We are having record cold temperatures again this week. Now it’s going all the way down to the gulf states where they will also be getting some snow and ice. Snow on a palm tree must be something to see.
There were some hearty souls watching the Adirondack Ice Bowl Pond Hockey Festival at the east end of Fourth Lake over last weekend.
The temperature on Saturday did get up into the 20s but the wind down the lake sure put the wind chill factor much lower.
It hardly got above zero on Friday which is cold enough without any wind.
Those bright lights around the rinks out on the lake don’t give off that much heat but the games went on without much trouble.
Some year we might get both good weather and good ice at the same time for them to play on.
I had been cold so many times during the week that I just couldn’t bring myself to go over and watch any of the games. It’s a great event and I’m glad they have found a home in Inlet.
The Mike Norris Memorial Ice Fishing Contest at Raquette Lake went off on Saturday (1/25) with 94 adults and many kids getting some fish for their effort.
It was a great day for ice fishing. I’ll bet some stiff fish came to the weigh-in as it didn’t get much above zero that day.
The snow today (1/27) should help with the ice problem underfoot. The rain a week ago froze solid and put a coat of ice on everything.
I’ve heard of several people taking bad falls and breaking a bone or two.
I went down a couple of times myself but never broke anything.
I was down by the outlet of Limekiln Lake, being careful with each step, when I went down so quick it wasn’t funny.
I got some black and blue marks but no broken bones.
Many of the side roads are the same way and with these cold temperatures it’s going to take a good thaw before that goes away.
Sand just blows away at these temperatures leaving the ice to slide on.
When we were growing up they plowed the roads and we used to sleigh ride down the little incline between my house and Karen’s house.
There wasn’t much traffic there at the time, but now you would need a traffic cop just to get across the highway.
So be careful out there as there is still some ice under all that snow.
This cold and snow has pushed many birds that have been foraging out in the woods to feeders.
Most feeders have a few more blue jays than they had a month ago, which will continue until spring.
For weeks I had only three but now I have at least nine hogging all the feeders. When they weren’t here over the weekend I had up to 150 American Goldfinch.
The ground was covered, the nyger seed socks were covered, and my table feeder had fifty birds on it at the same time.
I even had a tree swallow stop by. The last time I saw them was back in December.
When it’s this cold I don’t band as I feel that would just stress the birds more than they need—so I just keep filling the feeders.
The final results of the Region 7 Waterfowl Count on January 18 are in. The numbers would have been a lot less if we waited a couple days as all the cold temperatures turned some of that water to ice.
As Ellie George commented on her report, where there was ice there were no ducks—and a duck out of water is no good.
We had a total of 7,974 birds just short of 8,000.
These we mostly counted on Lake Champlain from the outlet of Lake George to the Cana-dian Border.
Only 25 mallards were counted in Inlet, outside that area. I heard there were some ducks at a bubbler in Lake Placid but never got a count on them.
Results from six observers for the day were one snow goose, six Canada geese, 37 black ducks, 678 mallard ducks, one mallardxblack duck, two redheads, 107 ring-necked ducks, 203 greater scaup, 2,226 lesser scaup, 169 buffleheads, 4,210 common goldeneyes, 18 hooded mergansers, 268 common mergansers, 16 red-breasted mergansers, two common loons and 30 pied-billed grebes.
Also counted were 10 bald eagles, 20 greater black backed gulls and a few hundred herring and ring-billed gulls.
Many of these were sitting on chunks of ice that were floating out in the middle of the lake.
These birds were hard to identify as there were both heat waves and fog coming off the surface of the lake.
I thank all those who helped with the count on such a nice day.
The Great Backyard Bird Count is coming up, but that’s another story. See ya.