2017 What's the weather like where you are?

[Vanisle_BC]

Here in the so-called coastal rainforest we had less than 2mm precipitation (a shade more than 1/16 inch) for the whole of July & August. Still no rain forecast for early September and they say it will hit 38C this week - that's just over 100F - and where we live it's usually a couple of degrees hotter than forecast. We're aged temperate-zone guys and it's hard to take! Wet towels round the neck and stay in the deepest shade you can find. If there's any gardening done it's in the hours of near-darkness.

[digitS']

The day of showers is now just a dim memory. It began to vanish nearly as quickly as the dampness on the pavement, that distant summer afternoon. The air here is now full of smoke. Flushing the house with outdoor air beginning before sunrise has been discontinued. The air in this valley has reached "very unhealthy" levels and "hazardous" in some communities.

I have welcomed guests at the airport from areas with wildfires. The crowd that leave the plane smell of smoke! Planeloads of travelers going outside of this region must carry the same cloud. We are smoked!

The Weather Service says that for the Spokane Airport, this is the 2nd longest string of consecutive days at 71 days with precip < 0.01". Still with no rain, the record is expected to be broken September 10th.

I went to bed last night with a sinus headache and woke up that way, this morning.

Steve

[Vanisle_BC]

Steve, now that our BC smoke has almost disappeared, - at least on the coast - what is probably some of "yours" is saving us from the threatened 38C. It may not make 30. Sun's just a fuzzy orange glow. Come on Autumn! We could use some proper mists, and mellow fruitfulness.

[digitS']

I like the idea of "proper mists, and mellow fruitfulness." Especially, if the mists would give us a couple inches of rain by the end of this month .

We had a record 6.23" of October 2016 rain. Then, a first-rate snowy winter. The wild grasses were "as hiiigh as an el·e·phant's eeeye" by late spring ... and now this!

Actually, we are doing quite well ... as I understand it. If we think of this area of eastern Washington and northern Idaho, 68,000 square miles, an area of the West larger than Wisconsin - there is only one major fire. Over 80% of wildfires are man-caused, that fire west of the Columbia is listed as lightning-caused. We are doing good but major fires outside the region are on all sides! Smoke pours over forested hillsides, into the valleys and basin, and lingers. Koff

I was talking with my neighbor yesterday and the first thing he brought up when asked about the conditions was the eruption of Mount St Helens ... Yes, it feels something like that. We weren't going anywhere then, just out washing volcanic ash off our houses, running our sprinklers, worrying about our health ...

Steve

[pepperhead212]

Raining...again.

[Gary350]

51 degrees this morning that beat the 52 degree record set in 1872

[Vanisle_BC]

Our weather broke!! Only 76F today (smoky sky helped) and we even had a little rain. Now to see all those sad looking plants come back to life?

[rainbowgardener]

Hurricane Irma now headed straight for me. But by then it won't be a hurricane any more. They predict Tues evening tropical storm with 35 mi per hour wind and lots of rain. Nothing like what will be hitting Miami, but we will get the tail end of it.

[thanrose]

Despite all the doomsayers, I don't anticipate Hurricane Irma being worse than other 'canes I've lived through. All the path predictions show my area will get some effects. I'm philosophical about it. I can't do much more than I have to prepare and if it's still a 'cane when it hits here, then we will have a lot of downed trees and closed roads and shortage of gasoline.

This spring into summer has not been all that dry. I don't water lawns and yet they are still green.

[rainbowgardener]

Yes, summer here has been coolish and wet and it seemed to turn into fall at the end of August. I put a blanket on my bed last night! We never get hurricanes here, but we will get the end of this one, downgraded to a tropical storm by then.

[imafan26]

Well, no blanket until 3 am and I sometimes sleep with the ceiling fan on, but it has been relatively mild. It is 76 degrees now, and there have been some early morning showers. It is still hot during the day especially when the trades are light, but not the worst. August and September are usually the hottest months of the year.

