The Rattlesnake Hill Wildlife Management Area is a 5,100 acre upland tract, situated approximately eight miles west of Dansville, New York. Roughly two-thirds of the area lies in southern Livingston County, while the remaining third lies in northern Allegany County. The tract was purchased in the 1930’s under the Federal Resettlement Administration and is one of several such areas turned over to DEC for development as a wildlife management area.
The area is appropriately named after the Timber Rattlesnake, which may be occasionally found in the more remote sections of the “Hill”.
The area offers an interesting blend of upland habitats such as mature woodland, overgrown fields, conifer plantations, old growth apple orchards and open meadows.
The area is inhabited by a variety of game species and is open to public hunting. The white-tailed deer, wild turkey, ruffed grouse, grey squirrel, cottontail rabbit and woodcock are found on the area. An occasional snowshoe hare may be observed adjacent to thick creek bottom brush or conifer plantation habitats.
A number of small marsh units have been developed and provide limited hunting for waterfowl. Some of the area’s furbearing species such as mink, beaver and raccoon may be occasionally viewed at these marsh units.
That would fix the electoral college and make state governments more representative of the people. If you had truly solidly blue or red states it would enable them to enact policies closer to local needs and desires.
For example, I think it makes sense to put Northern New Jersey, New York City and Connecticut in one state then put the Adirondacks in Vermont and Western NY in Pennsylvania. Likewise it might make sense to put much of Western and Norgthern Michigan into Wisconsin and merge Detroit – Chicago – Indianapolis into another state.
Sure I get the inconveniences of being drawn into a different state – but it’s no different than moving from state to state – but it would require a constitutional amendment if not approved by the affected states and the congress.
Maybe I just get up too early, the hour when the good folks of Madison County are milking the cows but shifting that extra hour of daylight in the morning doesn’t help that much. There is only a limited amount of daylight in November.
Good morning! Monday’s come back around again. Partly clear and 33 degrees at the Stoney Pond State Forest. Sunrise is quite pretty now that it’s finally happening. 🌅 Calm wind.
Up early decided I wanted eggs 🥚 again this morning. No cinnamon on my eggs this morning, lol. 🍳 😂 Did fry up two onions 🧅 which made for an excellent start though sort of melted my olive oil bottle warming it by the heater. Mushrooms 🍄, garlic and spinach, lots of turmeric and smoked paprika. Then I decided I was still hungry so I fried up some French style green beans with another egg and nutritional yeast. 🥗 Should be good on the energy ⚡ side of things today.
Today will become mostly cloudy 🌤️👉🌥, with a high of 48 degrees at 2pm. Five degrees below normal, which is similar to a typical day around November 18th. Light south wind increasing to 11 to 16 mph in the morning. A year ago, we had mostly sunny skies in the morning, remaining cloudy in the afternoon. It was humid. The high last year was 72 degrees. The record high of 73 was set in 2015. 3.2 inches of snow fell back in 1933.❄
Today I plan to head to Cazenovia around nine 9⃣ and park and ride my bike from there. 🚲 Some around the village, Lorenzo State Historic Site and Cazenovia Lake Park.🏰 I know nothing about the historic site, worth checking out. Then some of the Chittenango – Cazenovia trailway down to Chittenango Falls State Park 🏞 and hike down to the falls and maybe some of the park trails in the back.
Solar noon 🌞 is at 11:47 am with sun having an altitude of 31.2° from the due south horizon (-39.3° vs. 6/21). A six foot person will cast a 9.9 foot shadow today compared to 2.2 feet on the first day of summer. The golden hour 🏅 starts at 4:10 pm with the sun in the west-southwest (242°). 📸 The sunset is in the west-southwest (249°) with the sun dropping below the horizon at 4:51 pm after setting for 3 minutes and 7 seconds with dusk around 5:19 pm, which is one minute and 12 seconds earlier than yesterday. 🌇 The best time to look at the stars is after 5:54 pm. At sunset, look for mostly cloudy skies ☁ and temperatures around 47 degrees. Breezy, 16 mph breeze ⛅ from the south. Tomorrow will have 10 hours and 6 minutes of daytime, a decrease of 2 minutes and 26 seconds over today.
