Well, the rain that didn't fall all summer fell during the month of November. Normally my wettest month, the rain fell with a vengeance and reloaded my rain barrels and then started spilling into puddles all over the neighborhood. Rivers of water running down the street. Even the rainshadow town near me had standing water in the streets. And then the Nooksak River up by the US-CA border jumped its banks and caused tremendous flooding in the town of Sumas, British Columbia, built in the basin of a lake that was drained back in the early 1900s. So, perhaps predictably, their lake-draining pumps were overwhelmed by the volume of rain and river, and the former lake recreated itself. Thousands of animals and their farmer people were flooded. Damages in the millions of dollars (not sure whether Canadian or U.S.).
After the wettest November in the state, ever, since records exist, December was mostly mild. Sure, while there were relentless waves of typical storm fronts coming through almost daily, for the most part the precipitation stayed rain, and the temps were in the 40s and even 50s. Until our Christmas miracle...a lowland white Christmas, courtesy of the "Fraser Outflow" from British Columbia, channeling the cold from the North Pole down through the mountain passes and aiming all that cold right into the Puget Sound region (sort of like a lake basin of lowland between mountain ranges, hollowed out by the glaciers during the last Ice Age). Cold plus precipitation makes the white stuff.
I may live in the foothills, but I am not a fan of snow. Not with my animals, and, well, footHILLS. Driving becomes dangerous, no matter how careful or rigged up you are. Once, sometime in the past decade, we had a lot of snow. Something like ten cars went off the road on my hill, it was a big story in the local news. And roads on our hills...well, narrow, windy, inclined (natch), trees all the way up shading the road from the sun, with deep ditches on both sides (or worse, just a drop off the road and then down the hill into trees). So I don't drive in snow unless absolutely necessary. And when snow and Fraser Outflow combine, we have snow that never melts, snow packed into slippy ice, night temps in the teens or single digits and day temps that never warm up past 20s even if the sun shines...almost Canadian weather one might say. Plus, my elevation means winter precipitation in the form of snow, even if it doesn't make it to sea level.
I worry about the outside gang in such cold temps. One year early on the farm, I bought coats for all the alpacas. I got one coat on the youngest girl, and within a week she had started wearing it almost like a sari or some exotic garment, wrapped around her so badly that I had to take it off lest she hurt or choke herself. Imagine her watching me try to catch her, after having already putting a straightjacket on her...I spent the better part of a hour trying to coax her into letting me take it off. Another one of the alpacas, when I put the coat on her and then stepped back, she bolted and ran around the pasture shrieking like a banshee was eating her alive. Now imagine trying to catch her. Just two examples of coat sagas. So no coats. I can't abide alpaca stinkeye, it leads to alpaca spitting.
I have thought about building straw bale "walls" to try to insulate their shelter during winter, but they want to eat the straw. And how to keep the walls stable, yet removable when the spring comes? Two years ago after Fraser Outflow kept the polar vortex aimed at us for several weeks, I worried that the four feet of snow that would not melt would collapse the roof of the alpaca shelter, or collapse the roof of my house. They seemed okay back then, pacing the pastures on channel paths through the deep snow in the deep cold, but I have a couple of older girls who are starting to show their age; the oldest dropped weight this fall and the vet didn't have a lot of suggestions for getting the weight back on her. She is also on meloxicam for her arthritis. It may be a tough winter.
I rejoined my local fiber guild. I joined the weaving study group, and at the first meeting one woman told me that she was considering quitting, so it isn't only me. But it is getting me back on the loom. I have done more puzzles and read more books and finished more knitting UFOs during the past twenty-two months, when I should have buried myself in spinning and weaving and dyeing up inventory for when I can sell again. I have also joined a citizen science program, studying the coast to "establish baselines." The program has been around for at least thirty years, according to their literature, so it seems like they should have a baseline by now, but I am constantly surprised at the state of scientific knowledge..."What?! We didn't already know that?!"... seems one of my regular refrains the past few years. But it is motivation to go walk the beach once a month.
If I can get down off the mountain.
