The day · Bozeman, Montana
Afternoon · 76 min left
Sun 22.7° up, in the west · Western Mountains & Interior Plateaus
The kind of day it is
Front passing
and bluebird
Pressure is moving. Animals feel this before you do: the hours ahead of a falling barometer are often the best feeding of the week, and the bright, cold, high-pressure day behind it is usually the worst.
Go now, before it arrives. Afterwards, give it a day.
The day, phase by phase
Happening now · 15:12–18:34
3h 22m long
Afternoon
Where the sun is this minute. Its highest today: 47.1°.
The angle falls away again, but the ground is still releasing the morning's heat. Air temperature peaks well after the sun does — usually two to four hours late.
Where the light lands · Western Mountains & Interior Plateaus
The sun swings west and the valley heats. Air rises up the slopes — the anabatic flow, exactly the reverse of the night's drainage.
Up close
That upslope wind carries insects and pollen with it, and swifts and swallows work the ridgeline lift. Golden eagles use the same lift for nothing at all, because it is free.
The whole landscape
Afternoon thunderstorms fire over the peaks nearly every summer day. Their lightning starts most of the region's fires, and a dry storm — lightning with no rain reaching the ground — is the one that matters.
In the water now
Northern pikebest now
Sitting still in the weeds in one to three metres, facing out, waiting. Pike hunt by sight and prefer daylight to dark.
Bluegillbest now
On the beds and the shallow flats, in water warm enough to see the bottom.
Arctic graylingbest now
Holding in the current and rising steadily to anything that drifts over. Grayling feed through the long northern day.
Cruising the weed edges, pads and shallow flats, ambushing anything that moves across the top.
Feeding hard on the drop, shut down behind it. The two days after a front are the slowest of the week.
In the garden now
Hoverflybest now
Hanging motionless in a sunbeam, then darting — hoverflies use warm still air and are strongest in the middle of the day.
Aphidsbest now
On the newest growth and the undersides of leaves, reproducing steadily through warm daylight.
Spider mitesbest now
On leaf undersides. They explode in hot dry weather and collapse in humidity, which is the whole control strategy.
Working flowers from about 13 °C upward, most heavily mid-morning when nectar has risen and the dew has gone.
Wind shift and a drop in pressure — stake, tie in, and pick anything ripe before it arrives.
Sitting this one out
Lake trout · Brown trout · Chinook salmon · Coho salmon · Green lacewing · Ground beetle
The full guide
Everything for Bozeman this week in one place.
Western Mountains & Interior Plateaus
The region this day belongs to, and what lives in it.
The almanac
The year's arc: day length, the moon and the water behind the air.
The week ahead for Bozeman
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