Mother Nature's Cubism

I was walking down our path to Caesar Pond when I came upon slick ice that was blocking my way.

As I looked down upon it, I saw that it had a somewhat fractured appearance all over its surface.

So, being me, I stepped on it and the surface bent under my foot, but didn't break. So, I stepped off it and kicked it to see what would happen. Lots of cubes of ice! Sooo cool!

Here is one cube that broke off from an edge area.

And, here is Mother's Nature cubism artwork, with a little help from yours truly, as the sun was setting!

Spinning Ice Disk/Carousel on Caesar Pond

Some guys came to Caesar Pond to create their second ice disk (also called an ice carousel.) Apparently, they made one last year but we didn't know they were out there. This was cool. It was about 60 feet in diameter. The chainsawing began yesterday after the guys put a stake in the the ice and ran rope out from it in all directions to make a circle. Then, they had to use axes to chop out the channel. By the way, the ice is about 10" thick. The channel widened as the disk turned and would eventually get about a foot wide.

Today: To get it to spin, they first tried using a boat engine, but that didn't work, so they hooked up a heavy tracked ATV to do the initial pulling of disk. They had to remove chunks of ice from the water circle to allow the disk to turn. Cool! Drew got to ride the disk which stayed moving once it got it's initial motion. I wish we'd thought to bring over the selfie-stick because at least then we would have had something of an overhead view. We'll try to remember to do that next year if we happen to find out when they are doing it again.

Feb. 22, 2021, Addendum:

Drew went over to the pond on Monday morning to photograph what was left of the ice ring. Surprise, surprise, it was lined with pine boughs!

Sure enough, the channel around the ring really got wide!  Wowzer! 

But, we have to say how impressed we were with the fact that the guys were so responsible as to line it with pine boughs so that nobody would fall through.

Longish walk in the woods

Whoooeee! I took the longest time yet to traverse the woods! We took 112 minutes (almost 2 hours) to walk 1.37ish miles. Poor Drew and Toby... I am such a slow poke.

But we had uneven trails to walk, mud to slog through, ice to navigate, a creek to cross, brush to remove from the trails, photos to take and Toby with his blind dog stand-up strikes because he didn't want to go where we wanted to go! 

Here is the old county road where water has iced over a bit in the tracks of the ATVs that traverse it.

I took a photo of the edge of the track where you can see the frost crystals that have formed.

Drew's bridge is still standing after all the rushing water from the rain, wind, and snow melt.  

You can see the rushing water under the bridge. It took me a few tries to cross it as I got a bit of vertigo from the motion of the water. But, I figured if Toby could do it, so could I! It is a bit skinny for the unsteady of foot, and for a blind dog. Toby fell off it several years ago, but was successful at crossing it today as he took it very slowly. Drew is so great at guiding him. 

Further up the trail, I found more crystals and ice to photograph. There were lots of wet areas and lots of drainage from all the melting. I love this photo as you can see layers of ice and crystallization patterns. And, the sun was hitting it in such a pretty way.

I also love this frosty ice on a tiny puddle. So pretty...

Ribbon of open water on Caesar Pond

The pond ice looks the same overall, but the ribbon of open water is just a bit wider today than it was a few days ago.

Caesar Pond Ice is starting to thin

It is getting to be that time of year when the pond ice starts looking a bit blue mixed with the frosty white. This signifies that ice-out isn't too far off!

So, I focused my camera on the far north end of the pond where the ice starts to open up before any other area. And, I saw what looked like a thin line of dark coloring.

I zoomed in to the maximum my camera would allow and spied this! Yahoooo! A thin ribbon of open water is starting to form near the boggy end of the pond. Ice-out won't be too long from now;-) Happy, happy, happy...

Let's talk about lake ice and safety

“Cold Regions Research and Engineering Laboratory.” U.S. Army Engineer Research and Development Center (ERDC), 17 Jan. 2020, https://www.erdc.usace.army.mil/Locations/CRREL/.

First of all, here is a chart about ice thickness and the amount of weight it can support! And, here is some general information about ice from the US Army Corps of Engineers (with photos from my archives to illustrate the information):

Strong, new ice on Caesar Pond

New ice is much stronger than old ice, as a rule. Ice from direct freezing of lake water will be stronger than ice formed from snow melt, refrozen ice or ice made by water bubbling up through cracks and freezing on the surface. Several inches of new ice may be strong enough to support you, while a foot or more of old ice might not.

