April Snowstorm Blues

 We survived the nor'easter of '24.

Snowfall reports vary, but my snow stake showed 19" of heavy, wet snow at the end of the storm.  Winds from 30-40 and sometimes 50 mph wreaked havoc on snow laden limbs and weaker trees, bringing down so many that at one point the citizens without power numbered over one hundred thousand in New Hampshire alone.  At one point the road closures due to trees and wires down exceeded 200.  Thanks to hundreds of tree service companies and utility workers from New Hampshire, as well as crews from neighboring states that flooded the area in the aftermath, we were only without power for 3 days.  

The storm started for me on Thursday morning; I woke up at 3:00 am and was too keyed up to get back to sleep.  I got up, checked the snowfall, made my coffee, and sat down to do some internet surfing.  At 3:53 am there was a huge flash of lightning followed by two thunderclaps that were so intense, they shook the house.  Thundersnow!  Jim Cantore, eat your heart out.  

Five minutes later we lost power.

Through the first part of the storm, snowblowing was fairly easygoing.  After feeding the mules I cleaned up in front of the garage, did my path to the barn, and cleared at mom's house.  I managed to get my generator started and was very pleased with how well it did over the three day period.  Running my mini split heating unit, the water pump, my refrigerator, and a few outlets between my kitchen and the connecting porch I was able to get eight hours of running time for every 5 gallons of gas.  

The most significant thing that happened to me specifically is a cautionary tale to anyone who has become far too comfortable with winter cleanup.  As the storm was winding down I decided to do some preemptive cleanup around the mule barn.  There was about 16-18" of snow built up on the roof, and it's metal, so I knew it would come flying off at some point.  It generally will come down in a sheet, and it slams to the ground forming a cement-like berm of snow in front of the hay room doors.  My plow guy had punched open the main part of the driveway, but hadn't plowed along the barn side, and I like to keep the hay room doors accessible for unloading shavings, hay, or moving carts of manure out of the barn.  And I wanted to dump some manure that morning.  I also knew if I could get the current snow cleaned up, that would be all the less I'd need to deal with once the snow came off the roof.

So it was that I began a slow trudge along the barn, through snow over my knees, trying to clear a path with my trusty snowblower.  I managed to break open one path almost to the doors, when in a flash there was a complete whiteout, and a second later I was standing - quite shocked - looking at my snowblower buried under a pile of snow.  Part of the snow load from the roof had let go.

I began frantically trying to dig out the machine with my hands, which was still running, and attempted to rock it out of its position, to no avail.  I went into the barn and grabbed a shovel, and began digging it out with that.  And that's when it all went to hell in a hand basket.  

 The next thing I knew, the other half of the snow load let go and I saw it hit the machine, realized what was happening, and a split second later was thrown sideways into the snow and completely buried.  My panicked brain's first thought was "AIR!", and I began trying to claw the snow away from my head.  I was pinned under about two feet or more of heavy, wet snow, lying sideways on my right side.  My right arm was pinned underneath me, bent so my hand was near my head.  My legs were buried the worst, and I couldn't move them at all.  I was able to free my left arm and began digging and pushing the snow away from my head and torso as best I could.  I was keenly aware that there could be more snow on the roof ready to come barrelling down on me at any second, so of course I began to panic.  I started thrashing my torso around, trying to free my right arm enough to bend it behind me to my right back pants pocket, where my phone was.  (Note to self - keep the phone in a front jacket pocket from now on!)  When I realized I was not going to be able to reach my phone, absolute panic set in.  I began screaming at the top of my lungs for help, because my mother had been snowblowing up near her barn when this happened.  Unfortunately, she couldn't see me, and couldn't hear me over the noise of her own snowblower, and my snowblower was still running right beside me.  I was fairly certain I was going to die in that snow coffin, and wouldn't be missed or found until my plow guy pushed my frozen corpse up the following day.  After about fifteen minutes of thrashing, clawing, and screaming I was able to get my right arm freed, then twisted myself up on my hands and knees.  I called my mother on my cell phone, crying hysterically.  By the time she made it down to the barn, I had managed to pull a foot out of my boot and get myself kicked free, and was standing upright. So I didn't die.  Obviously.

I managed to get the machine shut down and my mother took a picture of the snowblower, buried.

Later that night, after I'd stewed on my idiocy for some time, I decided to rescue the machine.  I forced the hay room doors open and dug a path to the snowblower, and managed to rock it out of the snow and pull it into the barn.  Once in, I was able to wheel it down the alley and out the front door.  My back was decidedly not happy.

My would-be snow coffin.

Chalk that up to a hard lesson learned.

Other casualties were part of my newly started mule track; I may be able to salvage the no-climb horse fence, but I'll need to replace some pressure treated posts, and it looks like I may have lost three or four corral panels and a gate or two.  I had leaned extra sections against the started fence to use later...wouldn't you know that's where the tree would fall?  This was a tall pine that came up by the roots.

Other random shots of destruction around the area, mostly after the dangerous stuff was cleaned up:

Our town road agent, hard at work cleaning up the roadsides.