Yesterday was a great day. ☀️ A whole lot more sun then I expected. I thought maybe sunshine breaking through clouds late but not the deep blue skies most of the day. ☺ Started out around 11 am parked across from the Chittenango Village Hall, rode along the Chittenango River Trail, the partially completed Chittenango Feeder Trail to current terminus, Chittenango Canal Musuem, then along the Old Erie Canal to Green Lakes State Park, part of the way around Green Lake, then to Canastota and Wampsville. 🚲 Then back around to Canastota and poked around the village then back to Chittenango on Main Street. 36 miles or so ridden, see my track I posted earlier. 🗺
Drove back through the Fenner Wind Farm ⚛ and made it back to camp ⛺ nearly a half hour before dark. 🌃 🔥 Had a quick dinner of bean soup 🥣 and bread 🍞 that I reheated then fried some apples, banana and strawberry 🍓 🍏 🍌 in some olive oil with stevia. Pretty good. A bit cool with the wind for a while 🍃 but it died down as the night progressed.
Tonight will have showers, mainly before 2am. 🌧 Low of 43 degrees at 7pm. Nine degrees above normal, which is similar to a typical night around October 11th. Windy, with a southwest wind 18 to 28 mph, with gusts as high as 43 mph. Chance of precipitation is 90%. New precipitation amounts of less than a tenth of an inch possible. In 2022, we had mostly clear skies in the evening, which became mostly clear by the early hours of the morning. It was somewhat humid. It got down to 46 degrees. The record low of 18 occurred back in 1962.
Replenished the firewood stock 🪓🪵 up at camp ⛺ so I’m ready for tonight. I’m not going to string up a tarp but I’ll have dinner fairly early and a fire 🔥 and retire to the bed of my truck once the rain 🌧️ picks up which looks to be around seven 7⃣ o’clock if the forecast is accurate. I have books 📚 to read inside my truck cap and I have cell service here 📱 so I can stream video, listen to podcasts or lectures from my truck. Hoping tomorrow will be dry enough to do some riding or hiking, not sure but maybe one of those preserves on Otsego Lake north of Cooperstown. 🚶 I could also ride around Hamilton and poke around the village a boy if it’s not raining.
VeteransDay Weekend 🪖 goes back and forth on how nice it will be. Depends on the timing for that front on Thursday still could change. Still much cooler than this past weekend. Veterans Day Observed, Friday, mostly cloudy and 40. Saturday, partly cloudy, with a high near 37. Sunday, mostly sunny and 38. Typical average high for the weekend is 51 degrees. Not sure if I’m heading out of town next weekend but if I do probably Rennselearville State Forest though I’ve considered Vermont too.
Looking ahead as but not forward, next Monday is the first Average Night Below Freezing 🌌 when the sun will be setting at 4:43 pm with dusk at 5:12 pm. Earlier for sure back in the Albany. On that day in 2022, we had partly cloudy and temperatures between 49 and 36 degrees. Typically, the high temperature is 50 degrees. This morning in Madison County was a bit below freezing but the elevation is higher here. We hit a record high of 69 back in 1964.
I’ve decided this winter ❄ I really want to and should commit to bringing my programming and data science skills to the next level 🖥 with those free courses on Udemy offered by my library 📚 and other free sources of programming knowledge like Free Code Camp. I was really into Free Code Camp until the class got really hard and was on topics I thought I’d never actually use for my blog and similar purposes. 🤓 But now in the next few months when I transition over to Data Services professionally, I want to have not only the skills needed to succeed at work but also personally. Computer programming and data science skills are a transferrable to a wide variety of careers. 🧑🏫
I got an early enough start that I had plenty of time to ride and explore the Erie Canalway in Madison County and by four o’clock was tired and got back to camp while it was still light.
Really it’s when I go back to work on Wednesday and can’t ride my bike home from the office due to the time change that will be the major bummer. That said with the days growing shorter and colder even if we didn’t set our clocks back an hour it would soon be too dark in evening. Plus I’m a early riser, I want to start doing my morning walks again and would prefer more of the marginal daylight we have remaining in the morning.
Taxpayers will end up cleaning up all that TCE and other chemicals you forever taint the groundwater with in search of a handful of jobs for a decade before converting this Greenfield to a Brownfield.
