Minnesota Prairie Roots

Writing and photography by Audrey Kletscher Helbling

There is weather outside of the Twin Cities March 5, 2012

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 11:02 AM
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A farm site along Minnesota State Highway 67 between Vesta and Echo on Sunday morning.

A farm site along Minnesota State Highway 67 between Vesta and Echo on Sunday morning.

HONESTLY, I HAVE LIVED in Minnesota long enough that I should know better.

I shouldn’t believe the weather forecasters all the time, especially if those forecasters are based in the Twin Cities. How much or little do they care about the weather in rural Minnesota?

Case in point: This past weekend my husband and I traveled 120 miles west to visit my mom in Redwood County. The forecast, which we always diligently check before driving that direction in the winter, called for occasional flurries. That sounded doable to us.

So Saturday morning we set out, bucking strong winds, to reach our destination. The farther west we drove, the more snow we saw blanketing the landscape. Fortunately those strong Saturday winds did not whip up a blizzard.

Sunday morning, however, we awakened to a Winter Wonderland of snow falling in graceful flakes. You know, the kind of snow that makes you just want to stand there and take it all in for the sheer snow globe beauty of it.

So much for occasional flurries.

Thankfully, no wind accompanied the snow, which continued at a steady pace well into the afternoon. It marked an early departure for us.

A few miles north of Vesta, we came across this truck spun off the Minnesota State Highway 19 curve.

We rounded the curve and drove eastbound into this low visibility, snow-covered roadway situation. Fortunately, shortly after I shot this image, the eastbound lane was mostly cleared of snow. The westbound lane was not.

Pulling onto Minnesota State Highway 19 at Vesta, we realized this could be one long trip back to Faribault. It was slow going until we reached Sleepy Eye, where the snow finally began to clear and roads improved. We followed state highways rather than the short-cut, back county roads we usually travel.

When we drove into Morgan about 30 miles later, snow was still falling strong and steady.

That evening, unpacked and cozied on the couch for the10 p.m. news, the weatherman reported only flurries in southwestern Minnesota. No mention of the several inches that slicked up highways and made for difficult travel.

Between Evan and Sleepy Eye, this pick-up truck cut across the prairie on back roads.

IF YOU LIVE in rural Minnesota, where do you turn for the most accurate weather forecasting?

© Copyright 2012 Audrey Kletscher Helbling

 

Longing to skate March 1, 2012

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 10:15 PM
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My neighbor's temporary "pond."

IF I WAS 10 AGAIN, I’d slip on my winter boots and dash across the street to slide on my neighbor’s pond.

Oh, for the joy of slip-sliding across ice, free and untethered from the worry of falling.

Those thoughts flew through my mind this morning as I viewed the pond that just days ago existed only as a patch of dormant lawn, visually unappealing in the deep of the winter we haven’t had here in Minnesota.

Tuesday brought snow to most regions of our state. But here in the southeast, precipitation fell as strong, steady, relentless rain that gushed down hills, pooled along curbs and flooded basements.

And in some spots, like the low-lying lot that dips between two neighbors’ property, the rainwater just kept pouring in, creating a pond.

That water’s frozen now, and, as I gaze out my window, I’m tempted, oh, so tempted, to pull on my chunky and practical Northwest Territory boots and race over to skate upon the ice. Except that the ice likely descends no more than a half inch.

I cannot risk it, risk the falling , the plunging into ice water, to relive youthful moments of skating across corn field-stubbled ponds in buckle overshoes.

© Copyright 2012 Audrey Kletscher Helbling

 

Thoughts from a Minnesotan now that winter has arrived January 24, 2012

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 7:54 AM
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Even I'll admit that snow brings a certain beauty to the landscape, including this view of my neighbor's yard.

AS UN-MINNESOTAN as this may sound, I don’t particularly like winter. I’d grown rather fond of the unusual 50-degree temps earlier this month and a landscape free of snow.

Yet I knew better than to get all smug about the weather, realizing that, at any time, the proverbial shoe (or boot) would drop.

No fashion boots for me...I wear practical Northwest Territory boots.

It did, with temperatures plummeting to below and barely above zero followed by two measurable snowfalls within the past several days.

Snow means work, aka shoveling snow.

Snow means walking with trepidation.

I wasn’t always fearful of walking across snowy or icy sidewalks, driveways or parking lots. But then 3 ½ years ago I had total right hip replacement surgery because of severe osteoarthritis.

