Goose Lake Weather Blog

A little humor for New Year’s Eve. Wishing all a very happy, healthy, and prosperous New Year!

Weather Channel Accused of Pro-Weather Bias

Do you like observing weather from your own backyard? If so, we need you for the Community Collaborative Rain, Hail and Snow Network…known as CoCoRaHS. You are required to purchase an official 4 inch diameter CoCoRaHS rain gauge ( $22 plus S&H)for accuracy and consistency. Data is entered via a web site and you can see your report and all the other CoCoRaHS daily reports in the county, state, and country. To learn more about this great volunteer program, go to the CoCoRaHS web page.

A CoCoRaHS training session will be held in Grundy County on:
Thursday, July 17, 6:30 p.m. – Morris, IL

Training session has been canceled. This session has been rescheduled for Oct 1, 2008 starting at 6:30 PM at the same location.

Grundy County Soil & Water Conservation District Office
3605 N. Illinois Route 47, Suite B
Morris, IL

To register, call the SWCD office at 815-942-0359, ext 3. Registration deadline is Friday, Sept 26.

Directions to the SWCD office can be found here.

I hope to see you there!

Every year during March the Community Collaborative Rain, Hail and Snow Network(CoCoRaHS) conducts “March Madness”, a campaign to see how many new observers each state can recruit. Do you have an interest in measuring rain, hail, and snow from your own backyard? Why not become a member of the ever growing community of CoCoRaHS observers? My site is IL-GY-1, the first to sign up in Grundy county. We currently only have 2 other observers in the county and could use many more. To learn more about the program visit the CoCoRaHS web page. You will need to purchase an official CoCoRaHS rain gauge for accuracy and consistency, the cost is about $25.00.

Viewing conditions were perfect for the lunar eclipse that occurred on the evening of Feb 20, 2008. The temperature was around 8°, nevertheless I made an attempt to get a few pictures by holding my digital camera up to the eyepiece of my spotting scope. The results were nothing like the pros but here are a couple of images.

Temperatures just above zero combined with northwest winds of between 20 and 30 mph created brutal windchills of -20° to -25° today. It was even too cold for our normally non-stop dogs. Maggie left is a Border Collie and Hector is part Border Collie, part ?. Both are rescues.

Wishing everyone a very Merry Christmas and a Happy and prosperous New Year! Judging from my web server stats, it would appear that folks enjoy the weather data from Goose Lake Weather. I’m hoping the blog entries are somewhat interesting as well. I have a few projects planned for the Goose Lake Weather station in 2008 including the possibility of a lightning detector, soil temperature measurements and more. Stay tuned. As always, comments/suggestions are appreciated.

Happy Holidays!

-Bill

The winter solstice will occur at 12:08 AM Saturday Dec 22nd. More information can be found here. Daylight length will very gradually begin to increase again.

Snow rulers (marked in 1/10 inch increments — the CoCoRaHS and NWS standard) can now be purchased through the Weather Your Way store. Lucy now also sells replacement parts for the CoCoRaHS rain gauge as well. It’s nice to have a spare outer cylinder in order to swap it out when bringing one inside to melt the snow.

Wishing everyone a Happy Thanksgiving! We missed the snow although some flurries are falling as I write this. The weather has turned cold and windy. Enjoy time with family and friends today.

A developing storm system has the potential to produce the first real snow of the season in the midwest.  Depending on the exact track of the storm, we may see our first snow at Goose Lake Weather. If you are planning on travel make sure and monitor the latest forecasts from our web page.  It should be noted that winter storm forecasts can change so it’s important to get the latest information.