2011

Friday July 8th, 2011

Greetings and welcome!

My apologies on not having an early week update. It was a bad week around here with the short week making it more concentrated. Like many of you I will be looking forward to putting that behind me and getting some weekend in.

The weekend weather looks interesting. I checked 4 sources and got 4 different ideas. We have a weak cold front expected to be over us today and as the heat an humidity build it could bring some showers and storms later in the day.

The NWS has the front moving north into the UP, but it could head south again tomorrow again bringing the chance of rain.

The North American Model (NAM) is showing a storm coming in from the west about Saturday night as a line of thunderstorms. It could bring some heavy rain if it actually unfolds that way.

The GFS is also showing a line of storms, but they are a little slower with it, bringing it through early Sunday morning.

The TV weather channel is the best looking one, with a chance of storms today and again Sunday afternoon or night.

It is a challenging weekend to forecast. The atmosphere will be hot and humid, there is cold air just to the north, and all it takes is a trigger to set off the instability. In our case the triggers are the warm/cold air boundary today, and a jet steak area of energy that is predicted to pass over Northern WI for anywhere from Saturday to Sunday night.

The atmosphere will have some energy available as we see hot and humid air building in as the weekend progresses.  My best bet is that we will be ok Saturday until at least late afternoon, and the chance for rain goes up Sunday as that day progresses. With highs around 90 and plenty of humidity, I think that is the one to watch.

I always hated physics in college and tech school, but now watching the weather it is fascinating. It is amazing how much energy it takes to evaporate water, and it doesn’t give anything off. That energy is stored in a humid atmosphere in immense amounts, just waiting for a trigger.

One metric that I watch is CAPE, Conductive Available Potential Energy. To oversimplify it, it represents the potential of the atmosphere to produce rapidly building storms and severe weather.

In the case of the storm for this afternoon the CAPE is estimated at about 1,200 J/kg, and Sunday afternoon they are in the 1,500-2,000 J/kg range. That tells me that both will bring the chance of a thunderstorm, and Sunday’s 2,000 high end could mean some pretty good ones.  When you get over about 2,500 watch out, that is a very unstable atmosphere.

So anyway bottom line on the weather- It looks like a hot July weekend. There is the best chance for showers or T-storms today and Sunday afternoon, but a minor chance all weekend.

We have some big events this weekend.

At the top of the list is the 3rd annual Northeast Poker Run and Super Dave Memorial Party. It is a big poker run that benefits the Crivitz Food Pantry. It involves 10 local bars and campgrounds. Super Dave was a great guy and bike mechanic that offered free road service to broken down bikers on the poker run. He passed away the day after the poker run a few years ago and is very much missed by a lot of people. Anyway, here is a poster.

Saturday is also the Athelstane Volunteer Fire Department Annual Parade & Picnic.  The parade lines up at 10:30 am at town hall (On Hwy A just north of C) proceeding to Fireman’s Park. Activities include men, women and kids’ water fight competitions, games, grab bags, silent auction, Rafflemania and refreshments including home made french fries.
Music in the evening will be provided by Force of Habit.

It will be a hot weekend so a good one to get wet floating down the Menominee River on a Bear Point Yacht Club Float Trip Saturday. They get together in the morning and do shuttles and then the float trip starts at 11. They float down the river in anything from an inner tube to a pontoon boat and end at the Bear Point for more fun.

We will be at Kosir’s as always, and it should be a good weekend. We only had a little rain this week, but the rivers are doing ok. The Peshtigo is at about a +1, and 335cfs. It doesn’t seem to be going down any, so we should have an above normal weekend. The median flow for today over the last 12 years is 205cfs, and we are at 335.

With the hot weather expected it would be a good weekend to take to the river in a funyak or tube, or take a sit on top kayak out on the flowage. Kosir’s.

That is about it for me. Have a good weekend and thank you for visiting!

RJB

Friday July 1st, 2011

Greetings and welcome!

We are on the edge of a very nice 3 day holiday weekend this morning.

Today is expected to get very hot and humid as a warm front passes us and brings juicy southern air. Temperatures in the low 90s doesn’t sound too bad until you figure in that dew points in the 70s will make it extremely humid. That will lift the ‘feels like’ temperature over 100F this afternoon.

That heat and humidity is expected to break overnight as a cold front passes through and brings high pressure for the weekend. The passing front could trigger some showers or storms late tonight or early in the morning Saturday.

The rain is not expected to add up to a lot around here, it looks like more of a demonstration of the cold front passing than a protracted rain. The HPC QPF has us in the 1/4-1/2″ range. To the northwest of Eagle River it goes as high as an inch. The difference is probably timing with the storm calming down as the night progresses. The morning TV news is showing it down to a hit or miss line of scattered storms by the time that it gets here.