But it was beautiful, too.

Gotta love a New England spring.

And Away We Go!

 Happy 2024!

It's been another mild start to winter with above normal temperatures and rain instead of snow, but that's changing this week.  We're gearing up for our first big storm of the season - better late than never!  Since I don't have the discipline to follow through with new year resolutions like lose weight, eat better, exercise more, yadda yadda yadda, I'm just going to jot down my landscaping goals for this year.  They may or may not happen.

* Finish the mule track, at least the first section.  I've had terrible luck with equipment this year, but hopefully everything is now straightened out and ready to go for spring chores.  Fingers crossed.

*Create paths in the back yard.  There are a few things that are going to require some assistance from equipment, and this is one of them.  If I can get the paths laid, I can get the cat fence up, and I'll deal with creating gardens after. 

*Install a conifer/alpine bed in the back yard.  Another chore that will require a backhoe to dig out an area for planting, and add in some landscape rocks to create the right mood for alpine plants.  I have a whole stack of big rocks, so this is going to be fun.

I still have my forest garden project to work on, my new cottage garden beds, the new barn hot garden beds, and many other items on my never ending to-do list, but those are the things I hope to finish before the year is out.  I'm also thinking of building a rustic pergola over the lower gravel patio just to see if I can do it.  So long as I don't lose steam before May gets here, I should be ok.

Now that's what I call a good start.

 

 Our first good storm of the 2022-23 winter, and it was a doozie.  It snowed from around 7 a.m. on Friday morning until about noon on Saturday.  At 6 a.m. Saturday morning I measured 14 1/2 inches of heavy, wet snow.  We probably had another two inches fall after that.  Thousands lost power and cleanup was insane.  The ground wasn't quite frozen, so many dirt and gravel driveways are a complete mess after being plowed.  Thankfully we had power back after six hours, but in the meantime I re-learned how to start my generator and actually used it to power the mini-split and a few other items.  The day before the storm I remembered that I had started to replace the chute deflector cable on my snowblower back in the spring but never completed the job, so there's another skill I quickly mastered.  Happy to say the old snowblower is still working perfectly!  

Most of the snow arrived overnight, so here's what I woke up to. 

So festive!

...oh my.

Well then.

My poor little birch trees!

 Once it stopped snowing the sun came out and temperatures rose.  Snow came off the trees and roofs in earnest, and everything melted a little.   This morning it's all froze up and would have made for a great base if the next storm brings the initial 6 to 10 inches of snow they were predicting, unfortunately now it looks like our pre-Christmas storm will be mostly rain, thanks to temperatures rising to 50F.  

While that might not be the best outlook for skiing or other winter activities, it will make heeling in my new baby trees easier.  

I sent in a $20 donation to The Arbor Day Foundation and in return received these little gems.  5 Norway Spruce, a White Flowering Dogwood, an Eastern Redbud, 3 crab apples, and two hydrangea.  Hard to believe there are twelve trees in that bag.  Even harder to believe frozen ground and over a foot of snow are "optimal planting conditions" for my zone.😒  If the weather does get that warm, I'm thinking I might heel them in against the foundation of the house, as that would be the only diggable soil.  We'll see.

I'll end this post with some wild and not-so-wild critters out in the weather.  Like the porcupine who has been living in the old horse barn.  He appeared at dusk near the bird feeders and waddled his way through the snow to mom's big barn.

And the goldfinch who decided to wear a snowflake as a hat.

The mules were out and about - the snow would have been almost up to Flea's belly, but I did snowblow parts of their paddock.

I've recently begun feeding a pair of resident crows.  I throw soaked cat kibbles, shelled peanuts, and mealworms out for them.  They didn't show up yesterday, but I was happy to see some bluebirds were taking advantage of the feast; I think they were after the mealworms.

And all was well on the farm. 😊

spring tease

 Just when you think spring has arrived and maybe you can get out and do a little work on the property...

...winter says, uhhhh NOPE.

 Well, it is March after all.  We've had wicked Nor'easters on April Fool's Day, so you can't count the weather out just yet.  

The storm didn't stop a couple of young Tom turkeys from their daily trek.

 And a small flock of Red-winged blackbirds showed up at Mom's feeders.

Meanwhile, inside the house, seedlings are beginning to emerge.

Three of my broccoli seeds have sprouted, and they're already getting leggy.

Now, I know that to fix leggy tomato plants you can transplant them into larger pots, burying them deep.  The little hairs on the stems are actually roots, so they'll quickly spread under the soil and anchor the seedling a little better.  I had no idea if that was also a solution for leggy broccoli seedlings, so off to the world wide web I went.  The verdict?  Yes, you can do the same.  Instead of climbing through the mess that is my storage shed searching for small plastic pots, I'm going to use toilet paper tubes.  

I put a small amount of seed starting soil in the bottom of the tube, dropped the broccoli seedling in there peat pellet and all, and filled it with more soil.  Hopefully that will give them a chance to bulk up their stems before they really start leafing out. 

...that's not what I had in mind.

