More Whoopers and Ice Storms and the Sun Came Out To Play!

Renita called me and told me I needed to get over to Lamar as two families of whoopers were having a territorial fight. She was with Judy and Cissy and Judy said she had never seen whoopers fighting before! Of course I grabbed the cameras and binoculars and headed out the door and of course the fighting was over by the time I arrived.

It was still a sight as there were now three different whooper families, the Alts, the pair with twins, and a new pair that was so close I could take their picture through the truck window! I felt nervous as I watched them feed on crustaceans exposed by the extremely low tide. Occasionally they would stop their activity and look at me and so I drove away as I didn't want to stress them with the cold front approaching and their need to put on more fat.
That night the front passed and the temperature dropped to the twenties. Our hose froze and so I took it off and stowed it inside to thaw. The forecast was for an ice storm and so we put in the slides as I didn't want to test the weight bearing capacities of the slide outs. One half of an inch of ice would add over 1000 pounds to the normal load on the roof alone.

Luckily the ice storm didn't put much ice on us. Enough to shut the areas roads and bridges down, and enough to kill the flowers and many sea turtles and possibly the fish. I took Molly for her morning walk and took photos of the ice on the sago palms.

This afternoon the sun came out and the temperature warmed above freezing. I reattached the hose and we washed the dishes and even cleaned up. Our house has so much more room with the slides back out and the whole experience made us wonder why we were in South Texas, but only for a little while, The whoopers and birds and fish and ocean have a hold on us and our new friends in the lapidary shop and jewelry factory,(our recreation hall), all add to our enjoyment.
Our daughter called and she said she wondered how we were dealing with the cold. She casually mentioned it had been thirty below in Minneapolis and we told her how our daughter in law Patty, had said it was 29 below at their new house just south of the Hoback in Wyoming. We hope of course that this will be the last major cold front of the season, but it is still winter. Clear skies.