Greetings and welcome!
Hooray hooray the first of May…
We have a very soggy morning in Silver Cliff this Wednesday morning. We had a rain storm overnight that brought heavy rain. Looking out of the window I would estimate it to be easily between ¾ and 1” of rainfall. I wasn’t expecting quite that much. I hope that my car window was closed..
Anyway.. my various rain gauges that I consult are showing between ½ and 3/4”. My puddles and erosion disagree.
The rain did hit the Peshtigo River watershed in a big way, and it is perfectly timed for the weekend. Weekend whitewater paddlers and rafters will have some great water to play in this weekend. The river is running at a delightful +22” this morning, and this rain should take it into the upper 20s for Saturday morning. Whitewater rafting will be excellent this weekend.
Peshfest (4th annual..) was a smash hit. There were tons of people and Kosirs/Rapids Resort was a whitewater central last weekend. The river was huge and a lot of people came and had a great time. Everyone is looking forward to #5. Thank you to all of the people that made it so fun.
Normally at this time of year I start talking about fire danger. The dead vegetation from last year dries out and becomes tinder for wildfires. Added to the spring breeze that is frequently here and a nice sunny low humidity day and fires can get out of hand quickly.
We have dodged that bullet this year. There was a lot of moisture from so much snow, and now we have soaking rains and high humidity. The grass is starting to green up, so we just might have a very uneventful spring wildfire season.
The Marinette Co ATV trails remain closed. It can happen when they open back up the first weekend in May, but according to my sources it isn’t happening this year. There is no set date for the ATV trails to re-open. It all depends on how the ground progresses in drying out. We will need to wait at least another week.
They close the ATV trails when the snowmobile trails close in March or April. The ground gets really soft while the frost comes out of the ground. Even a couple of riders can do a lot of damage, so they close the trails while the ground firms up. While there was not a really deep frost this year we had a tremendous amount of snow to melt. Look at that in the context of some of the deep forests up by Hwy 8. I was still seeing a little snow last week in really sheltered spots around here. Farther north they likely still have a little drying out to do.
You can ignore the trail closures, but be ready for some fat fines and no shortage of people that will pounce on you or call you in. They want to ride too, and don’t want to see trails lost because of some inconsiderate riders doing damage. Don’t do it.
The opening of game fishing comes this weekend. Bass is catch and release until the third Saturday in June, but most other species open Saturday morning. The lakes that I have seen were open and ice free last week already, so that should not be an issue this year. Trout fishermen might not like the high water in the rivers, but otherwise we are headed for a good start on the fishing season.
One season that hasn’t started yet at my house is the bug season. Usually by now we have at least one pest showing up. So far this year there has been nothing. No gnats, mosquitoes, or ticks at all. I am a little surprised by that, and I expect that season to start any day now.
We have had a wet and colder than normal week. Yesterday we only got into the mid-40s for high temperatures. Our normal high temperature is close to 60 degrees. The weekend will finally bring some improvement on that. The TV says that we could see 60 and sunny Friday and 67 and sunny Saturday. Sunday brings a chance of morning showers and a high of about 60. I am ready for some of those 60s and 70s.
That wet and soggy weather has snubbed my plans for spring cleanup around the yard. It would be ideal for burning brush and leaves, but it has been too soggy to get that stuff gathered or to run the tractor and wagon to gather it all up. Hopefully that will turn around next week.
I am off to work. Have a good weekend and thank you for visiting!
RJB