Rain in the afternoon

The day began sunny and warm. The County drove by with a tractor and mower and mowed the half of the ditch along each side of the road. Too bad as the tall grass was a deterrent to the drivers who like to cut the corner on the bend in the road in front of my driveway thereby wearing down where my driveway meets the road.

I checked all my gopher and pocket gopher traps. No gophers caught. I did hear a couple of them in the next pasture chirping their warnings. I caught a few pocket gophers including the one that moved in near my barn. The garden pocket gopher... he or she is a wily one as he/she is avoiding my trap. I noticed fresh dirt mounds in the NE pasture along the ditch. *sigh*

The forecast was for rain later today. I figured it would be like yesterday, sometime early evening. I decided to spray for weeds in the yard. It is recommended not to spray if it will rain within 4 hours so as to allow the herbicide to get absorbed by the weed. I finished spraying at 1:45 pm. Few clouds in the sky, and no rain clouds, it should last until 5:45.

I had lunch and when I went outside at 2:45 pm dark rain storm clouds were approaching all along the west. That was fast! The low rumble of thunder announced the approaching clouds and I only had time to stake a half dozen sunflower plants that for some reason don't want to stand up, and to harvest all my radishes. By now the wind started to blow and a few rain drops were arriving. Some lighting was here and there to the west. On the local news I heard that lightning stuck a house's roof causing it catch fire.

The wind blew so hard from the west I had to close the windows on that side of the house to keep the rain out. The west side of my house has a wide overhang and seldom does rain enter the window.

I watched the tall hayfield grass whip and roll with the wind like waves on a stormy sea. I saw the heavier rain approach from the pasture and pine trees and cross the wind driven grass. Then it got whiter. Once it arrived it turned out to be small hail. More white and very heavy rain. The wind drove the white hail and sheet of rain across the hayfield. It reminded me of wind driven snow moving across a North Dakota highway.

It rained hard. My rain gauge showed a half inch of rain. And yes, it rained before the four hours had passed. I probably will have to re-apply the herbicide on my lawn's weeds.

Later in the evening it stopped raining and the roads dried. I decided to make a run into town on my bicycle to pick up the weekly papers and ads. As I began my ride I noticed more rain clouds to the west. Hmmm.... The first rain storm dropped the temperature from 80 F to the lower 60s F. This second storm should be slower to arrive and not be as serious as the first one.

I should be a weather forecaster considering my inaccurate weather prediction. Ok, I didn't get it all wrong. We didn't have the wind, nor the lightning, nor thunder, but the dark clouds moved faster than I expected. While it didn't rain hard, it was steady and was more rain that I expected. My last four miles riding home were in the rain. My body heat didn't keep the rain at bay for long and I was very wet by the time I got home. Oh well, that's the way it goes. I keep telling myself that we can always use the mositure.