Saturday, March 1, 2014

OUR 'MONSTER' STORM

I don't mean to diminish the damage that our 'monster' storm did, but we in Southern California are so spoiled.  I know that Los Angeles and north really did get lashed with floods and downed trees, but we here in San Diego were let off relatively mildly.

We on the coast had about 2 inches of rain (our yearly total is 10 inches), but 2 inches in 2 days is certainly not unheard of around here.  There were also a few downed trees and large limbs around the county that were brought down by the rain and the high wind. There was some coastal flooding in low areas, but there always is.

But all week we had been regaled by weather forecasters of the coming 'stormaggedon'.  We were warned to stay indoors, turn off electronic appliances in the event of thunderstorms, be ready with sand bags, tie things down that might blow away.

We were more concerned about the creek at the bottom of our yard, flooding.  For the past year it has been hardly more than a trickle and the ducks have had to walk through the water because there wasn't enough to swim in.
Well we did have a good number of down-pours and since this is our first winter here we watched with a little anxiety. I took these photos in the midst of a lull in the storm.


This was the view from our back porch

This from the bottom of the garden.  There's an eight or nine foot drop down from the small tree to the creek bed.

The wind swooshed the water downstream toward the sea about two miles away.


The ducks had a wonderful time, paddling like mad up stream, then turning around and letting the current sweep them back down again.


Along the edges of the bank the water covered some of the greenery giving the ducks an ideal place to forage for food.  Talk about "lovely weather for ducks!".  They were in duck heaven!

The evening brought more looming clouds and the promise of more rain.  And yes, it did rain hard overnight, but by noon today the creek was way down.  The sandy soil just lets it all run away, so there isn't much fear of flooding.

But Scruffy was all set for the bad weather!

8 comments:

snafu said...

That cat is priceless, is Scruffy planning on using it as a shelter or an emergency life raft? I understand California could do with some steady rain not floods. Nice to know you are well above the flood level. England is no longer sinking and some people are reclaiming their ground floors, but having been flooded once, my sympathies are with them, both here and in LA.

Gill - That British Woman said...

super photos, and so nice to see green grass and flowers. "One Day" I hope to see the same around here!!! Going to be minus 38 oC overnight tonight

Barbee' said...

I do so love to watch ducks swimming and floating about. I nearly fall asleep watching them. More relaxing to me than watching fish in a tank. Lovely view you have there.

kaybee said...

Scruffy is hilarious! I guess he was expecting your roof to leak or something!

Nice to see the creek filled with water for a change!

claude said...

Weather is completely crazy this year. Very bad weather on west coast in France. Wind storms ( more 30) a lot an rain and floodings, very high waves on sand dunes. Some houses are just ont the point to fall down in the ocean.

Lisa said...

That sounds like a scary forecast. Our scary 6+ inches of snow forecast only ended up being a little ice and no snow. Your creek shots are lovely, but I'm sure it was a bit concerning when the water was rising!

Anonymous said...

those purple flowers covering the rocks on the cover photo, I am in love with them.

Wanda said...

Beautiful photo's Chris. Love the ducks.

That last picture takes the cake. What a smart cat you have.

BTW thanks for your prayers and thoughts with my brother's passing.