A Wintery Mix

Saturday brought us the legendary "wintery mix" of precipitation.  Luckily the weather forecasters had seen it coming, because the temperatures dropped along with the precipitation and it's likely to be several more days until the roads are clear again.  We made sure that we had the basics ahead of time so we were able to relax and cocoon all day Sunday.

Cocooning didn't mean confining myself to the house all day, though.  The clouds moved out around noon; mid afternoon found me outside, seeing what I could photograph to share before wind and cold drove me back inside.

Truthfully, I'm glad that we got the moisture, even if it came in a less-than-gentle form and is limiting our mobility a bit for a while.  We've been getting pretty dry.

Everything looked soft and tranquil....

...but certain angles showed the reality beneath the fluffy snow: about 1/4" of ice, coating absolutely everything.

At times like this, thick evergreens are particularly important as shelter for wildlife.  Eastern redcedar (Juniperus virginiana), our only native evergreen out here on the prairie, is particularly valuable in weather conditions like this.  In the hedge by our driveway, there were all sorts of mammal tracks along and underneath these trees, as well as signs that birds were roosting in the refuge of the thick branches.

Looking across the front tallgrass, colors were rich but the snow seemed muted - captured and contained by the tall prairie grasses covering the soil.  There won't be much runoff here, as the grasses will hold the snow in place as it melts, allowing the soil to absorb the precious moisture.

Behind the house, one of our cats had walked boldly out, through the Courtyard hedge, into the grasses of the Beyond....

...without even stopping to investigate the myriad twisting strands of bird tracks that meandered between and around the plum bushes which grow under the Amur maples that anchor the Courtyard hedge.

A feather on the snow added a small, rather dramatic spot of color and texture....

Skeins of geese laced the sky....

The path to the Back 5 cut through the Indian grass and big bluestem of the Beyond...

...then crossed the draw...

...and skirted the edge of the big grove of redcedars in the Cedar Grove.

On the south end of the Cedar Grove, a pair of redcedars caught the evening sun and looked like rich Christmas trees glinting in a story book tale.

I think we're actually going to have a white Christmas this year.