tamarack

Here it's big fat cluster flies. We generally see a few each fall, like this year. In our first year here (1998) there were thousands - we twice put out the 2-ft long glue strips and had them fully loaded (both sides) in a day or two - not pretty. In 1999 there was maybe a hundred or so, and after that more like 10-15 per autumn. Dog and cat get excited even with the low numbers.

95-96 was the winter of whipsaw - great patterns followed by cutter sequences. 43" in Dec including 17.5" in the solstice storm (biggest snowfall of my 13 winters in Gardiner) followed by 10 days of AN temps and meh. Then 4 small-medium snows in early Jan (4" from the big blizz) bringing the pack to 28", followed by 3 cutters driving it down to just 5. Several Feb storms boosted depth to 20" followed by more cutters. March 7-8 saw a 15.8" dump, #3 for the Gardiner experience, but after mid-month the snow disappeared quickly. Next month brought 3 storms totaling 23.5", easily tops for April. Just under 140" for the winter, 30" above my 2nd snowiest there, but only 5th in SDDs. Much preferred 93-94 despite its having 50" less total snowfall. I like having significant pack (it's hereditary - my daughter once opined that the ground wasn't really snow-covered if the grass was still sticking up thru it) and 93-94 also featured more than twice the days with 10"+ as 95-96 and 3X the days with 20"+. Given recent winters, I anticipate more of the whipsaw than the consistent pack of 93-94 (or 86-87, 89-90.)

Over 20 years since I took that route, but IIRC the sign at the pass read 2,855'. With Alex to the north reporting snowline about 3k, I'm not surprised the Kanc had none.

Welcome to the board. I lurked for a year or more before joining, back in the Eastern days. Having spent Thanksgiving week in the Olympia area in both 1995 and '96, my impression for RA there was "some every day" - the November joke is that it only rains once that month, lasting 1st to 30th. However, in those 2 weeks there were only 2 all-day rains, and w/o a gauge I'd estimate neither reached 2". IIRC, Seattle averages a bit under 40"/year and Olympia probably isn't much different, with Port Angeles (closer to Olympics' rain shadow) about 10" less. Without checking stats, I'd guess your current area has big rain events - 3"/4"+ in 24 hours - more often than the communities on the inner part of Puget Sound.

Norway maple bark tends to be darker than that of sugar maple, and on larger trees bears a resemblance to the bark of white ash - shape only, as ash bark is much lighter in color. Other differences include the sap during the growing season. Break a Norway maple leaf from the stem and the sap is white; sugar maple will be clear. (I recently learned that the opaque sap is only during the warm season, and Norways can be tapped for syrup.) The winter key is bud shape, sugar maple pointed and Norway rounded. Tough to see when the nearest buds are 50' off the ground.

This storm was odd, in that winds probably never gusted to 40 near my place and leaf drop was already well over 50% before the event started, yet we lost power for 29 hours. The unusual wind direction for peak velocity may have some validity, however. Looking back 2 years, when even fewer leaves remained on the trees (because it was nearly 2 weeks later), Maine was hammered and some think it was because our strongest gusts and most frequent strong winds are from the NW, so the SE winds of 2017 broke more trees than expected. Also, many observers report that all the damage occurred in a short period, 15-30 minutes at any particular location though different times as the storm moved northward. Resembled catching the edge of an eyewall or an extraordinarily widespread downburst.

GYX discussion this morning talked of some colder CWA sites flirting with 20, but P&C for my town says 34. I'll bid at 10° below that.

The large oak 100' behind the house retains half its leaves. All others are bare or have a few tatters hanging on.

Our mostly rural town of less than 1,500 has about 75 miles of roads. Spread that over Maine's nearly 500 municipalities, and probably double the total to account for towns/cities with far greater road/powerline density, and the total at $5 million/mile would cover the entire state budget into the 22nd century. Even as the wind was blowing water up my rain jacket as I was trying to pull the dead fir off our road and go to work, I didn't think it was all that strong, maybe into the mid 30s. Later in the morning we had gusts well into the 40s at 1,600' on Bigelow Mountain's lower slopes. The roar of that later wind was many decibels beyond the earlier wind plus rain. Lots of rain, though - 1.80", significantly more than the other 2 cocorahs reports from Franklin County. Despite the non-exceptional winds at home, our power was off 4 AM yesterday thru 9:15 AM today. Only the 30 hours in December 2000 lasted longer. That one was SW gusts ahead of a CF, took down a dry pine long enough to smack the wires and break about 8' from a utility pole. Both that tree and yesterday's fell out of our on woodlot - c'est la vie.

Very good month of winter here. No storms greater than 3.4" thru Feb. 9 then 60" in 31 days with 21" and some thunder on Feb. 10-11. Two 11" storms in early March and a 12-18" forecast for 11-12; verified at 5.5" and that was it for snow except for some dustings. The Nov. 2 I remember was in 2002, 1st day of deer season like this year, and temps teens/20s with strong NW winds. Wouldn't be terrible for mid January but sure felt cold that day.

Last winter's 14 events of 3"+ was my 2nd most at my current home. 2007-08 had 21. Average is 9.8 (206 in 21 winters.)

Fourth place for my 46.5 Maine winters with 142.3", and 1-3 are all in Fort Kent. Biggest event was a modest 12.5" but so, so many events. Last winter tried to duplicate but slid a few dozen miles north so we had lots of mix. In any case, weak ENSO has generally been nice to the foothills.