Once our line of rain passes we are expecting a great summer weekend. High pressure should bring clear weather. We are expecting mid-80s for Saturday and low 80s for Sunday and Monday, and overnight temps in the high 50s. The next mention of rain in the forecast comes Tuesday.

As predicted the Peshtigo River will be above normal this weekend for all of you rafters out there. My early prediction was +6-12 and I revised it down to 4-6, maybe a little higher. Right now it is about +10, and it should be about +7 or 8 tomorrow.

People should be really happy about that, it is a Goldilocks level. It isn’t huge so anyone can do it, and it isn’t rocky, so it is a lot more fun. This is the best water for the 4th of July in recent memory. Don’t hesitate to go rafting this weekend.

I was saddened this week to read about the passing of a local fellow named Gervase Hemphner. He was a town board member in the Town of Stephenson for a while, and was a state legislator. He was also a spirited guy who could get people fired up.

I knew Geravse from my work with the Wild Shores Preservation Alliance, a group that we founded to keep the High Falls and Caldron Falls Flowages from becoming a 1,200 lot subdivision when WPS sold them off. His contacts in the state government were invaluable as was his knowledge of the process and contributions at meetings. Part of his legacy will always be the formation of the Peshtigo River State Forest and Tommy Thompson State Park.

The DNR has been on TV a lot this week saying that they will be at state boat landings over the weekend checking for people that don’t drain the water and clean the weeds from their boats and trailers. They are trying to raise awareness about transferring invasive species and VHS fish virus between lakes. As usual they will also be on OWI boating and playing unsafely too close to shore and swimmers, and sticker & PFD (life jacket)  enforcement.

You can probably expect the same kind of push from law enforcement watching for OWI, seat belts or aggressive/unsafe driving. That is standard holiday weekend stuff.

The only thing that I have to add to my event calendar below is that they are having a DJ at Caldron Falls Bar. Beyond that the list is up to date with everything that I’m aware of.

Have a fun and safe holiday weekend and thank you for visiting!

RJB

Tuesday June 28th, 2011

Greetings and welcome!

It was a heck of a weekend for the folks around Kosir’s. The rivers were running at historically high levels for this time of year and people that came rafting had a great ride. There were a lot less wipeouts than I had expected, but there was still some carnage. The weekend itself was fantastic for weather too. There are quite a few pictures and a video on the Riversport Digital and Kosir’s Rafting Facebook pages.

Yesterday we had a line of storms come and split around us for a while. It didn’t last though, and an hour or so before sunset we had a line of thunderstorms come through. It featured quite a few lightning cracks and a good steady downpour.

About sunset I was driving east in the forest and could see a big black cloud in the rear view mirror. We really dodged a bullet on that one. The atmosphere was really loaded with ready to evaporate mist in the trees and above the ground. Had the sun been up to stir that up we probably would have seen severe weather out of it. As it stood the sun set just in time and evaporative  cooling cooled the surface air down enough to stop the convection.

The whitewater rafting continues to be great. The river dropped from it’s peak of +28 last Friday night at midnight to about +16 today. My best guess for the weekend is for the Peshtigo to be in the +4-6 range and a good chance of it being above 6. It takes some time to drain enough water to make it run that high, and it should not be too rocky this weekend.

The weather this week and weekend looks clear and seasonal according to the NWS outlook. Friday looks like  hot one, getting close to 90. Saturday looks like mid-80s and Sunday looks a little cooler. Monday looks like more of the same for the 4th.

The GFS was showing the weekend rain staying to our south. The QPF map showed a line at about Hwy 64 where north of that we would see 1/4″ or less for the weekend. The same map quickly ramps up precip amounts as you go south, with parts of the state seeing an inch or so of rain. So far the outlook here is a good one with only a minor chance of showers about Sunday, with the 6 hour QPF in the lowest 0.01-0.1″ band.

I would add Repel to the shopping and packing list for the weekend. The bugs have been hit and miss in my travels. In one spot I can stand untouched and a hundred steps away there is a cloud of gnats and mosquitoes. When you miss it is nice, when you hit it is nice to have Repel.

Also in the bug report.. it is the time of year where we start seeing some of the more spectacular moth species. I have seen a Spinx moth as well as a cecropia already. The luna moths should be along shortly.

I also spotted a black pine sawyer last weekend, and he went with a satisfying crunch.  They are like a giant beetle with big long antennae. They can take as much as 5-8 years in the larval stage before emerging as an adult. Since this occurs in pine trees, they are very destructive.

There are a wide variety of wildflowers this week including hawkeye, white daisy, and the yellow ones that look like tall firm stemmed dandelions. Add in a little purple from clover and it is a good show along road sides.

