Gorgeous But Fleeting Vermont Foliage To Fade This Week

Fall foliage in my St. Albans, Vermont back yard Sunday.

You know the end of the spectacular fall foliage season is about to come to end when a wind gust of maybe 5 mph sends a blizzard of orange maple leaves off the tree you're standing under.

That was the situation Sunday, a gorgeous peak fall foliage day while I was working in a yard in Richmond, Vermont.

With lots more wind in the forecast this week, foliage season will largely end. Not completely, of course.

There will still be splashes of color statewide, and warmer spots like the Champlain Valley and lowlands in southern Vermont will hang on to the fall beauty even with the wind and rain expected between now and Friday.

Early this morning, leaves were already blowing around like crazy when I got up in St. Albans, Vermont.  Winds were only gusting to about 20 mph, so it wasn't exactly a storm. But there you go. Expect winds like that all day today, so the leaves will be falling.

Fall foliage just beginning to fade Sunday near Hinesburg, Vermont.

After a cooler, but sunny and tranquil day Tuesday, Mother Nature's leaf blower will really get going Wednesday and Thursday.  A storm will pass to our north starting Wednesday, which would pick up winds from the southeast.

Meanwhile, a nor'easter will begin to form off the coast of Virginia and head toward coastal New England, all the while strengthening rapidly. This will all but guarantee wind gusts in the 25 to 35 mph range locally into Thursday night.

Depending upon how close the nor'easter comes to the coast, we could also have some pretty heavy rain later Wednesday and Wednesday night from the nor'easter. That would also help the leaves to drop.

It all sounds disappointing, but I think one thing that makes fall foliage so wonderful in Vermont is its fleeting nature. This type of windy week happens pretty much every October, which ends foliage season, well, every October.

Besides, this won't be a terrible storm for us. Southern Vermont, in particular could use more rain. (Northern areas are pretty OK with above normal rainfall over the past few weeks.

Southern New England endured wind and rain from another  offshore nor'easter that turned into a tropical storm last week, so they're probably sick of inclement weather. We here in most of Vermont, escaped with nice weather last week.

Southern and eastern New England will bear the brunt of this next nor'easter as well, with the risk of strong winds and heavier rainfall than Vermont would get.

Unlike the last storm that missed Vermont, this one will move right along and be out of our hair on Friday.

TYPHOON HAGIBIS

A much bigger, more newsworthy storm hit Japan over the weekend in the form of Typhoon Hagibis.

Typhoons are fairly common in Japan, but this one might have been the worst in 60 years.

It had been a super typhoon out over the eastern Pacific, with winds of 150 mph. Those dropped down to 90 mph or so by the time the storm hit Japan. So the wind, while intense, was not the worst that Japan can get.

What made this typhoon so bad was that it was even wetter than your typical typhoon. That meant the flooding was immense.

So far, nearly 50 deaths have been reported, with more people missing. Tens of thousands have been evacuated. Some areas received 30 or more inches of rain during the typhoon


Hagibis

Hot Autumn Is Messing With Our Fall Foliage

Still a lot of green amid record high temperatures
in these hills near Richmond,  Vermont on Sunday.
Fall colors should be peaking now, but they are
very late due to a hot autumn.

It's fitting that because we've had such a bizarre autumn in the weather department here in Vermont, our famed foliage season is off kilter, too.

In and near the Champlain Valley, there's still a lot of green on the hills at a time when the foliage should be at peak.

No wonder. Those crisp fall days we should have seen in late September were overtaken by a very humid, unprecedented stretch of 90 degree weather.

After a brief cool down to normal temperatures a week ago, it warmed up again over the past five days, culminating in a record high of 80 degrees in Burlington, Vermont Sunday afternoon.

The dew point, a measure of how humid it is, reached 69 degrees late Sunday morning in Burlington. Such readings usually only come during the most oppressive midsummer weather. I've never seen anything like that in October.

All this has left the forests confused. Aside from the late season green, some trees that normally turn brilliant seem blah, and some trees that usually make me go "meh" in the autumn are gorgeous.

