia

Olympia this morning at 9:30, five inches of snow and counting.

 It's been like being in a snow globe here in Olympia this weekend. Big fat snowflakes for hours and then many tiny ones and near-whiteout conditions. And lots of time to check Cliff Mass's weather blog where you can stay up to date on the latest predictions for what was referred to as "Snowmageddon" earlier this weekend. While we've been focused on accumulation amounts, road conditions, and school and business closures, we may have  overlooked the clouds themselves and the snowflakes they have brought us.

   Here was what was happening in my neighborhood this morning: 

  Really huge snowflakes. As you probably know, snowflakes do not fall from clouds composed of ice crystals--the high cirriform clouds. Ice crystals falling from these clouds usually evaporate or sublimate in the air before reaching the ground. We can observe this as "virga" or "fallstreaks." 

   The clouds that bring us snow are the same clouds that bring us rain--the lower cumulonimbus, nimbostratus, and sometimes altostratus clouds. In summer, much of our rain actually begins as snow then melts on the way down--usually when it falls below freezing level (about 12,000 feet). In winter, however, freezing level is much lower and falling snowflakes have a much better chance of staying frozen on their journey to the earth. The general rule of thumb is that snowflakes will survive 1,000 feet below freezing level. Thus, if freezing level is at 1,500 feet, snow level could be as low as 500 feet. For us to get snow in Olympia (all the way down to sea level) freezing level needs to be at most 1,000 feet. 

   Here is what Meteorology Today author C. Donald Ahrens says about big, fat flakes: "Snowflakes that fall through moist air that is slightly above freezing [our current conditions in Olympia] slowly melt as they descend. A thin film of water forms on the edge of the flakes, which acts like glue when other snowflakes come in contact with it. In this way, several flakes join to produce giant snowflakes often measuring several centimeters in diameter." 

   Meanwhile, take advantage of this "wet snow." It makes great snowpersons and snowballs, but it's stickiness makes for clumpy cross-country skiing. Yesterday, my husband and I took to the Chehalis-Western trail in our Nordic skis and had only two other beings for company on our five-mile jaunt.

Signs of our Nordic companions: a lone cyclist (whom we saw) and a mammal (whom we did not) that was not a dog. I am thinking fox judging by the pad size and shape and the pairing of tracks. 

Snow, it turns out, isn't a good medium for identifiable animal tracks, but is ideal for tracking an animal a long distance. 

Mima Mounds for Cloudspotters

Strange Sightings: Mounds of Mystery and Flying Saucer Clouds.  

    This past Sunday I went cloud watching at Mima Mounds Natural Area Preserve just south of Olympia. Most visitors to this 637-acre site are there to see and the mysterious naturally formed earthen mounds that cover this Puget prairie grassland. The landscape is strange to be sure, so strange that scientists have been unable to determine exactly what caused these mounds to form.
    Theories of origin include seismic activity, wind, retreating glaciers, swelling and shrinking clays, and (a favorite of the press) burrowing of pocket gophers. Most people discount the gopher theory, but it's fun to see wide-eyed children imagine the out-sized creature living in these mounds, many up to 8 feet tall and 30 feet across.
  While gophers do burrow in the these mounds (and everywhere else in Thurston County!), they are not likely to be the architects of Mima Mounds. Dissected mounds show they are composed mostly of loose sand, fine gravel, and decaying plants. These mounds are the official type specimen for other such mounds found elsewhere in the U.S., China, and Australia. They may be called mima mounds or pimple mounds, hog-wallow mounds, or prairie mounds.
   But last Sunday, I was out to see the clouds without the distraction of the wildflowers that blanket the prairie here in April and May. Flowers would have kept my gaze earthward, not skyward where the clouds were processing by. I spent well over hour strolling the trails and lolling at the preserve, watching one large cloud band take shape ever so slowly.

Lower altocumulus lenticularis ("lennies" or "flying saucer clouds") and higher cirrocumulus clouds.