A spring and an entry hole next to the beaver lodge

Judging the safety of ice requires consideration of several factors, including its appearance, the daily temperature, thickness, whether the ice is or isn’t covered with snow. The depth of water under the ice, size of water body, water chemistry, distribution of the ice and local climate also contribute to the equation.

Variable ice depth from the dock to further out on Caesar Pond

Ice rarely freezes or thaws at an equal and uniform rate across a body of water. It can be a foot thick in one spot and only an inch thick a few feet away. A layer of snow insulates ice, slowing down the ice forming process. In addition, the weight of snow can reduce the amount of additional weight the ice can bear.

Near shore ice is thinner and melts faster - darker surfaces of grasses and muck absorb the heat.

Ice near shore is weaker, not stronger, than ice farther out. Buckling of the lake or stream over the winter breaks and refreezes ice continually along the shore.

Springs on the pond have moving water that makes the ice thinner.
I marked their locations while walking all over the pond on Dec. 27, 2011.

Ice formed over flowing water can be dangerous near shore, around inflowing or outflowing streams, or on lakes containing large numbers of springs.

One of the springs on Caesar Pond with very thin ice around its perimeter.
It takes a longer time to freeze over to safely support a person's weight
than ice that does not have flowing water underneath.

Another spring near the north outflow of the pond.

The Sabattus River takes longer to freeze due to moving water.

River ice is roughly 15 percent weaker than ice on lakes, and straight, smooth flowing stretches are safer than river bends.

Early in winter the ice comes and goes. This is meltwater on top of ice that will freeze over again.

A potential danger spot on lakes is an open portion completely surrounded by ice. Winds will force exposed water beneath the ice and cause the ice to deteriorate from below.

Caesar Pond ice is thinning

Looking south from where the dock will be placed

Oh me, oh my, oh...The ice is melting on Caesar Pond and I couldn't be more excited. It will soon be time to put the dock in the water!

There is open water to the north as well!

In fact, I heard geese honking from the far north boggy cove area. This is one of their nesting areas. I am hoping for mergansers, buffleheads, and other ducks to fly in soon, as well!

Caesar Pond Ice Patterns

Drew photographing the ice - CLICK ON THE PHOTOS TO SEE MORE DETAIL!

What a great day to be out on Caesar Pond! Drew and I put on our YakTrax and headed out to photograph patterns in the ice. After so much rain, the ice was smooth and gloriously patterned, layer upon layer down into the depths. Outdoor temp. 29F with a windchill of 19F.

There were lots of cracks in the ice, of all shapes and sizes. 

This one stretched for a long distance and was surrounded by millions of air bubbles.

This one had some twists and turns and extended down at least 6 inches from the surface.

This one caught my eye with its triangular pattern.

And, this crack shows crystals radiating out from the central line.

Speaking of cracks, check out what I call ice neurons!

I think these ice neurons are created from spreading water from old ice fishing holes when the ice was thinner? I'm not sure. I have catalogued all of the springs in the pond that I know of, and I don't think this is a result of one.

And, here is a close-up of an ice neuron center with it spreading dendrites!

Then, there were disks of bubbles of all shapes and sizes. This is one of the flat surface bubbles.

This was a common disk design in many spots. Could it arise from a plume of water rising as surface ice was freezing over? Then, the plume froze? Maybe...

And, here are a series of disks through layers of ice!

I love this radiating design from the central point of this circle. Lots of geometry on the ice!

Then, there were these clear bubbles which were rather rare. I wish we could show more depth of field as these were above the main bubble.

And, this mishappen bubble upon a bubble was fairly common.

Now, let's check out the ice domes under the surface!

Like magma rising from the depths of a volcano, we think a bubble of water rose up toward the ice fishing hole as it was freezing.

Some of the domes have very precise borders from an auger that drilled the ice, and the domes are perfectly rounded.

Others have a flattened disk on top of the dome. And, yes the surface ice is flat over the top of the domes.

Check out this dome near the eastern shore. The ice curved around it as if from the surface water being blown by the wind. Notice that the thin center ice disk has broken in the middle.

I call this one a dome volcano! It looks like there were air bubbles galore surfacing from the central disk atop the dome. Cool!

And, then there are what we call the ice vortices! Check out this tube that opens up to a concave disk on top. You can see ice crystals along the vortex tube.

This vortex has a bit of texture on the concave top. Why these "vortices" form, I have no idea. Gotta do some research!

And, this is my favorite topped with what looks like ice foam.

Last of all is what I call an ice rosette. It has a more complex structure below the ice. It too is near the eastern shore, and may have been created by wind blown water as it rose and froze.