For many the extra hours is a chance to sleep in but I look at it as another hour to ride and explore the Erie Canalway today.
Good morning! Happy Sunday. Cloudy and 44 degrees at the Stoney Pond State Forest. ☔ Calm wind. Nice morning now that the rain showers have pulled away.
Started my morning with frying 🍳 onions, spinach, garlic and peppers. And making eggs, dumping cinnamon rather than chipotle on them but actually I kind of liked the warm note the cinnamon gave to the eggs 🥚. Experimenting isn’t a bad thing even if it’s driven by your half awake body. Coffee ☕ is good, with the intended cinnamon and ginger in it, lol 😂.
Bit cooler this morning then last night with the breeze picking up 🌬️ after that little clipper front came through delivering rain showers early on keeping me mostly in the truck bed 🛏 until closer to six though around five I got up and visited the bucket shitter 🚽. Eating breakfast this morning I watched a gray squirrel 🐿️ run up the tree across the way and wonder why I wasn’t sitting next to my 22. Probably shouldn’t be shooting in a campground at any rate, especially as there are people camping down the way by the lake, but we used to shoot up here back in the day with the boys when I was working down in Nelson. Those were the days. 🔫 I was surprised that others are camping but they’re a ½ mile away and out of ear shot. 👂 Except maybe from a gun.
Today will have a chance of showers, mainly before 8am. Cloudy, then gradually becoming mostly sunny 🌥 👉 🌞, with a high of 46 degrees at 1pm. Eight degrees below normal, which is similar to a typical day around November 23rd. Light west wind becoming northwest 5 to 9 mph in the morning. Chantce of precipitation is 30%. New precipitation amounts of less than a tenth of an inch possible. A year ago, we had partly cloudy skies. The high last year was 76 degrees. The record high of 75 was set in 1994. 3.0 inches of snow fell back in 1894.❄
Heading down to Chittenango to explore the Chittenango Landing Musuem, 🚣 and ride the Erie Canalway west to Green Lakes area and then go west to Canastota. I was originally going to park in Canastota as I thought it was closer but I think I’d rather explore the other part of the trail as it seems more interesting. 🚲 The Oneida – Canastota section pretty much just runs along the road that I’ve driven a million times when I was working up this way.
I could stop at the Aldi’s in Canastota this afternoon but I think I’m fairly set on overpriced groceries after visiting the Richmond Springs Price Chopper. 💵 It actually wasn’t that bad but I skipped getting peppers and broccoli 🥦 there as they were absurdly expensive. I skipped getting gas in Sharon Springs for $3.54 a gallon and was raked over the coals for gas at $3.79 in Richfield Springs ⛽ but I wasn’t messing around this time as I almost ran out of gas driving down to Binghamton two weeks ago. ⛽ Figured better just get r dun. It’s stupid to stress over $4 when your putting $80 in your truck. I got black sweet grapes 🍇 at Price Chopper hoping to capture some of that sweet flavor of the concord grapes I got last week at Annuto’s. Lol. 😂 Nope, maybe 20%, of the sweetness. Tomorrow I’ll probably check out the fancy Caz Aldi’s though.
Solar noon 🌞 is at 11:47 am with sun having an altitude of 31.5° from the due south horizon (-39° vs. 6/21). A six foot person will cast a 9.8 foot shadow today compared to 2.2 feet on the first day of summer. The golden hour 🏅 starts at 4:11 pm with the sun in the west-southwest (242°). 📸 The sunset is in the west-southwest (249°) with the sun dropping below the horizon at 4:52 pm after setting for 3 minutes and 7 seconds with dusk around 5:20 pm, which is one minute and 13 seconds earlier than yesterday. 🌇 The best time to look at the stars is after 5:55 pm. Time change gets you! At sunset, look for partly clear skies 🌄 and temperatures around 42 degrees. There will be a northwest breeze at 9 mph. Tomorrow will have 10 hours and 9 minutes of daytime, a decrease of 2 minutes and 28 seconds over today.
