Brrrrr... Winter Has Arrived

For the past four or five days the morning low has been in the single digits.  On top of that the wind has been blowing.  I was surprised that one of the first casualties of the cold was Hector the spitting frog.  His stream of water got smaller and smaller and the ice build up from his nose down toward the pond was getting bigger and bigger until there was nothing coming out.  Hector quit being a spitter and started being the poster frog for this freezing weather.

I'm sure Hector will once again spit like a champ and probably before spring... we just need a few days of warmth to set things right.

In the mean time the birds continue to attract the raptors of our clime and this keeps everybirdy on their toes... so to speak.

Snow is forecast to start tomorrow (Sunday) evening and continue on and off for the better part of the coming week.  Once is starts snowing it usually warms some and I expect the single digit temperatures to abate for a while.  There is no doubt they will be back as January is the the coldest month for Grand Junction.

The pond water will continue to flow and the ice will become more than a foot thick in the bridge pond where the water moves the slowest.  It is truly a different look than what one pictures in their minds eye when a pond is introduced to a conversation.  Many people shut down their ponds for the winter but we prefer to keep it running and enjoy the different and sometime spectacular influence the winter season brings to the pond environment.