There have been quite a few deer spotted with fawns this week, and some with twins.

According to the solunar tables, Thursday is a new moon. That puts Friday and Saturday as peak fishing days, and Sunday just past the peak days. It is nice when that lines up on a holiday weekend.

This year the 4th of July lands on a Monday. That essentially gives a lot of people a three day weekend. As a result there are a lot of events to gather up for the weekend.

Friday July 1

Goodman Firemans 4th of July Street Dance music by Cest La Vie (a very good band)

Saturday July 2

Twin Bridge Ski Team Fireworks and ski show at Boat Landing #3 on High Falls Flowage

Wausaukee 4th of July Celebration and Firecraker 5K walk Run. The walk/run starts at 8am. Parade at 1pm on 141, followed by events at the fairgrounds and in the alley behind Bank North. Fireworks at dusk. Live music, crafts , kids games, more.

Mountain Fireworks Celebration- Live bands, fireworks at dark, craft sale, kids trout tank and bounce houses, horse shoes and softball tournament, bucket brigade competition and raffles, starts with a breakfast at 7:30am

Sunday July 3

Curve Inn Resort and Campground– Live music with Brothers & More Band from 9pm to 2am Fireworks at 10:30 PM

Marty Cooper Memorial Celebration at Bear Point Yacht Club– Join Marty’s family and friends as we celebrate Marty’s life.

Crivitz softball tournament and fireworks at the high school at dusk

Crooked Lake Sportsman’s Club Annual Picnic at 11am

Boat Parade On the Townsend Flowage 8:30 P.M.

Monday July 4th

Crivitz parade at 11am followed by a flag raising and a flea market, live music and fireman’s challenge.

Townend Family Fun on the 4th at the fire department garage 10-4pm- Music, food, and raffles, Fireworks Extravaganza at dusk, at the ballpark. Floats, bands and prizes. Parade at noon. Kids games 5:00 P.M. at the ball park (ages 12 and under). Food and refreshments served on the grounds. Arts and Crafts Fair sponsored by the Townsend Festival Committee at Townsend Fire Garage 10:00 A.M. to 4:00 P.M. Food and beer tents sponsored by the Townsend Fire Department.

Got all of that?

Next weekend we have some big events too..

The last thing on my outline today is to report on the bluster over the forgotten road. Highway C for about 6 miles east of the Forest County line has been under construction and pretty rough for a while. Now there is a petition at the Silver Cliff BP asking them to step it up. Along the road there apparently is a sign too. As seen on Jeff Deebo’s Facebook page..

Well I think that my damage is done here and it is time to move along. Thank you to the people that came rafting last weekend and stopped by to say hello.

Thank you all for visiting and have a good week!

RJB

Thursday June 23, 2011 Paddler’s Alert!

Greetings and welcome!

This week the hot topic is the rain. My bucket as of 2:14pm has 3 5/8″ in it for this week’s storm total. That bucket was emptied Tuesday morning, and the first few drops of rain fell on me as I set it back up.

That is just a local measurement. Some areas got less, some more. The Wolf River, Menominee River and Peshtigo River watersheds all got slammed. Rumor has it that they shut the Wolf down due to high water levels. That isn’t going to happen on the Peshtigo unless it gets a lot higher, the Menominee River is getting close.

People that get to go rafting Friday or this weekend are in for an epic adventure. The Peshtigo is running at +25″, just huge! Likewise the Menominee is running over 6,000CFS, again just huge. If you are looking to feed the adreneline rat or want to be able to brag about how big it was when you ran it, get on the phone with Kosir’s. This is it.

It is very unusual to have water this high at this time of year. Usually if you want water in the 20+ inch range on the Peshtigo you are talking about the second or third weekend in April, when the water is under 40 degrees and the day might be too. To have this and a weekend in the mid-70s and sunny is very very unusual.

The folks around Kosir’s are really pumped up, and you can count me in that number (obviously). It is going to really be a big weekend around here. Next weekend will still be good too, this much water can’t drain off that fast, but if you want peak flow and adventure, don’t hesitate.

The rain pretty much kept me inside most of the week, so I don’t have much to offer beyond the rafting stuff, except for this one little tidbit..

Gas prices are going down again. The Nymex is down another dime to 2.86, off of the peak of 3.43 May 1st. The 2.90 level was an important barrier, hopefully that triggers some selling and more lowered prices. It has been as low as 2.78 today. At the pump add 65-75 cents to those numbers.

So far oil is down 4-5% today, and I hope it gets out of hand and goes down 40 or 50%.

Well it is a very full day, so forward I must madly dance. Have a good weekend and thank you for visiting!

RJB