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Three Summers of Drought
Jul. 26th, 2023 02:38 pmIt is well into Cancer Season at the time I write this, and I have not much excuse for having been absent for so long. The best explanation I can give is to say that it has been a busy year, full of events vying for my attention. On the upside, I did finish some important projects that I needed to get done, so no doubt that was part of my delay on updating my blog for so long. Overall, there was not any one thing that ate up so much time, so much as it was just a never-ending succession of distractions, interruptions and other inconveniences. But as I have the time this evening to put some thoughts into writing, I'm going ahead with it.
We have now had 3 dry summers in a row. And actually, it seems that the summer droughts began in August of 2020, when I took a trip out West with some friends during the pandemic. We had been a bit stir crazy from being locked down for so long and decided to get out. After all, what could go wrong? It was camping out and we were socially distanced. Well, as a matter of fact, I almost stepped on a rattlesnake in Colorado and I also ended up getting COVID because of that trip. Oh well. I still don't regret doing it. But the point is, an abnormally dry pattern began right around that time, and persisted into the fall. Then the next three summers ended up being dry.
And once again this year, we had a rather deceptive situation in the spring. As of the last time I updated this blog, there had been so much snow over the winter around this area (100" reported in the suburb of Chanhassen, for example) that it took almost the entire month of March for it to melt, despite moderating temperatures. So at the time of the last writing there had been a large snowstorm which basically put a period to accumulations of snow for the year. It was followed by a week of abnormally hot temperatures that were actually record highs, which had only just begun at the time of the last writing. I had mentioned that the ice was breaking up on the St Croix River, well by the end of the week it was long gone. These were July type temperatures in early April. Above 80° f.
There were actually a few more snow storms in April, including one that was quite severe later in the month, about 3 weeks after the one I wrote about in the last entry. I had been planning to go to an event and heavy snow and ice conditions on the roads made that impossible. But nevertheless, by April it was basically to the point where the snow would fall and then it would melt off within the next day. So for example on the Sunday of the last blizzard that I just mentioned, snow was gone by Monday afternoon. But nevertheless, a cold pattern persisted all the way through April as well. But because of the warm-up that happened rapidly, the massive snow pack which had built up all across the state began to flood the river systems badly. The St. Croix River ended up being among the most severely flooded. I made a habit several days of going down to the public water access and watching the water rise, almost to the point where the ramp was underwater completely. People with cabins near the water had some flooding issues.
It wasn't until May that it really began to look like spring. And even then there were some relapses. But the pattern stayed wet enough to green things up very nicely. During the month of May I decided to go up to the Gunflint Trail, which is an area I'd not been to since 2016. This is a well-known wilderness area of northern Minnesota, which was made somewhat famous by the books of Helen Hoover as well as some other nature writers over time, including the Duluth Tribune's longtime nature contributor Sam Cook. In the intervening years, more businesses had opened up there. In the old days, Trail Center was pretty much the only place to eat on the trail if I remember correctly, but now there are several places. The last third of the Trail was badly burned out by a fire in 2007. Only now is the forest is beginning to grow back, rather short forests of Aspen for now amidst some rather towering iron hills and wetlands.
This was my first time visiting the North Country in May and as a matter of fact, on the Trail, the ice had only just gone out the day before I arrived. But that day I arrived it was rather spooky , because already there was a harbinger of recent summers past. The sky was beginning to take on an eerie red light. The wildfires in Canada had already begun in the middle of May. That set the tone for things to come you might say. But the time up there was great. There's an upside involved in going to the Northern Lakes just after the ice melts, because the bugs have not yet come out, tourism and crowding is lessened, and bird migration was in full swing. The entire forest was alive with the song of warblers. I'm used to visiting in the early spring, when the forest is still quite silent, except perhaps for the distant call of the raven, the familiar sound of the chickadee and nuthatch, or the nagging call of the blue jay or whiskey jack.
