I was surprised by the ferocity of the winds last night. We have been lucky so far with most of the winds coming at us from a protected side. Last night, winds were from the S and our big firs are on the southside of the house. I quickly shut off the TV, found a flashlight and decided to leave the den. Branches were hitting the roof, the power went off and I decided it was time to go to bed -- in the part of the house away from the trees. This morning there is quite a bit of debris and one branch about 5 inches through leaning on a fence but we escaped unscathed. I think it's time Mother Nature gave us a rest -- we want to know why she is sending our nice winter weather to Ontario and the NE states. Doesn't she know that we expect that?

Saw nothing coming up from Seattle early AM until I hit a blackout and branches and garbage all over in my area, starting about Lynnwood. While waiting for a light on 99 saw a bucket blow all the way through the interchange and beyond, just like a car.

Power came back on early this afternoon.

The lush-looking grass around the gum in your pictures might indicate that spot has the wrong moisture and nutrient regime for such a tree. Allelopathic chemicals coming out of the grass might also be a problem, trees and grass are adversaries. Gums seem to have a tendency to grow in severe habitats where there is often not alot of dense ground vegetation.

Oh, Ian - sorry about your Eucalyptus viminalis. It doesn't look like it fell on anything major though including your fence....?

It started getting nasty here on the coast in late afternoon while I was still running errands - wearing the only weatherproof coat with big hood in the house that can be seen in public (fishing, gardening I've got), DH's GeoDesign parka that goes clear to my knees. No pride here. By dinner time, the 5 arborvitae on the E side of the house, now 6' above the gutter line, were snapping back from the W wind and smacking my new metal gutters, filling them with debris. Have to prune those :)

Could someone tell me what's with the snow in the forecast for Tuesday night? I really don't think we need more snow; we need a little sun and a lot less rain. I'm playing Simon says with myself when I try to get out to weed or clean...one giant step here so you don't step on the overly saturated lawn, one giant step there so as not to compact any roots in the bed....and I've got short legs.

In July we'll all be wondering when it's going to rain again.

I like wondering when it's going to rain again.

You are right about mother nature being kind to the NE USA this winter. Yesterday, it was in the low 70's here with sunny skies, after tropical downpours earlier in the morning. Many locations recorded the highest temperatures ever in January. This might seem great, but this is creating problems. Some flowering trees, particularly cherry trees, have burst into full bloom this week as far north as Boston. Hydrangea buds are breaking. Perennials are starting to grow. When we get some real cold again, there will be some plant damage. So, much for spring!

Used to lots of rain in Oregon but not this constant WIND !!! Why does each and every storm now come with gusting blowing roaring damaging wind? It never used to be this windy. Thank goodness I staked my trees when I planted them last December 2005. Will take the chainlocks off July and put them back on September. Otherwise the south wind funneling through will blow all the baby trees getting established down.

It's been warm here. The iris are up 6" and the daffodils 4". Buds are swelling. The nobbs on the salix smithiana willows are about to burst. The roses are putting forth pink nubbins.

Hope the arctic swoop they're predicting for next week never goes below freezing! And yes it needs to RAIN much more in the summer here. The summers have become unbearably dry and HOT, scorching relentless burning sun. A balance would be nice :-)

Actually, the PNW has been in a cool, wet phase since well before any of us were born. Multiple times in the post-glacial past it has been hotter and drier than it is now.

Trees toppling all over the place recently. Maybe it was that wet weather late last year. County park north of here has them down left and right, like I've never seen before (on that site). Way more logs on the forest floor than I have seen. Lots of new snags. Was thinking it was a bonanza for pileated woodpeackers, had one land in a nearby alder right after, and work its way up the trunk.

Another alder close by somehow ended up split up the middle, as though fileted, detached from the ground well away from wherever it was attached to the roots and leaning against another tree. Don't remember seeing that combination before.

It seems like we've had a lot of wind here for some reason although I don't have any statistics to say if that's true, or just me getting older and less patient....

