By my observations, we had more than 6" of rain this month, about 2 1/4" above the historic average. Late on May 27 and into early morning of May 28, when tornadoes hit parts of Ohio and threatened us (we slept through the warning sirens), we had, according to our two rain gauges, nearly 3 inches of rain. The signs of minor flooding were all around the next morning: mulch was washed off gardens; gravel was washed off parts of the driveway; According to the mud-lines, the tiny creek at the front of our property rose a good 4 inches above its bank. To my surprise, the nearest weather-reporting station measured only .6" of rain, a total that once was a lot of rain, but over the past few months has been almost normal, and that amount doesn't cause the damage we found.
Which brings me to another cause of my gloominess; I'm no longer able to access the stats from a weather station anywhere near to us, which means I have no way to corroborate my observations at Bean Hill. Since January, for some mysterious reason, reporting from stations as near as 3 miles away is not longer accessible on the internet. For a while, I could get local precipitation reports from a government agency for a free, but that option has disappeared and been replaced by a rather pricey subscription. So the nearest weather-reporting station now is at the John Glenn International Airport, 15 miles away in the Columbus Metro area. Precipitation amounts can vary widely within a one mile radius; add 14 more miles and the chance for variation increases, which probably accounts for the discrepancy on May 28. There's also a big difference in temperatures; Bean Hill's temperatures are always 5-10 degrees lower than the metro area's.
Readership of this blog was never great, and has fallen off. Between that and my inability to get local confirmation of my observations, I'm pretty discouraged. In addition, this month, with all its dampness and grey skies, included a number of depressing observations and events: the discovery of drowned baby possums, the loss of most of our mason bees from the erratic weather, the absence of butterflies, fritterlies, and any type of bee (except for a few giants that float like dirigibles rather than really fly), and the terrible loss of trees in the Jersey Woods due to days of high winds.
All this is to say I've decided to lay this blog down for a while. I've enjoyed dabbling in citizen-science, but it's become a challenge on several levels, and I no longer have the time or enthusiasm for it. So instead of gathering stats and recording observations, I'm going to just be, and enjoy this beautiful, peaceful nature sanctuary we created out of a soy bean field.
