Category Archives: Weather

February 24, 2023 · 23:52

Soggy Critters

I did a quick check of several National Weather Service sites and a few local weather sites, trying to see if anyone has an exact figure for how much rain we’ve gotten. Couldn’t find one, I’m sure we’ll have a total in the morning. Let me just say, as a semi-educated amateur, it was A LOT! Probably as much as I’ve ever seen here in SoCal in almost 50 years here.

Surprisingly, we haven’t lost power. There have been a few flickers, but we’re still online, warm, dry, with a roof over our heads and the lights on. The wee wild critters can’t say the same.

When I went out to put out seed, this guy didn’t even wait until I was back in the house before he was charging the critter banquet table.

He was soggy and looked the worse for wear. I don’t know if he was grateful, be he sure wasn’t going to look a gift meal in the mouth.

While he attacked the seed that I had dropped on the porch, a gazillion birds descended to pick the rest of it out of the mud.

The hummers were also buzzing around both feeders. They need all the energy they can get when it’s this cold, and more so when it’s also this wet.

I topped off both feeders and they were put into use within seconds of me getting back into the house.

What kills me is the way they immediately come over and hover around the empty space when I pull the empty feeder down and take it inside to clean it and refill it. I’m at the kitchen sink looking right at this spot and they’re buzzing around like, “Wait! WTF! Where did it go? Man, it was RIGHT HERE! Now it’s gone!!”

Later this evening it got downright nasty. It’s warmed up about 10º over this morning (meaning that it’s about 50º instead of 40º) but the rain has just been falling in sheets and the winds have been gusting to over 50 knots. For the last several hours we’ve been under a flash flood alert. For about ninety minutes tonight we were under a severe thunderstorm alert. (Never saw any lightning or heard any thunder – RATS!) About four miles away, at Warner Center Park, the LAFD was doing a rescue of passengers trapped in a car after a big tree fell over on it.

Let’s hope all of the soggy critters stay warm and as dry as they can tonight. This rain and nastiness is supposed to last until Wednesday or so.

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Filed under Critters, Photography, Weather

February 23, 2023 · 23:56

Here Comes The Rain

No sign of snow here yet (and probably still highly unlikely HERE-here) but there is snow on top of the Santa Suzanna Mountains just a few miles north. The coldest part of the storm isn’t due until tomorrow and Saturday.

I just got a new cover for the BBQ and it’s all black and plastic-like. The rain we got today beaded up nicely.

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Filed under Photography, Weather

February 22, 2023 · 22:51

Venus & Jupiter & Crescent Moon

I told you! We got one last clear sunset to see Venus (at the bottom), Jupiter (at the top), and the 12% illuminated, three-day old crescent Moon before this cold, snowy storm moves into SoCal.

Stunning! This is using a hand-held iPhone in 30-gusting-to-40+ winds.

Using the big camera on a tripod there was a little less shaking and bouncing.

And close-up on the Moon and Jupiter. I was hoping to get a picture that showed a couple of Jupiter’s moons (three of the Galilean moons were visible) but with the wind, longer exposures look like modern art, not astrophotography.

You’ve got a day or two to see this with the Moon hanging around and a week to watch Jupiter and Venus get closer to each other. The closest approach will be March 1st. Then you have weeks to watch them pull apart. If you get a couple minutes after sunset and it’s clear, go take a few minutes to gander at our corner of the Universe!

That cold storm is definitely on its way. It was pushing 80º yesterday – tonight it was 43º headed to a low of 38º and with the wind the wind chill was right around freezing.

As for that even weirder weather headed our way, it’s a weather pattern that’s rare so there’s not a lot of baseline information in the computer models. For our location there’s still a chance of up to an inch of snow, but only down (as of the latest) to about 1,500 feet. Castle Peak (see in the bottom right of that first picture above) might get some snow on the top, as might the Santa Monica Mountains, south of us between the San Fernando and Conejo Valleys and the coast around Malibu. If we don’t have snow, we’ll get something on the order of 5″ of rain between now and Monday, so either way it’s going to be fun.

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Filed under Astronomy, Photography, Weather

February 21, 2023 · 23:36

Watch The Skies The Next Few Days!

If you’re just about anywhere for the next couple of weeks and you have a clear sky at sunset, look to the west just after sunset.

Remember when Venus and Saturn (and sometimes the young Moon) were all near each other in the evening sky about a month ago? Well, something similar and very bright is happening again.

This time it’s Jupiter and Venus. And for the next couple of days, the young Moon as well. For the next nine or ten days you’ll see Venus nearest the horizon with Jupiter above it, both quite bright. On March 1st they’ll appear the closest to each other (from our viewpoint, of course – in reality they’re a billion-plus miles apart) and then Jupiter will continue to sink toward the sunset and Venus will continue to rise above until Jupiter disappears in the glare in mid-March.

