I've commented about how our little corner of VT is changing due to the new weather, brought to us by a century or so of digging up and burning stuff that probably should have stayed buried.
Weather 2.0 is the mandatory upgrade to the buggy public weather beta.
Like most betas, Weather 2.0 doesn't sound bad 'til you try it. Some features even sound kind of attractive - yay, warmer winters! But when you open the box, and start to use it, you discover things aren't so great - like the annoying pop-up Paper-clip Dude that insisted on trying to "help" you use Windows, back in the 90s.
:: Bugs
The first obvious sign of bugs in Weather 2.0: the bugs - like ones that aren't supposed to do so well in winter in Vermont. Weather 2.0 replaces "not supposed to" with "do."
New name for trees: swiss cheese with bark. Mill it into "lumber," discover it's useless.
Left: an infested spruce.
Dripping sap flows from the insect holes. Other trees have different kinds of holes.
We love warm weather - in the right season.
Spring is a relief here in snow country. It's a nuisance to haul firewood into the house with sleet drizzling down the back of your neck, or to sink past your knees in waist deep snow just to empty the compost. But I gotta say, we liked having trees. Especially the kind that aren't trying to fall down on us or our stuff all the time. Plus they look so sad when they're dying.
Unfortunately, the bugs love warm, too. Having a warmer winter, and longer spring and fall (aka - extended periods of the ideal breeding and growing temperatures), means that the trees are suddenly perfect little rapid reproduction incubators. The bugs are adapting splendidly to Weather 2.0. Bugs that used to be a secondary nuisance are now just outright killing trees. I'm guessing the bugs LOVE Weather 2.0. The trees ... well ... not so much.
Here's a close-up of those holes:
::Sun
Another feature we wish had been carried over from Weather 1.x is sunlight. We wouldn't mind more in the winter (December had all of 3 days of sun). But it's particularly popular during the growing season. Gardeners find it much easier to till, weed, and harvest when the ground isn't waterlogged muck. Oddly, plants find it much easier to grow when there's sun. That whole photosynthesis thing works waaaay better when there are photons.
Haying season this year has been a terrible mess. There haven't been enough dry days to get a second cut in. The farmer who comes by once in a while (usually in winter, to lift our plow out of the ditch with his BIG tractor. Heh.) doesn't expect to have enough feed for his animals this winter. He usually gets 3 cuts. With all the rain, he could have had 5, if only there'd been enough sun between bouts of rain to be able to bale it dry. Baling wet hay gives you moldy hay, which kills horses outright, and is none too healthy for the other critters over the long term. My brother-in-law paid double for this year's hay over last year. A friend's farming neighbor just charged double what my BIL paid to some desperate folks in Massachusetts - not to rip them off, but because he could bring the proceeds back and buy at the lower local price to get enough to feed his own animals this winter.
We're noticing that trees like sunlight, too.
This is a young sugar maple in our yard. The photo was taken Sunday, August 10.
There's a certain time of year people associate with turning leaves in Vermont. Hint: it's not the middle of August.
Why is this tree turning?
Because there's no sun.
There's been so little sun for the past several weeks, that some trees and other plants are getting confused. The light trigger that tells them to stop producing chlorophyll has been triggered.
[Side note: I drove the other day to a place where it hasn't been raining so continuously for so long. Part way there, I thought the car sounded really weird. It took several minutes to realize that the "weird" sound was dry pavement].
Even ferns are confused. And they LIKE wet weather. They're wetland plants. They live in the shade below the trees. It's been so dreary, even the ferns are unsure what color they're supposed to be. Hint: not turning yellow.
:: There's a Fungus Among Us
Weather 2.0 does have some advantages.
Sort of.
Like Fungi!! We have LOTS. Look down, there it is! Look up, there it is! It's everywhere.
Here's a cool one: a bowl turning kit, just add tools. This is caused by two fungi that invade the tree together - white rot and brown rot. They create a reaction within the tree that's kind of like the way our bodies respond to getting bonked on the noggin: a big bump forms.
In the tree, the process is a bit slower and never recedes, so you're left with this multi-colored block of wood. Toss it on a lathe, wear all sorts of protective breathing and eye wear, and some good gloves - with luck, you will unearth a salad bowl! Alas, sometimes, the fungus has been too effective at colonizing the wood, and it will be too rotted to turn, but it's worth a try. Due to the branch poking out of the middle of this one, it's probably going to be better as a lamp shade. Hint: You really don't want to breathe the fungi, do wear appropriate protective gear.
I also found this cheerful little critter. I'm not sure what it is, but it's so bright and happy, sprouting from the space between rings on a maple stump under the tastiest, longest-bearing raspberries we've got.
But wait, there's more!
I've never seen this thing before. It's a VERY LARGE mushroom. If it weren't squishy, I could stand on it with both feet and barely cover it. Isn't the color incredible? I can not believe how blue it is inside!
That's it for this installment. There's a lot more, but I need more pictures, and need to wait for a sunny day before I pull the camera out. rumor has it we may get some sun again on Wednesday.
::Your Turn
So, what are you seeing in Weather 2.0? Weather oddities seem to be occurring everywhere. What's happening to plants around you? Water supplies? Food?