Dodged Another Weather Bullet

This year is starting out to be a strange one. We had the snow and ice, we’ve had hot weather already, and we’ve had some lovely days. One thing we haven’t had much of is rain. Thank goodness the snow melted slowly and helped saturate the ground. That spring is still flowing, after all!

Lee keeps detailed records of our precipitation, made even more accurate by our fancy rain gauge I got from being a Master Naturalist. He reports that so far, this year is on the way to being the lowest rainfall since we started keeping records after the big drought in 2010. Every month has been below average. It’s like the opposite of the citizenry of Lake Woebegon, where all the children were above average.

It’s been gray and dreary for a few days now, but we’ve only gotten a few hundredths of inches of rain each day. It’s been enough to get the ground wet, but not very deep.

Yesterday was our best chance at some rain, so I prepared by closing the big window on the chicken hatchery area. Lee shut the garage doors after we saw that our friends in Leander got really big hail. It was no exaggeration to say it was golf-ball sized. I foresee a lot of new roofs going up down there, and a lot of cars getting hail damage removed. It was a bad as the hail I watched in 2009, which ruined my Forester, while I watched it happen from the yarn shop. At least that hail was smaller, just larger in quantity.

When the storm finally got to us, though, it was just very hard rain (of which the dogs are NOT fans), and a good amount, at last.

So far we have less than an inch, but we may get some more. I always know if we got measurable rain by the puddles on the driveway. If we get puddles, the rain amounted to something. Maybe that will help the tanks stay filled and the creeks flowing a little longer.

I was glad to see all the birds made it just fine, domesticated and wild. I’m so glad I have Star taking care of the chicks, because I keep reading about how much work it is to keep the temperature perfect for raising chicks without a mama hen.

Good ole Star just raises up a bit to cool them off and hunkers down to keep them warm, between bouts of eating and drinking.

It’s really fun to watch them growing and getting more inquisitive. I got to show them to Mandi yesterday, too. It’s pretty great to be able to see your friends again. Vaccinations are making my world better, that’s for sure.