I'm going to reserve judgement on how brilliant the colors will end up, but there are a couple of potentially bad signs.

I haven't driven around personally to see, but there are reports that in some places, especially toward northern New Hampshire that have reached peak, the colors were a bit subdued this year.  NECN says the weather extremes this year have put stress on trees, which seems to be leading to fewer of the red and orange blasts of color we are used to this time of year.

However, I have seen photos of the colors in Vermont's Northeast Kingdom and things look as spectacular as ever up there.

Of course, the Northeast Kingdom should be well past peak by now, but this year they're late like everybody else.

I was in the western foothills of the Green Mountains near Richmond, Vermont yesterday and there were certainly wonderful splashes of color within the green. I'm not sure if the rest of the colors will pop later, or if things will be muted. We'll have to wait and see.

Encouragingly, it is going to be seasonably cool during the middle of this week (Highs in the 55-65 range, lows in the 30s to near 40) So I imagine that will make the colors blast out. A spate of coolish weather between the heat waves last week did seem to prompt some color to quickly appear.

We had very warm autumns in 2015 and 2016, too, so the foliage season was a little late those years, but it was spectacular.  So maybe this year will be the same, who knows?

Even if this year's autumn foliage proves to be not quite as spectacular as some years, it's still gorgeous. So get out and enjoy it. Better late than never, right?

Cool Images: New England's Fall Colors And Morning Fog From Space

The landscape in this visual satellite photo has turned
orange in southern Quebec and northern New
England. That's fall foliage.  

Two weather satellite images from the University of Wisconsin, Madison Space, Science and Engineering Center pretty much sum up fall in New England just awesomely.

The first fascinating satellite photo in this post is a visible image taken amid the clear skies Saturday.

With no clouds to get in the way, you can see the rust colored hue of the landscape in southern Quebec, New York's Adirondacks, and the northern parts of Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine.

That orange-ish hue is the autumn foliage, approaching peak in this region. More to the south, you can see things are still mostly green in southern New England.  

Morning fog is seen in the Connecticut River
valley, and in the valleys of central and eastern Vermont.  

The second satellite photo was taken this morning.

You can see river valley fog snaking up through the valleys, especially along the length of the Connecticut River, and in the Winooski and White River valleys of central and eastern Vermont.

Pretty cool vantage points of our beautiful autumn weekend.

Classic Indian Summer Unfolding In Northern New England, SE Canada

Morning fog breaks up to reveal bright
fall colors during a 2012
Indian Summer in Vermont.  

One of the big joys of autumn is Indian Summer, and parts of northern New England, the interior Northeast and southeastern Canada are in the throes of a perfect one now.  

Indian Summer is loosely defined as a period of sunny, warm, calm weather after some of the autumn's first frosts.

Most of the area now heading into Indian Summer had a big frost last week. That chill is  all but forgotten as temperatures will rise into the 70s under sunny skies for the next few days.

The core of this Indian Summer, with the best weather now through Sunday, will be in northern New York, Vermont, New Hampshire, Maine and an area of southeastern Canada including Ottawa, Montreal and Quebec City.

A very common fall weather pattern causes Indian Summer. Sprawling, slow moving high pressure systems often linger over the northeastern United States or southeastern Canada this time of year.

High pressure systems feature sinking air. Clouds need rising air to form, so the sinking air encourages clear skies.

The air in these autumn high pressure areas is often dry, so you get cool nights, but warm days with the sun.

The only major exception to the "no cloud" rule during Indian Summer is dense morning fog, especially near rivers and lakes. Pretty much every morning now through Sunday will feature patchy early morning fog.

The air cools off a lot at night during Indian Summer. The ground, rivers, ponds and such are still pretty warm from the recently departed summer. As the air cools, the relative humidity goes up and the moisture from the warm-ish rivers and ground, etc. forms a dense fog.

On the negative side, dense fog is dangerous because anyone who's driven through it knows you often can't see a damn thing it's so thick.

On the bright side, the morning fog is almost always a sign of another beautiful day in store. The rising sun will quickly dissipate the fog, usually by mid-morning.

