SNOW WORDS: A caller provides the American Indian name for that
sparkly snow we’ve been writing about – Pogonip. Apparently, it’s
the winter equivalent of summer fog except the “fog” is frozen and
the ice crystals reflect light. The Farmer’s Almanac even makes
reference to this particular type of snow, he said.

We hear a similar story from Pat Franco of Rew: “You wrote in
your column about sparkling snow. Actually, those are ice crystals
which are what they call frost. It only happens on clear nights as
the frost settles to the ground. It’s so cold in the atmosphere and
with no clouds to block them, they come down. I was trying to take
a picture of the Christmas star I wrote about but there were too
many of them and it looked like snow in the pictures.”

An avid RTS reader had these naming suggestions for snow –
glistening snow, “glitter snow”; those puffy flakes that drift
down, “feather snow”; and for the tiny, icy snow flakes, “pellet
snow.” All perfect descriptions.

TREE TIME: Who says money doesn’t grow on trees?

The Bureau of Forestry, Elk State Forest, releases its timber
sale activity from 2008 and the figures have been pretty
astonishing.

The forest had 14 sales throughout the year on 1,191 acres of
land. The volume was 2,660 mbd (thousand board feet) of sawtimber;
and 2,011 ccf (hundred cubic feet) for pulpwood. Total revenue
generated was ,3,128,477.

For all state forest land for 2008, timbering was done on a
total of 11,573 acres. Volumes were 460,861 mbf for sawtimber and
29,805 ccf for pulpwood, bringing the revenue figure to
,28,470,594.

TUNE IN: Era columnist Mychal Massie, who has quite a loyal
following in the McKean County area, will be making a return
appearance on C-SPAN’s Washington Journal this Sunday. His segment
is scheduled from 8-9 a.m. Sunday. “Hopefully, you will be able to
tune in,” Mychal writes us.

LEGAL REASON?: Hal Harmon of Bradford poses a possible reason
some drivers fail to wave through a fellow motorist stuck in a long
line of traffic – legal entanglements. He said he’s been told
aggressive lawyers are able to pursue a courteous driver whose
actions cause a traffic accident. Sign of our times? We wouldn’t be
surprised.