   Mima Mounds makes a great cloud-watching site because this open prairie is carefully preserved through prescribed burns, eradication of invasive Scots broom, and removal of aggressive Douglas-firs (a species thriving on the land surrounding the preserve).

A distinct band of altocumulus clouds, perhaps 30 miles wide, stretched across the sky .

   At home later, I went to the National Weather Service website and saw this exact cloud on their satellite imagery. The cloud was skirting the edge of the high-pressure system we've enjoyed earlier this week. Fun!
  And this morning, heard on KPLU radio a report on Mima Mounds. Fun!

Click here for more information and directions to the preserve. 

Birds? What Birds?

Wednesday morning birders at Nisqually NWR. 

     The first hour of my Wednesday morning did not go well. I slept through the alarm, had to cancel my first appointment, was already running late for my second, and forgot a third. But nothing was going to keep me from joining the birders at Nisqually. So what if it's 27 degrees Farenheit?
   Every Wednesday morning at 8, a genial band of birders gathers at the refuge Visitors' Center for a three-hour birding walk with Phil Kelley or another Nisqually NWR volunteer. Usually there are several refuge volunteers in the group all with spotting scopes, field guides, and much knowledge to share with beginner as well as experienced birders. The weekly walk is organized through the Black Hills Audubon Society; there is no fee for the walk, just the $3 refuge entrance fee. Tip: spend your first $3 of the day at Nisqually instead of Starbucks.

Pintails, snow goose, mallards, shovelers, mergansers, buffleheads, Canada geese, and goldeneyes are commonly seen in the refuge ponds.  Luckily, they did not distract me from the cirrus sky above. 

   Until this month, I have been going to Nisqually to walk, usually very fast, out to the end of the new boardwalk and back. Nisqually was exercise with a great view, maybe some bald eagles, a harrier, or other large bird I could see without binoculars. Now I go to walk very slowly and just to the start of the boardwalk looking at birds. I cannot call what I am doing "birding." I am looking at clouds while birding. I am chatting while birding. I am not pulling out my field guide or making a list. I am hearing the names of the birds and watching them fly and perch and hunt. Being in their company is marvelous. As is being in the company of a group of people who seem to want nothing more than to make sure everyone sees what they do--and delights in it.
   There is a generosity of spirit that infuses this group and that seems to build during the walk. The volunteers and birders set up their Swarvoski spotting scopes and newcomers are invited to take a look. Birds are identified, genders noted or guessed at, behaviors marveled over, plumage admired. Everyone will see something common such as a bald eagle (usually several) and everyone will see something unusual or something few have seen before. This morning, in addition to many eagles, we saw one cryptically colored American Bittern crouched down in the grass, it's feathers fluffed against the cold. We watched a red-tailed hawk perched in a small tree warming itself in the sun--its wings spread like a cormorant, its tail fanned out so that we could see individual feathers. Common or rare, it was all stunning. And unphotographable with my l'il camera that is better suited to big skies.

Here are the cirrocumulus clouds. There is a bald eagle in the top of that Douglas-fir.

Altocumulus lenticularis forming above the pond where waterfowl dabbled.

This January sky holds so much more than I will ever know.

   To find out for yourself what's in the sky and waters of Nisqually National Wildlife Refuge (8 miles from Olympia) follow this link: Black Hills Audubon. Or better yet, cancel all your Wednesday appointments and go the refuge at 8.

Relief

Low-tech Model Trumps Google Earth. Ha!