 In light of my previous post, Mother Nature responded with a resounding FREEZE HER OUT! battlecry.  We've had bitterly cold temperatures, and our last storm was 8 inches of heavy snow followed by freezing rain.  To add insult to injury, after the blizzard raged all morning, temperatures rose to nearly 40 degrees F by afternoon, then plummeted once again to below zero the next day. 

Although that storm was hell on my snowblower, I have to say that I'm pleasantly surprised at how well my mini-split heating system is doing so far.  It seemed like any time I told someone that was going to be my heat source, I was told it wasn't a good choice for the area, and I should really have an alternate heating method to aid in keeping my house warm.  Instead, I soldiered on with my plan and I don't regret it yet.  

One difference with the mini-split vs. a typical forced hot air furnace is that I've learned you don't fool with the settings, unless you plan to be gone for any length of time.  I have 3 of the 4 heads set to 67 degrees, and it's keeping the house comfortable.  The 4th head is in my bedroom, and I have that one turned off.  During the day when the sun heats the upstairs, the units will run maybe every half hour to keep the temperature steady.  At night, they seem to kick on every ten minutes or so, but they're so quiet you don't really notice it.  I do hear the compressor unit turning on and off outside my bedroom wall, but it's not an irritatingly loud noise.  I did find that in the basement the floors are very cold, and working down there all day wasn't comfortable.  I moved my work from home setup to the upstairs, but I still go into the basement den to watch tv at night.  Having a propane heater in the adjoining garage is definitely helping to keep the downstairs warmer, I believe.  I have that set at 48 degrees, which is probably a little warmer than it needs to be.  My propane consumption hasn't been nearly as much as I had anticipated, either.

My electric bill is only a little higher than it was in my big drafty farmhouse during the coldest part of winter.  There, I was heating with a forced hot air furnace (oil), a wood stove (firewood and compressed wood blocks), and electric heaters to take the chill off in certain rooms.  Even though I don't have exact numbers, I'm definitely spending less to heat this house.  Of course, it helps that it's smaller and much better insulated, but it is wide open, too, with a vaulted ceiling in the main living area.  

Would I recommend a mini-split as a main heating source?  Yes, IF your house is well insulated.  For new construction, absolutely.  As an additional source of heat?  Yes, absolutely.  They are built to be energy efficient, and I can't lie; the added benefit of having air conditioning during the summer is a huge plus.  I'm very, very happy with my choice.

A good snow

 Well, hot diggity.  Our 6-12" snowstorm ended up whalloping us with about 28" of powder.  At least it wasn't that same heavy, wet stuff like the last storm.  It was still a LOT of snow.  

Thank goodness the roof was on the addition, otherwise it would have been twice the chore to clean it out.  As it was, the gusty winds blew quite a bit of snow inside, but it drifted up against the walls for the most part.  They actually used a leaf blower instead of shovels, it was that light...genius.

Once clean up was done, they got to work framing and sheathing that front truss for day 27.  

I'm so glad I went with French doors and two windows; even two double windows would have been pretty small in that space.  

My houseplants are going to love it.  

And the cats. 

And me.

Gah!  I just want it done so I can move in and enjoy it!

😁

It was a dark and stormy night...

 Ain't nobody lovin' this.

It's no fun when you get a dumping of snow before the ground freezes (or after it thaws), and this storm was made even worse by being heavy, wet, and mixed with rain.  We probably had at least 10" of snow, but the rain beat it down to an even 8" after it was all done and over with.  Trying to plow, snowblow, or shovel this kind of snow is akin to moving wet cement.  Everything was coated in a thick layer of wet snow, and the sheer weight of it, coupled with brutal wind gusts, brought down tree limbs, entire trees, power lines, and utility poles all over the southern part of the state.  We were one of the 40,000+ people left in the dark for two and a half days, and it was one more day after that before our internet was restored.  That doesn't sound so bad, but we as a society have grown to depend on our modern conveniences.  I am certainly no exception to that; I nearly cried when we had running water again. 

The contractor came down on Sunday and cleaned up the building as best he could, then opened up the driveway and building site a little more with his Bobcat.  My plow guy did the best he could, but his big, heavy truck was nearly mired in the mud near the house.  The Bobcat is lighter and was able to get into smaller areas.

Our internet cable, hanging low.

 The mulberry tree lost a few limbs, and the little birches I had carefully chosen to keep down front were bent over with snow.  We'll see if they recover, but more often than not they don't straighten back up.

Monday , Day 24, was more snow pushing/moving/dumping, and more cleanup.  There was a little construction going on; they walled up the downstairs.  Not sure why they covered the window frame, but there must be a reason known only to the coven of tradesmen knowledgeable in all things house-building.

 

Day 25 was pretty quiet.  I did get my garage door, and I absolutely LOVE it.  

The roof trusses are delayed, unfortunately.  They were supposed to be here at the end of this week, but they won't get here until middle of next.  In the meantime, I'm not sure what's going to happen.  I don't think there's much they can really do until the site is completely thawed and dried.  

And there's more rain and snow on the way, of course.