A Pro Tip here: If you want to photograph fall foliage, get out there when there is dense morning fog. Yeah,  I know you can't see the foliage through the fog, but just wait. The rising sun, with its low angle, combined with dissipating fog around brightly colored trees, often leads to some spectacular photos

Try it, you'll see.

Speaking of foliage, this current Indian Summer is hitting when the foliage is getting very colorful in some areas. The High Peaks of the Adirondacks, the Northeast Kingdom of Vermont, far northern New Hampshire, the mountains of western Maine and the Laurentians of southeastern Quebec are approaching peak color.

Lower elevations to the south of this region have some color, and it's nice, but there's still a fair amount of green.  It's still worth a look at the colors in those areas if you can't head to the north and mountains.

As always, Indian Summers have several days of wall to wall sunshine, but there are interruptions. The first nor'easter of the season is causing a rainy day in the mid-Atlantic states. That huge high pressure system causing the Indian Summer will block that nor'easter from reaching northern New England, but it will throw a few clouds into the sky today.

A cold front heading due south from Quebec later Sunday and Monday will cool off the weather a bit and create some clouds next week, especially since an east wind behind the front will bring in some low clouds from the Atlantic Ocean into parts of northern New England.

But meantime, enjoy this spectacular weather.



Go out and enjoy during this Indian Summer.

There's early foliage viewing to enjoy

More Gorgeous Leaf Peeping Weather In Vermont

Does somebody at the Vermont Department of Tourism and Marketing have special powers?

Fall foliage near Mount Mansfield, Vermont last weekend.  

Because it seems the weather has been great this year for all those tourists who come to Vermont to watch the leaves die spectacularly.

Columbus Day weekend is traditionally one of two big October weekends for leaf peeping.  As usual by mid-October it's actually kind of past peak foliage now in the high elevations and in the northeastern third of the state.

But it places like the Champlain Valley and southern Vermont, it's gorgeous, and the sun is going to play off all those colorful leaves beautifully today and Sunday.  I noticed this morning's sunrise on the orange and gold trees around my house in St. Albans is absolutely lovely.

There might be a few clouds, especially in eastern areas of the state today, but that might just add to the photos. Also some wispy high clouds might arrive Sunday, which could mean another spectacular sunset to add to the color

Some showers will probably arrive Monday. But hey, you can't have everything.

Enjoy the weekend!

Winds To 50 MPH Will End Foliage Season In Some Sections Of Vermont

The woods around my house in St. Albans, Vermont look a lot different, a lot thinner than they did yesterday morning.

Fall foliage in my St. Albans, Vermont yard on
Saturday. These colorful branches are
now largely bare after wind and rain last night. Such
weather will continue today.  

We've had some good rains and some gusty winds late yesterday and overnight, and a lot of leaves blew off the trees.

It's still quite colorful with autumn foliage, but it is going fast in this wind.

I'm afraid peak foliage season is pretty much over in higher elevations and parts of northern Vermont as of today.

The state is under a wind advisory, with gusts to 50 mph likely during the day. We'll also get showers and thunderstorms this afternoon and evening, and some of those will have some pretty heavy rain.

All this is the perfect recipe to strip foliage from the trees.

That's OK. We had a long spell of calm weather, and that meant the foliage was spectacular. We had our chance to enjoy it. I hope you did.

Plus, in the Champlain and lower Connecticut River valleys and in low elevations in southern Vermont, spectacular foliage will continue despite today's storminess. There is still some green foliage there, and that will turn color over the next week or so.

The wind will not only strip leaves from the trees today, it might also be strong enough to knock a few whole branches from the trees, and take down some power lines. So watch out for that.

This is particularly true since the National Severe Storms Center says some of the thunderstorms in Vermont could become severe, with winds pushing 60 mph. Maybe.

Also, the fallen leaves will clog storm drains. The rain this afternoon and/or evening looks like it might come in one heavy burst, with up to an inch of rain in just a couple hours in some areas. That clogged drains and heavy rain could combine to produce some street flooding here and there.

The stormiest weather in Vermont will come this afternoon, when the winds will be strongest and the showers and thunderstorms will arrive.

