Burgeoning Green Life

Thirty-nine years, six months, and 17 days ago, I left California where I had grown up and moved to Kentucky.  It was January 1975 and California had been green, rainy with roses blooming. Kentucky was cold, dreary and gray. But three months later spring came to Kentucky, and with it the miraculous abundance of green, growing things. 

Nearly four decades later (some of which were spent in Pennsylvania and Virginia before I found my way back to Kentucky), and I never cease to be amazed by the exuberance verdancy of eastern woods, forest, fields, roadsides, yards, empty lots, etc.  Indeed any tiny open space in which something might grow, things DO grow. 

People who have lived here all their lives do not appreciate how different this is from the western part of the United States. And people who live in the western states fail to realize how different life is when green growing things can actually flourish without attention and even threaten to take over your home and yard without constant vigilance. 

Currently the entire state of California is in advanced stages of long term drought - severe, extreme or even exceptional drought. The image below is from May 2013; before the drought these hills would have still been green.  ( http://droughtmonitor.unl.edu/Home/RegionalDroughtMonitor.aspx?west) 

But even long before the current drought, California was a place where substantial diligence was required to grow things.  For a lawn to grow, a yard had to be carefully seeded and watered regularly every year in perpetuity.  Our Kentucky lawn (pictured at top) was completely dug up last July for a new septic system, the dirt bulldozed back in place, a few grass seeds were scattered, but no other attention was paid - only rain, sunshine and nature operated on the yard. This summer it is as if the construction never took place.  

Every spring and summer, we must continually beat back the forest to keep it from swallowing our home. Already the pathway and gate that used to lead from our property to the neighbors has been completely enveloped in new trees and shrubs.  It is both beautiful and awesome in its fecundity. 

spring sprung awry

I never really appreciated spring as a season growing up in California. I did like March, when the winter rains were still with us, and the neighbor's willow tree would begin to green. But the San Francisco Bay Area didn't really have four seasons, just two - raining and dry -- a typical Mediterranean type climate. When I decided to go "back east" to college, a big part of my decision was weather; I actually wanted a real winter, with snow and cold. That real winters resulted in real springs was a bonus that had not occurred to me.

My first year of four seasons in Oberlin, Ohio was full of incredible discoveries. I'd fantasized about what it would be like to walk in falling snow; I learned what it was like to live with two feet of snow on the ground for two weeks, and that walking on icy walks was a real art form. The biggest discovery of that first year was the spring sequence of blooms and color, although I didn't realize the first year that it was an annual occurrence. The sequence that began with the brilliant yellow of daffodils and forsythia, and ended three months later with wild roses. In between came tulips, the flowering fruit trees, red bud, dogwood, irises, blackberry blossoms and heavenly scented lilacs.

Over the next forty years I found that where ever I spent spring -- Ohio, Kentucky, Pennsylvania, Connecticut, or Maine -- that the sequence of spring was the same, only the timing differed. In Ohio, the daffodils and forsythia appeared at the end of April just in time to liven up the last weeks of the semester, in Kentucky, daffodils and forsythia made their yellow splash during spring break in March, in Pennsylvania the yellow blossoms always appeared just after graduation in late April.

Over the past decade, climate change has shifted the start of spring, and its daffodils and forsythia earlier, by nearly two weeks, but the sequence seemed to remain largely intact. This spring, however, the sequence seems a bit out of whack. For the first time in my memory, the daffodils and forsythia came early as they have for some time, in early March, but strangely they hung on longer than usual. Suddenly the flowering fruit trees blossomed white and pink and are already fading to green leaves while the bright yellow forsythia was still in full bloom - and it is past April 1st.

The most startling discontinuity of this spring has been the redbud, which began blooming one full week ago, in March, while the forsythia and daffodils were still bright yellow, and the flowering fruit trees still clung to their pink and white blossoms. This is an entire month ahead of what was normal blooming time for redbud ten years ago.

