(C) Daily Kos This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered. . . . . . . . . . . The Daily Bucket -- Great Lakes Winter Ice 2022-23 [1] ['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.', 'Backgroundurl Avatar_Large', 'Nickname', 'Joined', 'Created_At', 'Story Count', 'N_Stories', 'Comment Count', 'N_Comments', 'Popular Tags'] Date: 2023-01-02 Here’s a summary from the GLERL website about their ice monitoring. CoastWatch is a nationwide National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) program within which the Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory (GLERL) functions as the Great Lakes regional node. In this capacity, GLERL obtains, produces, and delivers environmental data and products for near real-time observation of the Great Lakes to support environmental science, decision making, and supporting research. This is achieved by providing access to near real-time and retrospective satellite observations and in-situ Great Lakes data. GLSEA (The Great Lakes Surface Environmental Analysis) is a digital map of the Great Lakes surface water temperature and ice cover which is produced daily at GLERL. The lake surface temperatures are derived from NOAA polar-orbiting satellite imagery. The addition of ice cover information was implemented in early 1999, using data provided by the National Ice Center (NIC). Lake surface temperatures are updated daily with information from the cloud-free portions of the previous day's satellite imagery. If no imagery is available, a smoothing algorithm is applied to the previous day's map. The big picture — graph of Great Lakes ice cover as of December 26, 2022. Bigger. The red line is the historical average. The black line is the current year. Here are three pairs of maps from North American Ice Service, Global Cryosphere Watch. One map shows the western Great Lakes and the other the eastern ones, on December 17th, 24th and 27th. December 17, 2022 ice formation western Great Lakes (Superior and Michigan). December 17, 2022 ice formation for eastern Great Lakes (Huron, Erie and Ontario). Lake St. Clair is all open water. Bigger December 24, 2022 ice formation western Great Lakes. December 24, 2022 ice formation eastern Great Lakes. Bigger. December 27, 2022 ice formation western Great Lakes. December 27, 2022 ice formation eastern Great Lakes. Bigger. Pretty amazing that Lake St. Clair went from open water to 90% ice covered in ten days. For a slightly different perspective, including a comparison with the same date last year, these maps are from the U.S. National Ice Center for December 22nd and 27th. Great Lakes ice formation, December 22, 2022. The upper left panel is % ice concentration. Upper right is thickness in inches. Lower left is ice concentration on the same date last year. Lower right combines current concentration and thickness. Zoomed. Great Lakes ice formation five days later, December 27, 2022. Zoomed. Lake St. Clair is relatively shallow compared to the five Great Lakes, and freezes over much more rapidly. Same for Lake Erie. The U.S. National Ice Center also produces a 30-day and seasonal outlook. The short term forecast for Lake St. Clair and Lake Erie predicts that the bitter cold over Xmas is more of a transitory phase. Above normal temperatures are expected in January and in February. Below normal ice conditions are forecast. So what does that look like on the ground? I’ll start at Lake St. Clair and move downstream to Belle Isle. *Lake St. Clair December 20, 2022* The beach at Lake St. Clair Metropark had freely moving slushy ice near the shore. The ice was making a really interesting rustling sound as the waves came through. The rest of the lake was ice free as far as I could see. That dark spot is a Buffie hen, preening in the ice water. Closeup of the Buffie. Amazing how well adapted they are. The ice closer to shore was more solid and had been compacted by the wave action into amazing patterns. Zoomed. Close up of the ice near shore. *Lake St. Clair December 27, 2022* I intentionally went out on a day where the temperature remained below freezing. I knew a fast and substantial warmup was in the forecast and wanted to see what the lake looked like before it hit. This is a view from the same beach, looking out into the lake. Those dots to the left are ice shacks. And those aren’t waves near shore. The ice was frozen solid enough for the fishermen to haul their equipment out on the lake. Same view but looking a little further northeast. This view is even further north along the shore of Anchor Bay. The wind was coming across the ice, with nothing to slow it down or warm it up. You can’t see it in this photo, but there was open water just under the grey line at the horizon. View of the open water, which is where the Clinton River flows into Anchor Bay. There were thousands of ducks — Canvasbacks, Redheads, Common Goldeneye, Ruddy Ducks, Scaups, Buffies, Hoodies and more. Zoomed. Close up of some of the ducks — mostly Redheads and a couple Canvasbacks. Zoomed. Stark but beautiful, frozen Lake St. Clair. *Belle Isle Park in the Detroit River November 22, 2022* It was cold enough in November for much of the inland water at Belle Isle to freeze. Can you spot the Herring Gull amid the Ring-billed Gulls? Zoomed. Muskrat eyeing me and about to duck for cover along the frozen shore of an inland lake. *Belle Isle December 4, 2022* Early December warmed up, and all the November ice melted. This is the MacArthur Bridge on the north side of the island. The shipping channel on the south side of the island was ice-free as well. View from the southern tip of Belle Isle looking downriver towards the Ambassador Bridge. *Belle Isle December 27, 2022* View of MacArthur Bridge. That’s not open water in the foreground. There were a few slivers close to the far shore. Zoomed. View from the southern tip of the island towards the Ambassador Bridge. Open water in the distance. Zoomed. View of the shipping channel on the southern (Windsor) side of Belle Isle. The wind was coming from the south across from Ontario (yes, Canada is to the south of Detroit), and pushing the ice to the island shore. Looking north to Lake St. Clair at the headwaters of the Detroit River. The lake funnels down to a point, where the Detroit River starts. If you look closely, those aren’t clouds on the horizon but ice. Zoomed. THE DAILY BUCKET IS A NATURE REFUGE. WE AMICABLY DISCUSS ANIMALS, WEATHER, CLIMATE, SOIL, PLANTS, WATERS AND NOTE LIFE’S PATTERNS. WE INVITE YOU TO NOTE WHAT YOU ARE SEEING AROUND YOU IN YOUR OWN PART OF THE WORLD, AND TO SHARE YOUR OBSERVATIONS IN THE COMMENTS BELOW. FOR MORE INFORMATION ABOUT THE PURPOSE AND HISTORY OF THE DAILY BUCKET FEATURE, CHECK OUT THIS DIARY: DAILY BUCKET PHENOLOGY: 11 YEARS OF RECORDING EARTH'S VITAL SIGNS IN OUR NEIGHBORHOODS Now it’s your turn. What’s happening in nature in your area? [END] --- [1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/1/2/2144102/-The-Daily-Bucket-Great-Lakes-Winter-Ice-2022-23 Published and (C) by Daily Kos Content appears here under this condition or license: Site content may be used for any purpose without permission unless otherwise specified. via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds: gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/dailykos/