[applestar]

it's 45°F out there this morning! All my container "tropicals" are of course still out there.

@imafan would you say that's cold?

[imafan26]

It is 72 degrees but no wind and it is humid. The sky is full of dark convection clouds and there have been a few big drop sprinkles.

[thanrose]

Power outage times 2 days with Hurricane Irma. Just got it back this AM. Huge limbs and all kinds of tree litter, palm fronds etc are down in the yard, some landed on roof but it seems intact. Hurt my elbow trying to drag an 8" diameter live oak limb, maybe wider, that was about fifteen feet long and multiple heavy branches with a fifteen feet wide canopy. Yeah, dumb, but I was just tugging to see if it was all in one piece. It was. I couldn't remove debris from that side of the house unless I could shift the beast. I did trim off quite a few smaller branches but need to get the pros to handle it. Kind of cloudy today, but still humid and hot.

[FinnMcOwl]

Currently it's quite nice. about +20 celcius. But in about 2 months I know it's going to hit -30 celcius and my gardening days will be done for the winter.

[thanrose]

Where are you located, McOwl? I'm guessing Canada, probably interior. I, perversely, reveled in the cold frozen months.

[Gary350]

Garden has been a mud hole for a whole month from all 3 Hurricane rains, 70 degree weather has been nice. Saturday was 92 degrees and Sunday is predicted to be 95. If the soil finally dries up I can TILL. The SUN has returned it has been very over cast for too long.

[digitS']

It has been a very pleasant weekend!

After several days of blessed rain, there was a frost on Friday. I did fairly well at mitigating the cold by running the sprinklers in part of the garden. Frost usually occurs here about this time and much of the veggie garden was past its prime. Now, we have warmer weather and I just cannot complain about that frost!

It was 71°f this afternoon. Blue sky, sunshine ... the gentlest of breezes. Zephyrs, that's right!

Steve

[Gary350]

We went camping it was 58 degrees each night. Pull up the blankets and stay warm as toast all might. Full moon every night, star show was amazing, lots of cricket sounds all night long. Camp fire was nice too. No rain in the forecast for another week and 80 degrees every day. The squirrels and crows wake us up every morning. Bacon, eggs, toast, hash browns, coffee, every morning wow breakfast sure is good.

A HATE to be an advertisement for any company but has anyone tried SMUCKERS low sugar jelly. My wife bought this jelly a month ago I have been putting off eating it but this is all we had on this camping trip. WOW I was shocked how good the flavor is. I swear it tastes like it has 5 times more flavor that other jelly. I won't be buying anymore jelly with sugar. When you make jelly you boil away all the water I guess concentrated flavor with no add sugar that is why the flavor taste like natural fruit.

[applestar]

Finally got to see the moon -- been trying to catch a glimpse of it for last three nights. Gorgeous!

[digitS']

A strange end to the growing season: I don't know how many light frosts we have had! There may have been continuous morning frost since Tuesday. I've kinda lost count. Six mornings! Counting 9/22, that is 7 ... Not on every day have the sprinklers been running to try to limit the effects. LIGHT ... I have to emphasize that .

There are garden plants that you might expect to be dead that are not. Zucchini is only lightly damaged. Tomato plants are, too. I have dahlias!

Cucumbers were the first to go. I've seen that before. The other vines are toast, too. The bush beans are severely damaged but it's been so many days, it would almost make sense to check to see if there are beans developing under those crisp leaves.

Steve

Gary and RainbowGardener, how is your weather today?

[gumbo2176]

Here we are going into the second week of October and we still are getting in the mid to upper 80's daily with night time temperatures only 10 degrees cooler. Cooler weather is WAY overdue as far as I'm concerned.

I'm tired of air so heavy with humidity that it feels like you need to cut your way through it when outside.

[digitS']

But Gumbo!

NOLA dodged Hurricane Nate!

I bet that's not true with Lakngulf in the middle of Alabama.

