There is a new post

Blogger stuck it under the last post because that's when I first began composing it.

Learn something new every day.

.....Alan.

How Dry I Am (Or Maybe Will Be Next Year)

We may get lucky so that it won't be as dry as this indicates but I wouldn't plan on it. For the next six months or so I'd plan on receiving less rainfall than we normally do and plan accordingly.

Mulch is your friend.

-----Original Message-----
From: ***
Sent: Thursday, September 13, 2007 9:13 AM
To: ***
Subject: La Nina Watch Issued - Office of the State Climatologist

The Southeast Climate Consortium has issued a "La Niña watch" for the next one to three months. La Niña conditions usually bring a warmer and drier cool season (October through March) to Florida. Please see the release below, we will keep you posted on any developments.

Clyde W. Fraisse, PhD
Assistant Professor & Climate Specialist Agricultural & Biological Engineering University of Florida P.O. Box 110570 Gainesville, FL 32611-0570 U.S.A.
352-392-1864 ext 271
http://www.agclimate.org


-----Original Message-----
From: David Emory Stooksbury [mailto:stooks@engr.uga.edu]
Sent: Tuesday, September 11, 2007 1:07 PM
To: David Emory Stooksbury
Subject: La Nina Watch Issued - Office of the State Climatologist

Sept. 11, 2007

Sources/Writers: David Emory Stooksbury (706) 583-0156 stooks@engr.uga.edu (Georgia)
John Christy: (256) 961-7752, john.christy@nsstc.uah.edu (Alabama)
David Zierden: (850) 644-3417, zierden@coaps.fsu.edu (Florida)
Jim O'Brien: (850) 459-1938, jim.obrien@coaps.fsu.edu (Florida)


LA NIÑA WATCH ISSUED FOR ALABAMA, FLORIDA AND GEORGIA

Athens, Ga. --- A La Niña watch has been issued by the Southeast Climate Consortium and the state climatologists of Alabama, Florida and Georgia.

A watch means that conditions are likely for the development of a full-fledged La Niña event.

The watch will be followed by an official La Niña declaration if development continues in the next one to three months.

The tropical Pacific Ocean is now poised to slip into a full-fledged La Niña. Chances are very good that La Niña conditions will develop, strengthen and persist through the fall and winter months. This follows months of cooler than normal water temperatures near the coast of South America.

La Niña is commonly thought of as the opposite of El Niño. Under La Niña conditions, sea surface temperatures along the equator in the eastern and central Pacific Ocean are a few degrees colder than normal for a minimum of five months. La Niña typically returns every two to seven years.

La Niña conditions usually bring a warmer and drier cool season (October through March) to Florida, central and lower Alabama, and central and south Georgia.

With the arrival of La Niña, there is a good chance that drought conditions, currently ranging from exceptional across much of Alabama and Georgia to moderate in south Florida, will continue and possibly worsen throughout the winter and into next spring.

If below normal rainfall occurs during the cool season, moisture recharge of groundwater, soils, ponds and reservoirs will be limited. Southeastern states depend on water recharge during the cool season.

Farmers who plan to plant winter forage and do not have irrigation capability have a high risk of being seriously impacted by the winter drought.

In addition the risk of increased wildfires should be expected during the winter and spring wildfire season in Florida, south Georgia, and lower Alabama.

The Southeast Climate Consortium has estimated the impacts on climate based on past La Niña events. For central Florida, the probability of normal or above rainfall for January 2008 is only 8 percent. The chance of moderately dry (rainfall amounts from just below normal to half of normal) is 20 percent, and for very dry conditions (less than half of normal rainfall) is 72 percent. For the Panhandle of Florida, south Georgia, and lower Alabama the probability of normal or above rainfall in January 2008 is 20 percent, for moderately dry 50 percent, and for very dry 30 percent.

More information on the developing La Niña and its potential impacts can be found at www.AgClimate.org and www.CoastalClimate.org.

The Southeast Climate Consortium is a research group aimed at aiding the use of climate forecasts in agriculture, forestry, and water resources. The consortium is a partnership of six universities, The Florida State University, University of Florida, University of Miami, The University of Georgia, Auburn University, and University of Alabama Huntsville.

