Simon Beck's Snow Art

Simon Beck in an internationally known snow and sand artist. I have been a fan of his for quite some time as his work is amazing. This article is about how he began his work that sort of morphed out of his map-making/engineering profession. This is a Mountainfilm of his inspiration for art - made in Norway.

Happy First Day of Christmas Vacation to me!

We decided to celebrate the first day of my Christmas vacation week by going on a short walk along Hix Small Cemetery Rd. and a short distance off trail into the woods.

I walked just shy of a mile, while Drew and Toby went a bit further into the woods. It was too rough for my knee to handle.

When we were walking through Hix Small Cemetery, I found a grave stone that was beautifully adorned with possibly a few species of Rock Shield Lichen.

Rock Shield Lichen (Xanthoparmelia sp.) is a foliose lichen with leaf-like lobes that radiate out from a central greenish-yellowish center. I like that you can still see some of the letters on the grave stone. The grave stones in this cemetery range from dates in the 1700's to present day.

I couldn't get close enough to the grave stone to do the lichen justice. This is one of the most common lichens to grow on exposed rocks. And, indeed, this grave stone was smack dab in the middle of the cemetery where it gets a good amount of sunlight.

Northern Woodlands- A Place in Mind: Witness

Audio version of Ben Bailey's encounter with a red tailed hawk and gray squirrels. The circle of life continues...always...

Caesar Pond

I went over to Caesar Pond to check on the water level and the state of the ice. The water is high.

And, the ice is very thin. I was surprised to see any ice on the pond after all the rain and wind!

Birthday Boogie

It's my birthday, and I wanted nothing more than to have a nice walk in the woods! I got all bundled up (way too many layers which look to add about a foot to my waist size) and we headed for Hix Small Cemetery Road, and then onto a friend's 100 acre lot. It was a short, but satisfying walk which lead me to do a stationary birthday boogie as my knee is not up to allowing me to bust any moves!

The Rain in Maine...

Geesh, Drew just put out the rain gauge to measure the rainfall from 6am until the storm is over this afternoon. We are in the flood watch zone. UPDATE: WE MEASURED 2.2 inches of rain and figure that there was at least a total of 3 inches from the start of the storm Friday night until the bitter end. AND, people were hydroplaning on the highway. We saw two, single-car accidents within a half mile of each other.

Now, Weather.com says,

Rain is expected to continue to spread northeast today and become heavy at times through tonight. By this afternoon 1 to 2 inches of rain is expected with some totals approaching 3 inches. This rainfall in combination with some snow melt and already high river levels will cause additional rises on area rivers. Minor river flooding is possible as well as ponding of water in urban and poor drainage areas.

AND, there will be wind along with the rain. Check out these temperatures! By the way, we are slated to get back to normal and have snow on Tuesday;-)

Rats! We've got rats! Aughhhhh.....This one's name is "Nibbler."

Aughhh...We put out bird seed to try to attract turkeys to our bird feeding station.

But, we got rats instead. Brown rats, that is. 

Otherwise know as the common rat, street rat, sewer rat, wharf rat, Norway rat, and water rat, these omnivores will reproduce like crazy if their population numbers are depleted. So, you have to demolish the entire population if you want to get rid of them. By the way, Antarctica is the only place on earth that is too cold for rats to survive.

I need to put up a sign that says, "For Turkeys Only" to try to deter the rats!

This is Maine and It's Going to Snow Song

Check out this great song by R. Burton. Seen on Bangor Daily News.
This is Maine and it's Going to Snow

By the way, this is the 700th post of Maine Nature Diary, on Blogger;-)

Snow Blowing

Drew put the Cub Cadet snow blower to work for the first time this season. It is slower than our old one.

It is a bit different than our last one, and time will tell if it will do as good a job as it's blade shape is a bit different.

Once Drew left the driveway and started snow blowing a path around the house and in the backyard for Toby, the snow blower got bogged down with snow. Drew had to clear out the snow half a dozen times so it would go up through the hopper. He only had to clear the old snow thrower once in 20 years. Mixed reviews on this new one... Bummed. UPDATE: IT BROKE A SHEAR PIN IN THE FIRST 10 MINUTES OF USE! We will need to keep at least a dozen shear pins on hand for each winter's use of this beastly machine! The company we bought it from is going to pick it up sometime and put a bolt in where the deepest shear pin is so we won't have to deal with that one (as the machine has to be dismantled to get at the nefarious pain.) UPDATE ON THE UPDATE: A bolt couldn't be installed, just supposedly stronger shear pins...We''ll see... Now we are planning on going outside and picking up stones along the edge of the road before each snow to avert snow blower damage.

Snow Day # 2

Snow Table showing about 2" of snow early this morning

 We got 5" of fluffy snow from this storm. 

Looking over at the pond from the front deck.

It was nice to have a day off to get school work done, along with a bit of exercising (including snow scooping-)