Steve

[imafan26]

It is getting cooler the nights are around 65-69 degrees. Today it is going up to around 82 and it is overcast. It has been drizzling to heavy rain for brief periods in the afternoons for a few days. No wind right now. It will probably rain from the convection heating again this afternoon. All in all a pretty good October day. Now, if I can just get some work done. I am on my second load of laundry and I have changed a light bulb that burned out while I was in the laundry room. So far, it is a decent start.

[gumbo2176]

But Gumbo!

NOLA dodged Hurricane Nate!

I bet that's not true with Lakngulf in the middle of Alabama.

Steve

Yes we did and I'm know folks in Mississippi got battered and I can assume so for Alabama, especially along the coastal area.

My nephew got married yesterday afternoon in the French Quarter at a very nice venue and the venue moved the wedding up 4 hours due to the possibility of the storm hitting. It was a no-show and that was a good thing for the city.

Today my brother-in-law held an after wedding party at his house and had 3 large briskets, 3 Boston Butts, 9 chickens he smoked and I brought a huge container of potato salad, another large container of vegetable salad, jars of pepper jelly, Philly Cream Cheese and crackers and someone else brought a large container of pasta salad. Then there was the wine, beer, sodas, water, etc. to finish it off. But man, was it hot with no breeze to speak of and fairly high humidity, but the 50 or so folks in attendance didn't really seem to mind much.

[xtron]

thank you nate !!! FINALLY got some rain...2 1/2 inches, and not a mud puddle anywhere. the ground was so dry, and the rain came slow enough, with enough breaks that it all soaked in.
the okra doubled in size overnight, and there are a dozen new blooms today. since that's about all that's left, the rain did some good.

[applestar]

Oooh it's going to be close! 3:30am and the closest Wunderground station that records and forecasts nearest to actual in my garden is reporting 38°F. In the next couple of hours, temp is supposed to fall to 37°F minimum before going back up again. At 37°F, dewpoint will be 33°F -- at 7am, 39°F and dewpoint will be 32°F. IME, dewpoint is a huge factor.

...but sunrise is at 7:12am...

[applestar]

Well, it's light enough and I went out for inspection tour. A very light touch of frost was evident in the NW front yard/lawn where it gets hit first. Nowhere else, so at least no frost. Remaining basils are probably done for, but I took some cuttings last week (2 weeks ago? ...last 10 days anyway) that are rooting and a few container plants are inside as well.

[digitS']

Any Damage?

Wow, AppleStar! You confused me at this early hour by having exactly +- the same sunrise time as my official time. Then, I checked the hours of daylight for my location: 10:45. Yours (I chose Trenton, in the center of NJ): 11:04. Okay, our sunrise times depend on location in those broad timezones. Now, I feel better ... or worse!!

Yeah, you will have 42 minutes more daylight in a month and 54 more minutes in 2 months! Waaah ... Dangnation! I guess I should just feel lucky that the moderating effects of the Pacific and prevailing winds across 300 miles of the Wild West helps keep the winter temperatures from being as cold as they might be in this northerly of a location. But shoot, daylight sure disappears quickly!

Steve
forecast to be in high winds and blowing dust, today! think I'll stay indoors! rain soon ...

[ElizabethB]

Yesterday we turned off the A/C and opened windows. 6 AM - 53 degrees.

12:30 PM - 72 degrees. Blue bird skies, very little humidity and a light breeze. Sitting on my patio in shorts and a Tee shirt. No need for the fan.



Time to water my garden boxes.

[Vanisle_BC]

Your Majesty, it is WE who are not amused.

Weather alternating between light frosts and solid rain.

[imafan26]

It has rained everyday for the past week. Mostly in the evenings and early morning and occasionally a drizzle during the day. The trades are turned on and the winds are now 13 mph with gusts up to 24. A few things are rolling around in the yard. Even a few plants. Next week the forecast is for more rain. No snow in sight, the days are in the mid 80's but it is so overcast and breezy it feels cooler. Tonight will be 70 degrees. I'm glad it doesn't get as cold as some of you, but my house has jealousie windows to let the air in so tonight, I might wear my sweats and think about getting another blanket.

