Sunday, October 17, 2010

First Frost

The temperature dropped to 30 degrees yesterday morning and I decided to slip out back to see if the whiteness on the grass was actually frost. As I went through the door, I saw some neat fog ribbons forming along the hillsides, so I decided to head up The Hill to see if I could get some good photos.

Along the way I verified the first frost of the season. Many people mark the first frost and it’s a safe topic of conversation in most crowds. Ask just anyone if they had frost and they’re more than willing to discuss the subject. If people paid the same attention to all common seasonal events in nature there’d be a lot more opportunities to initiate a conversation with someone you didn’t know. Can you imagine looking at some stranger in the grocery checkout line and saying, “Have the salamanders hit the breeding ponds out your way yet?” That’s enough about that. I’m almost to the top of The Hill.

The little bit of fog is giving us a true starburst sunrise.

As temperatures begin to change, ribbons of fog flow like a river. It looks as though the fog is trying to out run the rising sun in an attempt to continue its existence for a little while longer.

Fog untouched by the sun remains less concentrated. As the sun continued to rise, the rest of the band turned to a thin ribbon before dissipating completely.

The band of fog along the woods has almost completely disappeared. Just a final streamer left and enough haze to make it look as though my camera lens is dirty.

The Hill is at a lower elevation than the wooded ridge, so the sun has not yet reached this point. The formation and disappearance of the fog ribbons was completed in a matter of minutes. If I had been five minutes later I would have missed the whole thing. As I stood in the ice covered grass watching the last of the fog disappear, I just wished I had something more substantial on my feet than an old pair of worn out Chucks. I was correct in my original assumption that I didn’t have time to change into warmer footwear before running up The Hill, but that didn’t make my feet feel any better.

3 comments:

  1. Great images once and a smile once again. :) I just love your nature walks and images.

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  2. Hi Steve.. I am among the living...a blackout, a gash on the head with 5 staples, a hospital guinea pig for 28 hours and I'm still here!!
    Hey... beautiful morning pictures...frost and all. There was a killing frost while I was in the hospital!!
    Today it is 60 degrees..who knows!!
    I always ask questions like that...especially about "breeding salamanders" where ever I am...I thought everybody did!! LOL ; }

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  3. Thanks, Lois. I'm going to try to do future walks without freezing my feet.

    Hey, grammie g, I wondered where you had gotten to. I hope you are recovering nicely and this doesn't interfere with your walks. I would have trouble if I cut my head because it's too hard for staples.

    Hope that frost didn't do too much damage to your garden. I used to grow a lot of things that were frost sensitive and I always seemed to be unavoidably absent when the first frost hit, so I was never able to protect anything by covering.

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