I can remember driving to Elizabethtown, Kentucky back in 2002 on April 25th and being blown away by the hundreds of miles of light purple redbud along the roadsides. Over the past decade the time for redbud blooming has slowly crept forward. Last year the redbud was in full bloom on April 16, when I drove to Harlan for a faculty meeting. But a leap ahead another two weeks to April 1st to be in full bloom is astounding, and disturbing.

It's as if what was once nearly three months of sequential blooming has been compressed and overlapped into a few weeks of March and April; with the life span of some flowers extending much longer, while others come and go more quickly. The scientists who study climate and and seasonal changes refer to this disruption of established patterns of plant flowering as "desynchronisation" (see: Dr Malcolm Clark and Prof Roy Thompson, and suggest that it could create problems for animal species that depend upon reliable plant food sources for seasonally timed reproduction.

It's one thing to read about the science. It's another thing to have it so clearly visible in one's own front yard.

Photo of redbud from April 16, 2010 by sgreerpitt

autumn garden

 September 27 and our unusually long hot summer has extended the growing cycle of the tomatoes substantially. The presence of the large ripening tomatoes is not as unusual as the new growth -- dozens of new buds and new tiny green tomatoes forming.

This part of Kentucky is normally frost free until between October 4 at the earliest and October 30 at the latest, but usually cooling temperatures have discouraged the formation of new growth and new buds long before now. The normal average low for the month of September around here is 53 degrees F and by this time of the month, the lows normally run in the mid-forties (fahrenheit), but this year, the average low in September so far is 58 degrees F, with only one day (back on September 1) where the low was below 50 degrees. 

The normal average high for September is 76 degrees F. This year, the average high temperature so far for September is 88 degrees -- 12 degrees above average. In fact there have only been three days all month that have fallen below the normal average of 76 degrees!

While it is pleasant to have new tomatoes growing on the vine in late September, this disruption of past patterns of plant growth cycles for this region, has the potential to throw off the life cycles of the many types of animals, from insect life and birds, to mammals, whose times for mating, raising young, migrating, and hibernating developed under a different climatic regime.

Photos "September tomatoes" by sgreerpitt, taken September 27, 2010.

weather is not climate, but....

The Weather Channel's website has a number of nifty new features. One of which provides you with lots of information about how your current month (and previous month) stack up against historical weather patterns. I've captured the screen shots for my zip code 41825, for June 2010 and July 2010.

Notice that for both June and July the "highest temperature recorded so far" is higher than the historical record for that month -- so we broke the all time temperature records for both June and July in Eastern Kentucky. Notice also that the total rain fall amounts for both June and July are well below the average. June's precipitation total was 1.05" below the average. Of course July isn't over yet, but let's hope we don't get 3.65" of rain in one week. While the July total rain is more than three and a half inches below normal, eastern Kentucky did get one whale of a gully-washer, to the great dismay and anguish of hundreds of folks in Pike county.


While it is important to remember that weather is not the same as climate, and unusually hot days occur periodically, as do droughts and floods, overall warming of the climate as is currently occurring on planet earth, does give rise to more frequent extreme heat, more common droughts, and paradoxically more frequent intense rain events like that seen in Pike County this month.

rain, no wind

Odd weather today.

Yesterday was not the very hottest day this week (most places round here it was in the low 90's) but the air was very, very still and thick with pollutants. Visibility was limited, and distant hills disappeared behind a gray veil. This may be a rural area, but its a rural area with extremely heavy truck traffic (i.e., coal trucks) belching out lots of exhaust.

We were looking forward to the rain, to cool things off and freshen the air. Instead while the rain came cooled things a bit, there is no wind, not even a slight breeze. The moisture has mixed with the pollution and created an even thicker miasma to cloak the mountains. The other side of the holler, only a few hundred feet away is obscured by the veil of light rain and smog. This must be what the 19th century London fogs were like - that mixture of damp and industrial pollution.