I would like to keep that expensive ceramic implant intact for another 17 years. So I tread with caution, eyes locked on whatever slick surface I must traverse. I will myself not to fall. Thus far, the strategy has worked to keep me upright and out of the hospital.

Despite my winter worries, I still shovel snow. However, I questioned the sanity of that effort on Monday as I crunched my way across the ice-glazed, snowy yard toward the sidewalk encrusted in snow and ice.

The car my son drives, encased in ice on Monday. Freezing rain fell before the snow. He walked to school.

I didn’t exactly rush my way through snow removal. More like half-skated.

By the time I finished clearing the sidewalk and the end of the driveway, I truly wanted to give up and leave the rest for the husband or the 17-year-old. But winter wasn’t about to defeat me.

I may not like her, but I sure as heck won’t allow her to get the best of me.

A city of Faribault snow plow spreads salt and sand onto the street by my house on Monday.

© Copyright 2012 Audrey Kletscher Helbling

 

How about this balmy January weather in Minnesota then? January 6, 2012

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 9:06 AM
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HEY, ALL YOU MINNESOTA SNOWBIRDS wintering away in Texas, Arizona and Florida. How’s the weather at your winter retreat? As warm as back home?

If you’re detecting a hint of smugness in my inquiry, you are correct.

The temperature reading at 8:30 a.m. on Thursday, January 5, is 28.4 degrees in my backyard. Note that the time is incorrect , so just ignore it.

Let’s step into my backyard and review yesterday’s weather via a series of photos. First, imagine me dressed in a comfy red and black buffalo plaid flannel shirt and blue jeans minus a winter coat. It’s 8:30 a.m.and I’m clipping freshly-laundered flannel sheets onto the clothesline. At 28.4 degrees the cold air nips at my fingers, but I work at a rapid pace.

Notice all of the snow on the ground at 8:30 a.m. when I hang sheets on the clothesline.

Four hours later I step outside to read the temperature; it’s already climbed to 46 degrees.

I scrape the last remnants of snow and ice from the concrete driveway. The snow that had clung to the lawn on the north side of the backyard fence is disappearing in the warmth heat of the day.

By 3:30 p.m., when I visit the backyard again, I read 52.7 degrees on the weather recording station.

My temperature recording device reads a balmy 52.7 degrees @ 3:30 p.m. Again, note that the time is incorrect so you'll just have to trust me on this time and temp.

An hour later I pull the mostly-dry sheets from the line in a backyard nearly free of snow.

How’s that for January 5 in southern Minnesota?

This is my backyard @ 3:30 p.m. See how the snow has all but vanished in the balmy temps.

NOTE: These temperature readings from my Faribault backyard are unofficial.

But officially, Minnesota broke some record temps on Thursday. According to the National Weather Service, temperatures soared into the 60s in southwestern Minnesota.

Reports the NWS: “There has never been a 60 degree temperature recorded in Minnesota during the first week of January…in the modern day record. Click here to read the full NWS summary on Thursday’s record temps.

And for me, personally, this may mark the earliest date I’ve hung laundry on the clothesline in a new year.

© Copyright 2012 Audrey Kletscher Helbling

 

New Year’s thankfulness January 3, 2012

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 9:57 AM
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The sun begins to set as we drive west on Interstate 90 near St. Charles on New Year's Day.

FOR EVERY MILE WEST my husband and I drove Sunday afternoon, I felt as if the bully wind shoved us two miles back east into Wisconsin. The wind, raging in from the northwest on January 1, seemed that forceful. It was a long 300-mile drive back to Minnesota from our daughter’s Appleton, Wisconsin home, bucking winds of 30 – 45 mph, at our estimate.

Whipped by strong winds, snow sweeps across farm fields along I-90 in southern Minnesota Sunday afternoon.

Despite the powerful winds, I was thankful for the minimal snow cover. Any more snow than the two inches or less covering the ground between eastern Wisconsin and our southern Minnesota home, and we would have been stranded in Appleton. As it was, the occasional snow squall reminded us just how quickly visibility can become an issue.

Not until we reached the two-lane section of U.S. Highway 14 between Dodge Center and Owatonna, on the final stretch of our journey, did drifting snow sometimes become a concern. The highway wasn’t blown shut, but conditions left me wishing we’d taken our usual U.S. Highway 52 from Rochester to Zumbrota then State Highway 60 to Faribault route.

Despite the gas-sucking travel on Sunday, we drove on mostly snow-free roadways, a bonus on a weekend when two separate snowfalls created occasionally hazardous driving conditions through-out Minnesota and Wisconsin.

