More Snow!

Today is the first full day of spring, and to celebrate we got about 9 inches of snow. February was unseasonably warm (mean temperature of 44.1 on my weather station), but so far March has been cool and wintry with a mean temperature of 38.6. Even more snow may be on the way this weekend.

The trees are so loaded with snow that you really can't see through the forest.

Snowy road.

Tree at our "Three Rivers Campground". (The "rivers" are actually small streams that can be crossed with one large step.) We haven't camped here since we built our house.

More trees at "Three Rivers".

Small branches holding a load of snow.

Staghorn sumac (Rhus typhina).

Our dog, Dakota, has to check out all of our small culverts that direct run-off under our road. He can find them even through a foot of snow.

Snow curling off the small table on our deck.

Herons Return

The Great Gray Herons have been back on their nests for about 2 weeks now. (Just in time to catch all of our recent March snow storms.)

This sycamore tree seems to have more heron nests in it every year.

Most of the nests have two herons standing on them.

A closer look at a heron pair.

A solitary heron.

A solitary heron on a nest.

Snow Caps

Flowers & Fungi

The red maples had already started to bloom.

This dead tree had two beautiful shelf fungi on it. This was the lower fungus.

Higher on the trunk was an older fungus that almost looks like it has a thick layer of bark, along with a nice covering of moss and snow.

Same theme, but this photo was taken last December. I love witch-hazel. It's the only tree I know of that blooms in the winter after the leaves have dropped.

March Snow

The third nor'easter of March finally gave us a bit of snow. It's a bit late in the season, but March has been known to give us significant snow. This time we only got about 3 inches, but it was wet and heavy and stuck to the trees to give a real winter wonderland effect.

Three inches of heavy, wet snow, but no problem with the roads.

Tectonic plates on our solar panels. We make zero kWh on a day with heavy snow.

I can't remember snow with such cohesion. As the snow started to melt later in the day, it formed "snowsicles" than hung from branches.

A "snow diamond" pendant hanging from a branch.

A snow day contrasted with the same scene the following day, when all the snow had melted.

Terra-cotta Army at VMFA

Yesterday we made one of our occasional trips to Richmond, and we stopped by the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts to see the special exhibit of pieces from China's "Terracotta Army". We had seen pieces from the Terracotta Army in Chicago's Field Museum in January 2017, and it was interesting to see the difference in emphasis between a natural history museum and an art museum. The Field Museum had more emphasis on the Terracotta Army itself and how it was manufactured in workshops. The VMFA emphasized the early history of China (roughly 800 to 200 BCE) and put the pieces into their historical context.

The first three galleries included pieces from royal tombs preceding the First Emperor.

A carpet weight -- used to keep the corners of carpets from curling up. The bronze deer surrounds a large seashell.

This ceramic garment hanger is decorated with silver and gold.

An early ceramic horse and rider showing the Mongolian influence in northern China around 800 BCE.

The final gallery was filled with artifacts from the excavations at Xi'an. This necropolis/mausoleum complex was discovered by farmers digging a well in 1974. The site occupies an amazing 38 square miles! Only a small fraction has been excavated.

An army general.

The kneeling archer. The crossbow he holds was made of wood that rotted away long ago.

Cavalry soldier and his horse. The hole in the side of the horse was most likely there to facilitate firing in a kiln.

Four-horse chariot and driver. (Replica)

In April, this exhibit moves the the Cincinnati Art Museum.

Night Photography

Earlier this week it was warm enough to spend the evening on our deck with a campfire in the fire pit. Since it still gets dark fairly early, I decided would spend some time working on night photography. Orion and the Pleiades were prominent in the southern sky, and light clouds were coming through from time to time.

The clouds in the southwest were illuminated by light pollution from Covington in this 30 sec exposure. The red dot in the lower left is the cable TV antenna on Horse Mountain.

Orion. 30 sec exposure. The various star colors stand out.

A 10 sec exposure of the Pleiades was less successful. I have no idea what the red dot near the center bottom is.

The same photo with a bit of lighten-ing in Photoshop. Again, I have no idea what the red dot and two blue-violet dots are.

A weird artifact in a 2 sec exposure of Orion's belt (not in the photo). I presume this was an ember from the campfire. Cue the "Twilight Zone" theme.

The one thing I did learn was that I need a better, sturdier tripod for multi-second exposures!