  After creating my Western Washington relief map in modeling clay yesterday, I was not left with a great sense of accomplishment. I had spent about three hours spreading clay around on an old white-board, spread maps all over the kitchen table, and had bright-green clay under my fingernails. Was there any value to what I had done?
  I cleaned up my mess, stored my map out of sight of my GIS-cartographer husband, and got in the car to drive to my book club meeting. No sooner had I turned out of my neighborhood onto the main east-west road when I suddenly felt the success of my project: I was driving through my terrain model.
   I knew where I was in all the spread-out clay, I could feel where the Black Hills were, how far Gray's Harbor was west of the hills, the shape of the harbor, it's distance from Willapa Bay. When I turned north and the road began to slope toward Puget Sound, I could feel that, too. I could feel the Cascades on my right, the Olympics ahead and a bit to the left.
  For some, Google Earth offers this same sensation (much enhanced) to users as they zoom over the 3-D map of the earth on your computer screen. But for whatever reason, this tool doesn't work for me. I just get dizzy and lost. To internalize my landscape I needed to create the hills and lakes and mountains and rivers myself and with my own hands. The three hours or so I spent shaping clay in total silence--no music, no speaker-phone calls, no talking to myself--seems to have gotten into that part of my brain that makes maps make sense. I am not sure a few mouse-clicks could have done same.
   Though my awkwardly shaped Olympic Mountains is barely recognizable (above), I can now see in my mind's eye the location of  the Quinault Ridge. I know where it is vis-a-vis Cape Flattery, Port Townsend, and Olympia. I can imagine the clouds moving in from the Pacific Ocean and bending around the southwest flanks of the Olympics. I can feel the low, heavy clouds funneling into the Quinault Valley. I can hear them drenching the forests. It's a beautiful sound.

Terrain Modeling for Dummies

The start of what was going to be a long day.

   The territory for the book I am writing on clouds has been in flux these past few months. I had originally planned to write exclusively about the clouds I could see from Olympia. Then I wanted to go to Costa Rica and visit the Monteverde Cloud Forest and to the Southwest because the clouds were different there. Eventually, I focussed on writing about clouds in Washington State--my book being a natural history of how the state's topography influences cloud formation. 

   I selected several sites in the state's physiographic provinces, but time flew by and I made but one trip. I thought about planning more, but you just can't schedule a cloud-watching vacation the way you can a bird-watching or whale-watching vacation. What if I got all the way to the southeast corner of the state and it was (gasp!) sunny! And did I really need to travel that far to see a cumulus cloud I could very well see from my back yard? Part of my book is to encourage people to enjoy the clouds right over their heads; no one needs to travel great distances to accomplish this. 

So, after a bit of hemming and hawing, I've decided to focus on a swath of Western Washington where I spend most of my time, the places I have been drawn to over and over, the nearby places that I can walk or bike to and the far-away places where I go for a day trip or weekend.

   This swath is convenient and I have gerrymandered into territory I am calling a "Mega Hydrologic Cycle Unit." The clouds I see from Olympia appear and disappear within this territory. What does this territory look like? I tried to draw it in my notebook: 

     

   I could see the territory--but I couldn't feel the terrain. I have a relief map of Washington State, but many of the places I am planning to write about are not on it. I needed my own personalized, customized, relief map of my territory. So I bought some kiddie modeling clay, found a old whiteboard in a closet, sketched out the territory, and started smushing modeling the clay. 

Luckily, there was coffee.

In case you didn't recognize it, this is southwest Washington. 

Apparently, south Puget Sound is very complex and cannot be easily rendered  without the help of glaciers and a millennium or two. The peninsula of land at center where Olympia is situated is roughly the size of Florida. It is not.

In fact, there are several peninsulas of land in South Puget Sound. None look quite like these.

Except from a distance. 

Now the water--bays, lakes, canals, a strait, and some generalized water.

Problems develop with scale and realism. The Black Hills looks like a wad of wasabi; the Nisqually River  has overflowed its banks and several miles of floodplain; Mount Rainier and the Cascades look like...a lot of wasabi.

It is okay to laugh at this one. The chewing gum atop Mt. Rainier is actually a snow-cap made of clay. That blue thing is not the tail of a mouse hiding under the snow, but the Nisqually River flowing from the Nisqually Glacier through/above what appears to be a landscape of Gulden's Mustard toward Puget Sound. But you get the idea.

Shortly after this sensitive rendering of Lake Quinault and the rain-forested valleys of the Olympic Peninsula, I decided to call it quits for the day. Now, a watering can and some cotton balls and--voila!--nimbostratus!