[digitS']

Vanisle_BC location just had a river of moisture over it for a time this week.

Portland Oregon, which usually sends its moisture our way, has gained an inch of rain just yesterday. We picked up about 1/2" through the entire week but there was so much time and wind between the intermittent little sprinkles that I don't know that it did any good. The nearest location (right at the Canadian border) of a serious fire this year had a good deal of rain, however. I imagine that there are still hotspots but that rain should have helped put an end to some of them.

Forecast is for more rain and maybe it won't just blow by this time. Oh yeah: More Wind.

Steve

[Vanisle_BC]

Vanisle_BC location just had a river of moisture over it for a time this week

Steve

Yes, it was noticeable. Couldn't sleep for the noise of it battering the roof of our covered patio. It'a bit of a shock after such an amazingly dry summer. I guess we're back to being the raincoast. The We(s)t coast.

[xtron]

we got rain!! an inch and a quarter so far and the radar shows that much or more yet to come.
over an inch and nary a puddle yet, that's how dry it's been here.

[rainbowgardener]

The bottom is about to drop out of our temps! We've been having a string of gorgeous fall weather, clear, blue skies, warm (mid 70's), no humidity to speak of, so pretty. Friday this week the prediction is for clear, sunny, 70 degrees, low of 51. SATURDAY the prediction is for an inch of rain, high of 57 degrees, low of 35. And Sunday the prediction is for high of 51, low of 30 degrees! FROST!

Sunday is 10/29. Our average last frost date is about Nov 1, so it is pretty much right on schedule, but still the sudden drop is a shock. I've got to hurry up and get some things re-potted and ready to come in!

[gumbo2176]

Finally, a sustained cool front is upon us. Night time temperatures in the low upper 50's to low 60's and daytime temps in the upper 60's to mid 70's with low humidity to boot.

Time to get back out into the garden and replant much of the fall stuff I put in a few weeks ago to get an early jump. All I managed to do was have very few seeds come up and survive the extended summer weather. I do have a bit of the lettuce in one variety that has done well, but for the most part, all of the stuff I put in as seeds will need a new planting.

[applestar]

My parents moved into an Assisted Living community yesterday — I’ve been so busy and distracted for weeks! The weather has been holding until now but I woke up this morning after collapsing dead to the world last night and realized I forgot to check on the garden last evening like I had intended.

...yep. 33°F at the nearest reliable/close to my garden wunderground station. I will have to have a walk-through as soon as it’s light enough to check for frosts (that would never have been forecast nor reported officially since my Garden always seem to be several degrees colder than the official temperature). Maybe I should turn on some sprinklers now anyway.....

[digitS']

Water at a warmer temperature than the air and falling regularly on plants has saved them a number of times, AppleStar. I haven't used the sprinklers lately because we are beyond pretending that they would do any good. Only when they will cover everything with ice have they failed and even that icing sometimes and with some plants has been of some help. Of course, there is a risk of breaking down plants from the weight.

The season is beyond it! Still, there is green near the house, buildings and beneath trees. It has been a remarkably slow cool down. The first frost (mitigated) was 5 weeks ago. Morning temperatures have yet to be very far into the 20's. Several windstorms and continuing dry weather has put added stress on plants. Deciduous trees have looked more ragged than colorful, this year.

Frost occurs probably 3 out of 4 mornings. A very slow transition to fall ...

Steve

[thanrose]

The hurricane (Irma) left my sister's neglected mulberry tree confused as to season. Leaves swept off by the winds, the tree budded new leaves and some fruit! The squirrels are happy with the immature fruits. The backyard retention pond is covered by azolla and salvinia, probably due to all the hurricane debris. Some light chill today, but I'd venture it's in the low eighties outside this afternoon. And I hear someone mowing their lawn.

Most years, we'll have a cold snap right around Christmas. Sometimes it's enough to gild the deciduous trees before they gradually drop their leaves.