Monday, October 5, 2009

First Snow, 2009

We had our first snow yesterday and last night. This is what our garden looked like at about 1:00 pm yesterday.
This is what it looked like at about 2:00 pm. Snow kept falling off and on through the day and night, with maybe an inch more of accumulation.
Clouds early this morning were mostly wave clouds (lenticulars) stacked over the mountains - Duck Creek Range shown above - with smaller lenticulars scattered over the valley.
The view from our hiking hill, looking south of town toward the southern Egan Range, showed raggedy lenticulars, and a fairly light snowfall, except on the higher peaks.

Cheatgrass in the snow.


More ice crystals.

It's now clouded over nearly completely, although skies are supposed to clear. Hopefully the snow will mostly melt over the next week or so.

This first snow of 2009 has beat the first snow of 2008 by 6 days and the first snow of 2007 by 1 day.

12 comments:

Lockwood said...

My two nephews (who live near Toronto, Ontario) somehow discovered this morning that seven inches of snow fell at Mt. Bachelor yesterday; both wrote e-mails to express how jealous they were. Now I have to write back that I'm near sea level, and Mt. Bachelor is at 6000 feet, on the other side of the Cascades. We had some very light mist yesterday, but I'm sure it amounted to only 0.01-0.02 inches.

Very nice and sunny today; I imagine it'll make it over the mountains to Nevada soon. I'm not sure what I'd think about getting first snow in early October... not much, I'm afraid. But the pictures are very nice. I'm happy to enjoy it from a distance.

Mathias said...

BBbrrr....cold! Here in France on fieldwork the forecast for tomorrow predicts 20 to 24C!

Silver Fox said...

Lockwood, I hear that Bend - of all places - got a ton of snow, but I didn't write down how much.

Silver Fox said...

Lost Geologist, ha! This morning it was 21F here, and it was 20-24C where you are. That's a huge difference!

Anonymous said...

Looks like you don't gain much advantage by being a few hundred miles south of my digs. Your first snow coincided exactly with our first snow! Looks like we got a bit less than you did (it's all gone now), though there was a pretty good dump in the mountains, about an hour west of here. Stay warm!

--Howard (Calgary, AB, Canada)

Lockwood said...

Story from The Bend Bulletin. Apparently an all-time October record.

Silver Fox said...

Howard, ours is mostly gone at our elevation (6450 feet) - but not gone above 8000 feet and on north-facing slopes. I love winter!

Silver Fox said...

Lockwood, I got my Bend news from a former Oregonian native now in Alaska: 7 inches! Thanks for the link.

Gaelyn said...

So much for the garden huh. It's beautiful to look at, from someplace warm.

ReBecca Hunt-Foster said...

We have lucked out and not had any snow yet!! Thank goodness! But it is getting colder. I hope it will hold off a few more months here.

Silver Fox said...

It's another cool day - cold overnight - the snow has melted up to the 9000+ foot elevation on mountains, except some north-facing slopes. Nice and sunny!

ReBecca, amazing the snow passed you by entirely.

Gaelyn, garden is down! (Except for inner leaves of the kale and the chocolate mint, which will survive any temps - I think.)

ReBecca Hunt-Foster said...

I feel very lucky - so far!