Perhaps we will still get some thunderstorms and wind to push some of this stale air out before the warmth comes back tomorrow.

ice watch

Since the summer of 2007, when Arctic ice extent hit an all time measured low, I have developed an ice watch fascination that generally sets in when the summer heat does in June.

The National Snow and Ice Data Center Sea Ice Index, provides a daily snapshot of the extent of ice in the Arctic Ocean. Both in map form and in a graph. The gray line is the average ice extent from 1979 to 2000, the green dotted line was the ice extent in 2007, the lowest ever measured. Right now, in June 2010 (blue line), the extent of Arctic ice is well below that of the recorded minimum from 2007 -- less ice, more open water, less reflected sunlight, more absorbed heat. This does not automatically mean that we will set a new record in 2010 for the smallest ice extent, because Arctic winds and storms can retard ice melting (and increase it); but a new record low ice extent does seem to be possible this year.

If you don't like all this snow, join the fight against climate change!

In 2003, seven years ago, the Union of Concern Scientist published the following article: "Early Warning Signs of Global Warming: Downpours, Heavy Snowfalls, and Flooding." This article states:

"Climate models predict an increase in average precipitation in winter at high latitudes due to poleward transport of evaporated moisture from lower latitudes. There is also an increase in the expected frequency and areal extent of intense precipitation over the continents."

An "increase in average precipitation in winter" means more snow!

Look at all the problems created by the snow storms in the U.S. this winter. Transportation systems disrupted. Power systems disrupted with millions of people losing electricity. Lost revenue to retailers and other businesses. Schools closed, government services disrupted. This is exactly why climate scientists have been warning about global climate change. When climate scientists say that not fighting climate change is going to cost us more in the long run than making changes to our economy, energy and economy now, this extremely snowy winter is part of what they are talking about. Among the other things they are talking about it is more frequent, more drastic alternating periods of drought and heavy rains in the other seasons.

People who want our government and economy to take steps to reduce the extremes of climate change (stopping it altogether is not possible), want to prevent even more extreme disruptions of society than we are currently dealing with this winter.

dangerous beauty

Just before the power went out at 8 AM Saturday December 19, I spent an hour tromping around documenting the snow fall. Notice how much snow is on the telephone and power lines!

This is the most snow we gotten since we've lived in eastern Kentucky (now 13 years). And its the second major snow before Christmas -- a highly unusual occurrence. For those in the know, this is just another example of the weather weirding that results form over all global warming. Here's the explanation:

The unprecedented melting of arctic sea ice the past two summers has undoubtedly had a significant impact on the early winter weather over the Northern Hemisphere. Several modeling studies presented at the December AGU meeting showed that sea ice melt on this scale is capable of injecting enough heat into the atmosphere to result in a major shift in the jet stream. Dr. Overland [Jim Overland of NOAA's Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory] remarked that the early cold winter over North America this winter, and the exceptionally cold and snowy early winter in China last winter, were likely related to arctic sea ice loss. The sea ice loss induced a strong poleward flow of warm air over eastern Siberia, and a return flow of cold air from the Pole developed to compensate. Thus regions on either side of eastern Siberia--China and North America--have gotten unusually cold and snowy winters as a result. Source: Dr. Jeff Masters' WunderBlog

Not all signs of global warming are warmer days, instead what we see are important shifts and changes in the weather patterns.

merry electricity and happy running water

100 hours (4 days and 4 hours) after the power went out, it came back on -- noon today. The water is still not back to full power, but at least there is something coming out of the tap. [The water company's pumps went silent due to the power outage.]

We were very, very lucky. We were able to stay warm and comfortable in our own home, and did not have to seek shelter elsewhere. We would not have wanted to leave all our furry children. Between a nice fireplace and a modern kerosene heater, we were able to keep the central rooms -- family room, living room and kitchen -- around 62 to 63 degrees (warmer right next to the heater), which is not much cooler than we keep them when we do have electricity.