High winds pushed eastbound traffic, like this car, along I-90 late Sunday afternoon.

Late Friday morning while traveling along Interstate 90 east of Rochester, we encountered a partially-closed traffic lane due to an earlier accident. A flat-bed semi trailer was parked along the east-bound shoulder with the driver loading debris scattered in the median.

We would learn upon our return Sunday evening that a family member was injured in a crash with an enclosed semi along I-90 on Friday morning. We’re not sure whether the scene we passed by was the site of the accident involving our nephew’s wife. But we do know that Heidi was traveling from Winona to work in Rochester when her car hit an icy patch as she was changing lanes, spun out of control into a semi and was then struck by a pick-up truck.

She had to be cut out of her car.

Thankfully, Heidi was not seriously injured and is apparently going to be OK. She was transported to St. Mary’s Hospital in Rochester, where she was diagnosed with a concussion and held overnight for observation. She’s bruised, sore and now back home recovering.

Heidi’s car, according to her mother-in-law (my sister-in-law) did not fare so well. The passenger side was pushed in and the back end was shoved into the back seat leaving only the driver’s seat, where Heidi was sitting, intact.

That’s how bad this accident was in terms of potential for serious injury, or death.

You can bet my extended family is offering prayers of thanksgiving that Heidi, the mother of two young children, survived, and survived without serious injury.

“The Lord,” says my sister-in-law, “was with her (Heidi) all the way.”

The County Road 32 overpass over I-90 near St. Charles slices across the wide sky as the sun sets on Sunday.

© Copyright 2012 Audrey Kletscher Helbling

 

Grilling on a balmy, brown Christmas in Minnesota December 27, 2011

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 8:17 AM
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FOR CHRISTMAS DAY dinner, I planned to prepare homemade lasagna complemented by salad and garlic bread.

But at the last minute, due to weather conditions, I changed my mind. The lack of snow and predicted 40-degree temperatures here in southern Minnesota called for firing up the Weber on Christmas Day. My husband enjoys grilling no matter the temperature or ground cover, and he’s darn good at it. (Click here to see images of him grilling atop a snowbank.)

My husband grilling in our snowless and warm backyard on Christmas Day in Faribault, MN.

On Sunday he grilled pork chops, seasoned potatoes and carrot slices, a simple and savory meal.

I proposed setting up a card table on our south-facing, sun-drenched patio, just to say we’d dined outdoors on Christmas Day. But even I found the low 40s still too nippy for comfortable and leisurely noon-time dining.

Instead, I settled for photographing the holiday grilling in shirt-sleeve warm weather without a trace of snow lingering in the backyard.

Weather-wise this marked a mighty fine Christmas weekend here in southern Minnesota with a high of 42 degrees in Minneapolis/St. Paul, the fifth warmest Christmas Day on record since 1905.

On Monday, the temp soared to 52 degrees in the metro, shattering the previous December 26 record high of 51 degrees set in 1936.

I don’t know if Santa appreciated the warmth and absence of snow. But I sure did.

Juicy pork chops on the grill.

Christmas Day dinner ready for dishing up. If you look in the upper left corner through the window, you'll see a smidgen of snow outside on the north side of our house.

Christmas dinner plated on my garage sale china.

© Copyright 2011 Audrey Kletscher Helbling

 

Thoughts after the season’s first snowfall December 4, 2011

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 1:58 PM
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The snowy woods adjoining my backyard in Faribault late Sunday morning following about a five-inch snowfall.

WELCOME TO MY BACKYARD after the first significant snowfall in Faribault this season.

It is a world of mostly black-and-white, like vintage photos in an album.

Branches laden with the first significant snowfall.

I’m trying to be poetic here because, as disloyal Minnesotan as this sounds, I don’t particularly like snow. I dread the resulting icy sidewalks and parking lots.

I realize I possess the attitude of  “an old person” here. No offense meant to any of you who are older than me. But, at age 55 and with an artificial hip implanted in my right side three years ago, snow and ice threaten me. I fear falling, so I inch across ice with trepidation.

Just to clarify, my hip replacement did not result from a fall. I suffered from osteoarthritis and reached the point where surgery was the only option to deal with near immobility and chronic pain.

So here we are, in the season of snow and ice in Minnesota. If I don’t exactly embrace it, now at least you understand why. I suspect it is the reason many Minnesotans flee to Arizona and Florida during the winter months—not only to escape the cold, but to escape the danger.

