As we shiver our way into yet another new year, we optimistically hope it will be a better one than the previous. In 2007 the global warming alarmists were swooning over Al Gore's Nobel Prize, while an equally determined group of climatologists refuted it as more likely a natural climate phenomenon the Earth sees occur periodically, dating back well before man ever existed. Global man-made warming or not, from this layman's standpoint, 2007 was a year of extremes.
We kicked off the 2007 New Year with almost summer-like temperatures, following a Green Christmas. The month remained slightly warmer than usual until near its end, when the mercury dropped like a rock. Then, as though a reminder that we seldom escape true winter weather for very long, nature slapped us with a blizzard-like two feet of white stuff on Valentine's Day. As though it was balancing out for the warmth of January, temperatures remained well below normal right on through March.
When April and the Spring season arrived, we could say goodbye to cold and snow, right? Wrong. Trout fishing had barely got underway when, on April 16, our area was buried with heavy wet snow from an unusual-for-the-season nor'easter that downed trees and power lines. Once we recovered from that, May and June were more typical, with the exception of a freak June flood that claimed four lives and destroyed homes, roads and bridges in Delaware County.
July and August ushered in a summer that was cooler and wetter than normal, but September countered by being warmer but still wetter than usual. In fact, there was no frost in our area the entire month, and we normally get the first one in the final week of the month. Early October saw traditional fall foliage, but none of it was created due to freezing, but rather by the trees ending their leaf-growth cycle for the year. The first "killing frost" occurred well after our foliage had peaked, and then rain and wind pretty much ended the brief colorscape.
Early November gave promise to a warm, late winter. But then, by the middle of the month, snow arrived and stayed right through December. Deer hunters wishing for a "tracking snow" got their wish, but it was somewhat negated by all the snow clinging to ground-level limbs and boughs that limited vision on opening day. Then a couple days before Christmas, temperatures soared and rains melted the deep snow, giving us a primarily "Green Christmas."
So, what might we expect for the new year, and especially the remainder of our winter season? Well, if you take much stock in the seasonal forecasts cranked out by NOAA computers, with their zillions of acquire bytes of global weather cycles data and trends, they're calling for a winter season that will be colder than normal in the beginning and end, and milder during the middle. Me? I'll just take whatever we get. That way, I'll neither be disappointed nor enthused.

New York Follows California's Lead On Lead
California prides itself on being the nation's trendsetter, or so many of the residents and politicians of that state boast. Last year, the state enacted a ban on toxic lead ammunition to protect the California condor in its primary range, which covers about one-fifth of the state. The condor is a scavenger that primarily feeds on dead animals. Cases have been documented in which condors died or became ill after ingesting lead bullets or residue from carcasses left behind or lost in the wild by hunters. Also new is a California regulation requiring that all ammo to be "microstamped" - meaning each shell casing contains an identifying mark. This format has proven less than reliable, in fact, almost impossible. As such, most ammo makers are boycotting California, meaning law-abiding hunters and shooters are having increasing problems obtaining ammo.
The new condor-zone lead ban restricts all lead bullets in centerfire ammunition typically used for hunting big game, such as deer and elk. It also added rimfire ammunition, such as the popular .22-caliber, and bullets used in black-powder guns and calibers that are commercially obsolete. Currently, most lead-free ammo is made from zinc, tin, tungsten, and copper.The problem is there are currently no lead-free .22 caliber bullets being manufactured, and the State Fish and Game Commissioner distributed his own research on the lead issue to fellow commissioners, which other researchers claim contained inflated condor mortality figures, many of which were not attributed to lead poisoning.
This week, DEC Commissioner Pete Grannis announced that DEC's ECOs and Forest Rangers plan to train with "Green Ammo" ... a term for ammunition that is lead-free. Granted, thousands of lead rounds are fired annually on rifle and pistol ranges, but increasingly more ranges have incorporated methods to "trap" the spent bullets and remove them. New York already has requirements that only non-toxic shot be used in waterfowl hunting and a ban on the sale of lead sinkers (for lead-core fishing line) weighing less than half of an ounce. Is this the first step in following California's attempted lead to get the lead out? Or is it, as some fear, primarily a smoke screen to gradually place so many restrictions on legal firearms and hunting that it will eventually lead to their demise, save for the criminal element in our society?
Never forget that old saying - "Laws are meant for honest people." It was true in Grandad's day, and still is today. Eleven million illegal aliens and jails filled to the brim are pretty good testimony to that.