Lake Cuyamaca poplars, low fog at airport

Daylight Savings Time ends this Sunday morning, November 1 at 2 a.m. With the resumption of standard time, midday (the time when the sun reaches its maximum altitude in the south part of the sky) will again be close to 12 noon on our clocks, rather than 1 p.m., as before.

Autumn Color in San Diego County’s mountain areas reaches its greatest intensity in late October and early November. The forested heights of Palomar Mountain are especially colorful right now. Black oaks on Palomar’s rolling uplands will be exhibiting bright yellow and brown hues for the next few weeks. Cuyamaca Reservoir, although hard hit by the 2003 Cedar Fire, remains a worthwhile leaf-peeping destination. The shimmering leaves of the Lombardy poplar, an Italian import that has taken root at the south end of the lake, delight the eye with their golden radiance.

Low-Lying Temperature Inversions commonly occur in San Diego from late fall through early winter. During the night and morning hours, a meterological condition often occurs in which the “normal” higher-you-go-the colder-it-gets trend is reversed. At such times cold marine air lies below a stable layer of warmer air originating from inland locales. Whenever moist air is trapped below a low-lying inversion layer, dense fog forms on or near the ground, and San Diego International Airport may be forced to suspend operations.

The Summer Triangle Effect. Here it is the end of October, but Deneb still shines right near the zenith as the stars come out. And brighter Vega is still not far from the zenith, toward the west. And the third star of the "Summer" Triangle, Altair, remains very high in the southwest (high over Jupiter and Saturn). They seem to have been there for a couple months!

Full Moon for Halloween. The moon (exactly full at 7:49 a.m. PDT) rises in the east about a half hour after sunset, depending on your location. This is the second full Moon in calendar October in many of the world's time zones, including those of the Americas, making this a "blue moon" for those time zones.

The above comes from the Outdoors listings in the Reader compiled by Jerry Schad, author of Afoot & Afield in San Diego County. Schad died in 2011. Planet information from SkyandTelescope.org.