Yet, even I can see the beauty in a fresh snowfall that layers branches and seed heads and the entire world around me in a surreal sort of peacefulness on a Sunday morning.

That, for me, redeems winter.

The blessing of winter lies in its beauty, seen here in a snippet of time-worn fencing in my backyard.

An unobtrusive patch of color in a mostly black-and-white world Sunday morning: Snow capping a hydrangea.

HOW DO YOU feel about snow and winter in general? The truth, please.

© Copyright 2011 Audrey Kletscher Helbling

 

Tough tilling in Minnesota farm fields November 9, 2011

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 8:57 AM
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A farmer works the field recently in this scene shot in southeastern Minnesota.

HAVE YOU TRIED DIGGING into the ground lately? Takes some effort, doesn’t it? This soil in Minnesota rates as rock hard right now given the lack of moisture.

I’m hesitant to admit it, but I don’t think about soil conditions and moisture nearly as much as I once did, when I was not so long-removed from the farm.

But last week when a carpenter, who is also a farmer, was working on a project at my house, we chatted briefly about crops, soil conditions and weather.

Kenny shared how fall tillage has been especially trying this year. Farmers in his area around Owatonna in southeastern Minnesota have been breaking implement parts with all-too-often frequency in the dry, hard earth. He mentioned shanks, which he claims never break.

Some parts are in short supply, Kenny says, meaning farmers sometimes need to wait. That’s not a good thing when you’re trying to finish fall tillage before the snow flies.

Friends of mine who farm near Dundas finally halted all tillage work for the season, leaving some 300 acres, of 700, untilled. The rock hard dry soil proved too difficult to work and too tough on their equipment.

IN SOUTHWESTERN MINNESOTA, my brother Doug Kletscher, the parts manager at Westbrook Ag Power in Westbrook, confirms that tillage is tough there, too, and farmers are going through the parts. “We ran out of ripper points and they have been back-ordered for a good month. I have heard of a few farmers that have pulled their rippers in half,” Doug says. “We have sold at least five years’ worth of chisel plow spikes in one year. Bolts have also been in very high demand.”

On the flip, positive side, farmers haven’t had to deal with mud, Doug reports, and the corn has been very dry with 14 percent or less moisture content (a significant cost savings on corn drying).

However, farmers are facing another issue related to moisture-depleted conditions. “The fertilizer companies are not putting on any anhydrous as it is too dry to hold the anhydrous in the ground,” my brother continues. “Anhydrous needs moisture to adhere to keep it in the ground; also it (the soil) is pulling so hard that they would break their anhydrous bars.”

Doug reports the last rain over a half inch fell on July 14 with .78 inch. Since then any rainfall has been .10 inch or less. That makes for extremely dry soil conditions for farmers trying to prep the soil for next spring’s planting season.

LIKEWISE, IF YOU’RE a gardener, digging vegetables has been anything but easy this autumn. Take my friend Virgil Luehrs, who lives along Cedar Lake west of Faribault. Unearthing potatoes proved tough, he says. But then he got to the carrots:

“First I tried the garden spade, then a round-point shovel and then a tiling shovel. I had to dig a trench beside the rows to loosen the soil around the carrots to get them loose enough to pull out.  Finally I resorted to a pick to loosen the soil and that was easier but still a lot more work than normal.”

Tilling the garden, even with a powerful Troybuilt rear tine tiller, proved equally challenging. “I could not get down deep enough,” Virgil reports. “Hopefully next spring.”

When Virgil talks soil and weather, I listen. He’s not just your average Minnesota gardener. He’s also a retired high school science teacher with a Masters in biology, a former interim and assistant director at River Bend Nature Center in Faribault, and a volunteer rain gauge reader for the Rice County Soil Water Conservation District (SWCD) and the state Climatology Lab.

In other words, he’s a knowledgeable resource.

So then, exactly how much rainfall has Virgil recorded at his Cedar Lake home (where the lake water level is the lowest in 20 years, but not as low as in the drought years of 1988- 1990). Thus far since April, Virgil has taken these rain gauge readings:

April:  3.14”

May:  4.63”

June:  5.26”

August:  1.38”

September:  1.00”

October:  .58”

TOTAL during the past six months: 15.99”

Says Virgil: “This year we had a much wetter spring and that probably helped to carry us through the dry fall. Recall that last fall we had record rainfalls.”

