Wednesday, May 1, 2013 6:04pm CDT

Travis Frank May 1, 2013

40 degrees F Cloudy Wind 10mph N

Sunrise 6:01am CDT Sunset 8:19pm CDT

Winter continues in Minnesota!

After a few days of 'normal' warmer weather over the weekend, winter seems determined to flex its muscles and make its return.

The area is under a WINTER STORM WARNING until 10am tomorrow!

A Winter Storm Warning means 'snow accumulations of 6 inches or more'.

It snowed heavily here for a while this morning. But the afternoon has brought only cold clouds, scattered sprinkles of rain and a bitter biting wind off the lake! We are 30 degrees colder than we were yesteray.

The ice finally went out of the lake sometime between 6:30am and 11:30am yesterday morning. I was gone so I did not see it go out nor do I know the exact timing. I was surprised when I came home and saw that it was gone and there were just the remains of some of the ice along one shore.

I had really thought that it would be another day or two before trhe ice went out, with as thick as it had been.

This has been the latest ice out that I have seen in over thirty years. The previous latest ice out date was April 23 in 1996. There have been numerous April ice out dates but never a May date in over thrity years.

When I left early in the morning, 2/3 of the lake was still ice covered. So it was a shock to see the lake ice free when I came home.

I have spent the last couple days rebuilding the nesting platform so it is essentially ready to go in the water. The good folks from BroadbandMN were planning on being here this afternoon to mount the camera and do the thousand and one things that are required to bring the picture and sound to you. They called this morning and said that their head 'tech wizard' is sick and that it would be this weekend before they could come out to do all the technical stuff.

They were as disappointed as I was but it is what it is and we just have to deal with it. It would not have been very pleasant having to do all that work in the snow and rain and cold.

Just know that we will have it up and running as soon as possible. I appreciate all they do.

If there is one ray of hope in this latest storm forecast, it is that we may be far enough north and west of the main line of the storm to escape the worst of the snow accumulation. We will just have to wait and see.

We will know by this time tomorrow night!

Monday, April 29, 2013 9:36pm CDT

Travis Frank April 29, 2013

60 degrees F Partly Cloudy Wind SE 2mph

What a day!

I just came up from sitting by the lake.

The spring peeper frogs were singing. The seagulls were making a racket as they sat on the ice out in the lake. An almost full moon shown through high thin clouds. It is a mild 60 degrees yet at this time of night. And there is just a whisper of a gentle breeze. And only one mosquito.

But the best part is that the loons were sitting on what open water there is on the lake and their mournful, haunting wail echoed across the lake.

Does it get any better than this?!

This is what it means to truly be "up north".

All seems to be well with the world when the loons are back on the lake and calling.

The ice continues to melt but the majority of the lake is still covered with ice. But the warmth of the last few days has taken a toll on the ice. I am not sure how thick it is out in the middle but it still seems to be thick enough to move back and forth on the lake as a single sheet in response to the wind.

Yesterday it went from one side of the lake to the other. And then this morning it moved back to the other side again.

We have much cooler weather coming in the next few days. Undoubtedly that weather change will bring a change in wind with it and will move the sheet of ice again.

If it is still solid, the ice can do great damage along the shore as it moves. Anything in its path does not stand a chance. The power of ice is amazing.

If it has "rotted", it will break apart into shards of ice or what look like icicles.

Today the ice was 'turning black' but I am not sure it has completely weakened yet and I think there may be quite a bit of solid ice out there.

It is so tempting to try to put the nesting platform out now when there is so much open water on this side of the lake and a pair of loons is here and definitely calling like they are establishing claim to this as "their territory".

But as the shift in the ice showed yesterday, if the nesting platform had been out there, the ice would have destroyed it. And the same is probably true of the next few days until the ice melts or breaks up.

I got a kick out of a story that one of our local television stations did on the 'amazing and unique thing that was happening on a lake that no one had seen before'.

They showed pictures of the wind driving the ice up on shore and the ice simply crumbling into icicles. The sound was like ten thousands small glockenspiels being played.

The thing that was amusing is that this is not unusual at all. It happens almost every year as the ice 'rots' and forms vertical icicles held together in a sheet. When they hit something solid, they simply collapse. The technical term that has been given to is is "chandeliering". And that is an appropriate name.

The shards of ice look like the crystal pendants on a chandelier and they sound like the sound you would get if you shook a chandelier. If you Google 'chandeliering', you will probably see many links to videos of what "ice chandeliering" looks and sounds like.

They also talked about how someone had said that in 1995 had said that this had happened on Mille Lacs Lake and that the ice 'piled into pile 20 feet high and had to be moved with back hoes'.

Once again, impressive. But not unusual.

That happens almost every year on Mille Lacs as the wind drives the ice to one shore. Piles of ice 30 feet high are not unusual.

There have been a few instances of the ice sheet not breaking up as the wind drove it off Mille Lacs and it actually went right up over US Highway 169 and closed the road until plows could be brought in to remove it.

Well, we have gotten way off the subject of loons!

But at least you have an idea of what is and will be going on in Minnesota lakes and things that our loons have to contend with.

But we take great comfort in the fact that at least one pair of loons is back here.

Is it our loons from last year?

Or another pair.

We watch and wait.

And hope.

Monday, April 29, 2013 3:05pm CDT

Travis Frank April 29, 2013

There are TWO loons on the lake!

Apparently it is a pair since they are swimming together. Is it one of the pairs from last year or even the pair from the LoonCam last year?