Some official rainfall records for my location though that might be interesting -
Annual total 1993 - 61.35" Totals 2004 and 2005 respectively, 68.40", 76.57". Followed by 2006 with a drenching 100.50", one of 12 years since 1891 rainfall has topped 100" here. Grays Harbor...

You're having alot of wind there because you're getting older and less patient? I'm taking naturopathics for wind, myself. Of course, trees still get blown over.

As I've mentioned before there are layers of golden chinkapin pollen in some local peat deposits, showing that periodically the climate dries out and these march up from Oregon, become common here. At the moment there are a few stragglers in the Olympic rain shadow above Hood Canal and some in the southern WA cascades, near Oregon. We have to get like Portland here first before we are going outside of the normal parameters - not that that means we aren't heading there quickly.

The soil is fairly nutrient rich, heavy clay with varying degrees of 'hardpan' about 8-12 inches down. None of it has great drainage, but it is not a permanent swamp. In summer it all dries up and turns brown, even most of that lush looking stuff. We'll see what that means in the next 10 years, maybe most of my eucs will fall over during that time period. But so far, those that have had problems are in the minority.

The E. viminalis did hit the fence, but the fence wasn't damaged. Thanks for the thoughts... it was a beautiful tree. It had a better than usual weeping habit for E. viminalis, and narrower than usual leaves and smooth white bark.

This winter has been stormier than usual.... one of the stormiest I can remember, in fact. 1996-97 was pretty bad but I think this winter has been worse.

Now whose ready for a nice arctic blast? Actually, it doesn't look too apocalyptic at this point.... just another moderate blast, not enough to make this the next landmark winter.

On another note... I went and visited the Chrysolepis population near Hood Canal in early November. I found a lot more trees than I had managed to discover previously, including some that can be viewed from Highway 101 if you know just where too look, and some growing deep in the forest far away from salt water. This is a very interesting area in that it is very wet, receiving 80-100" of rain annually, but still dries out sufficiently in summer to support extensive populations of manzanita, madrona and Ceanothus velutinus.

I'd like to see the tall one there listed in CHAMPION TREES OF WASHINGTON STATE. When I stopped at the ranger station the ranger who nominated it was out of the office. Someone else directed me to where they thought it might be based on the location listed in CHAMPION TREES. I never saw it but did find a few small ones on a sliding slope of coarse soil, competing with young Douglas firs and fighting a foliar infestation.

Exposed, moving soil is a typical location for such large-seeded trees to appear.

Cold weather still forecast for tomorrow on. Ugh. I may have a daily commitment starting in downtown Seattle 8AM Tuesday and going on for weeks.

If climate is shifting variable weather may become routine.

I didn't find any Chrysolepises that big - but that reference prompted me to look farther off Hwy 101. The ones closer to Hwy 101 were mostly out in the open... the ones farther inland (at least those I found this time) were in deep dark coniferous forest, surprisingly.

This winter has been somewhat dramatic but I still don't think there's anything too weird about this weather... we've just been spoiled with a lot of tame winters between 1999-2005.

I'm just catching up on posts, so wanted to say sorry about losing the Eucalyptus. That's too bad as it was obviously a lovely tree. Thanks for the pics though, and the probable cause.

Take care,
Grant

My obligation got moved to Wed. but Comcast is now showing snow showers Tue., with the softening (nights above freezing) that was previously forecast for today not coming until Wed. At the moment we are having a pretty, gentle snowfall here in Edmonds.

Last night the 10 day outlook showed cold continuing with snow showers Jan. 21. Eeeeek! My Wed. thing may be the start of as long as 2 months of daily trips to downtown Seattle.

Grant - thanks.

Latest word from the National Weather Service is "Confidence in the long term forecast is increasingly low." Well, they have a tough job, staring at all those computer models all day and trying to figure out which, if any, will be close to accurate.

Staring at models all day doesn't sound so tough to me. Ohhhhhhhhhh: computer models.

Page linked to by Comcast is showing upper 40s by the 28th. Yessss!

Make that 48 by the upper 20s.