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Yes, I know, a few of you survive worse on a regular basis, but even for one who grew up in Michigan, this is too cold. Especially so this early in the winter. Normally we descend to these depths or below only in January or February. It was 3°F when I got up this morning, and continued to drop until it reached zero. By sunset it was all the way up to 9°F but immediately started dropping again. Wind chills bottomed out at around -15.
The horses are amazingly tolerant. They act as if it were perfectly normal, more or less. Of course they've grown pretty fuzzy by now and will get even furrier over the next few weeks as a result of these cold levels. The sheep are well-protected now, though I'd think their skinny little legs would get frostbit.
Came home from lunch and a little shopping to find that the geothermal heat pump was "stuck". Gary keeps notes, and this seems to happen every year on the first really cold day. The loop that circulates to bring up heat (or dump it, in summer) from 100 feet down seems to lose pressure and the pumps shut down. We have auxiliary electric heat which kicks on in that event, and a warning light on the thermostat announces the fact. Takes a couple of resets to kick the pumps into action again, which involves shutting off all the power to the heat pump system for ten minutes, then starting it up again. As usual, the second try restarted it and it's running normally now.
I had built up the woodstove fire just in case we couldn't restart the pumps, and was prepared to spend the night in the living room to keep the fire fed so the pipes wouldn't freeze. Looks like that won't be needed though.
Gary's homemade chicken soup for dinner, with rice and veggies in it. Home baked cornbread too. I just need to do some last minute online shopping and I can go to bed.
The horses are amazingly tolerant. They act as if it were perfectly normal, more or less. Of course they've grown pretty fuzzy by now and will get even furrier over the next few weeks as a result of these cold levels. The sheep are well-protected now, though I'd think their skinny little legs would get frostbit.
Came home from lunch and a little shopping to find that the geothermal heat pump was "stuck". Gary keeps notes, and this seems to happen every year on the first really cold day. The loop that circulates to bring up heat (or dump it, in summer) from 100 feet down seems to lose pressure and the pumps shut down. We have auxiliary electric heat which kicks on in that event, and a warning light on the thermostat announces the fact. Takes a couple of resets to kick the pumps into action again, which involves shutting off all the power to the heat pump system for ten minutes, then starting it up again. As usual, the second try restarted it and it's running normally now.
I had built up the woodstove fire just in case we couldn't restart the pumps, and was prepared to spend the night in the living room to keep the fire fed so the pipes wouldn't freeze. Looks like that won't be needed though.
Gary's homemade chicken soup for dinner, with rice and veggies in it. Home baked cornbread too. I just need to do some last minute online shopping and I can go to bed.
