Category Archives: rain

Rain approaches

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It has been dry here at our little spot on top of the mountain. There has been spotty rain around, but very little of it has fallen on us. Almost three weeks ago we watched as rain moved across town towards us.

There were at least two separate showers, one to the right of this image, and another to the left. The falling rain eventually obscured town. Then it moved closer, obscuring the ridge that is in bright sunlight in this image. We prepared for the rain. I expected raindrops to start falling on the steps down from the porch. We waited.

And then, nothing. It missed us again.

We have watched a band of rain on our weather radar app approaching us and then dissipating or splitting and passing around us many times. I think I have mentioned it before. That sort of thing is not really unusual; rain showers hit one place and miss another all the time. But it has happened so many times that I was beginning to wonder whether there was actually some geological or meteorological phenomenon that made our particular spot on the mountain less likely to get rain.

And then I talked to a bicyclist I see fairly often while I’m walking the dogs. He lives in a neighborhood about four or five miles from us and often climbs the mountain on his rides. He stopped and we talked about rain. He told me that he felt like his particular little spot in his neighborhood was also singled out for drought.

So, two places not far apart that have some strange phenomenon that suppresses rain? I don’t think so. That convinced me that nature’s rain grudge against us was an illusion. It seems like it happens a lot because we notice it when it happens, but we don’t notice it when it doesn’t happen.

But we still need rain.

A little rain

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We have been having quite the summer so far this fall. It has been hot and dry for most of the last half of summer and now into late September. We finally had some rain last Friday. We got about two tenths of an inch in the afternoon. The rain was preceded by a double rainbow.

The outer bow is hard to see, especially in this shot.

Later in the evening we got more. The total was about eight tenths of an inch, not nearly what we needed but we’re grateful for what we got.

But it’s still supposed to be over 90F for the rest of this week. The Atlanta TV weather people have been tracking the number of days this summer with highs over 90. The record is 90 days, and as of Sunday, it was 86 for this year. They expect to break the record.

Next weekend the highs are supposed to drop into the low 80’s. That’s still higher than the average high temperature at the beginning of October, but it has been so hot for so long that those temperatures will be a relief.

Thunderstorm in the distance

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Wednesday afternoon a thunderstorm appeared within a matter of about 45 minutes to the east of us. I walked out on the front porch and told Leah to come out and see a classic thunderstorm anvil cloud.

It was late enough in the day that the shadow of the Earth was creeping up the base of the cloud. There was an occasional lightning flash beneath it. I checked my phone’s weather radar app to see how far away it was.

The pushpin shows our house. The storm was about 15 miles away. Unfortunately it was not heading our way. We have experienced a few light showers lately, but the strong storms have avoided us. We are very dry up here on the mountain top. I would like a light rain that lasts for a couple of hours, but I would settle for a heavy rain that lasts for 30 minutes.

A patchy fog

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According to our local TV weather people, 2018 had the second highest precipitation on record for Atlanta, and, according to our local newspaper, Rome had the third highest on record. I have no reason to doubt that. We have had rain, and then more rain.Topsoil and grass seed washed away, trees fell across the road, and cats and dogs got muddy feet. I took this picture on the night of January 1, just as one period of rain stopped.

The fog rose in patches across town, lit from below by the city lights.

After that night, we had some sunny days, but today, Thursday, is not one of them. It started raining lightly just as I went outside to walk the dogs, and it has been raining lightly ever since. We have only accumulated a quarter of an inch, but at 3 pm it was still only 38 degrees outside. Zeke is drying himself in front of the fire after a quick turn outside. Tomorrow is supposed to be better.

A note on the photo: I used a zoom lens on my Olympus camera on a tripod and let the camera decide what the exposure should be. It was probably about a second or two. There were a lot of blurred images; this was the least blurred. It’s possible to see one of the water towers visible from our from porch, around a third of the way from the right side of the image. I think the blurry, bright object just to the left and above the water tower is the City Clock, which stands on a hill overlooking downtown. There is a little red speck of an antenna marker light sitting almost on the tower’s shoulder. If I knew my camera a little better I might have been able to get a better shot.

Some sun, lots of rain

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We’ve had a fairly long period of wet weather, interrupted occasionally by a sunny day. I don’t really mind a rainy day. There’s something nice about being warm and dry while it’s cold and wet outside.

One day this week it was foggy — cloudy to those down at the bottom of the mountain — and it had been raining, so I took the dogs on a short walk up to the top of the mountain where power lines cross the ridge. The towers looked like half-hidden alien structures. And there was a crackle in the air. Turn your volume up for this video.

The buzzing sound is caused by what is essentially leaking electrical power. It’s audible only during wet conditions, at least if the power company is doing its job on the transmission lines. It’s called a corona discharge.

I had walked the dogs up a few days earlier when the view was more open. There were still a few clouds scudding about down in the valley.

What might look like a particularly bright cloud near the center of the image is actually a lake.

The maples have turned. It was hard to get a nice, bright image, but here’s one where I tried.

With all the rain, the wet-weather streams are running all over the mountain. I can hear the rushing water everywhere on our walk, even when I can’t see the streams.

This is where one stream crosses Fouche Gap Road near the bottom of the mountain in Texas Valley.

Sam always wants to drink from the ditches beside the road when we start back up the mountain. I usually let him. He didn’t notice this little fellow,

I suspect this is a red salamander, rather than a mud salamander. According to Caudata Culture (“The information resource for newt and salamander enthusiasts”), the two are hard to differentiate. The red salamander is “often associated with the environs of clear, rocky, streams” while the mud salamander frequents muddy areas. Unfortunately, I see their squashed little bodies in the road fairly often.

The rain ended Thursday, although the clouds stuck around for a while. Thursday night is supposed to be the coldest since last spring. Leah feels sorry for Dusty and Chloe, who stay on our front porch, which is soaked with the blowing rain. They do have cat houses with heating pads, and a foam insulation surround. Leah drapes a bed spread over the beds to try to keep the wind from blowing directly on them.