It was about this time in 1995 when the coastals began their endless parade. (A parade that sadly was contaminated by some truly destructive cutters in JFM.) 2 of the worst busts I've ever been apart of living in NE NJ. Such disappointment in 2001 when I was a kid expecting 2-3 feet of snow and barely ending up with 6 inches. I can still picture that Weather Channel graphic with a huge area of purple covering pretty much all of the Mid-Atlantic into SNE saying "widespread 2-3+ feet" and Paul Kocin honking hard. Jan 15' was like 50 miles too far west with the big snows but because it's one of the most populated 50 mile areas in the country, it was a big deal. I was fortunate enough to come of age during NNJ's snow bonanza of 1956-61, with 7 storms of 18"+ (though 2/58 might've been a bit less) and 3 of them reaching 24", possibly more. Feb. '61 records include the only 50"+ depths I've seen for NJ, though our place topped out closer to 45". However, I share your grief about Jan. '15 - was hoping the grandkids in SNJ would see their first ever 10"+ event. Forecast was 12-16 as we went to bed on the 26th, which verified as 1.5" during the mid morn, all melted by 2 PM; bleah!. They did get their snowcave-building crush job a year later.

Location, location, location. No bust at ACK (about 0.1% of Boston's wx bailiwick) - they've reported heavy rain in recent hours and winds 30sG50 since I first looked at 7 this morning. Maybe all that RA and many hours of sustained TS-force wind loosens a few tree roots?

Beautiful. Saw some electric reds and oranges the past 2 days, Monday driving to Orono and yesterday in the woods around Bigelow Mt.

Got nailed by one of those critter near the dam at Flagstaff Lake, where they probably had low 20s last week. Eleven of us standing near the shore in a fresh breeze, and the little beast hit and stung immediately. Saw a 2nd one crawling stupidly on the ground later. No one else had any issues.

Touched 25 yesterday, about the same this morning. High temp for Oct 1-5 is 56, average 53 - just right for cutting some firewood. Looks like a bit warmer next week, but no torch (which in Oct means 70s here.)

That offer (and it was a 10% rebate - typo) occurred at least 40 years ago, when pundits were (incorrectly, of course) worrying about a new ice age. And when I was still using a snow scoop to clear Fort Kent's average of 130" while we lived there.

Just don't be headed down the west side toward Lincoln when the leaf peeper chair is closing at Loon. Many years ago we hit that on the Saturday of Columbus Day weekend and spent 2 hours coasting 7 miles until we passed the ski area. (A beautiful day in the 70s at full color, we had no time constraint, so just put the car in neutral and enjoyed the view.)

Many years back when we lived in Fort Kent, an Aroostook dealer of snowblowers promised a 1 rebate if CAR snowfall that next winter was less than 50%. The CAR average for 79 winters is 114" and the lowest on record is 59" - pretty safe for the dealer.

Nice history, nice colors. There's a lot of northeast Aroostook where the woods are mainly conifer-aspen-white birch, and fall is mainly just yellow. Where there's maples, like these pics, we'd get two peaks, one for maples and yellow birch then the aspens about 10 days later. Nitpic: Hanson Lake isn't in CAR. Not PQI either though it's close to the Mapleton/PQI line.

I'll be close to that first one next Friday, as my knees are acting up, especially the right one. Did something to it 2 years ago while dragging a deer up a rutted, blowdown-strewn skidder track. The 2nd one is where they put on my walking cast in 1981, and where we took our son 3 years earlier as he had 15 minutes of grand mal seizure, the reason for his medical test the day my back muscles went on strike, violently.

Our first year in Fort Kent we lived 50 yards from the St. John, and September had a couple foggy 34s before we finally got a frost on the 26th. That was 12 days later than any of the other 9 first-frosts, and 20 days behind the average of those 9. Hope your back is muscles only. Hurts at least as much (my mom said her back spasm pain was worse than her broken back) but doesn't involve the spine. My first such event (Feb. 1981) came a month after our pickup lost its fight with a log truck, while I was still in a walking cast that made my left leg 3" longer than the right. Was at PQI hospital (son getting a test) when I reached for toddler daughter's books - weighed a pound, maybe - and as I drew them toward me it was like a knife sinking into my back, probably the most intense pain I've ever had. Walking 20' from bed to bath took 15 minutes with at least 3 points of solid contact at all times, to avoid the smallest bit of sudden move and another stab of the knife.

Boston has 30%+ snowfall departures all the time, but in 79 winters CAR has recorded snowfall under 70% of average just 7 times, and only twice since 1961-62. They've been 130%+ a bit more often, with 10 such winters. Thus 78% of CAR winters have had snowfall within 30% of their average. At BOS that figure is just 48%. Or to turn that around, 52% of BOS winters are more than 30% from their average, while at CAR it's 22% with such variance. (My BOS data only goes back thru 1920, with 96-97 and 97-98 missing, so 97 winters, with 28 under 70% and 22 over 130%.) You could be exactly right, but climo says the odds of verification are much longer at CAR..

And beyond. One of the forest certification auditors was unable to book a room in Farmington for Oct. 15-18 because all the lodging was already full - he'll be commuting daily from Augusta.. There's not a huge bedroom resource but it's a college town so there's more than might be expected from a community of its size. High to peak on Mile Hill in our town, and 75%+ leaf drop on neighborhood ash species. Overall leaf drop is about 1/3.