Sunrise light on a grove of tufa towers emerging from the water of Mono Lake with soft green and dusty-red wild grasses in the foreground, Canada geese in the shallow water with reflections of the rocky towers, and desert hills in the distance.

Summer update: thunderstorms, smoke, and mosquitoes—oh my!

It has warmed up, with most days this past week in the 80s. We have afternoon thunderstorms and a bit of smoke from two small fires in Yosemite. The mosquitoes are out, and there is still plenty of snow above 11,000 feet.

WEATHER
Hot, with highs in the 80s and lows in the 50s. Nearby thunderstorms the last two days have created amazing sunsets. A massive thunderstorm to our west Monday evening caused a brief windstorm with a peak gust of 40 mph, damaging some roofing materials that are being used to re-roof the Lee Vining Elementary School. Two hours later there wasn’t a hint of wind, while the sunset played on the serene scene of clouds and virga over Mono Lake. Showers remain in the forecast through Friday.

BUGS
Beautiful butterflies are out! The amazing scuba-diving alkali fly is abundant along M0no Lake’s shores—visit when it is warm to see them at their best! No-see-ums have come back out in brushy areas during calm warm weather, but they mostly just swarm around and aren’t as annoying as they were in spring.

HIGH COUNTRY
Mosquitoes have been coming out more and more in the high country during the last two weeks, and now are a formidable constraint in planning outings in the Tioga Pass and Tuolumne Meadows area. With the late runoff and wet weather, expect them to be bad for a while. There is still a lot of snow above 11,000 feet.

FLOWERS AND PLANTS
The roadsides are filled with bright yellow beds of sulphur buckwheat. There is an astounding bloom of dense white prickly poppies in the June Fire area that burned two years ago—drive on Hwy 395 just north of the June Lake Junction and be prepared to pull over just before you reach the Mono Craters viewpoint—you can’t miss it! Lupine are still doing a great job of  filling their responsibility of providing blue and purple colors to the gray-green sagebrush flats. Spiny hopsage is just livening up the sagebrush like it is at a Fourth of July party. The wet spring has allowed invasive cheatgrass (and other native and invasive grasses) to play its hand well, invading the roadside shoulders with purply-brown color.

BIRDS
The 8th Annual Mono Basin Bird Chautauqua was a great success! Thanks for coming and we’ll see you next year. With all the good birders that were in the Mono Basin on the solstice, vagrants didn’t have a chance hiding from the ubiquitous binoculars, spotting scopes, and trained ears. For details on the Northern Parula, Ovenbird, Chestnut-sided Warbler, Tennessee Warbler, and Kentucky Warblers that were seen, visit our Bird and Other Wildlife Sightings Page. We are compiling the bird list and will post it soon.

RUNOFF
See our hydrology update, just posted yesterday! Mono Lake is at 6382.53 feet above sea level and is expected to drop half a foot this summer.

FIRES AND SMOKE
Two small fires in Yosemite are giving us smoky afternoons here in the Mono Basin. Each fire is under 300 acres and being allowed to spread slowly. See our Fire and Smoke page for links to more information.

FOURTH OF JULY CELEBRATIONS
Bridgeport, just north of the Mono Basin, has a parade and fireworks. There are also fireworks at Crowley Reservoir.