Tag Archives: Peggy Berryhill

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Peggy Berryhill noticed these unusual clouds a few weeks ago. Scott Gasparian identified them as mammatus clouds, often a predictor of wild weather.

Scott wrote, "When I used to fly paragliders cross county, I found there are two sizes of clouds: those that are small and fed by an updraft, and those that get big enough to internally generate lift. We refer to the second type as 'cloud suck.'

"The normally flat bottom of the cloud starts to dome upwards as the freezing/cooling water in the clouds starts to accelerate. When the vertical column reaches up far enough to get into the really cold air zone, then we get hail, and thunder and lightning.

"If it keeps getting higher, with enough warm wet air to feed into it, tornadoes and waterspouts can spawn. If you see mammatus, and they start to rotate, duck. If moving away from you and rotating, sound the alarm. I lived in flat Missouri for a while and have seen two tornado starts, and a bunch of almosts, scary thrilling power to behold."

We Mendonomans will stick to a little hail and lightning, thank you very much.

Thanks to Peggy for allowing me to share her photo with you here, and thanks to Scott for teaching us about mammatus clouds.

 

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Bush Honeysuckle, Lonicera involucrata, is sporting beautiful berries and flowers. Peggy Berryhill photographed these striking berries.

Fruit of Bush Honeysuckle by Peggy BerryhillBush Honeysuckle is a native plant and is also called Twinberry, for obvious reasons. When I looked this plant up on Wikipedia, the site said, "It may be edible or very unpalatable, or even poisonous." Well, let's just admire this beautiful plant and not taste the berries!

Thanks to Peggy for allowing me to share her photo with you here.

 

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Jan Jewell spotted the Circumhorizontal Arc, also called a Fire Rainbow, a few weeks ago.

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A Common Raven can be seen flying by on the right. This phenomenon is caused by the refraction of sunlight in ice crystals found certain clouds, in particular cirrus clouds.

Here is another example of a fire rainbow, this one taken by Peggy Berryhill.

Fire Rainbow by Peggy BerryhillYes, there was beauty in the sky! Thanks to Jan and Peggy for allowing me to share their photos here with you.

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If conditions are perfect, you might be fortunate to see a fogbow, also called a white rainbow. Peggy Berryhill recently saw one form at Cooks Beach.

Fogbow by Peggy Berryhill

You look for fogbows in the morning hours. The fog should be about bluff high. It takes the morning sun to create one. Isn't it lovely?

Thanks to Peggy for allowing me to share her photo with you here.

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Peggy Berryhill and Susan Ruschmeyer attended the Gualala River event a few weeks ago. They saw thousands of tiny toads, which turned out to be Western Toads. There are four in the first photo - can you spot them?

Four tiny newly-hatched Western toads by Peggy Berryhill
In the second photo Susan has one of the little toads in her hand. They hatched early this year.

Tiny Western toad by Peggy Berryhill

Thanks to Peggy for allowing me to share her photos with you here.