Wednesday, January 27, 2016

Wednesday Winter White 27

As you might know I have had plenty of scope in the past five days to make images featuring winter white. Winter Storm Jonas came through.


It all began in the afternoon of Friday January 22 when I had been having some quiet moments trying to find just the right position to photograph these winter white tulips.


By sunset we had this amount and I would have been quite happy to find creative ways to make different images using this 4" or so.


But no, it had to continue didn't it? By Saturday morning not only was there snow falling but the wind had picked up. Snow was sticking to vertical surfaces.


Outside the birds were active and we were thankful we had remembered to put a new suet cake out and fill the seed feeders too.


With the wind blowing it was not easy to find comfortable ways to record the storm. This image appealed to me in its very limited color.


Snow was sticking everywhere.


Look at the textures on the front porch columns.


Hooray, by Sunday morning no more snow was falling. And, as a bonus, the sun was shining. Here it is beginning to light up the backyard and my homemade measuring stick. There has been an interesting story out about the weathermen whose job it is to record the official Washington DC weather at the main weather station at Reagan National Airport. It seems the way to do it is with a snow board - you place a flat white board outside in an unobstructed area. Every six hours you go out, measure the depth of the snow on the board, record the amount, wipe the board clean and replace it in position. Except on Saturday when they went out to measure the snow they could not find the board - it had blown away.

Now I understand why my measuring stick registered so little additional snow on Saturday. Despite it snowing continuously all day long the stick showed only an additional 5" from the 14" it showed at daybreak. The snow had blown away. But likely my board would have blown away also. That clear space necessary to get an accurate reading? I don't have one of those either. Those who know how to measure snow within my local 5 mile radius recorded anywhere from 25" to 30" of the winter white stuff. (63cm - 76cm - that is a lot of snow for around here!)


More in the backyard featuring the giant white mushroom (really the Asian-style lantern).


That driveway that had been shoveled repeatedly on Saturday? It made for a great textural shot on Sunday.


"I Surrender"!


There had been numerous bird sightings made during and after the storm. But what about the other wildlife? This one set of hoofprints showed up on the snow on Monday morning so we know that at least one deer was up and moving.


This morning the "cavalry" arrived disguised in these small yellow machines. Throughout Friday, Saturday and Sunday one pickup truck with a snowplow attached had made many many trips up and down our street. There was only so much it could do - and that was to clear a path wide enough for a single vehicle. But by this morning it was clear that the heavy duty clear up time had arrived. Within an hour or so the street was cleared curb to curb.


Some bloggers make a "Wordless Wednesday" post. Me? Gee, I can't resist adding words. But after this storm I may have been content to just post this one image with the presumption that you would understand. And save the photos above for another day.

But, I couldn't do it. You got it all.



1 comment:

  1. I think you should have made a recording of someone playing that musical piece if you were going to make the post wordless. I enjoy the text with the photos! Picking one other image out of all of these, I vote for the blue shadows on the snow piled next to the snow covered driveway.

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