I once spent time on a dairy farm on the outskirts of Brough - pronounced 'bruff' near the Scottish boarders. It was cold and came with a lot of ice, snow and salty road grit. I had a few months to fill while waiting for the summer camper-van trip and with a 'what the heck' moment I was up to my ears in cow. Working my arse off on Helbeck grange, it was good comparison to working in telco.
Days were long, sunrise was late and sunset even earlier. Sun skimming the north-west horizon to be gone around 3pm. The cows were in-doors all winter. It was sub zero mostly. I once joked with the farmer that if he showed the people where their milk came from, they might not drink it. He replied, 'sadly you're probably right' Cold, hard, long days, these people are real grafters.
One afternoon it was about minus ten degrees celsius and the snow changed. It appeared to be fluffy, pop-corn like. It was as light as the air and went where the wind went rather than to the ground. It was different and I wondered why. Today I stumbled across the morphology diagram It explains a lot to the cow-cocky I once was.
Photos taken by Kenneth Libbrecht of CalTech, using a specially-designed snowflake photo microscope. Smart-guy!
If you haven't seen enough snow for a lifetime (I haven't) see his snow crystals pages.
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