Night is going to come quickly that’s why I am getting an early start 🌅 and have gathered firewood up for later. 🪵🪓 This way it will have time to dry ☀ and I fully expect tonight I’ll be rolling back to camp about sunset 🌇 after riding the bulk of the day. Should be more sun later plus I get an extra hour with the time change. Need to shave, change and load my bike up but for now it’s nice by the heater. ♨
Tonight will be mostly cloudy 🌃, with a low of 33 degrees at 6am. Two degrees below normal, which is similar to a typical night around November 10th. Northwest wind around 6 mph becoming calm. In 2022, we had mostly clear skies in the evening, which became mostly clear by the early hours of the morning. It became somewhat humid as the night progressed. It got down to 67 degrees. Very mild night for November last year. I think I was in West Virginia then. The record low of 15 occurred back in 1951.
Yesterday was a fun day, 🚵 especially riding back down Tassel Hill once I found the trail. Some of those drops on the single track trail with the hairpin switchbacks were a blast on the mountain bike. Nothing technical or jumps just a lot of fun. That said parts of the lower trail weren’t well marked leading me to have to stop 🛑 and sear he for the trail a few times. 🔎 🗺
Then I rode along the old Chenango Canal Towpath trail 🚲 to the northern end or at least as far as I could go before downed trees blocked the northern end a bit past the substation. The northern end isn’t that impressive, 🐸 it’s a ditch and a towpath along the County Highway known as Canal Road. Kind of rough and slow going on the grass, took the county highway back. I then rode down to Woodman Pond 🦆 where there was a ton of geese. Nice section of the trail there though they resurfaced the old towpath there with fairly course gravel which made for more difficult riding.
Got to Stoney Pond by around 4:15 pm and I was disappointed to arrive to the campsite I like ⛺ and find a construction bag full of garbage and more garbage dumped in the woods. 🌲🌳🗑️ Got the mess picked upand seperated out the deposit cans, ♻ and gathered firewood 🪵🪓 for the night. 🔥 It was a beautiful night but dark, came so quickly by though. Very mild in the low fifties with a calm wind. This morning is cooler. Really wasn’t much garbage left by the time that rip roaring fire was done, the scraps of aluminum and cans I’ll take home crushed and recycle ♻.
One month 📅 from now will be Repeal of Prohibition Day 🍺 when the sun will be setting at 4:30 pm with dusk at 5:00 pm. I don’t drink the way I used to due to health reasons but an occasional drink isn’t a bad thing, especially a real high quality brew.
Next weekend now looks better lol? I’m packed though and ready to go with an ambitious agenda. More sun would be nice but I take what I can get as winter’s coming and I have Monday off with Tuesday being a state holiday for the mostly uncompetitive elections I voted in last week mostly pissed about the drone issue not that I even own a drone.
Good morning! Mostly cloudy and 42 degrees in Delmar, NY. ☁ There is a south breeze at 6 mph. 🍃. The skies will clear around 6 pm.
I had forgotten how unpleasant the side effects were from the COVID jab 💉 as my arm 💪🏻 was a sore throughout yesterday though the bike ride in the cold both ways probably didn’t help. 🚲 And then I was sleepy 😴 all afternoon yesterday, maybe because it was a five 5⃣ day work week after
So I’m off for a four day trip out to Madison County. 🐮 Not quite West Virginia but it’s a good adventure I have planned closer to home. 🌥 Not going to be a real sunny weekend but mild, not looking super wet. Lots of gravel biking maybe some single track trail riding come Tuesday. Plus exploring Chittenango and Canastota on the Erie Canalway. 🚲 Plus Cazenovia, a fun town and I want to check out the Aldi there. 🛒
Tried to keep the packing list 📃 simple and to the essentials for this four day, three nights trip. I’m close enough to stores 🏬 to buy supplies if I forget something or if things go terribly wrong I can head home. 🏡 But a lot of the camping 🏕 gear I keep in the truck year round. Trying though to keep this trip under $100 for all consumables like gasoline, and any items above and beyond ordinary food. Banana or oatmeal that I would eat regardless don’t count but paper towels do. Though most of the consumables I have from vacation already bought.
