The lowly Woolly Worm

Predicting climate in the old days relied upon observing cues in nature. The Farmers’ Almanac finds that people looked at woolly worms in late summer in get a sense of winter. The more black hairs on the worm, the colder and wetter the winter. Of course woolly worms come in all configurations of black and orange colorings so how could a worm’s coat predict winter? It can as an analogy;  you look at the forecast to decide which coat you’re going to wear before leaving home. I think you would want to wear a black coat as opposed to a white coat on a very cold and sunny day to maximize the amount of solar energy you could absorb. Woolly worms just plan far ahead.

Today we track global changes in wind patterns and sea surface temperatures to predict weather conditions. NOAA’s Climate Prediction Center has issued a climate forecast for this winter based on the El Niño pattern emerging in the Pacific Ocean.

Below are winter predictions for the U.S. indicating greater or lesser chances for departures in average winter temperatures and precipitation.

El Niño is a departure from average sea surface temperatures created by a change in the intensity and direction of equatorial winds. In a normal period, strong easterly trade winds blow across the Pacific and upwell cold, nutrient rich waters on the west coast of South America. These same winds also pile up water in the western Pacific so that the sea surface is about 2 feet higher at Indonesia than at Ecuador.

In an El Niño cycle, the winds are not as intense and warmer sea surface temperatures extend further to east. This change has a global impact on weather with increased precipitation on the west coast of South America and the south & east coasts of North America. Warmer than normal conditions also occur at higher latitudes in North America and over the Pacific ocean.

El Niño Sea Surface Temperatures in °C

The lowest temperature recored at Mt. LeConte for September 29 was 24° F and that happened in 2003. The coldest night ever recorded since 1988 was -22° F, which occurred last February 4.

Station reports for 7:30 am, September 28 - 7:30 am, September 29:

STATION             ELEV    HIGH    LOW     PCPN    SNOW DEPTH
SUGARLAND CENTER    1600     75      45     0.00
NEWFOUND GAP        5000     62      25     0.00
CADES COVE          1900     73      44     0.00
OCONALUFTEE         2040     79      42     0.00
MOUNT LECONTE       6400     57      31     0.01

http://www.outrageGIS.com/weather/grsm

Look Rock, Sept. 24

After a few months of intermittent outage, all four weather observation cameras for the Great Smoky Mountains National Park are now operational. We archive full-day animations for 3 webcams and the visible satellite view of the park every day at:
http://www.outragegis.com/weather/img/animation/yesterday.

For previous days, you can access other days by replacing “yesterday” with the 6-digit year month day combination. For example, for September 24, 2009 replace “yesterday” with “090924″and create this link:
http://www.outragegis.com/weather/img/animation/090924.

For highest resolution images, just click on the preview images.

The two National Park cameras are located on Look Rock and Purchase Knob. Look Rock camera overlooks most of the park. The two National Forest cameras, Cold Mountain and Joyce Kilmer Wilderness, overlook small portions of the park.

Now let’s watch fall pass in the mountains!

Join a group of trail enthusiasts and forest & park officials at the Daniel Boone NFS headquarters in Winchester to discuss the future of the Sheltowee Trace. We need as many committed folks as possible to attend. Voice your support for the Sheltowee Trace.

If you would like to attend, you can RSVP here with a comment so we can plan for breakfast and lunch!

Time: 9:30am
Where: Clark County Extension Office (map below)
1400 Fortune Dr
Winchester, KY 40391-8292
(859) 744-4682

Preliminary Agenda

9:30 to 10:00 – Meet and Greet – Coffee, Juice and Bagels, Donuts provided.

10:00 Opening Comments

• Frank Beum, Forest Supervisor, Daniel Boone National Forest
• Steve Handley, Big South Fork National Recreational Area, National Park Service
• Carey Tichenor, Ky State Parks and Recreation
• Steve Barbour, Interim Executive Director, The Sheltowee Trace Association

10:30 – Updates on the Current Condition of The Trace in each Ranger District and Plans for the next 12 to 24 months

10:45 – Current Management Plan Development

• Federal and State Funding Levels
• Challenges of a Muti-use Trail
• Current on-going volunteer programs
• Short Term and Long Term Maintenance Issues
• Trace Blazing - Signage
• Land Acquisition
• Trace Relocation
• Maintaining Easements
• Development of the Volunteer Base
• Promoting The Trace across the state

Following these discussion will be a session on forming the Sheltowee Trace Association, a non-profit dedicated to promoting and protecting this National Recreation Trail.