(David Emory Stooksbury is the state climatologist of Georgia, John Christy is the state climatologist of Alabama, David Zierden is the state climatologist of Florida and Jim O'Brien is professor emeritus at Florida State University.)
--

*******************************************
David Emory Stooksbury, Ph.D.
State Climatologist and Associate Professor Engineering and Atmospheric Sciences

Driftmier Engineering Center
The University of Georgia
Athens, Georgia 30602

706-583-0156 (Voice)
706-542-8806 (FAX)
*******************************************

The Payoff

It's been a long summer, but fall is finally on the far horizon. I note the five day forecast is predicting highs only in the eighties which is hopefully the beginning of a seasonal trend.

If it's too hot to want to work outside there's always something to do inside. Such as making the family jam supply for the year. So far there is muscadine grape, strawberry, and peach jams and maybe some persimmon to come if the recipe I came across the other day pans out. I messed up the shots of the jars so I'll try to reshoot them this coming weekend for the next post.

This is the last batch of peach jam processing. The nice 16qt Tramontina pot that Diana got me for Christmas last year (only cost $200 for a $40 pot! {laughing}) works well as a water bath canner. The Key limes are off of our trees. I always end up having to buy some additional fruit but those limes were grown by us. I much prefer fresh squeezed juice to bottled lemon juice which doesn't have a very good flavor to me.

This is a bit of summer's bounty from earlier in the season - yellow summer squash relish. We have a particular fondness for this relish, in fact there's nothing I like more on a burger or dog so we always make a lot to get us through the year and some for gifts. Had to go and buy a couple of red sweet peppers this time around as I didn't have any ready when I wanted to make the relish. Usually except for the vinegar, sugar, and spices we produce everything else. This is a great way to use all those squash that have grown too large but that aren't yet woody.

Just now it's the persimmons that are coming ripe. We inherited a mature tree when we bought the place. I have no idea of its specific variety but it is a Hachaiya type astringent that tends to alternate bearing. This is one of its big crop years and it is heavy with fruit. Ordinarily I just run them through the Victorio and freeze the pulp but this year I'm woefully short on freezer space so I'm determined to dry or can as much as I am able.

The problem is that astringent type persimmons have a peculiar chemistry. Even when allowed to become soft-ripe which makes them sweet and non-astringent extended cooking can cause the pulp to revert back to mouth puckering. I have a recipe that claims to eliminate that but I haven't tried it yet. This coming weekend I hope.


What I've been doing lately is drying them. This is a photo of the first batch. They were pretty in the dryer but the finished product was disappointing. I've since learned to wait until they are fully colored but still firm (and thus astringent) then peel them, cut into rounds, then dry. The dehydration process takes the pucker out and the cross sections reveal a pretty eight petaled design that looks nice when finished. Dried persimmons are new to me so I'm still experimenting with what I'll do with them.

I will be devoting a little freezer space for some puree though. The stuff is great in pancakes, muffins, and mixed with some cornmeal and buttermilk for a baked pudding.

The citrus are starting to color up. My trees are all young so this will be the first year that we've gotten more than a couple of fruit. Still won't be buckets full but hopefully we at least have some for fresh eating for a while.

I picked up the winter forage seed last weekend. Looks like I'll have to get out and start getting the ground prepped soon. The garden has been patiently waiting as well.

Looking forward to cooler weather!

.....Alan.

The Torpid Season

Every year when June rolls around our annual North Florida dry spell draws to a close as our rainy season (usually) begins and we enter what I have come to call the Torpid Season. The work needing to be done goes on as it always does, but my get up and go gets up and goes to some place cooler and drier. My desire to work outside slowly declines until more pleasant weather returns typically sometime in October. This year has been no different other than the erratic rainfall we've been experiencing.

But life goes on whether it's hotter than blue blazes and sticky humid or not. I haven't put a blog update up since June so I cannot any longer put it off. Maybe by the time I've run through the accumulated photos the weather will have abated enough that I'll feel like doing something outside so I can take some new ones!

When last we met I had just papered the henyard with bags and bags of shredded office paper. Three months later and you'd have to search hard to find any trace of it. A few rains, copious quantities of chicken flickin's and that paper composts right away to nothing. In another couple of weeks I'll shovel out the henyard and the roost house then spread it all on the fall garden. The new flock has been hard at work debugging the area for me so it's ready to turn up now.

Speaking of the new flock they started laying about a month or so ago. Here's a photo of the nest boxes with three of the hens doing what comes natural so that we now collect about a dozen or so eggs a day. I expect that number will rise for a while yet until we're gathering about a dozen and a half a day. Most of the hen fruit are still pullet sized (small), but they're gradually growing larger. I expect they will eventually come in around size large.