Quick breakfast 🥚 of eggs I boiled last night, some whole wheat bread I baked on Thursday 🍞, apple 🍏 and I’ll bring an a banana for the road. A five hour energy ⚡ for my caffeine jolt and a quick shower 🚿 and hopefully I won’t be pissing all day. No ginger or tumeriac until I’m to camp, lol. 😂 That five hour energy ☕ packs in as much caffeine as 2 ½ cups of coffee which I probably would otherwise drink and be pissing my way to Madison County. Plus I drank a lot of water 💦 yesterday to overcome the symptoms of the COVID jab.
Stopping at Tractor Supply in Guilderland to top off my propane tank 🏮 after 8 am when they open to be safe though it’s not super low after such a mild vacation but the nights are long and cool especially with the time change. 🕒 Set my manual clocks ahead at home, will do the truck before I leave. Also will need more gasoline and a few groceries – bananas 🍌, apples 🍏, carrots 🥕 and whatever fruit and vegetables look good and are cheap as I’m good on grains and proteins. Maybe honey, 🍯 cottage cheese and Greek yogurt. Canned pumpkin? 🎃 And fuel ⛽ for the truck.
Today will be mostly cloudy 🌥, with a high of 55 degrees at 2pm. One degree above normal, which is similar to a typical day around November 2nd. South wind around 6 mph. A year ago, we had mostly sunny skies. The high last year was 71 degrees. The record high of 76 was set in 1994. There was a dusting of snow in 2006.❄
Going to be a rather gray day today but the plan is to spend the balance of the day riding the Chenango Canal Trail 🚲 down to Hamilton from Bouckville. But not too late as the sun sets early and I want to have time to find firewood. 🔥 Gain an extra hour tonight and I get up so early these days, but I’m going to be a bit more relaxed about getting up but still probably in darkness to maximize the limited daylight. 🌅 Plus I like sipping coffee ☕ watching the sun rise.
Solar noon 🌞 is at 12:40 pm with sun having an altitude of 32.1° from the due south horizon (-38.8° vs. 6/21). A six foot person will cast a 9.6 foot shadow today compared to 2.2 feet on the first day of summer. The golden hour 🏅 starts at 5:06 pm with the sun in the west-southwest (243°). 📸 The sunset is in the west-southwest (250°) with the sun dropping below the horizon at 5:46 pm after setting for 3 minutes and 6 seconds with dusk around 6:14 pm, which is one minute and 15 seconds earlier than yesterday. 🌇 The best time to look at the stars is after 6:49 pm. At sunset, look for partly cloudy skies 🌃 and temperatures around 53 degrees. There will be a south-southeast breeze at 5 mph. Tomorrow will have 10 hours and 12 minutes of daytime, a decrease of 2 minutes and 28 seconds over today.
Yesterday was my last bike 🚲 ride home after work with the time change 🕒 but I still think I want to try to ride to work as much as possible until too cold and snowy ☃ and take the bus 🚍 home in the evening. It was a nice ride home, the wind not as strong as I had feared. But by no means am I going to ride through the South End after dark and onto an unlit bike path in the gorge. But the buses all have racks to take my bike home. 🚶 And I’m going to start doing evening and probably morning walks again.
Tonight will be mostly cloudy 🌥, with a low of 41 degrees at 5am. Six degrees above normal, which is similar to a typical night around October 17th. Calm wind. In 2022, we had cloudy skies in the evening, which became partly cloudy by the early hours of the morning. It got down to 61 degrees. The record low of 17 occurred back in 1951.
Got looking at Ebooks and all the online services my library offers. 📚 I’m still in the mindset of the library being just physical books but they have hundreds of ebooks, magazines, and especially those free training classes on advanced computer classes for GIS 🗺 and other skills like programming with Udemeny. While I probably wouldn’t pay for the online classes, they’re remarkably good and free through the library. 🖥 And they can be accessed from my smartphone 📱.
Looking ahead, next Saturday is Veterans Day 🪖 when the sun will be setting at 4:38 pm with dusk at 5:07 pm (Standard Time). Big change with the time change. Friday also is a state holiday with Veterans day observed then. On that day in 2022, we had rain and temperatures between 69 and 48 degrees. This year it could snow or be wet ☔ or maybe not it depends on the timing of the front come Thursday into Friday. Typically, the high temperature is 51 degrees. We hit a record high of 70 back in 2002.