Unfortunately, the trails were flooded in many places, and I had forgotten to bring my rubber boots. So the trail conditions were not quite as good as I'd hoped, but I made the best of it – the highlight being to hike the ridge overlooking Flour Lake, a hike I had done last time, only then it was in deep snow. This time the trails were clear, with occasional ponds. This area is hauntingly beautiful, the trail going along a ridgeline covered with pine forest, and opening out into majestic vistas. The lakes up there have a finger lake quality to them. Up there in the superior national forest, this is a region of true wilderness that's hard to find in the more urbanized sections of the United States. It has a very salutary effect on the soul to behold untouched wilds like this from time to time. The weather for most of the duration of the stay was cool, which I didn't mind, knowing that the heat of summer was not far off.
Ultimately, this summer ended up following the same pattern that we've had in previous years. The spring started off promisingly enough, with enough moisture to flood the rivers. But by June, drought began to shape up. This condition was not helped by a very hot stretch of weather. I'm writing this in July, and the pattern since the 4th of July was actually much milder, with a few hot days here and there, but for the past week at times resembling the pattern of September. Yet it has not rained much. A lot of the surrounding region is in moderate to extreme drought and parts of Minnesota are now in severe drought. It's a bit early to say whether this is some kind of climatic shift or just a kind of stuck pattern that sometimes happens (the 2000s had also been dry and hot, but the 2010s were wet). It is a bit concerning though, because things are starting to look like more of a Mediterranean continental climate with hot dry summers and cool wet winters. If that went on for a long time, we would probably end up with a very different biome here.
Well, I can't condense three or more months of events into just a few paragraphs. In this piece I've described some of the more important things that happened in the last few months. A rather uneasy feeling has set in over the recent months as this third summer of drought unfolds. We have had repeated smoke events from wildfires, including at least one day when the entire area was enveloped in a choking reddish haze of smog. The past few months seem to have been filled with omens of foreboding, beyond just the wildfires. Floods, severe storms, sinkholes, train derailments, infrastructure failures, industrial fires and so on happen regularly. There is both the feeling of a civilization in decline and the sense that we are seeing chains of bad omens warning of troubles to come (although I'm aware that most people would consider that superstition these days). And yet, there is a unreality to it all, as the mainstream seems to persist in a devil-may-care attitude with the sentiment that everything is fine. Rather surreal if you ask me, but until something breaks we can only watch and wait.
Until next time,
Deneb
We have now had 3 dry summers in a row. And actually, it seems that the summer droughts began in August of 2020, when I took a trip out West with some friends during the pandemic. We had been a bit stir crazy from being locked down for so long and decided to get out. After all, what could go wrong? It was camping out and we were socially distanced. Well, as a matter of fact, I almost stepped on a rattlesnake in Colorado and I also ended up getting COVID because of that trip. Oh well. I still don't regret doing it. But the point is, an abnormally dry pattern began right around that time, and persisted into the fall. Then the next three summers ended up being dry.
And once again this year, we had a rather deceptive situation in the spring. As of the last time I updated this blog, there had been so much snow over the winter around this area (100" reported in the suburb of Chanhassen, for example) that it took almost the entire month of March for it to melt, despite moderating temperatures. So at the time of the last writing there had been a large snowstorm which basically put a period to accumulations of snow for the year. It was followed by a week of abnormally hot temperatures that were actually record highs, which had only just begun at the time of the last writing. I had mentioned that the ice was breaking up on the St Croix River, well by the end of the week it was long gone. These were July type temperatures in early April. Above 80° f.
There were actually a few more snow storms in April, including one that was quite severe later in the month, about 3 weeks after the one I wrote about in the last entry. I had been planning to go to an event and heavy snow and ice conditions on the roads made that impossible. But nevertheless, by April it was basically to the point where the snow would fall and then it would melt off within the next day. So for example on the Sunday of the last blizzard that I just mentioned, snow was gone by Monday afternoon. But nevertheless, a cold pattern persisted all the way through April as well. But because of the warm-up that happened rapidly, the massive snow pack which had built up all across the state began to flood the river systems badly. The St. Croix River ended up being among the most severely flooded. I made a habit several days of going down to the public water access and watching the water rise, almost to the point where the ramp was underwater completely. People with cabins near the water had some flooding issues.