Here's an outside shot of the original Mk. I Poultry Schooner. Thus far I'm pretty happy with the design but for the excessive weight the tin contributes and the cross-members of the frame being a trifle low to the ground so that they sometimes catch high spots. Both problems I am rectifying in the Mk. II schooner which is now about three quarters complete in the workshop.


I have plans to build a total of five schooners - three for laying hens, one for turkeys (and maybe geese) with the last being for my daughter's 4H birds that we'll probably start researching this Fall. At the moment she's thinking Silkies. They're a silly looking bird but I have to admit after a while they do grow on one. I want to keep them separated from our other birds for biosecurity reasons. The permanent hen yard will become the permanent bachelor pad allowing me to eliminate the temporary one I put up last month which I'll discuss below.

Here's a shot of the new flock out scratching for their breakfast. They're in the corn patch side of the garden. Along about the beginning of October I'll move them into the orchard and pasture so I can till the corn patch preparatory to seeding it to winter rye. Some time in December when the other forage has been frost killed I'll move them back in so they'll have green feed for the cool season. Along about the end of March I'll move them out again so I can prep the ground for the year's corn crop after they've fertilized as well as cleaning up a fair part of the insects and weed seed to be found.


There are two new birds in that flock that I haven't mentioned before as they came on the scene since the last time I updated the blog. One of my egg customers asked me if I could take in a couple of birds that belonged to a friend. To my surprise she lives in one of the oldest subdivisions in Gainesville very nearly a stone's throw from the University president's house. She's kept hens for years but finally ended up with a neighbor who complained so felt compelled to find them a new home. I am now become the repository for unwanted chickens it seems.

So, this is Stella the Speckled Sussex. She's the first Sussex I've ever had and now that I've seen her I wish I'd gotten some years ago as she's right pretty. A good big bird too.


And this is her companion Buffy the Buff Orpington who is a still bigger bird. In fact I think she'd give Cogburn a run for his money in the weight department. She's the biggest bird in the new flock, but gentle soul that she is she's near the bottom of the pecking order I'm afraid. It took a day or so for that to get hashed out so they now pretty much coexist peacefully though she doesn't cotton too much to the boss bird getting fresh with her!


Speaking of the Boss Bird here he is. He's not full grown yet but is showing signs that he's going to develop into a pretty boy. He's as randy as you'd expect of a young rooster, but isn't too hard on the hens so I left him with the flock. I haven't decided on a name for him yet, but being the Boss Bird he should have one. I'm sure something will suggest itself presently.


And what became of the other boys in the flock? Well, when you have a bunch of teenage boys with too much time on their hands and nothing much to do with it they quickly made themselves a nuisance to all concerned. Matters got to the point that half the hens didn't want to come off the roost during the day which is no way to run a poultry operation so the time came for them to get a place of their own. They're now all in the Bachelor Pad.


It's a dumpy looking place, but that's because I was about to take it apart for salvageable materials when I decided I needed to move the boys out so it was pressed into service again this one last time. They're not too happy with the situation, but most have resigned themselves to it. When I first moved them one of them would fly over the fence each day trying to get back to the ladies. They had enough smarts to fly over one fence, but not enough smarts to figure out they had to fly over the second fence to get back to their old flock so they'd spend all day getting no love and no water until sundown when I'd chase them back to where they belonged. Except for the Maran from the old flock the rest elected not to give it a second go.

I moved the extra roosters from the old flock into the Bachelor Pad as well as they were running the hens there ragged just like the young ones were doing. There's just Cogburn and the little Silkie cock Shadow in there now and the hens seem happier for it. I tried to move the Cuckoo Maran birds one night only to have a misadventure which ended up with me losing both of them in the dark. Their barred feather pattern blends in very well with the brush at night! I was able to recover one the next morning, but his brother got himself eaten, probably by a coon judging from the feathers I found strewn all over the orchard. I have developed a strong dislike for coons over the years. The one remaining Maran still tries to get back to his old flock from time to time (those Frenchies!), but being a chicken he's pretty easy to catch by simply waiting for the sun to go down. He'll get the message one of these days I suppose. Or finally annoy me enough to receive a dinner invite!

In the next couple of days I'll try to get something up about the fruits of the harvest this year.

.....Alan.