Spirit - the amazing grey dewlap toulouse gander!

[Iain Utah]

Sorry about the frozen eggs. My goodness that is cold weather!

 

[Going Bhonkers]

When does it start to warm up for you all up north?

 

[Miss Lydia]

It's pouring sleet right now and 21 suppose to be into the 40's-50's next week. Crazy weather.

 

[Iain Utah]

We usually are in the upper 40s/20s in February, but typically have a lot of snow showers. Then March/April we will have big swings back and forth. So far, this winter has been at least 10 degrees below average and we have not gotten as much snow as normal. But we are in the high 30s this morning and it was mid 40s yesterday, so it feels like a heat wave!!

 

[LightningTFarm]

Janet - glad to hear Spirit is doing so well!

Our weather has warmed up a bit from December, when we had quite a few nights down into the mid-20s F, which is cold for us that early in the winter. I planted a lot of annual rye grass in the fall, and it is lush and green right now. My only concern is the transitional period, when the annual rye is dying down and the perennial grasses are coming up. I hope they overlap!

We had another earthquake last night. So weird to be having earthquakes in East Texas! This one was fairly short, but hit the scales at 4.1 on the Richter scale. Enough to have glasses crashing out of cabinets in the kitchen, pictures flying off the walls, bookshelves falling off the wall and dumping books everywhere. Part of the brick on the front of the house is now 1/4 inch away from the house, with a big crack running from the door to a big picture window. Such fun in the middle of the night! Nobody got much sleep around here!

The ducks and geese were fine this morning, though, as were the horses. We were the only ones upset.

 

[Going Bhonkers]

Wow! Glad you are ok, Lightning!

 

[LightningTFarm]

Thanks, we are fine. My mom is 81 and has high blood pressure, and these earthquakes always make her blood pressure spike. She is not happy unless she has something to worry about, so now she is worrying that our house will fall down someday. Theses quakes are causing damage, but I don't think the house will fall down. My brother is in Afghanistan, and his wife emailed him about it and he was worried. We Skyped him and reassured him that we were all okay, but he was laughing because he could see the picture on the wall behind us was all crooked!

 

[Iain Utah]

It's shocking to hear about earthquakes in East Texas. So scary! Glad you are all ok!!

 

[Miss Lydia]

That is scary, we have earth quakes here but their usually in the 2 range. but I can't imagine going through one. Glad everyone is okay.

 

[LightningTFarm]

We started having them in 2012. Apparently they have had them before, but not since around 1968. Back then there were two big man-made lakes East Texas being filled up with water, and scientists think there was a connection. Now we have very deep salt-water injection wells around here, putting waste water from fracking underground. Geologists think that's why we are having earthquakes now. I guess the injected salt water is "lubricating" the fault or something. It's certainly not something I expected to experience when I moved up here. I just wish they would stop! We are going to have to start taking some anti-earthquake measures around here, since it is becoming apparent that these quakes are not going away.