It wasn't until May that it really began to look like spring. And even then there were some relapses. But the pattern stayed wet enough to green things up very nicely. During the month of May I decided to go up to the Gunflint Trail, which is an area I'd not been to since 2016. This is a well-known wilderness area of northern Minnesota, which was made somewhat famous by the books of Helen Hoover as well as some other nature writers over time, including the Duluth Tribune's longtime nature contributor Sam Cook. In the intervening years, more businesses had opened up there. In the old days, Trail Center was pretty much the only place to eat on the trail if I remember correctly, but now there are several places. The last third of the Trail was badly burned out by a fire in 2007. Only now is the forest is beginning to grow back, rather short forests of Aspen for now amidst some rather towering iron hills and wetlands.
This was my first time visiting the North Country in May and as a matter of fact, on the Trail, the ice had only just gone out the day before I arrived. But that day I arrived it was rather spooky , because already there was a harbinger of recent summers past. The sky was beginning to take on an eerie red light. The wildfires in Canada had already begun in the middle of May. That set the tone for things to come you might say. But the time up there was great. There's an upside involved in going to the Northern Lakes just after the ice melts, because the bugs have not yet come out, tourism and crowding is lessened, and bird migration was in full swing. The entire forest was alive with the song of warblers. I'm used to visiting in the early spring, when the forest is still quite silent, except perhaps for the distant call of the raven, the familiar sound of the chickadee and nuthatch, or the nagging call of the blue jay or whiskey jack.
Unfortunately, the trails were flooded in many places, and I had forgotten to bring my rubber boots. So the trail conditions were not quite as good as I'd hoped, but I made the best of it – the highlight being to hike the ridge overlooking Flour Lake, a hike I had done last time, only then it was in deep snow. This time the trails were clear, with occasional ponds. This area is hauntingly beautiful, the trail going along a ridgeline covered with pine forest, and opening out into majestic vistas. The lakes up there have a finger lake quality to them. Up there in the superior national forest, this is a region of true wilderness that's hard to find in the more urbanized sections of the United States. It has a very salutary effect on the soul to behold untouched wilds like this from time to time. The weather for most of the duration of the stay was cool, which I didn't mind, knowing that the heat of summer was not far off.
Ultimately, this summer ended up following the same pattern that we've had in previous years. The spring started off promisingly enough, with enough moisture to flood the rivers. But by June, drought began to shape up. This condition was not helped by a very hot stretch of weather. I'm writing this in July, and the pattern since the 4th of July was actually much milder, with a few hot days here and there, but for the past week at times resembling the pattern of September. Yet it has not rained much. A lot of the surrounding region is in moderate to extreme drought and parts of Minnesota are now in severe drought. It's a bit early to say whether this is some kind of climatic shift or just a kind of stuck pattern that sometimes happens (the 2000s had also been dry and hot, but the 2010s were wet). It is a bit concerning though, because things are starting to look like more of a Mediterranean continental climate with hot dry summers and cool wet winters. If that went on for a long time, we would probably end up with a very different biome here.
Well, I can't condense three or more months of events into just a few paragraphs. In this piece I've described some of the more important things that happened in the last few months. A rather uneasy feeling has set in over the recent months as this third summer of drought unfolds. We have had repeated smoke events from wildfires, including at least one day when the entire area was enveloped in a choking reddish haze of smog. The past few months seem to have been filled with omens of foreboding, beyond just the wildfires. Floods, severe storms, sinkholes, train derailments, infrastructure failures, industrial fires and so on happen regularly. There is both the feeling of a civilization in decline and the sense that we are seeing chains of bad omens warning of troubles to come (although I'm aware that most people would consider that superstition these days). And yet, there is a unreality to it all, as the mainstream seems to persist in a devil-may-care attitude with the sentiment that everything is fine. Rather surreal if you ask me, but until something breaks we can only watch and wait.
Until next time,
Deneb
