Snowy weekend

Snow fell on Roundtop this weekend, a bit of a surprising snow in a couple of ways. This was the first snow of the season, and it’s uncommon for the first snow to be measurable. It’s also unusual that first night with temperatures that were below freezing all night ends up producing any snow at all. Up at the cabin I got 4, perhaps 4.5 inches of snow. It soon began to compress, though, and this morning I only have about 2 inches left on the ground.

The event was a pretty little snow that stuck on the trees and branches longer than is typical. I took enough photos that you will be seeing snow photos on this blog all week, even if the snow doesn’t last that long.

This was the chickens’ first experience of snow, and I don’t think they much liked it. When I opened the pen Saturday afternoon to let them out, they rushed the gate as usual but stopped dead when they got to that weird white stuff on the ground. Eventually they stuck their heads out and pecked at it a bit. They soon discovered they could avoid the snow and go back to pecking in the dirt and ruffling up the leaves if they stayed underneath the cabin and the back deck, where the snow didn’t penetrate.

The dogs are an entirely different story. They both love the snow. They forget everything they ever learned about walking nicely on a leash when the ground is white. They pull and lunge, and you’d never know that they do usually behave. Even after they run in circles and push their noses in the snow, they still don’t want to act as though they know how to walk nicely.

I enjoyed playing in the snow, too, though there really wasn’t enough of it to ski or snowshoe in. Maybe next time. Winter is here!