We have gotten used to calm, sunny weather and we've had so much of it lately. The good news is we're only getting one stormy day. The rest of the week looks like we'll have a return to sunshine. Tuesday will be sort of on the cool side, but it will warm up well into the 60s later in the week.

So the nice fall weather isn't finished yet.

Vermont Weather (So Far) Good For Fall Foliage

With peak foliage getting close in Vermont's Northeast Kingdom and some color popping elsewhere, we're in a good weather pattern to retain the foliage for all you leaf peepers out there.

This sugar maple next to my driveway in St. Albans, Vermont
is more vibrant than in past years, which is encouraging.
Last year, it turned a somewhat duller yellow.  

True, it's cloudy in much of Vermont today. I know leaf peepers like sun to light up the colors. You can't have everything, though,

But it's not raining, it's not particularly breezy, and the forecast for the next several days is very encouraging.

First of all, a windy, rainy storm system that some long range forecasts indicated might hit Vermont toward Monday isn't going to happen.

There will be a storm alright, but it will be way, way, way off the East Coast, so it won't be a problem for the Green (Multicolor?) Mountain State

The next cold front coming in from the west toward the beginning of next week is going to fall apart as it approaches the Northeast, so that won't be a factor.

Wind and rain are the worst for foliage, as such weather obviously rips the colorful leaves from the trees. But forecasts indicate high pressure systems will more often than not affect Vermont for at least the next week.

That's a good thing, since high pressure usually means generally fair weather and light winds.

The days will be warmish, in the 60s to around 70 over the next several days, but nights will cool into the upper 30s and 40s.  The humidity will stay low.

All of that is very good news.   Obviously, such temperatures are comfortable for all those weather-sensitive leaf peepers.

Additionally, the cool nights, combined with the fact humidity will stay low, is good for leaf color. Unusually humid weather with very warm nights in my experience tends to wash out the color. Bright sun and cool nights seems to encourage more vibrant reds and oranges.

I noticed driving around that the color is going to be spotty, which is also typical for Vermont. Some areas are a bit drab. It looks like the wet summer encouraged mold on some early coloring trees, which gives us some tans and browns.

But never fear. Judging from places where the color is farther along, the drab leaves drop early, and the green leaves left behind end up turning bright orange and red.

Here in the Champlain Valley, I see that starting to happen. Some of the white ashes have bare branches, because the leaves just shriveled up and fell. But the greens are starting to pop into reds.

Yes, I know I sound like a hopeless public relations cheerleader for the Vermont Department of Tourism and Marketing.  

But, the department's enthusiastic yelling and screaming about this year's foliage is so far truth in advertising. And no, the tourism department has not paid me a dime to say so.  (They can if they want, though!)

Now That Autumn's Back, Let's Guess How The Vermont Fall Foliage Will Look

While chasing storms across central Vermont Thursday, I could really notice the beginnings of fall color.

Wild turkeys enjoying the fall
foliage in Franklin County,
Vermont last October.  

Which meants its time to speculate on how the peak fall foliage will look.

The early colors I saw Thursday looked kind of blah, but of course the trees had been blasted by wind and rain and hail, so many of the few leaves that had already turned color had fallen.

Last year, the early colors were also blah, and we ended up with a beautiful, vibrant peak season. So hope springs eternal.

There's a lot of guessing, but no clear answers on what causes great fall color versus a "Meh!" season.

Scientists are studying the ins and outs of how leaves turn color and how weather influences the changes, but there's no clear answers yet.

Some experts say dry summer weather stresses trees, which in turn creates bright colors, but I've seen great foliage after a wet summer.

Other tree experts say a lot depends upon what the weather is like in September.  There's no firm conclusions, but some indications are cool, sunny, somewhat dry weather in September can lead to a brilliant October, but wet, warm weather could dampen colors.

For the past couple of days it's been extremely warm and very wet, but that hasn't lasted long. And the forecast calls for cool, dry weather for the next several days.

No matter what happens, I'm sure the color in Vermont will be brilliant as always. How brilliant compared to other years is anybody's guess, though.