14 September 2007

Tonight was supposed to be a Public Observing night at Columbia University so obviously the weather is going to be bad. We are getting thickening clouds streaming up along the Appalachians from the tropical storm that came onshore in LA yesterday morning, but it isn’t supposed to rain much here. Then a cold front is supposed to come through on Saturday. Yesterday’s temperature was below normal by a few degrees and they are talking about possible frost Saturday night in inland locations. All of this stacks with what was forecast for our area in The Old Farmer’s Almanac.

I looked up the Frost and Growing Season table in The Old Farmer’s Almanac and it appears that they have never heard that A Tree Grows in Brooklyn because they don’t give frost dates for NYC. The closest location they do list is Newark, NJ and it doesn’t frost there until 10Nov. They say that the dates are yearly averages and the first fall frost may arrive earlier than the average date 50% of the time. They define three types of frost:

Light Freeze

29°-21°F
tender plants killed

Moderate Freeze

25°-28:deg;F
widely destructive to most vegetation

Severe Freeze

24°F and below
heavy damage to most plants

I have been seeing a lot of trees that are dropping their leaves without them first turning color. A couple of weeks ago Peter and I saw our first two geese of the season flying south over TotL. Today the street across the street from my house was littered with the ends of the branches of an oak tree where the squirrels had bitten them off to get at the acorns that were out where the branches were too slender to support the squirrel’s weight. It is looking like we might have an early fall this year.

Tomorrow looks like it will be a decent observing night so it is obviously the night of the monthly sea chantey sing.