Again, as always for this sort of thing, ignore the mass media clickbait that will try to tell you, “TONIGHT!!!” March 1st they’ll appear the closest, but if it’s clear you’ll be able to easily see them for another month.

Yes, there will be pictures here. Later. After we get past…well…

In Los Angeles (and most of California) there’s no seeing anything other than clouds for several days as a large, unusual, and COLD storm moves in. It might not be the same cold that they’re getting in Chicago and Vermont, but there’s a finite chance that it could mean the oddest of odd events in places like San Francisco and Los Angeles – SNOW.

“1-4 inches” possible down to 1,000 feet??!! And yes, folks are asking specific questions about places near us like the Santa Monica Mountains, Santa Clarita, the Antelope Valley, and so on.

Our house? We’re at about 1,060 feet according to the GPS fix on ForeFlight.

This could be interesting…

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Filed under Astronomy, Space, Weather

February 18, 2023 · 23:32

Sunset – February 18th

A little bit of color tonight.

Warming weather coming to SoCal for a day or two, then rain.

Again, we always need the rain.

But when it’s completely overcast, grey, and raining, we do miss the colorful sunsets.

It’s all a tradeoff.

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Filed under Photography, Sunsets, Weather

February 13, 2023 · 23:50

Skyscapes – February 13th

Happy Monday!

Another winter storm moving in.

The high is only going to be in the mid 40’s for the next few days.

We might get some showers, but it won’t be much.

Snow is predicted on the Grapevine, but we won’t be going up there.

Instead I’ll just look at the clouds.

 

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Filed under Photography, Weather

February 10, 2023 · 23:24

Barren Bush

In addition to the big tree in the back yard that’s lost about 99% of its leaves (and in my possibly flawed memory is usually like maybe 70% to 75%), there’s a bougainvillea bush there that’s also lost about 99% of its leaves this year, when I don’t remember that happening in any of the four previous winters we’ve been here.

My first concern was that there might be some sort of disease in common or contaminant in the soil that might be killing both, but after a moment’s thought I think that a much better explanation might be the lack of water this year as we went through significant watering restrictions due to the drought.

That’s the BIG change between the previous four years and this one. While we had a significant amount of rain in December and January, the six months prior to that were hot and very dry, with only about a third of the irrigation watering allowed. I can see how that would leave these plants suffering and showing the effects now that they’re having trouble hanging onto their leaves when it gets cooler and windy and stormy. Let’s hope the recent rain lets them come back now that the days are getting longer again.

At least if it dies, the bougainvillea is unlikely to tip over in a Santa Ana wind event and crush the house!

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Filed under Climate Change, Photography, Weather

February 3, 2023 · 22:59

Skyscapes – February 03rd

Pay attention.

Even if you’re just bringing in the trash barrels.

You might be awestruck by the incredibly delicate clouds above your head.

Like looking at bubbles of spun cotton candy, bubbles the size of houses and spread from horizon to horizon.

While you there you may hear the red-tailed hawks calling, a pair of them right by the sun.

You look, but they’re up in the sun, like fighter planes in a war. Hunting.

You may suddenly see one of them, diving, right over your head, maybe 25-30 feet up. Wings tucked back, the wind screaming through their feathers.

As it sails across the houses on the other side of the street and disappears down into the canyon there, be grateful that you’re not the rabbit or squirrel or mourning dove that doesn’t see it coming.

Watch as the sheets of clouds above you start to shred and tear, like enormous spiderwebs torn by a bird flying through them.

Pay attention. Take your time.

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Filed under Photography, Weather

January 20, 2023 · 23:51

Blau

We haven’t seen this for a while.

That’s a LOT of blue, so many shades, such an astonishing gradient from horizon to zenith.

And it was so warm today in the sun (pushing 60º after days of only being in the mid 40’s).

Nice!

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Filed under Weather

January 11, 2023 · 23:32

Last Week’s Full Moon & Clouds Before The Storm

Last Friday night the full moon looked amazing through the cloud layers that were leading the way for the rest of the big storm that hit on the weekend.

What was really odd, and not really visible at all to the eye (which makes me wonder if it’s some sort of artifact, like dew or moisture on the lens) was the ring around the moon a minute or two later.

But looking at the way there’s a thin layer of clouds from about 7:00 to 3:00, where the arc is, but no thin clouds and no arc from about 3:00 to 7:00… Maybe there was some odd boundry layer there in that layer of clouds and I was seeing the moon at just the right spot?

Who knows? I’m just throwing ideas up against the wall to see what sticks…

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Filed under Astronomy, Photography, Weather