Friday 14 December 2012

Hoar Frost arrives

I have never seen this phenomenon in the States although I am sure some areas have it.   Hoar Frost is a deposit of ice crystals that form on grass, trees, and anything else outside making the area looked like a dusting of snow.  It happens when the air is extremely humid but also extremely still--essentially, it's a freezing fog.  We'd seen it in movies like "Narnia", but always thought that it was a Hollywood creation and didn't really look like that, but it does!

If you look closely you can see the ice crystals.  The kids and I woke up to this beautiful sight in the neighborhood and went out to explore and take pictures.

Our entire neighborhood is covered in ice crystals

1/2 inch thick in some places

leaves are covered

grass

This was the neatest to see spider webs along the garden wall

I get the sense we have a lot of spiders in our backyard

This is my garden netting, it is usually green


bushes covered in ice
My camera couldn't get really close up pictures of the crystals but it was so interesting to examine them with the kids.

6 comments:

  1. Wow! Those webs look amazing!
    Great pics.
    Rebecca

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  2. Thank you for this-I've never really thought about why we get hoar frost before. It must be the humidity. It does create such beauty though. It has been a good 1/2 inch on the car this week.

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  3. That is soooooo cool looking! The spider webs are the best! I wish we had that phenomenon in our area, but I have never seen it if we do.

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  4. Wow, that is so neat. I loved the pictures. I haven't seen anything like it here. You always do the most interesting things.
    Blessings, hugs and keep on enjoying the Christmas moments.

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  5. Beautiful pictures. We usually get to see a frost like this maybe once a year. We love going out to see it!

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  6. We get frost like that any time the temps get low enough. We're in the South, and we have plenty of humidity! We don't get really cold temps very often, but several times each winter it gets cold enough to have beautiful frost like you captured in your photos. :)

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