One of them was just yodeling, which is the call made only by the male and is a territorial call.

So it seems that they are staking out their territory here around where the nest will eventually be when the ice goes out.

There are a pair of swans swimming nearby as well. So I do not know if the territorial call was intended for the swans or if there is another loon somewhere on the lake that I do not see. I did not hear an answer to the yodel.

The excitement builds.

Monday, April 29, 2013 1:15pm CDT

Travis Frank April 29, 2013

73 degrees F Sunny Wind Calm

Sunrise 6:04am CDT Sunset 8:17pm CDT

Well, it is official.

We definitely HAVE AT LEAST ONE LOON ON THE LAKE!

I heard a loon calling and when I went down to the lake just now - sure enough, there was a loon swimming along the edge of the ice!

I had gotten reports yesterday of loon sightings on the lake.

When I checked one of them out, it turned out to be mergansers. But then I thought I spotted a loon. But he dove to quick for me to be sure. That resident called me later in the afternoon to say that he saw a loon out in front of his place.

Earlier in the morning I had received a call from someone who saw a loon out in front of her place as she sat and drank her morning coffee.

So I think that we can be sure that there is at least one loon back on the lake.

Last Thursday morning, someone on the east side of the lake reported hearing a loon fly over early in the morning. But she thought that it continued on over the lake toward a river that was ice free. The lake was still completely covered in ice.

We are getting close!

And the loons seem to be as anxious as we are.

I have kept track of ice-out dates for over 30 years on this lake. The latest the ice has ever gone out here in those 30 years is April 23. As you remember, last year the ice went out March 18, which was the earliest ever in over 30 years.

So we are officially now the latest ice-out date in over 30 years.

Today the ice is really turning black which is a good sign that it could start breaking up soon.

We have had 80 degree temperatures for the last couple days and that is really taking a toll on the ice. It was only a week ago when we had some major snow and the lake was frozen up to shore.

It has now melted enough around the edges that there is some open water. Yesterday morning, the ice was out about 500 feet from shore. The gentle wind had blown the whole ice sheet toward the other side of the lake where it was piling up on shore.

That is when we saw one unconfirmed loon on the side with some open water.

Late in the afternoon, a small thunderstorm passed nearby and the wind changed directions. Within half an hour, the whole ice sheet had shifted back to this side of the lake and the ice was almost up to shore here again, with ice piling up in some areas.

Now this morning, the ice sheet has once again shifted back to the other side of the lake.

As tempting as it is to put out the loon nesting platform [especially with a loon sitting out there], I cannot do it until the ice has broken up and is off the lake. If I had put it out before yesterday afternoon, it would have been completely destroyed when the ice sheet shifted and came this way.

The power of ice when it moves in the wind is amazing.

We can only wait until mother nature takes its course. Wait until the ice is gone.

It could happen anytime, especially if we get a fairly strong wind.

My personal guess is that we have at least a day or two before the ice goes out. If it is 2 days, that means that the ice will not be out of the lake until May 1st!

That is unbelievable.

But we have at least one loon on the lake right now. So there is hope. The loon had the characteristic break at the end of its call that we heard from one of the loons last year. Is it one of the same pair that we watched last year? It could be. But remember we banded both pairs on the lake last year so we may be able to know for sure who is who this year. We will have to wait until we can get a view of the bands.

Stay tuned. Now it gets exciting. Tell your friends and family and neighbors to start watching

Monday, April 22, 2013 9:05pm CDT

Travis Frank April 22, 2013

29 degrees Heavy Snow Wind 25mph N

6:15am CDT 8:08pm CDT

Well, here we go again!

We are under another Winter Storm Warning.

It is snowing heavily and it is being driven by a strong north wind. This is January weather, not April.

I cannot even begin to imagine what the loons are thinking.

Over the weekend, I was south of The Cities [that is our name for Minneapolis and St Paul for those of you from other parts of the world]. There a few lakes had some open water around the edges of the lakes and some of the smaller ponds were almost ice free.

Here, farther north, the ice on the lake is still solid up to the shore. It is trying to open up. But it is not making much progress so far. The continued cold and snow has keep the lake from thawing.

Last Friday, when there was a prediction of up to 6 inches of snow, we actually got over 10 inches here! Just 10 miles in one direction from here they got 15 inches. Ten miles in the opposite direction, they only had about 6 inches. So it varied widely depending on where you were.

There was even heavy thunder with it for a while! What is known as "thunder snow". That is basically a heavy spring thunderstorm only it is cold enough that it is snow rather than rain.

They are predicting the possibility of thunder snow again tonight, although I have not heard anything yet. But it has been snowing heavily for several hours already with more to come.

The winter storm warning from the National Weather Service is saying up to 9 inches of snow tonight for here at the lake.

That will not help to thaw the ice on the lake.

What may help though is that there are predictions of 60 degrees by this weekend.

That is the normal temperature for this time of year. But this year it is going to feel absolutely balmy!

If we get a few days like that, things will change rapidly. But it still will take a little while to melt all the ice that is still on the lake.

It is encouraging to hear reports of loons in the area.

They are as anxious as we are to return to their favorite lakes.

But until then, once again we can just wait and watch.

And enjoy the winter wonderland that we have been given with this snow which paints every pine tree with picture postcard snow. The bright red cardinal sitting in the deep green pine tree with the fresh white snow hanging on its branches, which will greet us in the morning, would make a perfect Christmas card for later this year.

Minnesota Bound

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