Map:Here

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Directions: If you can name or locate all of the suspension bridges on the Sheltowee Trace, then you can receive our new Sheltowee Trace map for free. Name all of the them and tell us which is the largest and which is the smallest, then you’ll get three free maps of your choice.

How to submit you answer: Email your answer to contest@outrageGIS.com beginning Friday, August 21, 2:00pm EST. You must be the seventh correct email to win. You only get one try and we’ll take your first answer.

If you’re not the 7th person to answer either question correctly, then you will still receive a bonus coupon to use at our online store. Just give it a try!

Ok….which bridge is this? If you need a little help, visit http://www.sheltoweetrace.com

Locations of Lexington’s community gardens. Gardens maintained by Seedleaf: Nourishing communities by growing, cooking, sharing, and recycling food.

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After the successful release of our new edition of the Red River Gorge Backpacking Guide last May, we’re now deep into making a comprehensive map of the Sheltowee Trace.

This is our most ambitious mapping and publishing project yet. We’re showing the entire 282 miles of foot, equestrian, and multiuse trail at 1:32,000 scale…that’s 1 inch to a 1/2 mile. So in this publication, you’ll be able to hold the full Trace in your hands…all 12 feet of it.

Let’s think of it a different way. To show this trail adequately, we’re designing and printing over 24 sq. ft. of map at full-color. That’s equivalent to making a 4×6 foot map that labels every stream, destination, and trail. This is a generous allotment of time and paper, but the trail’s incredible beauty and future deserve it. The Sheltowee is Kentucky longest hiking trail and frankly certain parts need to be used more by hikers.

Like our other maps, the Trace map will be a fine navigation tool. We’re dropping in latitude/longitude grids for GPS navigation, mile markers for the Trace that have been meticulously measured, 50-ft topographic elevation contours, canopy cover, and connecting trails and trailheads.

We’ll release the South edition for the Woodland Park Art Fair this August, with the North edition following shortly after. Each edition will have same format: an overview map that gets you to the major trailheads and the topographic trail maps. The image on the left shows a draft of the overview map. To the general layout of the detailed maps, visit here (note these do not show any text yet, just a preview of how we’re gonna make the Sheltowee).

The Trace is a 286-mile National Recreation Trail that connects recreation areas in the Daniel Boone National Forest, Big South Fork, Cumberland Falls, and Natural Bridge State Park.

Enter Yesterday: a site of prior-day animations of federal web cams and satellite imagery located here at http://www.outragegis.com/weather/img/animation/yesterday. Note this page always shows conditions for the prior day since they are full-day timelines.

The Great Smokies have about one mile of vertical relief and weather conditions can be dramatically different depending on your elevation. Whatever it’s a line of thunderstorms or fog in the valleys on a calm morning, this is a visual record of evolving conditions…only of course it happens during daylight. For the weather nut who likes to take it a step further, the page gives data from park’s 5 weather stations for the same day….and it’s all archived.

How was it done? After tinkering with ImageMagick and FFmpeg, I made a script that creates full-day animations of the webcams in the Great Smokies and visible satellite images from NOAA. What will it become? Consider it a visual archive of the atmosphere and movements of the Sun in the Great Smokies. Any suggestions are welcome.

Some notes for updates: I haven’t fully utilized the flash embedded video (see the two samples below, top is animated gif and below is embedded flash video). The problem is setting animations in sync together, e.g., sun rises at the same time in all movies. With an animated .gif, I think you simply need to refresh your browser after all of the images are loaded to get a partial sync. A better solution is out there. I can also increase the sampling rate for smoother play; now it’s two samples an hour.

Weather map and webcam animation for the Great Smokies

[See post to watch Flash video]

These are also archived, so if you go to the smokies for a backcountry trip, you’ll be able to find your days here.

So the month of May is nearly done and with it, ends the month-long celebration of the bike and human-powered travel. As a hiker, I often worry about my environmental impact during a drive to a favorite trailhead.

How can I minimize fuel consumption and make better? I reason that if I bike as my primary form of transportation, I will only need to drive during my trips to the woods. This works great if I have a network of safe and continuous bike lanes and trails in the city. Enter Bike Lexington.

I’m proud to say that I contributed a small share to bike community here. I took the artwork designed by Cricket Press (shown by the poster design left) and made the Bike Lexington interactive calendar (shown here), which hopefully encourages people to bike more. Building the site definitely exposed me to vibrant groups and events that helped me stay committed to biking in Lexington.

After this month is over though, biking doesn’t stop. Check out the website for new events throughout the year or join the newsletter subscription to stay updated.