We bought the kerosene heater after two day power outage in our first winter in the house -- thirteen years ago. We never used it, as we've had no winter power outages that lasted more than a few hours in the intervening years. But once new batteries were installed and it was filled with fresh kerosene it worked perfectly. I still have it going to help ease the furnace's load in warming up the whole house. Besides the kitties love the warm glow!

Because John has done a lot of backpacking in previous years, we were well equipped with two propane burners and a number of unexpended propane containers. Plus we had freeze dried trail food packages to cook on them, as well as plenty of easily heat-able canned foods. Piling bags of ice that we had in the freezer into the refrigerator instead allowed us to keep the small amount of fresh foods (eggs, milk, cheese and juice) safely cool -- more important than a vain attempt to keep the pizza and ice cream frozen.

Because of the unreliable quality (many boil water notices) and poor taste of our municipal water, we have drinking water delivered in reused five gallon bottles every three weeks, and our last delivery was less than a week ago, so we had plenty of water for drinking, cooking, and even a little washing.

We had our battery run radio --although the number of stations one can receive in our holler is limited -- to inform and entertain us, and our LED head lamps for reading, and most of all we had each other to talk to, discuss the news of the day, tell jokes and stories.

We were both very lucky in our circumstances during the outage and we are very lucky now, because our electricity is back and tens of thousands of people in the region are still without power, especially in neighboring Virginia. Our thoughts go out to all those still struggling.

winter wonderland

First snow.

bright spot in the rain

It's been very humid for days. Not particularly hot, but muggy. Everything feels damp and sticky: the salt refuses to pour, I never really feel dry after a shower, and my t-shirt sticks wetly to me after just one lap around the neighborhood with Rosie, even though it's only 9 AM. Now I expect that kind of humidity in July and August, but at the end of September it's a bit unusual.

When the humidity became rain -- lots of rain -- it wasn't a great surprise. However, folks in Letcher County do wish that the timing had been a little different. This week and especially this weekend are our annual Mountain Heritage Festival, with booths, crafts, food, carnival rides, and a parade. It all still happened, even the parade, rain notwithstanding.

The college always gets a booth in the center of the festival, and faculty volunteer time to sit in it, to give out information on the college, greet old students returning for a visit home, and welcome potential new students. My stint was from 11 AM to 2 PM today. I always volunteer to work during the parade; unlike many of my colleagues I have no children or grandchildren, nieces or nephews to watch for in the parade.

The rain never really let up the whole time. A small river of water was streaming from the bank above the booths, and ran right through ours, emptying into a huge mud puddle right in front of our table. But people gamely ploughed right on through.

My friend Madeline shared the shift with me. When we weren't conversing with the folks passing by, we had plenty of time to chat. There's not much time for conversation at school. We're either preparing for class, rushing to class, in class, or working with students from our classes. So even though my office is right next to Madeline's, we rarely have the opportunity to just talk about ourselves and life. Today, we discovered that we were in graduate school, at the University of Kentucky, in education, with offices and classes in the same building at in the same years (1975-1976). Comparing notes, we learned that there were a half dozen people that we knew in common, so surely we must have encountered each other. Yet we don't remember each other. I'm glad our paths recrossed to give us another chance.

One Single Impression -- Fog

Walking the dog

stepping out
into private space,
a deep well
of damp white;
morning fog
blankets the world
in stillness,
letting through small sounds:
dripping moisture
on phantom leaves,
the soft thud
of a cat landing
out of sight,
the rustling of birds
grounded by fog,
soft canine panting,
and the beating
of my heart.

sgreerpitt
Saturday September 19, 2009


To read other poems on the prompt "fog" check out One Single Impression between Sunday 9/20/09 and Saturday 9/26/09.

Photo was taken this morning (9/19/09) on my way to Rosh Hashanah services, just off US 23 just south of the Virginia/Kentucky border.

red sky at morning...

...sailor take warning. This was the sight that greeted me when I stepped out the door with Rosie dog at 6:45 this morning. Weather report says storms later today. Old wives tales and rhymes exist for reason.