His 2010 readings were as follows:

April:  1.35”

May:  2.75”

June:  4.76”

July:  5.49”

August:  3.91”

September:  9.13”

October:  1.91”

TOTAL during those six months: 29.3”

According to information Virgil passed along from State Climatologist James Zandlo and University of Minnesota Climatology/Meteorology Professor Dr. Mark Seeley, 2010 was the wettest year in Minnesota modern climate record. The 34.10-inch state average precipitation total was roughly 8 inches more than the historical average.

But here we are in November 2011, desperately short of moisture.

What will winter bring here in Minnesota? A continued shortage of precipitation? Or more snow than we care to shovel?

WHAT’S YOUR PREDICITON for snowfall in Minnesota this season? Submit a comment with a forecast and the reasoning behind your prediction.

IF YOU’RE A FARMER, an implement dealer or a gardener, have you faced any special challenges this year due to dry (or other) weather conditions? Submit a comment. I’d like to hear, whether you live in Minnesota or elsewhere.

CLICK HERE to link to climate.umn.edu for detailed statistics and information about Minnesota weather.

© Copyright 2011 Audrey Kletscher Helbling

 

Twenty-seven degrees November 3, 2011

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 9:06 AM
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THE 17-YEAR-OLD, bundled in his winter coat and stocking cap, poked his head out the kitchen door. “Mom, it’s below freezing.”

“I know. But the sun will come out,” I responded, continuing to pull heavy, wet bath and kitchen towels from the laundry basket and clipping them onto the clothesline.

The door slammed shut.

I smirked, amused that I’d annoyed my son so early in the morning, early being 8:30 given it’s the weekly late-start school day.

As I grabbed the last towel from the basket, my teen stepped out the door, shot me “the look” and shook his head, not even allowing me to reach up and wrap him in a goodbye hug.

“I love you,” I said. “Have a good day at school.”

He didn’t respond. But I saw the speech bubble above his head: “She’s crazy!”

SO, DEAR READERS, are you crazy like me? Crazy enough to hang laundry outside on a crisp, 27-degree morning?

© Copyright 2011 Audrey Kletscher Helbling

 

Field fires aplenty in Minnesota’s Red Flag areas October 6, 2011

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 5:10 PM
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A farm site between Morgan and Redwood Falls in southwestern Minnesota, where field conditions are dry and the fire danger high.

DRY, WINDY CONDITIONS persist in much of Minnesota creating ideal conditions for fire.

Unless you’ve had your head buried inside, you understand the danger and the reason for the National Weather Service’s Red Flag Warning that covers central and southern Minnesota.

Today would not be the day to build a campfire, have a bonfire or toss a cigarette butt out the car window (like you should any day). Burning bans are in effect throughout the state.

If forecasters are correct, these weather conditions will continue for awhile.

That all said, I wondered if my nephew, a kindergarten teacher and Westbrook volunteer firefighter, has been battling any blazes in his region of southwestern Minnesota.

Adam checked in with me early this morning:

Fires—we have had quite a few around here. Westbrook has had two; Dovray, two; and Walnut Grove, for sure three, all in the past week. It’s very dry and with the wind, it doesn’t take much to create a big fire. Many of the calls are mutual aid—helping neighboring towns with fires, but that’s how we do things here. All of them have been combines and fields. I haven’t made it to many of them as I could not get out of school at the time. But I made it to one on Sunday.

A story in today’s The Cottonwood County Citizen about a county-wide burning ban confirms Adam’s summary:

These burning bans come in the wake of at least a half-dozen fires that occurred around the county, most of which involved the harvest. Extremely dry conditions, low humidity and high winds have increased the potential for major fires.

I found an article in last Thursday’s Jackson County Pilot headlined “Combine fire sparks massive field blaze.” The story went on to say that a combine fire, fueled by 40 mph winds, quickly spread into a field. Fire crews from numerous departments in southern Minnesota and northern Iowa were called to the scene.

The Faribault Daily News today reports a Monday afternoon fire in the Lonsdale-Montgomery area that burned five acres of hay, 30 acres of swamp and 30 – 50 acres of corn.

Another blaze, this one on Wednesday afternoon in a soybean field northwest of Luverne, is reported in The Rock County Star Herald. In that case, farmers disked strips of black dirt to help contain the fire.

It’s a dangerous situation out there right now, especially for farmers bringing in the harvest in those dry, dry fields.

IF YOU WOULD LIKE to report on fires in your area, submit a comment.

© Copyright 2011 Audrey Kletscher Helbling