A Serious Fall Frost, 2013

The winter solstice is still a month and a half away – December 21^st according to the calendar. But Jackie Frost has been here the last few nights as evidenced by the layer of white he’s been leaving here and there.  It’s a sure sign that summer is over and winter is making ready to descend.

When I was still teaching and traveled along the back road each day, I loved seeing the frost on the cranberry bogs with the accompanying dense layer of fog hovering just above ground level on early fall mornings.  Now my morning vista involves our expanse of lawn that turns frosty white and the sunrises over the bay that provide spectacular counterpoint to the somewhat bleak aspect of the garden.

A Serious Fall Sunrise, 2013

Of course, we could still have an Indian Summer.  Even though I’ve heard those warm days of the last few weeks referred to as just that, Farmer’s Almanac says that it’s not so.  Here are the criteria that the venerable publication lays out:

• As well as being warm, the atmosphere during Indian summer is hazy or smoky, there is no wind, the barometer is standing high, and the nights are clear and chilly.
• A moving, cool, shallow polar air mass is converting into a deep, warm, stagnant anticyclone (high pressure) system, which has the effect of causing the haze and large swing in temperature between day and night.
• The time of occurrence is important: The warm days must follow a spell of cold weather or a good hard frost.
• The conditions described above also must occur between St. Martin’s Day (November 11) and November 20. For over 200 years, The Old Farmer’s Almanachas adhered to the saying, “If All Saints’ (November 1) brings out winter, St. Martin’s brings out Indian summer.”

Frosty Under Foot

So, I’m looking forward to day after tomorrow.  Maybe we’ll have one more little spurt of warm, sunny weather.  Meanwhile, I’m bundling up for the morning and evening chicken run and watching out for that wintery skim of ice on their water container!  Brrrr.