Greetings and welcome!
We have finally been getting some rain. After a fantastic day Saturday, Saturday night and Sunday brought some rain. There was an initial series of rain bands overnight and then Sunday some scattered hit and miss showers. Some of them had some pretty torrential downpours but it did not add up to that much.
Sunday’s hit and miss lines of showers made for some interesting weather. A trip to Crivitz started with rainy and damp weather in Silver Cliff. As I crossed into Criviz the skies parted and it was a partly cloudy day. On the way back at sunset there was a dark sky as I went west in Silver Cliff, and as I got closer to the river there was even a lot of mist in the trees. What a huge difference 30 miles made.
Monday brought a very windy day and falling temperatures. The cold air behind the storm was cold enough that we even saw a few snow pellets falling, and at one point a snow flurry. The radar showed Northern MN, NW WI, and the UP seeing a lot more snow.
I wondered if it is unusual to have snow when it was 80-85 degrees a month before that.. Maybe it isn’t unusual in October, but it probably is in Spring.
Anyway, the rain gave the land a nice drink and helped to reduce fire danger.
I would also expect that it will fuel a lot of green growth. There are quite a few trees with emerging leaves, and the grass is starting to really come in. I would expect to see rapid growth from both from the rain.
This weekend brought the first wild flower sighting of the season, some wild strawberries blooming down by the river. The choke cherry trees are also starting to bloom in the past few days.
So far the cold nights have held the pesky insect population in check. In my time spent outside in the past week I have not been bothered at all by gators, gnats, or even ticks. There are a few moths, and the other night the bats chasing them were driving my motion sensor light crazy.
There were a few critter sightings this week. There are a lot of deer out by the roadsides, probably feasting on the young grass growing there. There was a barred owl that I saw down by High Falls Flowage, and yesterday there was a squirrel that must have thought that I had Geico insurance, because he didn’t want to move.
Gas prices are a big item at this time of year. Right now the Silver Cliff BP is competitive at $3.86 a gallon. Looking at the NYMEX, there is a downward trend in the market, but nothing really compelling. May gas futures lost a penny in the last session. For the short term it looks like almost $4 is the going rate.
I don’t have any events on the calendar for the next few weeks other than the Iron Snowshoe banquet coming up this Sunday at Rene’s. That will pick up a lot as May and June come.
This week we have a storm coming for Wednesday that could bring as much as 1/4-1/2″ of rain. There is a small disturbance for about Thursday night that could just graze us with it’s northern edge. After that we are looking at clear weather for the weekend with highs around 50 Saturday and in the mid 50s Sunday. Tonight (Monday night) and Friday night look like the cold ones with lows in the mid-20s, and Wednesday and Sunday look line the warm days with highs in the mid and upper 50s.
Dan posted a comment asking about which roads will be open to ATVs this year. That is something that has been changing on a month to month basis as the towns and clubs figure out which town roads will and won’t work for trails.
Recent openings around here have brought a lot of new access. The Town of Stephenson has opened Caldron Falls Rd, Thunder Mountain Valley Rd, and Ranch Rd, which has allowed access to the area along Parkway by High Falls Flowage. You can get to places from Twin Bridge Resort north to Pine Acres Resort, and they are working on extending that.
The Hidden Bear ATV Club had a fundraiser late winter to rise money for signs to post ALL of the Town of Lakewood roads by the May Opening. The TOL roads that are already signed in the Nicolet National Forest allow acces from the west and south to places like Chickadee and Buck’s Ranch Road, which connect to Caldron Falls Rd, allowing access to the flowages area and to trails down by Hwy W.
It is good that the Town of Stephenson and Lakewood are on board with some ATV Access on town roads. The Peshtigo River State Forest and Nicolet National Forest have anti-ATV managers and have not been open to new trails. Thankfully the roads through the Nicolet are town roads, much to the USFS chagrin. Likewise the DNR has been vocally against opening roads around the state forest and blocked them at every turn in the forest plan. Thankfully the towns are finding some middle ground.
Silver Cliff has opened Boat Landing 11 Rd as an access trail to get to the other trails to the south, and I saw other signs up by Old J with the same mission.
I can really only tell you what I have seen in my travels or read about in the paper, this is not a comprehensive list. As I mentioned, this is evolving quickly as towns and clubs work out expanded access. It is very common to see ATV access proposals on the town board agendas.
I think that is about a wrap for this morning. Have a good week, and thank you for visiting!
RJB
